This week I had occasion to spend a couple of days with my best friend in the major trauma section of the emergency ward at our local hospital. It was stressful to say the least and because of the nature of that person’s illness, it also was fairly quiet (quiet, at least, for an emergency ward). I sat without speaking much, a huge challenge for me, and sometimes read. Mostly I pondered and prayed.
That person is home now and slowly improving, but the thoughts garnered during that time continue to take precedence. Death or permanent impairment could easily have happened, although thank God, neither did but out of that experience some of the following questions burned themselves into my mind and heart: First, what are my greatest challenges? Next, how do I best meet them? And, last but far from least, what am I doing to avoid finding myself in the same situation as my friend?
Here are the three answers I came up with to those three questions. My greatest challenges include deciding priorities in my life, deciding which risks are wise choices and which are foolish or unnecessary and, yielding to the temptation to eat the wrong thing at the wrong time.
I decided I could best address challenges by recognizing and planning my defences. Taking risks will have to be evaluated carefully, contrary to my “by nature” impulsive reactions to many situations.
The doctor attending to a different patient unknowingly provided encouragement and confirmation to me regarding an eating plan. I couldn’t help but overhear his words to a grossly obese gentleman in the next bed and the advice he gave him involved exactly the same regime as I began last year.
PS: The same three temptations were thrown at Jesus (Luke 4). He overcame and through Him, so can we.
