Mike And Patti

After 2 years of marriage Jackie and I moved back to my hometown of Holland. One of the first things we did after getting to town was to join a weekly small study group that met at the house of my older brother Jet and his wife Karen. With 2 other couples we studied and discussed a book by Larry Christenson called The Christian Family (a great foundational tool by the way. You really don't know everything by instinct).

Mike and Patti were one of the couples and have been our dear friends ever since. Jackie and I were co-leaders with them (with my brother and sister-in-law) for a Charismatic prayer meeting that met for about 10 years in the basement of our parish church. When Jackie and I eventually left the Catholic Church they did the same soon after. We both ended up getting heavily involved the next couple of years with 2 different Pentecostal churches and both couples ended up with the same result. Somehow we got burned.

That led to us having home church together for 7 years - Jackie and I with our son and 4 daughters, Mike and Patti with their 5 boys, a single woman and for awhile another couple with their 5 kids. It was I believe an important time for both families but eventually we felt the Lord's leading to join more traditional churches. Mike and Patti's family went to a large Evangelical church in town and Jackie and I spent many years attending a large Charismatic congregation in a near by city.

Mike was like me an owner in a family business. Trained as an engineer he was also McGuiver on steroids. Equip Mike with only a decent Swiss army knife and you could drop him off in the interior of Alaska and he would not only build a lodge but would somehow be exporting lumber within a year. This you could say was a little different than me.

One winter night Mike picked me up and we parked outside the property of the local gun club located in the rural north side of town. Walking back a ways Mike gets out a target, places it about 20 feet away on the side of a snow covered sand bank, takes out a 45 caliber hand gun, shows me how to stand, aim and squeeze the trigger, then tells me I'd be lucky if I get within 10 feet of the target. I did as instructed but really, with my eyes closed it was hard to tell how close I got. Next month as a reward for my bravery out of the blue I started getting in the mail the NRA magazine. That was Mike. Deeply committed in what ever he did, always generous, always gently trying to introduce me to something in his world.

For my part I would try to challenge Mike to see spiritual things from a slightly different angle. It is not easy to get an engineer to let go of his logical barriers because they have to understand how everything works. Mike would usually immediately reject any new thoughts I would introduce to him, then spend the next couple of weeks mulling them over in his mind until he finally figured out the logic in a way that made perfect sense to him. In truth I would do the same thing. It just didn't take as long. The upshot though was that because he went through the process and understood how a spiritual principle worked it made him very well prepared to teach what he knew.

Patti and Mike are a very good fit. She as well is very smart, deeply spiritual, generous, adores Mike, lets him get his way for most of his idiosyncrasies and loves to examine every decision in extreme detail (which to use one of the many Mike and Patti isms is the "catch 22" between her and Jackie. Jackie HATES endless details). Patti just retired last year from selling real estate.

Patti comes from a large Irish Catholic family and spent a good deal of her childhood working for her family resort business which they used to have on Beaver Island, located in the Northern part of Lake Michigan. She and Mike met there, own 2 cottages on the island and every year in May Jackie and Patti go up to prepare them for the rental season.

Our lives and our families have been intertwined for over 40 years. We rejoice when something good happens with us or any of our children and we grieve and pray when something goes sour.

Less than 2 weeks ago Patti found a lump on her breast. A subsequent examination found a spot on her liver. Further exams revealed that there is cancer throughout her body. The oncologist does not recommend any treatment. There is X amount of time left (which praise the Lord is in years and not months, but who knows?) and right now Patti feels great and does not notice anything different.

She is a realist but has always been a fighter and is currently very upbeat. They plan to attack the cancer with nutrition and prayer and the plans are still on for Jackie and Patti to go up to Beaver Island this May. For my part I will pray and seek the Lord's guidance for how best to pray for Patti and Mike and their family. I have no doubts that God can move powerfully in this situation.

However, to be honest, right now I feel like I could throw up.