Spoke with someone today who recently had surgery. He said it was routine. Cutting up a person hardly seems routine, not to mention being the one under the knife.
At one point in our conversation, he began to chuckle. “What is it?” I asked. “Oh, I finally figured out what the call button was for.” Now, this man is no stranger to hospitals. He used to be a pastor and chaplain. “What do you mean, ‘you just figured it out?’”
“I was able to witness to every staff person on that floor. The head nurse was already a Christian so when he came in a second time I asked if another could visit since I had something to say. Before long, I could hear them in the hall saying to each other, ‘It’s your turn, I’ve already spoken with him today’.”
This may not be your style, he’s in his 70′s, which probably gives him some latitude. The part of his story that caught my attention was the discussion he overheard at 3 am one night. They were actually complaining that they would miss the Bible study started at the head nurse’s house just to talk about the things this man had brought up in their lives. I thought he would be dismissed, especially in this cynical, Christian suspicious world. But not these nurses. They wanted to know more and took him seriously enough to start a Bible study.
God never ceases to amaze me. My friend was recovering from surgery but he never lost sight of what he is about in this world – drawing others to a deeper intimacy with Christ (pre-evangelistically, evangelistically or even in discipleship). I like that.
Call buttons… Now I know what they are really there for.
