trials

MAKING SOME SENSE OF MAYHEM & MADNESS

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Remembering the Chaos of Ten Years Ago this Month

Every year the month of June makes me uniquely reflective. My mind cannot help but revisit the chaotic events which occurred back in that month of 2016.

There was individual chaos in my health. Just a little more than three months earlier I underwent an eight-hour surgical reconstruction of my jaw. I posted often about that challenge beginning with A View from the Hospital.

There was relational chaos in my marriage. On May 31, 2016, I lost Nancy, the beloved wife of my youth, to an eighteen-month battle with ovarian cancer. At 5:50 PM that evening I became a widower. I posted often about my journey through the valley of the shadow (Psalm 23:4) beginning with Sad News about My Nancy.

And then there was cultural chaos in my city. On June 12, 2016, 29-year-old Omar Mateen shot and killed 49 people and wounded 58 in a mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando. The news that weekend left me and the nation shocked at the latest occurrence of murderous madness in America.

The following day, Sunday, June 13, I received a call from longtime close friend, Frank Reed. At the time Frank co-hosted the morning show at 94.9 KTLY, Dallas-Ft. Worth, Texas. Like the rest of us, Frank, a onetime resident of Central Florida, suffered from the aftershocks of the Pulse shooting. Beyond that he wondered how they might address the crisis on the air the next day.

He suggested we record an interview about the shooting that they might include in their programming. Imagine my surprise. I swallowed hard but agreed to give it a shot. Not everything I said in the recording made it on air, but what did can be heard at the less than five-minute interview here.

Please remember my title of this post if you care to listen to the interview. I sought to make some sense of the chaos–to offer some comfort to the listeners. More could be and has been said about such tragedies by wiser and better pastor/theologians than I. Still, I trust that some perspective proved better than none for coping with hope through the heartbreaking futility (Romans 8:18-25) of our broken world in seasons like June of 2016.

TSUNAMIS, CANCER, & THE SHEPHERD’S EXTRAORDINARY CARE

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One of the More Memorable Sermons I’ve Ever Preached–I Think


One gives a lot of sermons over the course of thirty-six years in pastoral ministry. I lost count eons ago.

Most exist to this day in manuscript form tucked away in digital archives. Far fewer have survived still in audio files accessible for download listening. That’s what happens when you’ve recorded messages to cassette tape, then on to CDs, and finally joined the internet streaming revolution.

The cassettes got tossed long ago. Some of the files from my last ministry assignment in Idaho have a home on my SoundCloud account. Thanks to a tech-savvy brother and servant-friend of mine, the collection of some fifty CDs I managed to save covering 2002 to 2005 at Orlando Grace Church now exists at Sermons of Pastor Curt Heffelfinger. Messages preached from 2015 to 2018 toward the close of my Orlando ministry are on file at the Orlando Grace SoundCloud site.

I felt led to devote today’s post to sharing this bit of personal news from my past for a particular reason. At least one of those messages sticks in my recollection of past sermons as particularly memorable. I preached it on June 3, 2005. That weekend our congregation struggled with bad news on two distressing fronts. One concerned the catastrophic Indonesian tsunami that swept away some 230,000 lives. The second hit much closer to home. Pastor Curt has tongue cancer.

I reasoned that our people needed from me as their undershepherd to hear some good news. I opted to preach from Psalm 23 about the Good Shepherd’s extraordinary care in crises like natural disasters and cancer diagnoses. I recently listened to the audio of this sermon I gave over twenty years ago. I was struck how everything I proclaimed from the text that day has proven true since then in my life and ministry and into retirement.

Perhaps you may be battling to trust the Lord in the midst of some distressing news or know someone who is. If so, I offer this word to encourage and bolster a faith that overcomes fear and worry.

By the way, for those who listen knowing only my speech troubles post-cancer treatment, you may find it difficult to believe your ears. Despite the presence of a tumor the size of a large egg in my mouth, I still had my entire tongue and most of my teeth. You will find the audio an easier listening experience!

