I recently lost a brother to cancer.
It was one of those cancers few survive. He and his loving family did everything they could to battle it. They fought the good fight, and they fought hard as anyone could.
Two things amazed me through this process.
He was kind, and patient, and good to everyone, in every situation, and that is amazing unless you knew Bill. That was him.
The second thing was this. He had hope. That hope gave him cause to plan a family reunion as he was recovering from having his second leg amputated. That hope gave him cause to set up a goose hunt seven months after the reunion. That amazed me because this wasn’t one of those cancers where you get much good news. That didn’t matter to Bill. He had things to do, people to see, and places to go. He had hope. It was only at the point where he got news that they “had no other treatment options,” and wanted to send him to hospice, that I perceived a change in him. What had changed I wondered? Within about two weeks after that news, he was gone on ahead into eternity. He never lost Hope, he just put it into an eternal perspective.