ADVENTageous: Loud and Visible

Guest post: My friend Nikki Adcock Williams is a wife, a mom to two amazing kids (Anna, 10 and Liam, 7), and a legal writing professor at Georgia State College of Law. In February of 2014, Nikki was diagnosed was multiple myeloma, a rare blood and bone cancer. She is undergoing weekly chemotherapy treatments for the next three years.

Although some doctors have told her that her cancer is treatable but not curable, she places her hope in God and the great scientific minds who are tackling this disease.

A native of Kentucky, Nikki lives with her husband, Tom, and two kids in a southern suburb of Atlanta.

In darkness, there is light. 

I wish I could say I am always an optimist. I, however, have been a sensitive soul and a worrier since the day I was born. I’ve had 38 years to perfect the art of “what if?” And right now, I’m angry because my life, and my family’s life, is drastically disrupted by cancer. I am sad that some people shy away from really talking to me because a conversation about how I am really doing is hard. And I am upset about the burden my young children must carry. Can you imagine being 7 or 10 years old and worrying whether your mommy will die soon? I am so sad about how burdened Tom is to have a sick wife. I dislike being a financial drain on my family, especially at Christmas time.

I am MAD that I have THREE YEARS of WEEKLY treatment left.

But then sometimes I can pull myself away from all of those worries and burdens (a product of your prayers?). And through all that worry come screaming loud and large moments of faith. Faith in God and faith that He has heard my prayers and will not let me succumb to this often terminal disease. Faith that God knows that I am needed on this Earth for healthy decades to come. Hope that a cure is coming. Hope that love will triumph over all my worry.

I’ve read several bloggers who suggest that this Christmas we should not celebrate as the angels did when proclaiming the Good News of the birth of Jesus to the shepherds. Shouting good news just won’t do. Celebrating in visible ways is inappropriate, they say. Our world is full of brokenness, injustice, and worry. Thus some say, we don’t get to celebrate with loud proclamations of joy.

I don’t agree with those folks. They seem to forget that when the angels came our world was already deeply broken. Injustice prevailed. Families grieved deeply. The world lacked hope. We needed a LOUD and visible reminder of love.

So God reached down to the depths of His bottomless heart and sent his Son to bring hope to the hopeless, to bring good news to those who felt broken and defeated, to save us all from ourselves.

And then angels came and LIT UP the night sky singing praises and announcing the birth of the Savior, the Hope Giver, the Love Reminder, to those humble shepherds tending to their vulnerable sheep.

So I am working on celebrating loudly and visibly. I have work to do, just as those shepherds did that night. Stress is not easy to overcome. But I pledge to bring light to my family. I promise to try hard to smile INSIDE my home as well as outside. I will remember that light always triumphs over the darkness.

Love is coming. Love already came. That message of Love piercing through the hopeless darkness deserves to be celebrated loudly and visibly.

You can follow Nikki’s journey via her Facebook page Nikki’s Army.
Her friends have also set up a fundraising page for her here.