The Cacophony Interviews: July 2007Peter Birt, Pastor et.al.

On a Wednesday in the middle of May, Peter Birt – pastor, runner, football fan – and my uncle – was diagnosed with bowel cancer. The following Friday, he went in for surgery and came out fitted with a colostomy bag. I spoke to him in early June – the day after he left hospital – about the journey so far. Here are some highlights of that conversation...

PB: Yeah, so...you go to hospital, and suddenly you’re an invalid. And you’ve got nurses saying ‘you will need to be shaved’ and it’s embarrassing, you know, and you’re just this helpless...invalid. And I was really grateful for some Scripture that I’d memorized...out of 1 Corinthians that says,

I care very little how you judge me – or any human court. Indeed I do not even judge myself. My conscience is clear, but that does make me innocent. It is the Lord who judges me.

And I found that concept incredible helpful when you’re going through all the indignities...You say, I care very little, it matters very little, it is the Lord who judges me, my worth and value and sense of identity come from him. So I found myself going over that Scripture while they’re snipping away, doing all that stuff. Which helped, I guess, to cope with embarrassment and indignity.
Prior to it all...there was another verse that I memorized the previous week or two weeks before, 2 Peter 1:3 that says,

His divine power has given us everything we need for life – and I gather the word means an abundance of life – and for godliness through our knowledge of Him who called us according to his own goodness and glory.

And it just struck me, those two things, life and godliness. His power is available for whatever life throws up but then it’s available for godliness which I took as being a God-centered, Christ honouring response to what was happening. So when I became more conscious [following the surgery], I just went over and over those Scriptures and other stuff...because I knew I just had to keep my mind...focused I suppose or renewed by truth...I just found that incredibly helpful and I’m so grateful that I had a whole lot of Scripture...

C: The spiritual disciplines have been a big part of your life for a while now…It sounds like they were really helpful?

PB:Absolutely helpful. One of the things I found most reassuring out of all this is that that stuff matters...There’s so many days over the course of a long walk with Jesus that you don’t particularly feel like reading Scripture, or you don’t particularly feel like praying or, for many years I made fasting part of my practices and you don’t feel like it, your stomach gnaws away. But what I found was just this overwhelming sense that it was worth it, it really counted for something. When the tough time hits, I’m not starting from scratch...You do the training off the spot so that on the spot, you instinctively do it.

I think some people kind of expect that you will fall to pieces, and I was always aware that that could happen; I’ve got great capacity to do that. It may yet happen, I don’t know. But when I look at the Scriptures and see things like Psalm 16,

I have set the Lord always before me, because He is at my right hand I will not be shaken.

You know there’s some reality there that seemed to become...
[Peter’s eldest granddaughter arrived. Peter really loves his grandkids…]

Yeah, so I want to shout to young people in particular, the disciplines matter, hanging out with Jesus matters, consciously doing it, being intentional. You might not feel like anything is happening but it is, and you cannot overestimate miles walked or kilometers walked with Him, intentionally, seeking to live in His presence, setting Him consciously before you. It matters. And you reap the benefits of it. It’s like there’s a reservoir that has something in it, as opposed to just trying to face it on empty, which I can’t imagine how hard that must be.

C:I know your family have been really important through this. What about other people? Has there been any interaction or impact?

PB: Yeah, huge. I’m so grateful, I got so many cards and emails and messages and people sending us, a couple of people sent us cheques... One totally anonymous one just blew us out of the water, we’ve got no idea where it came from, there’s been all of that, tremendous support, people who are praying. Then, I think at one stage there were about six people a day who would come through, and that’s even with our own home church being banned from coming because we didn’t want an influx. And just the conversations around the bed have been amazing, talking in depth about stuff.

...I was really encouraged, I eventually discovered two of [the nurses] were Christians and they would just drop in for social visits after a while and we had some fantastic conversations...

[In this situation] I’m just a normal person and my role as a pastor means absolutely nothing, I’m just this old fella lying in this bed... I began to think about what does it mean for the Kingdom of God to come in this body as it now will be? Or what does it mean for the Kingdom of God to come to this bed? And then I expanded that to what does it mean for the Kingdom of God to come to this room? And I thought about how if the Kingdom of God came to a location then there would be beauty, and so I was really thrilled that people had sent flowers and I was thinking, ‘Yeah, that’s what it would be like if the Kingdom of God had come’. And then Jill had had a birthday on the Monday and so she’d brought some balloons in that someone had given her for her birthday, and I thought, ‘I’m so glad that these balloons are in my room, in a somewhat sterile surrounding, they add a bit of life’. And I thought, you know, if the Kingdom of God came, there would be life in the midst of what’s happening.

