Category: Hospital Ministry

A Jon Post

My dad read a book a few months back about excess and the American lifestyle. It stirred something in him and he made several personal commitments as a result, including giving away many of the excess clothes he owned.

My dad has worked in the corporate world for years and one of the more enjoyable parts of that job is that he plays a lot of golf and gets to collect a metric ton of golf shirts along the way. You know those really cool shiny ones with that “Sweat wicking technology”, or the ones that have some strange relationship with helium so they kinda weigh less than air, or (my personal favorites) the ones that are so in tuned with the game of golf they were hand woven by the 80-year-old blind Scottish widows of the great Scottish golfing gods of the peat and they are guaranteed to reduce your golf score by at least 3 strokes? Yeah, my dad collected a bunch of those different kinds of golf shirts along the way.

So he read this book and realized that he has a bunch of scottish-hand-woven-sweat-wicking-helium golf shirts and he doesn’t wear about 90% of them. So he called me up and asked me if I could give away any he might send me! Despite our general decision to not pass out gifts to everyone (we try to keep our relationships based on the time we have with people, not the free things we might hand out) I made an exception for my father and told him I could. I have many friends here, old and young, who show up at the hospital not imagining they will be spending the next 6-12 months in the hospital living with a mere one or two outfits.

A few boxes in the mail later and I happily showed up at the hospital with a backpack full of top-of-the-line men’s golf shirts. I handed them out to the men I knew there and explained they were from my father. They all expressed their immense gratitude to him and I passed along the word of thanks in a phone call.

I occasionally see one or two of my friends there wearing their shirt but it is rare. These are scottish-hand-woven-sweat-wicking-helium golf shirts, not to be worn on any regular old day!

When I gave Nelson his shirt, he smiled broadly and held it up and fingered the smooth texture gently. His quiet nature did not allow for expressive shows of gratitude, loud words, or big hugs. He just looked me squarely in the eyes and solemnly said “thank you” with a smile. He didn’t say it but the way he held it made me think it may be the nicest shirt he had.

I didn’t see him wear the shirt until yesterday.

Last week Nelson’s health deteriorated from smiling, walking, eating and talking to bed-ridden and barely able to breathe. I don’t know if a tumor metastasized or if there was something else but he quickly lost the ability to communicate beyond muffled moans and murmurs to indicate mostly yes’s or no’s. I’ve spent much of the last 8 days visits sitting by his side… praying for miracles and praying for mercy.

Yesterday I walked in and found him much the same; lying on his side, holding his head with his hands as if he could push the pain out with his trembling fingers, and waiting for his miracle. Most of the time a person is admitted here they will wear their standard issue hospital clothes; light blue scrub top and bottoms. Nelson is no exception and up until yesterday he was wearing the same hospital clothes he nearly always wore. But this visit, I noticed, peeking out from the top of his blanket, a black, sweat-wicking collar above a butter smooth, tan-colored golf shirt.

Nelson had somehow found the strength that morning to put on his best shirt. At first I didn’t catch the significance. I smiled and remembered the way his eyes never left the black raven embroidered onto the breast as I handed it to him a few weeks ago.
Then I realized that Nelson was wearing his best shirt even in his desperate sickness. With a sigh, a deep pain and a deep longing for what Nelson had already realized, I sat down next to his bed and began to pray. Nelson’s miracle is coming soon. I held Nelson’s hand and prayed that God would smile with Nelson as he would soon be entering the throne room of grace wearing his best shirt and walking with a straight leg and back. Despite my failure to communicate with him about preparing to meet the Creator Who Smiles, he had taken it upon himself to look his best for that face-to-face meeting.

Nelson’s miracle is coming soon.

I’ll miss my friend.

A Layne Post

“Isn’t today Monday?” she asked, a bit perplexed.

“Yes. I can’t come tomorrow, so I wanted to come today,” I explained.

I usually visit the Dermatology ward on Tuesdays, and Jon keeps Anaya at home. I knew Alice had been there a long time, but I didn’t realize how long. She had become a regular visit for me, always insisting on my prayers before I left. She is from Maputo and her husband visits near daily. While Jon and I try and focus on those without visitors, sometimes someone just catches a place in your heart, and that’s what Alice has done. The second week I visited and remembered her name, she was delighted! (I am not always so successful in this area, but I do try! In this case it helped that our  ministry partner’s name is Alice.) She is usually full of optimism, but I’ve watched the expression on her face change as time has passed.  Yesterday when I asked her if she would be completing two months there, she scoffed, “Two months? No! This will be five months!”

Five months.

She has watched every other patient in the ward come and go. Sometimes she has someone in the room with her, sometimes there are weeks she is alone. Some 20 plus hours, alone.

The hospital is slowly renovating their wards, but unfortunately, they haven’t made it to Dermatology, which is in dire need. I want to respect the hospital, so I will not describe all that I see, but the conditions are not nice, especially for living there five months.

I laid in bed last night praying for Alice, thinking that I just cannot imagine being in her place. I tried and I just can’t. I have been a bit sulky about my husband taking an upcoming trip, about the weather, about some minor health nuisances that have come with this pregnancy, but last night those things seemed so trivial, so “doable”. And I was encouraged.

So maybe this week there are some things that have got you down, that seem like a lot, that seem hard to handle or perhaps just a nuisance, and maybe you can remember Alice. Maybe it will encourage you, like it did me.

A Jon Post

I had surgery on my left shoulder a few years back. I remember waking up in agony, begging for a drug to numb the pain. I remember the slightest tremor in my wide, soft hospital bed sending knives through my left arm, shoulder, neck, and chest.

I remember the state-of-the-art morphine drip seemingly doing nothing.

I remember trying to sleep… sleep was by far the worst of it all. Awake after, at most, an hour of sleep  because of an uncontrollable quiver of my arm ripping at perfectly placed stitches. Awake after another hour because rolling slightly on the high quality mattress I slept on caused my shoulder to erupt in agony.

I remember trying to sleep… trying… for a month.

So when 16-year-old Antonio went into surgery this week for a tumor on his neck/shoulder,

I remembered…

On Tuesday his surgery went well, his daily text message informed me. On Wednesday morning his message seemed to indicate he was doing well.

Later that afternoon when I walked into the room he shares with 7 others in the surgery recovery ward I could see the toll it took on him to simply roll to his side so he could face me on his twin bed.

“How are you friend?” I asked, hopeful.

“Not great Uncle Jon.” came the reply, “It’s hard to sleep.”

I remembered…

And looking at his little bed that he shares with his faithfully attending dad I knew…

My memories are nothing compared to this.

Antonio’s weary eyes glanced up at me as I told him I wanted to pray for his rest. His lips tugged at a smile but even that effort seemed overwhelming for him.

Antonio’s smiling father walked in with some cookies he’d scrounged up for his son.

“Matakatira! (Good afternoon!)” he greeted me in his language, Mandão.

“Good afternoon friend! Are you well?” My broken barely coherent Mandão returned.

His eyes glanced over his son and I saw the worry there.

“I am well,” he replied, “but my son is not.”

He rattled off a new Mandão phrase that I didn’t understand yet and I smiled and reaffirmed my gratitude for his effort in teaching me his language.

“I was just about to pray for Antonio. Would you join me?” I asked.

A smile and a “Yes” later, our hearts heavy and our heads bowed, we prayed for rest.

And my words and groans joined with Antonio’s and his dad’s as we expressed how eagerly we wait for the redemption of our bodies.

And  because my words fail even now as I write this, I pleaded with The Spirit to groan with me and for Antonio’s rest.

For now, Antonio’s unredeemed body needs rest.