A Time To Live

After an evening church service, Jeff Basone, a middle-school teacher, tracked down a young woman with long, naturally curly locks. She was visiting her hometown of Akron, Ohio, from Florida, and had just spoken in his church.

He asked for her phone number.

She was shocked. Why is he asking me out? Shawn wondered, because she had just disclosed to the crowd of mostly strangers that she has terminal cancer. Shawn had also talked about her passion for teenagers to meet Jesus and grow in their faith—something she would discover that she and Jeff had in common. But the then-37-year-old thought that the mere fact that cancer was devouring her body would scare away any potential suitors. And though she longed to be married, she had become focused on the next life.

It was that perspective—her concern about eternity and enthusiasm for bringing as many people as possible with her to heaven—that drew Jeff to her.

The two went on a date later that week while Shawn was still in town. They soon began falling in love. After a few months, Jeff began talking about marriage with Shawn, a peppy, everyone's-friend kind of person.

Shawn was still hesitant.

Once, after he had professed his love and hopes to marry her, she almost tried to talk him out of it. She kept saying, "Are you sure? Do you realize that I have a terminal illness?" However, Jeff was still willing to take the risk, confident of God's leading.

So, in July 2004, they married, and Shawn moved back to Ohio to be with her new husband. She stayed with Student Venture, the high-school branch of Campus Crusade for Christ, working with The Coaching Center and training leaders of all ages over the phone to help high-school students reach their peers with the gospel.

"What I love about coaching is that it makes me not want to waste my time," says Shawn. "I've believed [in Jesus] for so long, now it's like the rubber meets the road. It makes me want to pass this on to other people." At her supervisor's request, she began writing about how she coaches the students and adults so that Student Venture staff members will be able to continue to learn from her when she's gone.

"Shawn is an amazing coach," says her boss, Gilbert Kingsley. "She has so much wisdom that comes from her own walk with the Lord." She spiritually tutors eight people about tangible ways to begin a ministry, like gathering students and talking about Jesus.

"She has so much experience in knowing what to do with high-school students," says 11th grader Kaitlin McCleary (see "Party Time"), whom Shawn coaches. "She gives me tools to help with my own spiritual growth and asks, 'What would you say to someone in this situation?'"

Shawn also applies what she teaches. When she and Jeff were at the Cleveland Clinic for her chemotherapy treatment, Jeff excused himself. When he returned, he wasn't surprised to spot his wife holding hands with a stranger. Both women's eyes were closed in prayer. "That goes to show Shawn's willingness to be used by God," he says. Shawn had talked with the woman, also a cancer patient, and told her about her relationship with Jesus.

However, Shawn's trips to the Cleveland Clinic are often mixed with sadness. One time she learned she'd lose her long, shiny curls in an effort to stop the cancer—tumors ranging from the top of her head all the way down her spine and into her internal organs. She went home and wailed with sadness, yet called out to God. "Jesus, I need you," she said. "I closed my eyes and He was right there."

Then six months ago, as her hair slowly began to grow back, just as pretty as before, her oncologist gave her and Jeff more disheartening news: the chemo is seemingly not working and they are running out of treatment options.

She and Jeff left the clinic, crawled into their bed and clung to each other as they cried.

"It's strange," says Shawn. "As a Christian, I believe in Jesus and in heaven, but for me, there is still a fear. What will it be like to slip out of this world?"

She and Jeff both wrestle with that, sometimes asking God if He is trustworthy. Yet Shawn has seen God at work in the lives of teens, Jeff and herself. Even in the mere fact that He brought her a husband. In the dark, hard times she consciously decides to trust God. "It's a moment by moment choice to choose joy rather than despair," she says.

Jeff saw Shawn's genuine, solid trust back when she spoke at his church. "That's what I fell in love with—when she shared her heart," he says, "I thought, This is somebody special, going through what she is and saying, 'All right, God, I'm still going to serve You.'"

Serving Him gives her so much joy, and she says that coaching distracts her from the emotions of dealing with her cancer. Yet, since her time on earth is short, Shawn checks her priorities. "When you have six months to one year to live," she says, "you revisit what's most important to you in life."

She determined God is first, then loving Jeff, then family and friends. And she still wants lost people to know and fall in love with Jesus. That can seem overwhelming, especially when the cancer is zapping her energy.

So Shawn recently asked the Lord, "What does it mean to live?"

"Everywhere I read, in my spirit, and the things people told me, is 'Love Me.'" To Shawn that means God simply wants her to love Him, not to perform for Him. So, she loves Him, knowing that she'll be doing that in heaven, too.

Editor's Note: After a long battle with cancer, Shawn Basone went to be with the Lord on Friday, March 20, 2009.