Strangers

The other day I spent awhile in a hospital waiting room, with a family whose loved one was in surgery.  This is not an uncommon privilege; as a pastor and volunteer hospital chaplain I have spent a lot of hours in such situations. This was a large hospital, so there were many individuals waiting for news about their patient. Some were obviously close knit family groups (as was the family I was with), some showed signs of tension within their group—not anxiety about the person in surgery but signs of strained relationships. Others showed concern, in the way they talked with each other, the way they looked at the clock or the way they could not sit still.  Still others were relaxed and cheerful. For some the wait was long, but seemingly expected. For others as the wait lengthened the concern level increased.  Body language and unconscious behavior tells a lot.

From early on there was a teenager nearby. He was alone, quiet, intently playing an old handheld electronic game.  After while, when the family group I was with had left for a break, he pulled a Styrofoam tray with two long filled pastries out of his backpack. He offered me one, and his expression showed relief when I said no thank you. Otherwise, he sat wordless playing for quite awhile, and then disappeared.

Soon after he left, my family came back and an older gentleman sat down and struck up a conversation with us. He was a fascinating individual, having worked in the medical insurance field for several years. Retired, he took up photography. He was waiting for his wife, who has to have dialysis three times a week, and who was having a related surgical procedure.  Unlike the teenager who had been so quiet, he was talkative with lots of stories from a well-lived life. It came out after while that his wife was declining, and one could tell he was aware the end was coming for her in the near future, but he was dealing with it. Yet, talking seemed a way for him to relax, as it became apparent the procedure was taking longer than expected. Finally the doctor came out, and he was off to see his wife. Before he left he gave me a copy of a poem he had written. He prefaced this by saying he was not a religious man, but a very spiritual one. (He and his wife were very musical, and had led choirs and sang solo in one of the larger churches in town.) It is a poem with a lot of depth, and I may share it with you here sometime.

Then the teenager came back. This time he was anxious, and very talkative. No more games. He wanted to talk. He had been there, totally alone, for over 8 hours while his mother was in surgery and he was becoming more than anxious as the expected time for the surgery to end passed—fear was taking hold and he was trying to fend it off by talking. Before I left, with uncertainty he asked if I would pray for his mother. I sat and listened to him for a long, long time as he flitted from one subject to another, talking faster and fidgeting more and more as time went on. He had no one supportive with him, and was at a loss how to deal with his emotions or where to turn.  I was relieved when the doctor finally came and took him off to tell him the outcome. He was going to spend the night in the room with his mother.

Encounters with two strangers, one with a lot of life experience, a depth of spirituality and friends a cell phone call away that gave him strength and something solid onto which to hold.  He might not be religious, in that he does not find any one church group having what he needs, but he has no doubts about a power greater than us all who can give peace, strength, and a sense of purpose. He is at peace with God as he has encountered God.

On the other hand, a teenager whose only source of support was his mother who could not provide any comfort at all now when he desperately needed it. No one had given him the tools with which to cope alone. He had no one to call, no idea how to pray let alone to whom to pray. Deep loneliness and fear, fear of the unknown and what the future might hold, were almost too much for him to bear by the time the doctor came by to tell him his mother had done okay. My relief was almost as great as his.

As an on-call chaplain I have sat with a lot of individuals and families, all strangers, at times of emergency, or worse. I am there because they are at a loss how to cope with what is happening, and they do not have a pastor or a church family for support. At this moment of crisis, they reach out to grasp at what they suddenly realize they have needed for their lifetime but have no idea now how to secure.  Too often for their loved one it is too late. Life is fragile and now is gone. The tragedy of their loss is magnified by the tragedy of finding themselves without the hope or the kind of support only a relationship with God can bring.

Those of us who do have a relationship with God are called to be attentive to those around us who are not only not religious, but who give no thought to God at all.  We are called upon to stand out by the way we live, so that others will see our belief and faith in our behavior. As we go through our lives, we are observed by everyone we meet, sometimes intently, especially by children and others with whom we are around often. Words we might speak have no meaning if we behave no differently than those for whom God is unknown and therefore irrelevant day to day. Scripture teaches, “They will know we are Christians by our love.” What do others see in us and from us?  What does God?