this past saturday at the refuge we talked about how faith and doubt can exist in the same situation. it’s a little like the optical illusion images that most of us have seen, the one where you either see a vase or the profile of two people looking at each other. it just depends how we look at the picture/situation. we tend to vacillate back and forth, but we never seem to be able to focus on one or the other for a long period of time.
my brother worked in a hospital when he was in high school. as a janitor, he cleaned the bloody mess after the operations. my dad also told of his experience in world war II. because he signed a form saying he wanted to major in medicine when he went to college, this 18 year old, wet behind the ears, small town boy, was made a medic. he didn’t have a rifle to defend himself with. just a cross on his back which, according to the geneva convention, meant he was off limits to shoot. he thought it sometimes seemed like a target for the enemy to shot at. training was minimal. the best thing a medic had were the packs of morphine to stop the patients’ pain. dad often mused that he didn’t know how many men he helped or how many he killed with the morphine, he did the best he could.
recently, a safe haven for me has felt like a battlefield. many good people are suffering such traumatic experiences that i had been feeling bad that i seemed to be the only one left standing. that all shifted in late september when i and hundreds of good people were informed that we would probably have no jobs in 2 months. not feeling sorry for myself was pretty easy. i’m in pretty good shape despite my lack of using sound financial processes most of my life. but it will impact my time and my ability to live as i’m accustomed. the day after receiving this news, i awakened to a text from a friend that i hoped would never come, but i knew in my heart was fairly certain was unavoidable. it simply said: she did commit suicide. my friend and i, both bleeding now, sat crying at starbucks. the tears fell all day until there were no more. my heart breaks for precious friends.
oh, if i could help them. but i’m like my little brother. not a nurse. not a doctor. just a janitor, cleaning up the blood. like my dad giving morphine to stop the pain. waiting for a doctor to come.
that same week i went to a house of refuge hoping to get some love (tourniquets is what i call it for it stops the bleeding) and hope (that would be the morphine that stops the pain.) the pharmacist there handed out tourniquets and morphine to each of us. i picked up a little more from my friends and left. driving home it dawned on me that she didn’t get either. i knew i needed to share my hope/morphine with her the next time i saw her.
i took some before i went to bed and things seemed better. when i awoke, as is my habit i checked my e-mail. when i saw a certain name i knew something was wrong. as i opened it up, blood gushed from my computer. the pain poured out of massive wounds. i look around, and the morphine was gone. i’d used some last night, but not all of it. the enemy had taken it while i slept, and there was none to give her.
driving to work that day i knew i needed some God. i was fresh out. as i walked from my car, into the store where i worked, i was amazed how, in one day, a place could go from a grocery store to a mortuary. a place of death of dreams. more people bleeding.
i have to leave. i need healing. my friends need healing. now, i sit in the emergency room. i’m feeling tired and overwhelmed. but i keep putting dirty tourniquets on and try to tighten others while i look for more morphine. i hear a voice that sounds faintly like mine. it says. “if the Great Physician in in the hospital, would He please come to the emergency room.” i really hope He’s on His way, but sometimes i’m beginning to doubt it.
but then i get these little glimpses that maybe the Doctor really is on His way. i remember seeing the notes posted on the bulletin board, thanking Him for the care He gave. and then i see a recovery room that is full of healing patients, ready to be discharged. and i hear the charge nurse say; “He has come here every day since this hospital was built. He just doesn’t seem to be on the same schedule as the rest of us.”
i am betting the Doctor will show up. He somehow always seems to in the end. at least that is what i believe right now.
Oh Mike, I resonate so so much with what you are saying. It is so damn hard to be surrounded with a seemingly constant influx of urgent need. It can feel like a dam springing so many leaks, and fingers already very wrinkled from plugging the previous series of holes. Know that you have faithful company in the emergency room! So glad to be in the hospital wings with you. Love you.