Dave Evans

And so it wasn't just what's the lesson that my body's trying to teach me, but what is God trying to tell me?

He says, because I'm pretty sure this must be a lesson God is giving me, that if I can persevere through and learn the lesson, then I get to get out of jail.

You know, and I didn't think that was likely to happen because despite the fact that I too happen to believe in God, God doesn't fix every problem.

God doesn't instruct himself and miraculously fix everything.

That's a whole different understanding.

And it's nice to think that's what's coming your way, but you're not in charge of that.

You may not be the miracle child.

And so I asked him point blank, no, Gary, why is it you believe this?

And he said, well, what else could it possibly be?

There's got to be a reason for this.

I said, well, let's look at what the other reasons might be.

Could we just do that?

I said, well, okay.

He said, what do you mean?

I said, well, maybe the reason you're having strokes, Gary, isn't because God is going to use you as the demonstration of a miracle, but maybe you're having strokes because you've got really crappy DNA and brain chemistry that breaks down at about 50 to 55 years old.

Because, you know, we live in a broken world, and some of that brokenness falls on everybody.

We're all going to die, by the way.

All we're talking about is timing.

And I told him the story of the head of the gerontology department at Harvard Medical School, who I got stuck on the ground during an ice storm in Chicago with years ago, who reminded me almost nobody dies of old age.

They die of disease or starvation or an accident.