Recently in Family Category

I have, I think, just one more round of chemo left.

When I go through my pill popping regimen tomorrow morning it will be the last time for this particular round of drugs. Twenty-three rounds, it seems, is enough.

What comes next? We'll go back to what we did after the surgery. We'll watch and measure and see if the remaining area grows any once we stop. If it does we'll probably need to zap it with radiation. That we will eventually have to do something else is likely because mine is a chronic condition, not an acute one.

But that will be then. This is now.

I'm still in a round of chemo and therefore the world is a bit fuzzier than it normally is. As such clarity isn't necessarily found all that easily.

On the other hand though, there is a clarity that comes with chemo that is invaluable.

It is my monthly reminder of mortality, my monthly reset button that brings me back to the point of remembering what really matters and what really doesn't and the difference between the two. It is kind of stunning that I need this monthly reminder. You'd think, really, that that brain tumor surgery or the regular checkups would do the trick - and they have and do in their own way. But the chemo is different, it is just more regular.

Not that Jesus really needs anymore affirmation but the older I get the more awed I am by him and by his wisdom.

His parable of the seed and sower couldn't be more accurate - there is seed that falls on ground that is rocky and ground that is full of weeds. It falls on thin soil and rich soil. All of the seeds bloom but only the one in fertile soil takes hold and produces a bumper crop.

Jesus explained it this way,

The seed is the word of God. Those along the path are the ones who hear, and then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so that they may not believe and be saved. Those on the rock are the ones who receive the word with joy when they hear it, but they have no root. They believe for a while, but in the time of testing they fall away. The seed that fell among thorns stands for those who hear, but as they go on their way they are choked by life's worries, riches and pleasures, and they do not mature. But the seed on good soil stands for those with a noble and good heart, who hear the word, retain it, and by persevering produce a crop.

God teaches us lessons - sews seeds - constantly. The question is whether we receive it and whether we really live it.

I pray that the spiritual seeds that he has sewn through these last two years of chemo have fallen in fertile soil and that in the years ahead they will produce a crop of goodness.

Livvy is going through an "I'm scared" phase at night. She wants us to sleep in her bed and check on her all the time. As I write, her shades are up, a little nightlight is on, and she's hugging her Raggedy Ann...and a dozen other stuffed animals... simultaneously.

A few nights ago as I was tucking her in she said, "Daddy. I want to see the angels."

I didn't quite get it.

"I want to see the angels that protect me. That way I won't be so scared."

I felt like saying, "Yeah, me too." But I don't think that she would have understood me. So I told her that no, she couldn't see them and I couldn't either but that we knew they are there.

Were she older I would have told her about the one or two times that I felt angelic presence in an almost palpable way.

One of them was 5 1/2 years ago as I recuperated from brain surgery (but not on the sensory part of the brain - just in case you were thinking I was imaging things). Kim and I were so close to God, so dependent on Him for everything. There was no life apart from him. Every night before we went to sleep we spent a good bit of time praying not just for ourselves but for others and also just marveling at God's goodness.

In the middle of one of those nights I was turning over when I became aware of a presence - an almost electric presence - in the room. It didn't feel like anything I'd ever come across before. It certainly wasn't malevolent. But neither did it exude any syrupy niceness. It felt weighty, certain, sturdy, good. As I said, it was was unlike anything I'd ever experienced.

I didn't make the full turn. Instead I just laid there on my back, fully conscious, feeling like I needed to be fully still. And so I was. I wanted to tap Kim and wake her up and try and explain it all but I had this sense that by the time I did that the experience would have been over, the force gone... the sense that this was for me.

But she isn't older and wouldn't get that story. So I hold her close and I am teaching her to pray and telling her about the Good Shepherd and all the while reminding myself that I can't see the angels either but I know that they are there.

Note - Most of my blogging now occurs at Culture11.com a new media company. My blog is here.

John McCain had a good night at Rick Warren's forum on faith and character and so on. Barack Obama had a better night. How much better? We'll find out in a few months.

It isn't that Obama out performed McCain. He didn't "out Jesus" him or "out evangelical-ize" him. The crowd seemed to favor McCain a bit.

But that's the thing.

He didn't need to. For Obama a draw was a massive win.

Here was an audience of evangelicals in one of the most conservative counties in the United States. They interrupted him with applause on numerous occasions. They gave him a standing ovation. And HE is the Democratic nominee for President of the United States. Think this ever happened to John Kerry in 2004?

I'm trying to find anger or bitterness or shock at all that John Edwards did and didn't do and said he did and said he didn't do.

There is, of course, sadness - sadness for all those people who worked so hard for him, sadness for all of those who he let lie to cover his sin, sadness for his self betrayal and more than anything, sadness for his children and for Elizabeth.

Beyond that? I've got nothing.

Why should I?

He was just a man running for office - just a politician running for president.

He had an affair.

Stop the presses!!

He lied.

Noooooooo.

He's narcissistic... really?

One of the dangers of modern politics is the temptation to elevate these frail creatures to super human levels... to put so much hope and faith in them that they become little gods. Look no further than the passion and hope attached to one Obama.

This is both an expectation too great for frail humans and a hope thoroughly and completely misplaced.

Politicians run to be leaders of our government, at most the chief executive of the government. Their power is sublimely and appropriately limited. Hopefully they can deliver on the limited things a government can touch. Beyond that, we are wrong to have 'faith' in them.

Faith is a word best applied to our relationship with God. We'd be better served and less angry and shocked at politicians' invariable foibles if we remember that.

Our young daughter is engaging the world and loving it. Now 3 and aware that only most of the universe revolves around her she is exploring the other creatures she runs across - particularly those her size. This means that she walks up to children and says, in a high, sweet, clear voice that emphasizes each syllable, "Hi! What's your name? My name is...." and off she goes.

Kim and I find ourselves nearly doubled over by the sheer joy and innocence of it. There is a complete absence of anything corrupted in the questions, in the voice. It leaks wonder. And we can hardly stand it.

Sure we celebrate it. We laugh and we listen and we laugh some more. But in our ironic and cynical age, her innocence is all the more jarring. We already mourn its loss and all that will come before its loss. We long to hold it, protect it, bottle it before it is gone - if only to feed back to her one day.

Perhaps the greatest tragedy of all is that she will have no particular memory of it. Maybe that is the ripping pain of innocence - not its loss but its slow slide into forgotten memory.

But then, one day, hopefully, she will stand on a playground and watch her own daughter teeter confidently over to another child and say, "Hi! What's your name? My name is...."

My prayer for her now is that in that moment she will remember her own innocence and celebrate it.