When he first heard the diagnosis, he instantly felt God put the words from Hebrews 13:14 in to his mouth, and he heard himself say to the consultant: “Here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come.” He described feeling a peace that transcended all understanding, literally guarding his heart and mind. And from then on, he woke up. Christ became everything again. The gospel was all that mattered. He began to seek a different city.  

Jon Tilson was diagnosed with stage four bowel cancer in January 2017. He died 13 months later. Yet in many ways the illness changed his life for the better, as his daughter Sarah explains.

From the outside, my father was living a rich and full life. He was married with four children, two grandsons and three more grandchildren on the way. He owned a big house in south west London, had a steady job and a great pension plan for when he planned to retire in 2021.  He loved classic cars and had a sizable collection of old bangers that didn’t start, much to my mother’s annoyance. He went to a good church, heard biblical preaching every week, and enjoyed lots of Christian fellowship. He knew many Christian truths and considered himself theologically sound. 

But in his own words, he had become spiritually complacent, and far too invested in this life. He said he’d developed a ludicrous sense of entitlement to the life he lived, and although he enjoyed many aspects of a Christian lifestyle, his heart was far from God and living a life of true surrender. Nothing looked too bad from the outside, but he wasn’t living whole-heartedly for the kingdom. Jesus had become just a heavenly insurance policy, not the centre of his life. He bickered with his wife, collected car parts and watched too much TV. 

And then, in January last year, after a couple of weeks of what seemed like bad constipation, he was diagnosed with stage four bowel cancer, aged 61. The tumour had broken through the bowel wall and already spread to his liver by the time we knew about it. He had surgery within two weeks and had his entire large bowel removed. Once he had begun to recover from this huge procedure, the plan was to try two different chemotherapy drugs to shrink the tumours on his liver before attempting to operate on that too.

We were all shell-shocked and totally devastated. 

But Dad was not.

When he first heard the diagnosis, he instantly felt God put the words from Hebrews 13:14 in to his mouth, and he heard himself say to the consultant: “Here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come.” He described feeling a peace that transcended all understanding, literally guarding his heart and mind. And from then on, he woke up. Christ became everything again. The gospel was all that mattered. He began to seek a different city.  

And so began a gruelling year of chemo, blood tests, scans and bad news. He made the best of it, taking chemo selfies, and maxing out on free cups of tea at the cancer support centre. But he endured months of aggressive treatment that made him feel horrendous, only to be told after each scan that he hadn’t responded to it and the cancer had spread further. He developed infections and bowel obstructions which hospitalised him at times, and when he was at home he spent most of his days on the sofa. 

But curiously, he described it all as the best year of his life.

He certainly suffered, yes, but he said he wouldn’t have missed it for the world because of what it all did for his soul. It drew him near to God, into total dependence upon him, and many times during his illness he heard the Lord speak clearly to him.

Read More