If you've had a chance to see it, you begin to realize how degrading surgery is for a person. I'm not trying to paint a bad picture of medicine here, or criticize doctors and nurses in any way, but after spending time watching people get various things cut out or off, I'm pretty sure that I'm going to eat my veggies, keep jogging and try to stay off that table as long as possible.
I visited one patient with Dr. T today before he went into the operating room for a hernia repair. An inguinal hernia (bulging out of intestinal or other contents between two layers of fascia (tissue) in the lower abdominal region) can be safely performed with local anesthetic and some sedation. It isn't a pleasant procedure, but there is no need to go through the risk of general anesthetic and intubation for a 15-minute uncomplicated surgery. However, this patient had asked to be knocked out completely for the procedure as he was quite nervous and had his reasons, I suppose.
Dr. T asked him to cough while he felt to see if the hernia would protrude. I always feel especially bad for my male patients in that sort of situation, but I try to remain professional, and remind myself that I am a doctor and I am here to help them and they really haven't got anything I haven't seen before. Well, usually. This unfortunate fellow happened to have cultivated an exceptional amount of hair from his beard down to his ankles.
Dr. T is a hands-on teacher and he gets me to palpate and assess funny lumps and bulges along with him, and poor Mr. G stared at the floor and I had the feeling he was willing me into nonexistence. After the pre-operative assessment, the next time I saw him, he was lying on the table in the operating room covered in a blanket while the anesthetist started the anesthetic. He began to drift slowly off to sleep and as soon as he was gone, the anesthetist tilted his head back and stuffed a plastic tube in and attached it to the pump and taped it in place. He put tape over the man's eyes to keep them from opening and one of the nurses removed his carefully arranged blankets. We prodded and pushed him into a convenient position for the surgery and then Dr. T took out a razor and began to shave him for the incision. As I cleaned up the fallen hair with a sticky glove I thought, I wonder if he knew he was getting an asymmetrical shave of the nether regions today. The circulating nurse began to swab him down with antiseptic and then he was draped with sterile drapes.
When everything was ready Dr. T made the first cut. I'm always amazed at how roughly it seems the tissue is handled. Sometimes the surgeon's whole hand (or both) will be inside, prodding and pulling, and then there are the retractors that seem to dig into the flesh and pull it open wider than it looks it can go. The electric cautery burns through the flesh and blood vessels are tied and snipped and the herniated sac was removed and plastic mesh put in place to prevent recurrence and he was stitched up again, after jamming a needle full of local anesthetic into the raw tissue. A quick swab and a bandage over top and the drapes are pulled off and the poor naked man is lying there and then covered up and eventually the tube is taken out and he wakes up and wonders why he looks the same as he did before but everything seems to ache.
Let me tell you, if you ever watched hemorrhoid or hernia surgery you'd drink prune juice three times a day.
Is all that pain and trauma necessary? The irony is that it will heal him. In order to heal him, good Dr. T has to injure him first.
The spiritual parallels are not lost on me. A couple of days ago I was feeling particularly low and I happened upon a verse in Lamentations. The writer is lamenting about all the hard things that have happened to him. In the past I always missed the most important word of the chapter: He. He, meaning God.
“He has driven me away and made me walk in darkness rather than light....He has surrounded me with bitterness and darkness....He has barred my way with blocks of stone....He pierced my heart with arrows from his quiver.”
Sounds like a cruel God, doesn't he? Why would God be responsible for causing pain? Is it payment for sin? But no, that is not the case. Farther in the chapter the author concludes, “His compassions never fail... they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness....It is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord...let (him) sit alone in silence, for the Lord has laid it on him.” (Lamentations 3)
I pondered over the strange dichotomy in those verses. If the Lord is so compassionate and faithful, why does he purposefully cause pain and suffering? Why does he purposely shut out our prayers? Why does he purposely hurt me?
