Grace

I learned a new lesson about grace recently, and honestly I can't stop thinking about it. I also cannot stop thinking about writing about it. So here goes

What is grace?

In the context of Christian Theology grace is the unmerited favor we receive from God through faith in the sacrifice and subsequent resurrection of Jesus Christ. If we look at the term secularly grace is roughly defined as goodwill. So regardless of your personal beliefs we should be able to agree here that grace is something that we should be thinking about. Seeing as though I am a Christian, the experience I am about to share will come from the Christian perspective.

A wretched human being

As many of you know, I work in healthcare. My job is hard, usually pretty thankless, and the state of the healthcare system leaves me in a state of chronic angst. The only reason I can still drag my pain wracked body to work is because I can still feel compassion and empathy for the sick who find themselves under my care. Some days that compassion and empathy get hard to muster, and this is a story of such a case.

The case in question involved a patient who managed to wreck his physical and mental health, due to a lifetime of bad decisions. A 40 something year old man with his heart barely functioning, severely decreased kidney function, poor circulation to his lower extremities, and periods of violent antisocial outburst coupled with paranoia and psychosis...amongst other things. When I was being updated on his care, I learned how he had been throwing food at staff threatening to body slam nurses, and cursing at everyone. "Great, sounds like this is going to be a long shift" I thought to myself.

As soon as I walked into his room after receiving report he immediately began to yell at me. I wasted no time telling him that if he was going to do anything during the course of this shift he would talk to me like a man. I don't allow people to talk to me like that, and if he wanted respect that he would have to give it in return. He understood this, and that demonstrated that he was still in possession of at least some of his mental faculties. Despite this fact, the shift was horrible. I wont bore you, dear reader, with all of the details, but suffice to say the shift sucked. I left work exhausted and stressed out. I knew that I would have to take care of him again the following shift, and this made it all the more difficult.

The following shift

More of the same, the staff hated this man, I hated this man, and he hated us. Even revisiting those negative feelings now while writing this, I feel a miasma within my very being. I had twelve hours of this ahead of me, along with trying to help other patients. Despair. In that moment, sitting in front of my work station, I said a silent prayer that went something like this: "Father, help me love this man." I then went to start on my responsibilities.

As the shift started to progress, I started to see the whole situation with new eyes. Yes, this man has put himself in a bad place because he has made bad decisions. He is not a nice man, probably hasn't been for most of his life. In fact, given the opportunities he has probably hurt many people during the course of his life. Despite all of this, he is deserving of love. Not just that, but his Creator loves him, my Lord loves him. Therefore, I must love him. Surprisingly enough this task became much easier as my attitude shifted away from one of hating my life in this moment, and my thoughts went to realizing how wretched this man was. This patient is not only not long for this world, but he is being tormented of the knowledge of his bad decisions and the state he finds himself in. My attitude changed even more, to one of compassion and sympathy.

I spent the remainder of my time with him trying to bring him comfort and peace despite himself. He liked to eat like someone who knows what it is like to go long periods of time not knowing when he might eat again. So I fed him, made several trips to the snack machine that night. When he would have a psychotic break I would do my best to assure him that he was in a safe place and that I would not let anyone hurt him. He required a lot of work that night, but the change in my attitude made it easier to help him. At some points even joyous.

What I really learned about grace that night

I am also a wretched man, my nature is no more holy than his. I have made many bad decisions myself and hurt a lot of people as well. How vain of me to look down on anyone when I am in my own flesh a source of pain and misery for those I share this world with. I realized that the grace that I believe is given to me through my faith is no different than the grace offered to him...and that I am no more worthy of it than anyone else. Jesus loves this man, as he does all broken men (spoiler alert, we are all broken men).

I am thankful for this experience, and I pray that the patient in question finds some peace here at the end of his life. I am going to continue to learn, grow, and try to love my fellow man even when the worst parts of me believes them unworthy. That is all I have to say for right now, thank you for reading as always. Until next time, Jack

PS, check out my new explorer.