If you do happen to listen to Tsunamis, Cancer, & the Shepherd’s Extraordinary Care, I’d welcome your comments below as to how the Lord may have helped you as a result. FYI, scroll down to the fourth saved file on the opening page to find the file.

I CHOOSE TO THANK YOU

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An Original Song by Guest Blogger, Jan Leslie Heffelfinger

I wrote this song many, many years ago, but it has really been on my mind this week. “The hits just keep coming,” as Curt likes to say.

The needs and hurts of people we love and in our own lives can be so overwhelming . . . and by coming to love new friends in Idaho, that has only increased!

The Lord is reminding me this week that in any and every circumstance I can choose to thank him for his presence with me, his faithful love for me, and that he is in control even when I don’t understand. He is sovereign, and he is good.

Here is the text of the song–(don’t be confused by “thank you for my wife” . . . I wrote the lyrics so that it could be sung by a group):

Thank you for my family- thanks for where I live

The work that you’ve provided- the friendships that you give

Thank you for my husband- thank you for my wife

Or thank you that I live alone, and you complete my life

 

I choose to thank you, Lord,

Even when the words come oh, so hard

Even when my heart is weak and sore

Even when I’m feeling battle-scarred

I choose to thank you, Lord,

I have learned you know what’s best for me

Holy Spirit, do your work in me so I will be like you

I choose to thank you, Lord.

 

Thank you for this trial that shows how weak I am

That brings me to my knees at last to try and understand

Thank you for reminding me, I’m weak but you are strong

It sends me running back to you, and that’s where I belong

 

 

 

OPERATION ROBOJAW COMPLETE

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A Survey of My Unimaginable Journey

New Teeth

I’ve waited a long time to log this post. It required an image of my nine-teeth-brand-new-bridge in place before writing.

What a beauty!

The sheer joy of biting down on a sandwich again. The exquisite pleasure of chewing on the right side of my mouth again for the first time in years.

It has been three years to be precise.

My jaw started to fail in May of 2015. An implant inserted to replace a failed root canal dislodged over breakfast one morning. Little did I know what dominoes would fall from there.

My PCP, fearing a recurrence of oral cancer, sent me to a local oral surgeon. He hit me with a diagnosis I never heard of before–osteoradionecrosis–bone death by radiation.

They fried my jaw back in 2005 to save my life. I’ll live with the tradeoff. Pun intended.

After hospitalization for excruciating pain in December of 2015, a CT scan revealed a pathological fracture of the right mandible. I would need a jaw transplant. Gulp.

Fortunately for me the main man for this kind of herculean undertaking works for UHealth in Miami–Dr. Robert Marx. What a gifted, skillful healer.

We got to be buds over the next two years. Talk about someone who knows you inside and out.

February 2016. Eight hours on the table to remove half my jaw and insert a titanium implant. No fun at all.

A total of 45 hyperbaric dives before and after that procedure ensured needed wound care. No fun at all.

November 2016. Six hours on the table for bone graft surgery to rebuild the mandible in preparation for teeth. They wired my jaw shut for three weeks while the graft hardened. No fun at all.

March 2017. Two plus hours on the table for a hip debridement procedure. Inflammation caused the wound from the last surgery to open. Nothing else could close the incision.

That procedure occurred two weeks before my wedding to Jan Leslie. No fun at all. Not the wedding and honeymoon, of course–sutures in the hip notwithstanding.

August 2017. Another couple of hours on the table at Jackson South to sink four implants in the rebuilt jaw. Four more teeth were extracted. No fun at all.

February 2018. Two more hours in surgery at my Miami home away from home to expose jaw tissue for placing healing abutments on the implants. A nightmare splint held them in place for three miserable weeks. No fun at all.

March through July 2018. Several trips to team Tiralossi/Pileggi dental reached the finish line of this marathon.

After wearing a temporary bridge for several weeks, the final product pictured above got screwed in place. No fun at all–except that it is finished.

Lessons I’ve been learning? Among them . . .

One, life in Jesus is a perpetual test of faith (Heb.11:6). God’s promises sustain through trials from start to finish (2 Pet. 1:3-4).

