Worship IN the Pain—An Example of an Amazing Teen Cancer Patient
- Sharon Czerwien
- May 4
- 6 min read
~By Sharon Czerwien and Teen Guest, Bethany Cammell
I interviewed Bethany in the middle of her recent cancer journey. The following interview was done in December of 2024.
Praise God! Bethany is now 5 weeks post-chemo. She still has a journey ahead of her, but I think you will be incredibly blessed by Bethany's example of worshipping in her pain.
(By the way, check out the beautiful picture that Bethany drew and was willing to share for this post's cover photo. You can check out her neat artwork and more at her Facebook page, "Bethany Scribbles.")
Here is the official start of this blog post written a few months ago...
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The idea of traveling 13+ hours by plane sounds absolutely dreadful to me. If I won a free flight to New Zealand, though, I might just accept the offer! A brave 16-year-old teenager lives there, and it would be an honor to meet her. Her name is Bethany Cammell, and she is an amazing example of faith in God during a very difficult set of circumstances.
Though I have never met Bethany (and honestly, I only know of her mom professionally from afar), I have been able to follow Bethany’s childhood cancer journey these last several months.
I have been in absolute awe of Bethany’s faith and her spiritual maturity to see the need to worship through her pain.
Context
To give a little background and context, here is what Bethany shared with me about her cancer journey:
I have an osteosarcoma (type of cancerous tumour) in my upper left arm. I was diagnosed when I was fifteen, and had my sixteenth birthday in between chemo. Recently I’ve had a surgery to remove all the visible tumour, leaving me in both a sling and a moon boot (as they took some bone from my leg to help replace the affected cancerous bone). As it stands, my treatment should last about nine months in total, and I am about one third of the way through!
Worship Music
Let me (Sharon) jump right into what has blessed me most about following Bethany’s story. She has naturally incorporated worship into her hospital stays.
Bethany has shown that worship is possible in the middle of pain! Worship music—yes, in the bumpiest of bumps—is truly needed!
While following Bethany’s journey, I noticed she would consistently post about having worship music playing in her hospital room (during intense pain, too!). After seeing such a beautiful pattern of praise, I screenshotted some of her paragraphs and asked her and her mom if Bethany would consider being part of my blog.
Since I was so inspired by Bethany, I wanted to bless others with her pattern of worship music.
Bethany’s Quotes & Posts
Situation 1:
Bethany had been experiencing many issues and failed attempts with nurses working around her port site. She was experiencing intense pain during that part of her hospital stay. Here are the beautiful words she wrote after-the-fact:
“Before and after each failed attempt, Mummy prayed with me and I asked her to alert the prayer chain (Thank you so much everyone for all your prayers). We also had worship music playing from my phone (at one point one of the doctors found a pocket on my shoulder and managed to fit my phone in it) the whole time which really helped. Mummy reckons it’s the only reason I could physically relax while we waited all that time, which she says was a miracle in itself!”
Situation 2:
Bethany had been experiencing many painful pokes during one of the many times at her hospital stay. She described her chest as feeling squeezy, and her muscles were tense and unable to relax. Regarding these difficult moments, she later wrote:
“I don’t know when the doctor left, but I think he’s gone by this point. Then I asked for my favourite music to be turned on (Switchfoot, Tenth Avenue North, Casting Crowns, For King and Country) which Mummy did, and somewhere in there we also called Daddy and he prayed…”
I can guarantee you that I was all teary-eyed when I read Bethany's penned words the first and second time (and while proofreading this post!). She showed such spiritual maturity to recognize the need for prayer and worship songs!
Interview Questions for Bethany
-Me: How has your faith been stretched the most since your cancer journey started?
-Bethany: In my surgery, there was a small risk that I might have to lose my left arm. To be perfectly honest? That TERRIFIED me. It took me a while to trust God with it, that He had plans for me to use both my hands, before AND after surgery. The relief was immense after I had given my worries to God, and though I was still nervous, it wasn’t anything compared to what I had felt.
-Me: What have you learned the most regarding your faith during this time?
-Bethany: To trust God with tomorrow, and take it one step at a time. When I was first in the hospital, just after I was diagnosed, it was terrifying to think of the future. My brain would take me places that were scary and unsettling, asking questions I wasn’t sure I even wanted to hear the answers to. What would treatment look like? Would I die? How long would my arm be in pain? Trusting God with the future helped immensely. I chose to focus on the moments happening right now, the day I was in, and leave the rest to God.
Me: Worship music is important to you. What song (or two!) has been the most encouraging?
Bethany: That’s a hard one! There are honestly so many songs I love (as my hundred or so long playlist of favourites can attest to!) but a couple that have been especially comforting are All Shall be Well by Tenth Avenue North, and Where the Light Shines Through by Switchfoot (which inspired a piece of art I did with a quote from the song). But yeah, All Shall be Well is often one me or Mummy will put on after something especially hard or tiring, or even just as we get in the car to go to hospital yet another time…
-Me: If you had the chance to meet any Christian band, which would it be!?
-Bethany: Another hard one! Is there an option to just go to a concert with all my favourite bands in it? Haha! But if I had to choose one… Hmmm… Maybe For King and Country? Either them or Tenth Avenue North, I think. There are so many bands I love!
-Me: Has there been a favorite doctor or nurse that God sent at just the right time?
-Bethany: There was one night during one of my chemo stays where I spiked a temperature at midnight. In oncology, temperatures are a big deal… Usually it means immediate IV antibiotics and extra blood tests (and occasionally a nose swab, which I detest). But anyway, I’d had this temperature at midnight, and doctors and nurses were coming in and out and basically stopping any chance of me getting a proper night’s sleep. But the nurse we had (we’d never had him before, and I think he was from a different ward but happened to be in oncology this particular night), he asked if he could pray for us. We said yes, of course, and it was this special moment where he prayed for us, and the rest of our family (he asked about them, too, so he could pray for them too). I believe that God enabled that moment to happen, with the right nurse at the right time.
-Me: Has there been a favorite Bible verse to dwell on that has blessed you the most?
-Bethany: There was one on my wall in hospital (a friend printed out and laminated some that we usually put up in whichever room we happen to end up in) that included the words “He will strengthen your bones.” (Isaiah 58:11) Which means a lot to me, as part of my surgery included removing all of the affected cancerous bone, and replacing it with donated bone. This bone would take a while to heal, and, as the surgeon explained it, become properly attached (or something, I’m not entirely sure how it works) and grow to be properly part of my bones. But I trust that verse—that God will strengthen my bones!
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Here’s a very special thank you to Bethany and her willingness to take part in this blog. What an encouragement to me that a teenager can praise IN the pain!
Bethany's testimony shows that God can be praised in ANY situation!
Hebrews 13:15
Therefore by Him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name.
~Let’s keep our praise strong,
Sharon
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PS. I encourage you to check out Bethany’s artistic Facebook page (and her mom’s Facebook pages):
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