Hearts

I preached in Alabama this weekend (and for those of you who have stereotypes about Alabama, go visit...it's as good or bad as any other place, although I will admit they have more than their fair share of trailers) because I got to see my uncle and aunt and my two cousins, who I don't see as often as I'd like. In fact, because I don't think any of my family read my blog, I'll just say they're pretty much my favorite out of my eight uncles and their families (my mom and dad both had a lot of brothers).

It is hard to see this particular uncle, though in a good way. He looks very much like my dad did, and he also has had two heart attacks already. He's 47. And though I hate having to say this every time, no, he hasn't ever smoked, and he's not extremely overweight, and his diet is pretty good (at this point, he eats as heart healthy as you can). It's just bad genes.

And I just had a friend's mom die of lung cancer. She had quit smoking about 20 years ago, just so you know.

"Unfair" doesn't quite begin to describe it. I know there's evil in the world, and I think this is some of it. Stephen King had a novel, Insomnia, where he described how the "random" is the same thing as evil in the world. How "random" things that happen are more evil than the calculated things...a little boy hit by a car, cancer, heart disease, etc. And I do believe this is true. Stephen King also believes that God is love, and that God is a God of the ninth inning. That's what I'm having to believe when I look at my uncle's face with my baby...praying that somehow God will pull a rabbit out of God's hat and let him make it to 60 or 70. Or maybe it's just the grace given to me to see him, as I would have seen my dad, smiling and laughing with my children and his.