Two, suffering of any kind promotes humility and dependence upon God’s care for persevering over time and awaited outcomes (1 Pet. 5:6-7).

Three, the help of others at strategic points along the way eases the burden and lifts the spirit (1 Sam. 14:7-14).

Nancy, Jan, Chuck, Rob, Ryan, Ross, Dan, OGC, my family, my doctors, dentists, surgeons, nurses, et al carried my armor up the mountain to slay my personal Philistine.

I am forever grateful.

Four, I am learning–always learning–to run with endurance the race set before me looking to Jesus who alone sustains and empowers us to the finish line (Heb. 12:2).

Question: What lessons has God taught you through a challenging season of life?

How To Be the Church When the Pastor Can’t Be the Pastor

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Just Jawful

Ever since my jaw fracture forced me to the pastoral sidelines, I’ve given some thought to this question. How can a pastor’s extended absence from his church result in their greater good? In hopes the saints at OGC might actually thrive, not just survive, my health hiatus, I offer these Scripture verses as essential principles for being the church when the pastor can’t be the pastor:

  1. Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases (Psalm 115:3). Stay anchored in the sovereignty of God. My mandible misery is no accident. His plan for His church to soldier on for the time being without me is precisely that–His plan.
  2. And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose (Rom. 8:28). This season–8 hour surgery, week-long hospital stay, and all the rest of it–abounds with good in it for me, my bride, as well as my church. For example, some things God can only do in his servant by laying him out. He can get your attention on the bench in ways you never realize in the game. The benefits of the trial accumulate by the day for me. Keep your eyes open similarly for yourself.
  3. For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls (1 Pet. 2:25). Just like I remind everybody on day one of each Discover OGC membership class–I am NOT the senior pastor; Jesus is. Only one pastor holds the title “Chief Shepherd.” And He has promised never to leave us or forsake us. Church, you always have Jesus.
  4. So I exhort the elders among you (1 Pet. 5:1a, emphasis added). This balances number 3. God does give to His church pastors and teachers to shepherd them (1 Pet. 5:2-3). Sometimes we need Jesus with skin on. But in wisdom He rests the pastoral load on a plurality of elders. You almost always find the word in the plural form in the New Testament. No church benefits by relying excessively on one leader. God has plans through my leave both to grow our other elders in their ministries and increase your legitimate reliance on their pastoral role in your life.
  5. And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ (Eph. 4:11-12). This piggybacks on number 4. Pastors don’t exist just to tend the saints’ spiritual needs; they have a calling to equip the saints for spiritual ministry. Church, the body of OGC needs every single one of you more than ever! Are you in the game or riding the pines on the sideline (assuming you have a choice)? Where are you bringing your spiritual gift(s) to bear on others in community (1 Pet. 4:10-11)? When you see a need in the body, are you asking the Lord how you possibly might be the one to meet it?
  6. For I know that through your prayers and the help of the Spirit of Jesus Christ this will turn out for my deliverance (Phil. 1:19). I can think of no better place to end. My circumstances differ from Paul’s to be sure. But my need for your prayers and Jesus’ help doesn’t. May our heightened sense of need in this hard providence at the outset of 2016 cause us to seek His face like never before.

Lord willing, Jesus plans to restore me to the work at Orlando Grace before too long.

I look forward to coming back with a better-than-ever jaw and church to go with it. And that largely because you have been the church when this pastor could not be your pastor.

The Creed According to “Creed”

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I told Nancy all I wanted for Christmas–other than a new jaw, of course–was to see the movie “Creed.” Hailing from the Philly area and long a fan of the “Rocky” films, regardless of their relative quality, I wanted to see this latest edition in the saga, even if it hadn’t gotten such a good review. For Flikster’s take on the film click here.

The point of this post isn’t for me to review the film, although my bride and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Sylvester Stallone delivers a surprisingly nuanced performance as Adonis Creed’s trainer. Michael  B. Jordan is riveting in his portrayal of the conflicted son of one time heavyweight champion Apollo Creed. Be advised if you do see it, that there is one scene of PG-13 sensuality which did not seem necessary to me, but Hollywood will be Hollywood.

