Clean Bill of Health
Had my medical test today and all is well. Nothing showed up. Actually, the whole process of preventative tests like this one with all the new electronics and stuff, continues to amaze me. That the doctor can look at places inside me- and I can watch with him- is nothing short of miraculous.

My mother was only 48 years old when she died of cancer. I am now 56. I know these tests are not what has kept me from getting the same cancer so far, but if such tests had been available 40 years ago, perhaps things could have been different. Right now my father-in-law is in the hospital in Florida with some possible cardiovascular problems. He is 87 and had bypass surgery many years ago. He would not be alive today without the previous surgery. He has had many good years as a result of that.

But it is also reality to know that no matter how many tests we develop or what kinds of new surgeries we can find, in the end we are mortal. We will not make it out of this life alive. Something, sometime will get us... and accident, an illness, or just plain "old age" will finally move us from this life to the next one. In the end there is nothing that we can do about that.

What I am grateful for today is that we can make this life a better one by taking care of our physical and emotional selves, and we can get ready for the next one by
taking care of our spiritual selves. The two are intimately tied together and one of the greatest advances in recent decades is the (re-)discovery of that link.

I said earlier in the week that this "liquid diet" prior to the test was a potentially spiritual time. Well, it was- as all things in this life can be. It was a reminder of mortality and the need to take care of what God has given me as a trust. It was also a reminder that someday, somehow, things will change and I need to be ready for that as well.

Not a new insight, but an important refresher of some very basic truths.