And then I thought, there would be meaningful conversations if the Kingdom of God came, and so I made it a point of praying, ‘Lord, I don’t know what today holds, but if there’s anything, any way that my life can be an open book for other people, then I’m available, I’ll talk with them.’ So I’d quietly pray for the nurses.
And then with these two nurses… I’d talk with them and say, ‘this is how I’m wrestling with what it means to live in the Kingdom in my circumstances, how do you guys do it?’ And we had great conversations...

But then a whole bunch of other people came in, and generally speaking, the level of conversation was below the surface. There were a couple of instances where it was surface stuff, but generally it went down underneath, and we talked about what it means to walk with Jesus in these kind of circumstances. And in that sense, it was absolutely rich and life-giving and soul-replenishing.

C: I know you’ve talked about it as an ‘apprehensive adventure with Jesus’. What does that mean for you?

PB:Initially, it meant: I was apprehensive – I don’t like pain, I don’t like people fossicking around with my body, thank you very much – I’m somewhat private, by nature. I certainly didn’t know initially what the future would hold. So for example, I love running, I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to run again. So there’s all sorts of apprehension – what else might I not be able to do that I can now do. How will I cope with the pain, how would I cope with the emotion, would I get depressed? Apprehension – don’t know.

On the other hand, adventure because: Years ago I memorized or adapted a little phrase that says,

Discipleship is walking with Jesus in the real world, having him teach me moment by moment what it means to live life his way.

And that’s an adventure. So I thought; this is just a new adventure in knowing Him in circumstances I had never been in before. And I wonder what I’m going to learn about Him, I wonder what it’s going to be like to walk with Him through this phase of my life? Maybe he will rub some of the rough edges off that drive me nuts. Maybe I’ll get refined and I’ll end up looking a little bit more like him, maybe His love will become more real or present or be amazingly sustaining, I don’t know. It’s an adventure of getting to know Him in my real world that’s changing. That’s what was behind that concept.

I think out of that, came something that I hadn’t thought much about: That the formation of Christ in a person’s character; I had tended to think that that’s good for me, that Jesus will make me more like Him and so I will be more comfortable being me. What I came to see through my time in hospital was that the formation of Christ in me is for the sake of others. Yes, there’s a benefit for me, and ultimately it’s for Him, but there was a fresh sense that it’s for others, that what happens in others as a result of what he does in me is more important. And part of that meant being willing to open my life up, rather than shut it down, to be in the light, because people can’t see what Jesus is doing in you unless you’re in the light. So I deliberately chose that when people said, ‘What do we say to other people?’ I said, ‘Tell them that this is what is happening.’ I had no sense of keeping it a secret – this had to be in the light, or else I can’t see how Jesus can use it.

Which then led to some reflection on healing. I firmly believe that Jesus has the power to heal, and I was praying before I went in to the operation, with Jules and Brad and Jill, ‘Lord, if you want to, you could still heal and I would love you to do that.’ But the more I reflected on it later - I have a neighbour next door who has had two lots of cancer treatment, and another neighbour across the road who is currently going through a form of cancer treatment, and I thought, imagine if I come waltzing back saying, ‘Wow, they opened me up and miracle of miracles, I was healed! Woo! Isn’t God good?’ I’m not sure that that message would have as much capacity to glorify God as me coming back and saying, ‘Guys, this is new to me, what have you guys learnt? How are you coping?’ And then maybe, along the way, having the opportunity to say, ‘The support of people has been fantastic, blah blah blah, BUT, I also found that my relationship with God has deepened and that He’s sustained me.’ I just wonder whether that’s actually a little more powerful than just saying, ‘Wow, I’m healed, what happened to you?’ Which would be horrible...

In all of this, one of the things I’ve [been] wrestling with is the issue of whether I’m in denial. I’ve surprised myself...that I seem to have been fairly positive, and yet I know I’ve been depressed [in the past]. I know what the dark and melancholy side of life is. So I’ve been thinking, it might sound like I’m in denial, but it doesn’t feel like that. But, it’s always a possibility. Or maybe the issue is that you don’t know...

C:I pretty regularly get asked to pray for people who are in situations like this. There were a lot of people praying for you - did that make a difference for you?

PB:Oh, yeah. I felt, I think, I’ve been sustained because people have been praying. So in Phillippians it talks about, being in prison or whatever he’s been doing and he says, with the help of the Spirit and your prayers, and I go, ‘Yeah, I’ve experienced both of those’.

One of the interesting things I’ve noticed is, I have family members who aren’t followers of Jesus and it really struck me powerfully when I rang them to tell them. They’ve got nowhere to go with it, so they’re shattered, going, ‘Oh, I can’t imagine what that must be like.’ Yet when I tell a Christian, even though they may be not necessarily a burning hot Christian, they’ve got somewhere to go, and they’d say, ‘Oh, right,’ and they’ll be shattered, but they’ll say, ‘Well I’ll be praying for you.’