Oops, I slipped into review mode after all. Enough of that.

castaway

I felt led to do this post because I sensed the Lord speaking to me rather distinctly through the movie. OK, some of you are thinking, pastor’s painkillers have taken their toll. I’m not talking about any kind of audible voice. It’s hard to describe. I’ve only ever had it happen to me one other time that I can recall. That was back in 2001 with the movie “Castaway.” So this is rare. But just as the Lord had a word of encouragement for me with Tom’s Hanks’ port-o-potty washed ashore his island prison, He clearly used this film in a common grace timely way to help prepare me for what looms around the corner in 2016.

Take a look at the trailer, if you like, and I will explain what I mean.

In the film, Creed has his fight and Rocky has his. “It’s just another fight,” Adonis pleads. They got me with the two of them standing before the mirror. So in the ring, also in life. One’s biggest opponent is oneself. “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief” (Mark 9:24). As for this jaw replacement challenge, it’s just like any other fight. “One step, one punch, one round at a time.” Oh I wish that oft repeated line in the movie had made its way into the trailer! That, dear ones, is the creed according to “Creed.”

What heavyweight bout looms on your fight card in 2016?

So maybe God won’t speak to you from a movie, but what about these jewels from His word as you enter the New Year fray?

“Fight the good fight of the faith” (1 Tim. 6:12).

“If God is for us, who can be against us” (Rom. 8:31)?

“We are more than conquerors through him who loved us” (Rom. 8:37).

It’s just another fight.

On Asking Why

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why

For some reason I don’t usually. Ask the Lord why He lets me suffer like I am right now with my jaw, that is. Well, there was that time in 2005. I had finished cancer treatment with all its nausea and vomiting. My expectation that those symptoms would cease soon after the last chemo blast proved to be wishful thinking. One particularly violent episode turned into a flood of tears and a very loud “Why, Lord?” in my family room.

But for the most part, I’m not inclined to go there. Perhaps one reason lies in what I know the Bible teaches about God’s purposes in the trials He ordains for us. There’s a world of instruction in various texts to that end. For example, that we might grow in steadfastness which would have its perfect result—complete, lacking in nothing (Jas. 1:2-4). Or that we would be able to comfort others with the same comfort whereby we have been comforted by Jesus (2 Cor. 1:3-5). And that we get to identify with the Master in His sufferings because the servant is certainly no greater than He is (1 Pet. 2:21). I could go on.

Another reason for trials in our lives dawned on me recently with comforting intensity. In the middle of HBO2 dive #10, one of the nurse/techs engaged me about what kind if church I pastor. The Lord opened a door for the gospel so big, even I could drive a summary presentation of the good news through it! For once I had the presence of mind to make the most of the opportunity. I laid the truth in love on the man. It almost made my sentencing to hyperbaric oxygen prison palatable. Almost.

And then I thought of Paul’s attitude in Phil. 1:12-13. Writing from prison, here is how he framed his difficult circumstances:

 I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel, so that it has become known throughout the whole imperial guard and to all the rest that my imprisonment is for Christ.

Now I can’t say that it has become known throughout the whole of Florida Hospital that my treatment is for Christ, but to some extent it is becoming known in the deep wound unit that this is the case. Frankly, that took a good bit of the pain out of this preacher’s jaw that day. Have you considered the possibility that, among other reasons, one why for your trial involves God’s plan for your beautiful feet to bring the gospel of peace to someone in need?

Nearest When Most Needed

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mighty-fortress-a_t_nv

Yesterday some of us from Orlando Grace stood watch at the hospital. One of our own waited in suspense while her husband, a much treasured servant in our church, underwent a heart catheterization procedure. She got “bad” news. Even as I write this, her man faces bypass surgery in a matter of minutes.