I know that sometimes the answer is that I have sinned and these are the natural consequences. And I know that in the bigger picture, I also partake of the consequences of the sin of all humanity. Yet I am coming to believe that God purposely causes suffering (at least in my life!) not because of my specific sin but because he loves me and is wanting to train me.
In surgery, when the patient is not incapacitated enough, and suddenly starts to move during surgery, the results can be disastrous. A quick slip of the knife and there goes a major artery. So the anesthetist straps them down, doses them up with sedatives, keeps them still. It is only in that perfect stillness that the doctor's perfect work can be done.
I think God is asking that of me too. To sit quietly, to wait patiently, to accept that pain is coming directly out of his loving, gentle hand. It is painful, it is degrading and humiliating sometimes, it is terrible, I can't see the end, but I know by faith that the Lord is good and he is faithful and he is loving.
“I say to myself, the Lord is my portion. Therefore I will wait for him.”
And unlike surgery assisted by an eager medical student, there is no danger of God screwing up.
2 comments:
Ok Im going to stir the pot a little. I think that the Lamentations in the bible was pre Christs grace and Sacrifice. I think that what we experience today as a feeling of seperation from God is different from what they experienced in the old testament. The had no real way to a relationship with God but through an elaborate set of rules and sacrifice that caused seperation between the average isrealite and God because of sin. I think that the seperation we feel today is caused by our own choices and the fact that it rains on the righteous and unrighteous. Do we really have wilderness experiences or is our perspective facing in the wrong direction? Philip Yancey in whats so amazing about grace has an interesting story/ example about a friend of his that decides to use Gods grace for his own benefit. Philip asks him afew years later how its working out for him and he says God and I arent that close. which would indicate that at some point This fellow got away from God or God abandoned this fellow for his indiscretion. But yanceys perspective was interesting in that he felt God had not gone any where nor had the fellow been able to seperate himself from God but that the guy had turned around and was looking in the wrong direction for God. All he needed to do was turn around and God was waiting right there for him but he had made the decision with his own free will and now he was living the consequence. The concept being that there is nothing you can do to make God love you less and nothing you can do to make God love you more. Its only when we decide to through our own freedom of choice into the mix that we make things difficult. My buddy Mark wanted to be a truck driver and he decided that was what he was going to do come hell of high water. But it was the stupidest thing he was going to do to get it done. He came to timothy with me and he was struggling and god met him and when he got home there was a job waiting for him in his old field of care work. and he didnt want it but it was staring him in the face and undeniablly God. So he called and said its such a tough decision what should I do. I said No its not. You take the job and see what happens. So he calls the EI People that had him in the course in castlegar and he talks to the employment agency that was puttingit all together and they are upset and give him a hard time but he sticks to his guns and they turn around and completely revamp the deal they had going for him. he ends up taking a course in Kelowna part time days in 4 weeks instead of 8 in castlegar ( did I mention his wife is pregnant and due 3rd week of august) So hes home everynight instead of camping for 8 weeks by himself. He finishes the course and 3 days later has an interview then two days later and orientation and today was his first full day of training at one of the largest food supply companies with huge benefits and family programs. He is absolutely floored by Gods goodness. the care home was absolute crap. the owner was a crook and he felt like he had made the wrong choice but had it not been for the whole experience he would have probably got divorced or at the least experienced some major marital discord. So was it god putting Mark through the paces or Mark putting himself through it. I dont know .... You can tell me im wrong at fintry or debate it some more it could be fun. But im pretty convinved that we are the cause of most of our angst in our lives.
I agree with Heather. I think that God does allow/cause pain in our lives because it is for a greater purpose than what we can see. So often, the outcomes that we are focused on and think are most important, are so unimportant to God. I also think that God does not answer our prayers at times, again for reasons greater than we can understand, and it is not necessarily as a 'punishment' or result of our own actions, it is God doing it out of his love and grace for us because the end result will produce whatever it is that is His desire.
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