Author and speaker Tim Keller shared that new tumors have developed in his ongoing battle with stage four pancreatic cancer, requiring him to undergo a repeat of the immunotherapy treatment he received last year.
The founder of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City shared this update on Facebook:
“I will shortly be returning to the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, MD in order to spend April doing a variation of the immunotherapy that I received last June. It was successful in eradicating 99% of the tumors. However, new tumors have developed. They are unfortunately in some fairly inconvenient places, so the doctors encouraged us to go through the treatment again, this time targeting a different genetic marker of the cancer.
“It was fairly brutal last June, so we approach this with an awareness of how much prayer we need,” he continued. “Please pray for our trust and dependence on God, for his providential oversight of the medical preparations now in process, and for our desire to glorify God in whatever comes our way.”
Keller has continued writing and teaching since his diagnosis in May, 2020.
In a previous update in January, Keller said he underwent two years of chemotherapy and was participating in an immunotherapy drug trial for the National Institutes of Health. The treatments, he said, kept his cancer “at bay.”
“My cancer is still there, pancreatic cancer can break out anytime and take you, and yet we’ve been able to keep it somewhat at bay for a pretty long time, and so we’re very grateful,” he said at the time.