After the shock subsided some, we prayed together. We thanked God for watching over our brother, who does strenuous work as part of his job, that his condition came to light before the worst may have happened. We asked God for His mercy in the procedure to circumvent the triple blockage. Finally we believed God together that our sister and her family would experience the all-sufficient grace of God as never before. He has pledged to be our helper.

So says Psalm 46:1. “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble (emphasis added).” Charles Spurgeon commented about this massive promise in God’s word:

All creatures have their places of refuge. “ As for the stork, the fir trees are her house. The high hills are a refuge for the Spurgeonwild goats; and the rocks for the conies.” All men also have their places of refuge, though some are “refuges of lies.” But God is our refuge and strength,” the omnipotence of Jehovah is pledged for the defense and support of his people. “A very present help in trouble,”- one who is near at hand; always near, but nearest when he is most needed. Not much entreaty is required to bring him to the aid of his people, for he is close at hand and close at heart, “a very present help in trouble.”

What need, extreme or otherwise, prompts you to say “Help!” Make God your refuge in it. Always near, but nearest when most needed.

Birthday Burnings and Pleas for Mercy

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Josh and Me (2)

Josh,

You would have turned 37 today. Mom and I may not have necessarily enjoyed the pleasure of your company this very day. You would likely have pulled a double at the restaurant. But we would have caught up with you on your day off, maybe even watched the Super Bowl this Sunday, played perhaps with properly inflated balls.

I would grill you a ribeye, medium rare, just as you liked it. Mom would have baked you one of those killer “Black Magic” cakes – a Heff birthday tradition. We would have sipped a Zin brought by you purchased inevitably above my pastoral price point. And the preacher in Ecclesiastes 2:24-25 would have smiled upon us: “There is nothing better for a person than he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also, I saw, is from the hand of God, for apart from him who can eat or who can have enjoyment?”

But you are gone. I miss you.

Love,

Dad

Those horrible words sink in yet another heart-stabbingly relentless time. Just when I thought I survived January 18, the 28th brings another of grief”s battering waves.

Once again, where does a grieving father turn? He goes to His father above. And He never disappoints.

There this miserable-memory morning I read these words from another familiar-with-suffering servant:

Job gives utterance to a mood which is not foreign to us when he says, “Am I a sea, or a whale, that You set a guard over me?” In certain moods of anguish the human heart says to God, “I wish You would leave me alone; why should I be used for things which have no appeal to me?” In the Christian life we are not being used for our own designs at all, but for the fulfillment of the prayer of Jesus Christ. He has prayed that we baffled-to-fight-bettermight be “one with Him as He is one with the Father”; consequently God is concerned only about that one thing, and He never says “By your leave.” Whether we like it or not, God will burn us in His fire until we are as pure as He is, and it is during the process that we cry, as Job did, “I wish You would leave me alone.” God is the only Being who can afford to be misunderstood; we cannot, Job could not, but God can. If we are misunderstood we “get about” the man as soon as we can. St. Augustine prayed, “O Lord, deliver me from this lust of always vindicating myself.” God never vindicates Himself, He deliberately stands aside and lets all sorts of slanders heap on Him, yet He is not in any hurry. We have the idea that prosperity, or happiness, or morality, is the end of a man’s existence; according to the Bible it is something else, “to glorify God and enjoy Him for ever.” When a man is right with God, God puts His honor in that man’s keeping. Job was one of those in whom God staked His honor, and it was during the process of His inexplicable ways that Job makes his appeal for mercy, and yet all through there comes out his implicit confidence in God. “And blessed is he, who is not offended because of Me,” said Our Lord (Oswald Chambers, Baffled to Fight Better: Job and the Problem of Suffering, Discovery House, 1990, p. 41-42, emphasis added).

I’m not a 21st century Job. Not even close. But I do need mercy. Thus I appeal.

Sovereign God, if I belong to that privileged company “Guardians of Your Honor,” and I believe I do, only by grace, then burn away as You please. But have mercy on me for I am but a sinful, grieving man dealing with this birthday’s burnings. I admit it. I sometimes wish you would leave me alone. But not so much that I entertain offense at my Savior and abandon my implicit confidence in You.