Who Cares? 2001

Sharing Christ with patients

A junior doctor discusses some experiences from her first few months as a House Officer in an inner-city hospital.

The place

A friend from church once said that she would be challenged to think of a place that had more diversity under its roof than one of our dear old NHS Trusts. So many people, from so many backgrounds, all with distinct needs. One cannot help but draw a parallel with numerous characters Jesus encountered during his earthly ministry. Legion, the demon-possessed man (Luke 8:27-33); the lady troubled with menorrhagia (Luke 8:42-48); the paralytic who reinvented the grand entrance (Luke 5:17-20) and, of course, the invalid of Bethesda (John 5:1-15).

Jesus turned these individual’s lives upside down. One minute He was there and the next they were healed. They didn’t even have to come back for a follow-up appointment. Healing from incurable, chronic conditions - no problem for the Creator of the Universe. This is, however, only a fraction of the story.

Back to the beginning of the Gospels, where we meet John the Baptist. He was the prequel to Jesus: the man who told of His coming. Did he wear a sandwich board advertising Jesus’ miraculous powers? ‘Free miracles - get yourself healed.’ Of course not. His words were far more sobering: ‘Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is near.’ (Matt 3:2). This was the key to Jesus’ message, the establishment of the New Covenant, the forgiveness of sins achieved by Jesus’ sacrifice for us at Calvary. This is the true Good News of the Gospels.

Picture the scene

Let’s whiz forward in time to the 21st Century. You’re sitting in A&E (Accident and Emergency) with your NHS coffee getting cold. You have eight more patients to see. In front of you sits a middle-aged lady. She has a chest infection, smokes too much and is a poor historian. Just as you are about to reach the end of your tether, she bursts into tears telling you she has no hope for the future. You mentally add 20 minutes onto the consultation. What do you say? It would be very easy to mumble ‘Don’t worry,’ start her on 400 mg of ofloxacin and shuffle out wouldn’t it?

As Christians we are called to be ‘imitators of God’. (Eph 5:1). Jesus himself was no stranger to dealing with social problems. He dealt with his ‘patients’ with great compassion and sincerity, healing them where necessary but always whetting their appetite for more knowledge of the Father (John 4:13-15; 21-24.). Jesus would have seen that lady in A&E and loved her. He would have unselfishly listened to her worries and let her in on the Good News.

Day to day

If I’m honest, sharing Christ with patients is one of the most difficult things I do. I find it very difficult to ‘clinicalise’ God, to see him among the maze of day-to-day duties that I undertake. I am also frightened: What if I offend? What if that nice old lady decides to re-proclaim the Good News to my consultant on the ward round the next morning? Is it appropriate anyway?

We have seen that our Master felt it was supremely important and this in itself is a super encouragement. Paul also put his seal of approval on faith-sharing countless times in the New Testament. Being active in sharing one’s faith may sound scary but it is incredibly rewarding at the same time.

Prayer changes things

So, sharing our faith is an integral part of our walk with God. But where do we start?

Firstly we must pray. Commit the day to the Lord and let Him lead you to those patients He has earmarked for you. I remember being led by the Spirit to an alcoholic man with the DTs. I asked him if he had a faith that helped him at a time like this or was he not sure about these kind of things (a great conversation opener).

He opened his heart about his longing to get back into a relationship with God. I offered to pray for him and he accepted Jesus into his life. I finished to find that Sister was giving me Paddington-Bear-style hard stares and the old lady next door was frantically adjusting her hearing aid so she could hear better!

For the busy doctor, time is one of the biggest obstacles to prayer. Mostly my prayers are mumbled when I’m frantically scrabbling for notes, loitering in the dinner queue or waiting for the switchboard to answer the phone. They’re usually variations of ‘Lord, please show me who to pause with today’. However, God is faithful and will graciously uphold our most feeble attempts and do more with them than we could ever imagine (Eph 3:20).

Seasoned with salt

The second part of our witness is talking about the Lord; telling people the good news ourselves. Paul put it bluntly in Rom 10:14: ‘How then can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard?’

