I do not want to write this blog post. But it's time for an update. (This is not about me, so please do not be alarmed.)

Thank you for praying for my Chinese friend Dan who had brain surgery in June. God spared his life against all odds. I wanted so much for Dan to live long enough to hear the Gospel. He received a Bible and it was marked with important verses. He received a tract to tell him how to believe in Jesus. But Dan lost his eyesight during the surgery, and unless someone would read the tract or Bible to him, he had no way to read it for himself. I hoped that his wife would read it to him, and maybe she did, but they claim to be Buddhists and even ran a Buddhist house church in their home, so who knows? I have no way to know.

A few weeks ago, Dan, age 56, was in the bathroom one morning getting ready, when his wife heard a thump. She ran into the bathroom and found Dan had collapsed on the floor, and he wasn't breathing. She had no knowledge of CPR, and by the time emergency personnel arrived, there was nothing they could do. Four and a half months after surviving brain surgery, he died of lung failure.

I was stunned. His family was stunned. We thought surviving brain surgery had given him additional years to his life, maybe a decade or even more. No one expected this, and it is hard to wrap my head around it still. Pray for his elderly parents (in their late 80s). It is next to impossible to offer comfort and hope with people who have no belief in anything besides the material world they can see. They truly believe that death means the end of existence in all forms. They have no hope for an afterlife, either good or bad. Pray too for Dan's wife. In 16 months she lost her only son (in a car wreck) and her husband. She despairs, has no hope, and wants to run away to a monastery in the mountains.

And if that is not enough ….

I asked you to pray for my Chinese friends, Luella and Hank. (It was on this post.) Hank, age 49, found out at the end of May that he pancreatic cancer. Well, actually, Hank didn't find out from the doctors (this is Chinese culture), but his wife and grown daughter knew he had it. He eventually caught on when his fellow chemotherapy patients chatted about it; they figured it out together. His mother, living in the same house, never found out what he had, she just knew he was sick.

I see Luella often and consider her a good friend. I've been to their home several times for meals. Luella would tell me that Hank was doing pretty good, that the doctors had caught it early. She probably knew the outlook wasn't so optimistic, but was trying to put on her brave face as she always does.

The week after Dan died, Hank also died. My heart sank. I thought he had more time.

Luella fought back tears as she told me about her new life. Hank's boss paid for most of his medical care during his illness, and she continues to get her husband's monthly salary for now. She knows it cannot last forever though, and she doesn't know if she'll have enough money to survive when it ends. Her grown daughter has a job (she doesn't make much), and her son-in-law is not well educated and is currently unemployed. (They live together in the same house.) Luella's mother-in-law who lived with her for years has moved in with another child, so the group dynamics at Luella's home have changed dramatically in a shockingly short period of time.

And there's more ….

I have two friends I meet with regularly at coffee shops to study English and other important topics. One of the boys' mothers had neck cancer, a big blob of a tumor hanging off the side of her neck. The doctors were not optimistic on the prospects of surgery, and said even if the surgery succeeded, she only has 5 years to live. But she survived the surgery and last I heard she is weak but doing okay. The surgery happened a little over a week ago. The young man still lives at home and is terrified by the thought of losing his mother.

There is too much cancer and sorrow among the people I know here. My heart is heavy. Some eternal hope would make it all so much more bearable for me, and them. I pray God would open their eyes to see things they do not now understand.

Death is a certainty, I just always pray people will live long enough to get a chance to hear about God -- to really hear in a way they can understand.

Please pray for surviving family members as most now grieve without hope. Pray that God will help them to find their footing and make it through these horrendous days of change.