God and Cancer

After thinking I'd lost my life with a cancer diagnosis and then getting it back with the hope of effective treatment, it's been easy to give thanks for the little things:

the warm wash of a second cup of tea down my throat;
touching Julian's cheek to my cheek as I carry him around the house;
the way he sleeps, bum-in-the-air;
car windows down and wind blowing around my short-haired head in the morning;
the cradle of Sam's arm and chest, perfect to lean into;
the blossoming aroma of good food brought by a friend, neighbor, or just someone who heard the news.

I can list these joys as gifts of God's grace, but of course then rises the question: where is God's grace the other times? Where is his grace when I feel sick? At that moment in time (what was I doing - opening my eyes on the pillow? swallowing the last bite of oatmeal? opening my car door?) when the first tumor cell sprouted and began multipliying around my windpipe (was there death blooming at the same time as a baby's life)? Where is his grace when the cancer does not respond to treatment? When the disease takes over someone's body and puts them down, robbing their family of a daughter, son, mother or brother? Am I to say thank you for disease? For death?

I remember the man who went through the worst of things, Job. His children struck down, his riches stolen, his body broken into sores and his wife and friends turned against him - Job asked God why. The Lord finally answered, but with a question, asking Job who created the oceans and sorted the skies and ordered the cosmos. So I see that He is the omnipotent Creator, spinning galaxies and black holes and forming amoebas and spider monkies without taxing any of His reserves. He is great and all-knowing; Job is small and limited. As am I. Is there comfort here?

But then - then! - God didn't remain just powerful and above. He collapsed into a cluster of cells inside a young Hebrew girl. He pushed into the world through the birth canal as a wrinkly infant, wailed for want of warmth and milk, had thorns pushed into his head and nails into his wrists and ankles to death, for us.

There it is, I think. God gave his own son to us, a path to eternal life, an unthinkable gift before which all others pale and fall away with age, with ruin. But me, I want more. I also expect a long life on earth, health, and good things for my family. When I get cancer instead, I question if this is part of God's grace.

No. and yes. I think my business here is figuring how to live in the paradox.