In the quiet hours of a difficult Tuesday morning two weeks ago, Tammy Lanham sat with her Bible, overwhelmed by the uncertainty of her husband’s battle with cancer. After a year of treatments, an unsuccessful surgery and disappointing medical results, she was running out of answers.
Her husband, Tommy, pastor of Glen Cove Christian Church, has been fighting rectal cancer since last year. His tumor had grown, and doctors feared the disease might have spread to his liver and a lung.
Tammy had spent countless hours researching treatment facilities around the world, eventually discovering Hope 4 Cancer, a faith-based cancer treatment center in Cancún, Mexico. But its price of nearly $60,000 was beyond their means.
That morning, she turned to prayer. “This is too heavy,” she recalled telling God. “We need some hope. I need something positive, anything positive, just anything, any type of hope.”
Then she asked for a sign: a $10,000 donation.
Later that evening, during a virtual meeting with church leaders, Tammy’s phone buzzed. “Tammy and Tommy, I would like to gift you $10,000 for treatment wherever you choose to go,” the message, from a donor, who the couple knows but wants to remain anonymous, read.
“We had not told anybody,” she said. “I hadn’t even told my husband that I had asked God about that $10,000. I had not told a single human being.”
The following day, a second anonymous donor wrote a check for an undosclosed amount. Within 40 hours, the couple had secured almost enough money for the treatment. A GoFundMe campaign, private donations and congregational support helped bring the total to nearly $65,000, covering travel expenses as well.
“I never in my life would have ever dreamt that that would’ve happened,” Tammy said.
For the Lanhams, the generosity affirmed the faith that had sustained them through a difficult year.
Tommy was diagnosed with Stage 3 rectal cancer in 2025. According to the American Cancer Society, 50,000 new cases of rectal cancer are expected in the United States this year.
He underwent a surgery in May, when surgeons unsuccessfully attempted to remove a fist-sized tumor. After his surgery, he lost 15 pounds. With the help of specially prepared milkshakes at Scoop N’ Fruit Ice Cream and exercise sessions at Level Up Glen Cove, he regained strength.
Beginning in August, Tommy underwent another chemotherapy regimen, receiving six treatments before stopping in mid-October. Subsequent scans showed slight tumor growth and suspicious spots on his liver and lung. Although metastasis remained unconfirmed, no further surgery was considered for the time being.
Additional testing identified a gene mutation that can influence cancer growth, and treatment decisions. That setbacks prompted Tammy to investigate treatment centers in Egypt, Sweden, China, Australia, Canada and Mexico as well as the United States. Hope 4 Cancer caught her attention when she came across a video featuring a 53-year-old rectal cancer patient describing the facility’s daily worship services.
“I immediately was like, what?” Tammy recounted. “I did not realize that any of these places were faith-based. And this one is.”
Nonetheless, the Lanhams carefully examined favorable and unfavorable reviews of the facility, including concerns about safety, expenses and whether patients faced pressure to purchase additional services. “We looked at the good, the bad and the ugly,” Tammy said.
After speaking with former patients and weighing their accounts, the couple concluded that positive experiences outweighed their concerns. Their church’s leadership unanimously supported the trip, despite the responsibilities that would fall on other members during their absence.
“I’m shaking because I’m like, oh my gosh, we’re going to look in another country for medical treatment,” Tammy recalled. They left for Mexico Tuesday morning.
Hope 4 Cancer’s 22-day program includes hyperbaric oxygen, intravenous vitamin C, ozone therapy and hyperthermia — and daily worship beginning at 7:45 a.m. Although the facility has not promised a cure, the Lanhams hope its approach will offer another possibility while Tommy remains in contact with his oncologist.
“We gave the conventional therapies a year, and we’re not stopping now — we’re still meeting with my oncologist and stuff,” Tommy said. “But we gave them a year, and I’m worse off now than I was a year ago.”
For Tommy, continuing to seek treatment reflects the optimism that has shaped his ministry. “If we had said, oh, man, nothing’s worked, this is hopeless, then we wouldn’t have looked for other options,” he said. “But we look for other options because we do have hope.”
Among those who helped the couple was Nancy Bennett, a Glen church member whose sister, Gloria Cannon, received treatment at Hope 4 Cancer in 2015 after breast cancer spread to her brain. Although Cannon died the following year, Bennett said that the experience provided comfort during her sister’s final months.
“She felt loved,” Bennett recalled. “She felt cared for.”
Cannon became friends with the facility’s founder, Dr. Antonio Jimenez. Bennett contacted him about Tommy’s situation, asking whether financial assistance was available. It was not, but Jimenez donated $5,000 toward Tommy’s treatment in Cannon’s memory.
For Bennett, helping Tommy was deeply personal. After losing her sister, she found support at Glen Cove Christian. She recalled hesitantly entering the church for the first time three years ago and asking Tommy whether she was allowed to attend.
“He said, welcome home,” Bennett recalled.
Tommy later baptized her, and Bennett credits his family with helping her rebuild her life. “Tommy and his family have helped me immensely,” she said. “And my whole life has really come alive now.”
Despite his illness, Tommy continues preaching most Sundays and overseeing church programs. In September he traveled to Kentucky for the Enthusiasm Experience, a multi-day personal development event he founded. He and Tammy have also been taking ballroom dancing lessons.
Still, his physical limitations have become more noticeable. “I need a little more sleep than I used to,” he said. “It takes me a little longer to get ready for the day. I take more naps than I used to.”
Church leaders have assumed some of his responsibilities, allowing him to rest when necessary.
The three-week-long trip to Cancún will mean the couple will spend Thanksgiving away from their two children, another sacrifice during an uncertain year.
Tammy hopes their experience will encourage others facing overwhelming circumstances. “If what we’re going through can make somebody else stronger,” she said, “it can give somebody else inspiration and hope.”
She acknowledged the uncertainty of her husband’s prognosis, but remains determined to face it with faith. “I want people to realize, hey, if we’re facing death, then that’s what we’re facing,” she said. “But until that point gets here, we’re going forward with hope.”
For Tommy, healing remains the ultimate goal. But amid the setbacks, the community’s generosity has already given him something profound.
“I have not shed a tear over the fact that I have cancer,” he said, “but I shed a lot of tears — happy tears — because of the overwhelming love that has been shown to us through all this.”
