Derek Shafer

Christ-Follower, MD, Married to an awesome wife.

[Александр Елесев | Доброум TV @dobroum]

Моя любимая краткая история СССР.

Как только умер Ленин, оказалось, что второй человек в партии, товарищ Троцкий - предатель. Каменев, Зиновьев, Бухарин и Сталин свергли Троцкого и изгнали из СССР.

Но через пару лет оказалось, что Каменев, Зиновьев и Бухарин тоже враги и вредители. Тогда доблестный товарищ Генрих Ягода их расстрелял.

Чуть позже Ягоду, как вражеского агента, расстрелял Ежов.

Но через пару лет оказалось, что и Ежов не товарищ, а обычный предатель и вражеский агент. И Ежова расстрелял Берия.

После смерти Сталина, все поняли, что и Берия тоже предатель. Тогда Жуков сверг и расстрелял Берию.

Но вскоре Хрущев узнал, что Жуков враг и заговорщик. И сослал Жукова на Урал.

А чуть позже вскрылось, что и Сталин-то был врагом, вредителем и предателем. А вместе с ним и большая часть политбюро. Тогда Сталина вынесли из мавзолея, а политбюро и примкнувшего к ним Шепилова разогнали честные партийцы, во главе с Хрущевым.

Прошло несколько лет и выяснилось, что Хрущев был волюнтаристом, проходимцем, авантюристом и врагом. Тогда Брежнев отправил Хрущева на пенсию.

Вскоре Брежнев умер, и выяснилось, что он был маразматиком, вредителем и причиной застоя.

Потом было еще два маразматика, который никто и запомнить не успел, потому что дохли, как мухи.

Но тут пришел к власти молодой, энергичный Горбачев. И оказалось, что вся партия была партией вредителей и врагов, но он-то сейчас все исправит...

Тут-то СССР и развалился. А Горбачев оказался врагом и предателем.

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

@Austin2Jacobsen let me know if you hit up golden hour- hope you guys had a great time in the panhandle

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

@Austin2Jacobsen @AllianceBulldog 💯

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

@Austin2Jacobsen check your dms

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

@JessicaCoody @damonbenning @CrooksPBP you are beating the whistle pig though

[Sam McKewon @swmckewonOWH]

“I talked to a lot of the people around me and tried not to freeze. It’s Nebraska."

Where it's worth waiting 9 hours for Husker volleyball tickets.

From @JustinbFrommer:

https://t.co/wbkyZZUJ1u

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

@WestsideHigh66 @damonbenning

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

@marathonmed hopefully next year

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

@xjm716

[Nebraska Men's Basketball @HuskerMBB]

Heroes come and go.

But legends like @KentPavelka live forever.

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

@RobinWashut send off @ 9 still on? #huskers

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

@RobinWashut just need okc

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

@damonbenning oh boy

[Nebraska Men's Basketball @HuskerMBB]

this sequence >>>

📺: @BigTenNetwork

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

@CommonFanGBR check your email

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

@JacobPadilla_ Derek fisher 0.4

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

@PeterLBrandt

[Derek Shafer @dshafe55]

what a finish by tcu

[Ben Sasse @BenSasse]

Friends-

This is a tough note to write, but since a bunch of you have started to suspect something, I’ll cut to the chase: Last week I was diagnosed with metastasized, stage-four pancreatic cancer, and am gonna die.

Advanced pancreatic is nasty stuff; it’s a death sentence. But I already had a death sentence before last week too — we all do.

I’m blessed with amazing siblings and half-a-dozen buddies that are genuinely brothers. As one of them put it, “Sure, you’re on the clock, but we’re all on the clock.” Death is a wicked thief, and the bastard pursues us all.

Still, I’ve got less time than I’d prefer. This is hard for someone wired to work and build, but harder still as a husband and a dad. I can’t begin to describe how great my people are. During the past year, as we’d temporarily stepped back from public life and built new family rhythms, Melissa and I have grown even closer — and that on top of three decades of the best friend a man could ever have. Seven months ago, Corrie was commissioned into the Air Force and she’s off at instrument and multi-engine rounds of flight school. Last week, Alex kicked butt graduating from college a semester early even while teaching gen chem, organic, and physics (she’s a freak). This summer, 14-year-old Breck started learning to drive. (Okay, we’ve been driving off-book for six years — but now we’ve got paper to make it street-legal.) I couldn’t be more grateful to constantly get to bear-hug this motley crew of sinners and saints.

There’s not a good time to tell your peeps you’re now marching to the beat of a faster drummer — but the season of advent isn’t the worst. As a Christian, the weeks running up to Christmas are a time to orient our hearts toward the hope of what’s to come.

Not an abstract hope in fanciful human goodness; not hope in vague hallmark-sappy spirituality; not a bootstrapped hope in our own strength (what foolishness is the evaporating-muscle I once prided myself in). Nope — often we lazily say “hope” when what we mean is “optimism.” To be clear, optimism is great, and it’s absolutely necessary, but it’s insufficient. It’s not the kinda thing that holds up when you tell your daughters you’re not going to walk them down the aisle. Nor telling your mom and pops they’re gonna bury their son.

A well-lived life demands more reality — stiffer stuff. That’s why, during advent, even while still walking in darkness, we shout our hope — often properly with a gravelly voice soldiering through tears.

Such is the calling of the pilgrim. Those who know ourselves to need a Physician should dang well look forward to enduring beauty and eventual fulfillment. That is, we hope in a real Deliverer — a rescuing God, born at a real time, in a real place. But the eternal city — with foundations and without cancer — is not yet.

Remembering Isaiah’s prophecies of what’s to come doesn’t dull the pain of current sufferings. But it does put it in eternity’s perspective:
“When we've been there 10,000 years…We've no less days to sing God's praise.”

I’ll have more to say. I’m not going down without a fight. One sub-part of God’s grace is found in the jawdropping advances science has made the past few years in immunotherapy and more. Death and dying aren’t the same — the process of dying is still something to be lived. We’re zealously embracing a lot of gallows humor in our house, and I’ve pledged to do my part to run through the irreverent tape.

But for now, as our family faces the reality of treatments, but more importantly as we celebrate Christmas, we wish you peace: “The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned….For to us a son is given” (Isaiah 9).

With great gratitude, and with gravelly-but-hopeful voices,
Ben — and the Sasses