It is clearly not appropriate to launch into a Gospel presentation every time we interview a patient. We need to discern God’s will by prayer, evangelising those to whom we feel He is calling us. Asking patients if they have a faith during the social history is an effective and non-threatening way to open a conversation about Jesus. The question of faith becomes profoundly important to many people when faced with illness and death. Sensitive questioning can draw these issues to the surface and open them up.

Only recently have I finally mustered up the courage to drop the question about faith into the social history. It took an awful lot of prayer from myself and others before it got easier. I remember the first time I asked it. I must have asked that lady every conceivable question about her social life; what day-centre she went to, how many times a week she went to Tesco, the colour of her dog - I just couldn’t get the question out. I felt God tell me to get a move on and out came the question: ‘Er, do you have a faith that helps you at a time like this?’, ‘You what, dear?’ She answered. ‘A faith - you know religion, like Jesus’, I said, turning crimson.

We had a great chat after that and I thank the Lord for giving me the strength to initiate it and carry it through. Once we’ve shared Christ with patients, it may be appropriate to pray with them if they so desire. The last time I did this, I was surprised to find the three ladies in the opposite beds joining in! They were all Christians so this particular patient ended up with a large helping of prayer ministry for the rest of her stay!

The Servant King

So we’ve talked to patients and we’ve prayed for them. Let me just finish this discussion by saying something about service. ‘Just as the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve. . .’ (Matt 20:28). How can we serve our patients as Jesus would have done?

Lack of time is one of the big enemies of all health professionals. So, knock this on the head, first make time for people. Stop, even if for a few seconds. Ask patients how they are. Be like the apostle Timothy and take a genuine interest in their welfare (Phil 2:20). It is all too easy to look at a patient and see a walking disease process rather than a person created in the image of God.

If you’re an obsessive planner like me, prescription forms waved in your face and relatives wanting to talk to you when you are in the middle of something can seriously shorten your fuse. I used to dash round the ward with the notes trolley à la ‘Supermarket Sweep’, eyes down, mind firmly focused on my current mission - the ward round. Then I went back to the Bible. Jesus’ agenda was clear. Luke 5:31-32: ‘I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.’ Much of Jesus’ ministry as recorded in the Gospels was carried out through distractions. Let us take a leaf out of our Master’s book. Medicine certainly requires daily planning but not at the expense of dealing badly with interruptions.

Service in hospitals can also mean turning the tables on the age-old medical hierarchical system that seems to exist in many establishments. It is all too easy to don your white coat together with the ‘little god’ complex that so often comes with being a doctor. Jesus teaches that many ‘who are first will be last’, and vice versa (Matt 19:30).

It is all too easy to refuse to do something for a patient because it is ‘the nurse’s job’ or to make a mess and expect the domestic staff to clear up after you (guilty as charged on more than one occasion!). Be different, try to help the ward staff out when you’re not busy, be prepared to lend a hand with things that may not be in your job description. It’s a great witness to the humility and serventhood of Christ.

I continue to be awe-inspired by the wonderful way that God manages to use us Christian healthcare workers, with all our inadequacies, to reach out to patients. I really want to encourage those of you who have been thinking about faith sharing to go ahead and take the plunge. Recently, on take, I met a wonderful lady :

She was close to death and physically looked awful. As I sat down and took her hand, she turned and smiled at me. Her thin, wasted frame paled into insignificance as I saw the light and vivacity in her eyes. Almost automatically, I asked her if she knew Jesus. ‘Oh yes, Doctor, I know ’im’, she answered. ‘He’s sitting on my bed right next to you.’ That old lady died knowing she would soon be in the presence of our Lord. Her joy was irrepressible. It is this experience of seeing Jesus change lives and welcome home those we cannot save which makes hospital ministry so worthwhile.

Jesus himself was no stranger to dealing with social problems. He dealt with his ‘patients’ with great compassion and sincerity, healing them where necessary but always whetting their appetite for more knowledge of the Father.