Sean Lowe
Some of you may remember my sister Shay from the Bachelor, but most recently by her great blog “Mix and Match Mama.” This week, she wrote about saying goodbye to her best friend who died of cancer Sunday night after years of battling a disease. I think my sister’s post is an amazing testimony to friendship and love.
It begins:
I have started and stopped this post too many times to count. I’ve thought about what I’d write for months now…but today, I just can’t seem to put it into words. My heart is broken because one of my very best friends has left us here on Earth to be with Jesus. Sweet Manda Maxwell met her Savior face to face last night.
Manda was the very first friend I made when we moved to McKinney eleven years ago. I was instantly attracted to her because of her sweet, sweet spirit. She will always go down as the nicest person I’ve ever known.
Manda bravely fought cancer three times. First, as a child, she battled it when she was only five years old. Twenty three years later, it reared its ugly head and less than a week after giving birth to her firstborn, she began fighting it once more. Then in September 2014, it came back for a third time.
I started thinking about what Manda would want me to say today and I laughed to myself because she would tell me not to waste my time blogging about it and instead blog about something happy. I can hear her now…she would be all “Oh, I’m so sorry you have to blog about this today, please don’t worry about it.”. Ha! Only Manda would say something like that…but if you knew Manda, then you know I’m right. After I convinced her that I should indeed blog about her today, I really know in my heart she would say this: She is happy now. She is made whole, she is healthy, she is with Jesus. And she would want you to have that kind of peace, joy, hope and happiness that only comes from having a relationship with Jesus Christ. I know Manda…and even though she did not want this to happen and she wanted to live for her babies here on Earth…she wanted more than anything for her death to be a testimony to the Lord. She did not want cancer to be wasted on her…but instead a testimony to God’s faithfulness. Because even though she is gone, He has been so faithful to her and her family. She would tell us that over and over and over again.
If you’d like to know how to specifically pray for this family, click here.
“…whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.” – James 4:14
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