And so yeah, I felt incredibly supported and sustained by the prayers of God’s people. And really grateful to know that people were praying. If you were to ask me, what did I want them to pray? I would say, I want somehow Jesus, the reality of Jesus in me to somehow shine through whatever happens. Again it’s that wonderful thing, I think it’s John 12 where Jesus is wrestling with what the future holds for him and says,

So what shall I say, Father save me from this hour? No for this reason I have come. Father glorify your name.

For me that...it’s not about being saved from it, that would be great, but bigger than that, it’s that Jesus life and presence and reality somehow shines through and impacts people. But yeah, greatly supported and consciously thought of that, I think people’s prayers have really counted.

C: Has God been teaching you anything about himself?

PB: Over the last few years I’ve been reading through the Psalms with one of the kids from youth group...I think every Psalm has at least one verse underlined – every psalm except one – and one day I read through the ones that I’d underlined, and again I was amazed at how God is a living, interacting, present God. That he’s this refuge and that he acts on behalf of those that trust him, that just came through. I kind of want to say to people who are going into hospital, you know, if it’s been your practice to set him before you, then you can expect that you won’t be shaken half as much as you might be, because he is a rock, and he’s present, and he’s powerful and sustaining, and you can expect that. Yeah it might be tough but you can expect that the unshakeable God will pour some of his unshakeableness into you...

One of the things that struck me really early in the piece was the mechanisms of walking with Jesus on the Wednesday of the week before I knew any of this were no different from the mechanisms of walking with Jesus on the day that I discovered I had cancer, or the day of the operation. That internally, it’s the same processes, that you wake up in the morning and talk to Jesus and say, here I am today. I surrender to you, I trust you with what happens today, whatever it might be, and then you walk with Him. And if life kicks you in the guts you tell him about it, you say, ‘Oh, this really hurts, I never expected this but thank you that you’re there and I give this over to you’. And if there’s some joy in your life you capture it and say, ‘Lord, talking to these people was such a joy-filled experience, thank you for allowing me to do that’. So the internal processes are exactly the same and if you’ve got them in place, then you know how to deal with what happens. Sure it’s a bit more significant perhaps, but the processes are the same.

C:How high is the horizon from here, how far out are you looking? Are you looking forward in time?

PB:Well, in two weeks time I’m talking to the surgeon who will put me onto an oncologist who will begin a process of chemo and radiation, and I have absolutely no idea how I will respond to that, I’ve heard stories of how some people say, ‘I don’t know what all the fuss was about,’ and breeze through. I’ve heard stories where people are absolutely wiped out and they can’t work and then all shades in between... My church where I work has been absolutely fantastic, they said to me, you’re a staff member, we want you as a staff member, if we see very little of you over the next six months that’s ok, if we don’t see you over the next six months that’s ok, if we see a lot of you over the next six months that’s ok, we’re there with you. That’s an amazing gift. So, in terms of looking life expectancy, I don’t know. I just want to live well in whatever the next little bit holds. And I want to learn, I want the adventure to continue. I suspect that this is going to be lot tougher than what I’ve been through. I can’t imagine what it’s like to have constant nausea, and I am a physically active kind of person, to not feel like being active. I don’t know what any of that’s going to mean. So I suspect that that might be a far bigger battle.

C:But the processes are the same?

PB:The processes are the same, yeah. They might be harder to do. But [for example], my practice is to journal, and yet in hospital, I went over a week without journaling and yet I survived richly. I didn’t open my bible, and yet, just to be able to pray through the Lord’s Prayer as an extended paraphrase was a wonderful thing because I’ve done it many times before and I could invent new tracks. Or a stupid little thing that I found incredibly value was just going through the alphabet and thinking of attributes of God. I’d think of some A’s, think of some B’s, and then sometimes link As and Bs together, Cs and Ds together, Es and F’s together, and sometimes do nouns, sometimes do verbs. And in utter weakness I could lie there and in my head do that. And it builds your soul up with God. And it was a way of setting Him before me in my utter weakness. And it was sustaining. So yeah, the processes are the same.

C:It’s a very affirming story of God’s power...

PB:Yeah, He’s real. I wrote about 10 points in my journal and one of them is - Jesus is real. For me personally, it’s been really reassuring that this stuff matters, and it comes home to roost. And it’s not just the processes that come home to roost, it’s the reality of the One that the processes are about. His sustaining, nourishing, replenishing, rock-like life, comes real. I remember lying in bed, I couldn’t get to sleep because the nurses had been in and out and just going, Oh, Lord, I love you so much because you love me, just overwhelmed by the sense of his loving presence. It was so real, palpable. Will that be there all the time? No – and it hasn’t been. If anything, I think earlier on it was heightened, and it’s a little bit more mundane now, but man, I’m convinced that you just keep on clocking up the miles...

Peter is currently undergoing his second round of chemotherapy and radiation. He preached last Sunday - you can find the podcast here.

A month later I'm still processing the things I learnt that afternoon...