Sammy Tippit underwent major surgery on Wednesday, June 27.  He had been diagnosed with prostate cancer a few months ago and is now recovering at home after the surgery.  Below is an interview with Sammy on the state of his health and how those of you can pray for him.  Sammy also has a blogsite where you can learn even more detailed information about Sammy and how he is recovering (http://sammytippit.org/read-blogs/62.html).

1)      The first stage is the surgery itself.  That went well.  The surgery lasted about 3 hours and everything went as we had hoped and prayed for. 

2)      The second phase was the initial recovery in the hospital after the surgery.  We had hoped that I would only have to be in the hospital for one day and one night after the surgery.  But because of the pain, I needed to stay an extra day.  But God gave us grace to get through that. 

3)      The third phase is the phase I am in at the moment of the interview. It is a time of  healing.  We need the healing of the bladder and urethra, which have been connected together.  They need to be bound completely before the catheter is taken out.  The catheter should be taken out this Thursday, July 5th. 

4)      The fourth stage is the regaining of some of my bodily functions that will have been temporarily lost.  We don’t know how long that will take.  I have talked to people where it has only taken a few weeks and others where it has taken over a year.  We are praying to speedily regain those functions.

The first night after I came home, I had an interesting dream.  And I’ve never put a lot of stock in dreams. However this short, but concise dream, I have not been able to forget.  It was an Indian dream.  A few years ago, I learned of my Indian heritage.  In this dream, I only saw a small Indian boy and a grown Indian man.  There was just one word that I heard spoken and it was a name.  The name was “Wounded Deer.”  I continued to sleep and that was the end of the dream.  But it was so vivid.  I couldn’t get it out of my mind.  The next night, I began to have some bleeding that concerned me.  As I began to have the bleeding, I prayed and sought the Lord.  And as I did, the dream came back to me.  And then there was a song that has been very meaningful to me that began to fill my heart.  This song is from the Bible.  It simply says, “As the deer pants for the water, so my soul longs after Thee, oh God.”  I realized at this moment in my life, I am like a wounded deer whose hope is in God and God alone.  I realize as I minister from this point forward, I will minister as a wounded deer whose soul longs only after God.  And it is from that position of weakness that I will minister and not from the position of strength.  As a young man, I ministered from the position of strength, but during this month of July, I will turn 60 years old.  As an “old man,” I will minister from the position of weakness.  I was reminded of what the apostle Paul said, “That God’s strength is made perfect in our weakness.”  I know this may seem a little strange, but I really believe God is going to use this weakness to make me strong in Him and to use me for His glory in a greater way.

I think the most difficult thing is the humility that it brings.  During this third phase, I am not able to do much by myself.  Tex has been a tremendous blessing to me.  She has been the sole caregiver.  I am dependent upon her for most everything and that is a blow to a man’s pride.  So, it is the greatest difficulty, but yet the greatest blessing.

Pray, first of all, for Thursday, July 5. Pray that the removal of the catheter will go well.  We will put a report on my blog as to how that goes.  Also, pray for this final phase of regaining some of my bodily functions.  Pray that it will go quickly and smoothly.

We don’t know for sure yet.  That will be dependent on how everything goes in this next phase.  However, I canceled a trip to Romania and a trip to South Africa this summer, due to the surgery.  My first overseas travel is scheduled for October when I go to Brazil.  And in September I will go to Canada.  All of this is subject to how things go during this next month or two.  We will keep everyone informed on this.

I’m sure there will be changes, although I’m not sure what exactly they entail.  There must be some because of the aging process.  But the Christian life is full of changes.  We go through different seasons of life.  I’m sure that I am entering a new season of life. May God be glorified in this season.