454 Steve’s Terminal Cancer Part 8
I spent the morning with Steve yesterday.
I greeted him with a kiss. For most of our 18 year friendship, the thought of kissing Steve never occurred to me. That changed after leukemia stole nearly all of the life from Steve’s body and it was all he could do to lift his hand from his hospital bed for me to shake.
The sight of his once muscular body being reduced to a weak, thin shell moved me deeply, to the point that a handshake seemed terribly superficial and shallow – perhaps it always was. That’s when I started kissing Steve.
That was nearly a year and many kisses ago. But when I kissed Steve yesterday it was unlike all the other times. Steve was cold, rigid and non-responsive. I guess that’s to be expected when someone’s lying in a casket.
I spent the morning with Steve yesterday.
Steve died on a Friday morning in a most unusual way. He woke up talked briefly to his lovely wife Kay then went back to sleep. Shortly thereafter he awoke in another place with God. Most of the people I watch die from a thief like cancer give up their spirit and quietly drift into a coma. The person seems to almost be gone but their body continues to struggle on, sometimes for days or a week.
But Steve’s tenacious love for his wife, his friends, his church and his city drove him to maintain mental alertness far beyond normal. When Steve finally gave up his spirit, his body was so thoroughly spent that he died at almost the exact same moment. Jesus died like that.
The day Jesus was crucified was a high holy day on the Jewish calendar and their leaders didn’t want half dead people hanging on unsightly crosses during the Sabbath so they “petitioned Pilate (the regional Roman ruler) that their legs be broken to speed death, and the bodies taken down. So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first man crucified with Jesus, and then the other. When they got to Jesus, they saw that he was already dead, so they didn’t break his legs” (John 19:31-34).
Jesus loved us so tenaciously that he used up every ounce of physical strength for us; so much so, that he died the very second he gave up his spirit. “Jesus called out with a loud voice, ‘Father into your hands I commit my spirit.’ When he had said this, he breathed his last” (Luke 23:46). Steve died like that.
After Steve’s funeral I watched for a long, long time as 1200 people filed past his casket. It takes a lot of time and tears to say good-bye to a man who loved you the same way Jesus loves you. A man who not only lived as Jesus lived; but who also died as Jesus died.
I spent the morning with Steve yesterday.
(Please insert Steve’s attached picture.) Steven R. Valentine, November 12, 1947 – November 3, 2009.
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