Royal North Shore Hospital August Prayers

we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.
1 Corinthians 1: 23-24 NIV

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Pray for ‘a woman and a man struggling’…

I return to a patient and his wife. An enthusiast of Bosai, perhaps 30 plants. They suspect the Legionnaire’s disease he is recovering from was caught repotting. An induced coma, and an almost death. A somewhat reluctant receiving of a prayer of Thanksgiving? The wife voices that they have had more of their fair share of challenges. Other people seem to sail through life without a trouble or without a care. A quiet anger seeps. He seems philosophical, spiritual.  I return later in the week hoping to explore further. I raise it. And she depreciates, he is an internal processor, she external. I briefly touch on the story of Job, as a never-ending story, which does not so much as answer our experience as resonate with it. And Jurgen Klopp, the former Liverpool coach, reflecting on the untimely death of a player, “this is a moment where I struggle! There must be a bigger purpose! But I can’t see it!” Lord be with this couple in their struggling.  Read and pray Job 12, especially verses 1-6.

Give thanks for ‘an attentive volunteer’…

A referral from a volunteer. Just a name, ward, and bed, with no details of his concerns. He tells me his story slowly and deliberately. A seizure, aged 12, which repeat throughout his life. He finishes the Higher School Certificate. He works for many years and then increasing lack of dexterity results in early retirement. Recently, it has become harder and harder to do the daily things of life, like the shopping. A week ago, another seizure results in challenges to the left side of his body, including walking. The seizure was scary. He is worried about his health, his life, what another seizure might led to. He is worried about his move into a residential home out of his apartment of 30 years. We name ‘anxiousness’. I ask what the speech pathologist suggests? The social worker has suggested a psychologist. We explore Jesus’ and Paul’s thoughts on anxiousness: seeking God’s kingdom and prayer. I write some key words on his whiteboard to ponder and suggest I will return later in the week to see how his experimenting goes? Giving thanks and pray using Matthew 6: 15-34 & Philippians 4: 5-6.

Give thanks for ‘a young doctor’…

We meet for lunch. We discuss a Bible Study they led during the week, the first in 7 years. They used to lead youth group, but the randomness of shift work has made such things impossible. We discuss the chapter explored, 1 Corinthians 3, and the book. We digress to compare the relatively clear structure of Romans and its focus on Jewish and Gentile Christians with the more obtuse structure of moving from the wisdom of the cross to the resurrection of Jesus Christ and the seemingly random challenges in between of the Corinthian Church. We wonder how the trajectory of cross to resurrection plays into these themes. As we pray, we touch on our personal lives. Give thanks for Christian staff and students living, working, studying and bearing witness with their lives and their words. Read and pray, 1 Corinthians 3, and 1 Corinthians 1: 23-24.

A patient and his wife receive me enthusiastically. They wish to reconnect with God. She asks will God receive me after so long.  Her husband rehearses their back story… Catholicism (she), Lutheranism (him), Buddhism (both), Meister Eckhart, the psychology of Freud, Jung, and Frankl and more recently, a local church, Adventist, and a neighbour, a young person, doing the Alpha course. I retell the story of the two sons, Luke 15: 11-32, she knows the story well. We explore sin as repentance, forgiveness and embrace and sin as self-righteousness and withdrawal. We note sin as falling short of a mark and trespass of a law. Grace precedes practice. A change of heart before a change of behaviour. She will ask about what happens when we die? He will ask, what about other religions? And I will suggest Christianity Explored at their local church.  Read and pray Luke 15, especially verses 13-17.

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Chaplain Andrew Osborn 0497 414 388 andrew.osborn@anglicare.org.au