Since I was way overdue, I ordered the works. One
nurse put me on a table and stuck little cold suction cups to my chest. Another
nurse wrapped a heavy band around my arm and squeezed a black bulb until my arm
tingled. Then they pricked my finger (which always hurts) and told me to fill up
a cup (which is always awkward). Then, with all the preliminaries done, they put
me in a room and told me to take off my shirt and wait on the doctor.
There is something about being poked, pushed,
measured, and drained that makes you feel like a head of lettuce in the produce
department. I sat on a tiny stool and stared at the wall.
May I tell you something you know, but may have
forgotten? Somebody in your world feels like I felt in that office. The daily
push and shove of the world has a way of leaving us worked over and worn out.
Someone in your gallery of people is sitting on a cold aluminum stool of
insecurity, clutching the backside of a hospital gown for fear of exposing what
little pride he or she has left. And that person desperately needs a word of
peace.
Someone needs you to do for them what Dr. Jim did for
me.
Jim is a small-town doctor in a big city. He still
remembers names and keeps pictures of babies he delivered on his office bulletin
board. And though you know he's busy, he makes you feel you are his only
patient.
After a bit of small talk and a few questions about my
medical history, he put down my file and said, "Let me take off my doctor hat
for a minute and talk to you as a friend."
The chat lasted maybe five minutes. He asked me about
my family. He asked me about my work load. He asked me about my stress. He told
me he thought I was doing a good job at the church and that he loved to read my
books.
Nothing profound, nothing probing. He went no deeper
than I allowed. But I had the feeling he would have gone to the bottom of the
pit with me had I needed him to.
After those few minutes, Dr. Jim went about his task
of tapping my knee with his rubber hammer, staring down my throat, looking in my
ear, and listening to my chest. When he was all done, as I was buttoning up my
shirt, he took his doctor hat off again and reminded me not to carry the world
on my shoulders. "And be sure to love your wife and hug those kids, because when
it all boils down to it, you're not much without them."
"Thanks, Jim," I said.
And he walked out as quickly as he'd come in a seed
sower in a physician's smock.
The Applause of Heaven
copyright [Word Publishing, 1996] Max Lucado, p.
130-131.
Used by permission
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