On Sunday, sitting in the pew, I couldn't focus on the words spoken or the songs sung. I could only think of one thing: my patients.
My job is unique. I'm paid to take care of peoples' physical needs. But the more and more I'm in this job, the more I know it's so much more than a job. It's humanity.
It's so easy to think that I just show up and do stuff for eight hours and go home. I don't. The stupid, tiny, seemingly inconsequential activities of my job are the lifeline for my patients. When done haphazardly, I not only degrade their quality of life, I degrade them as human beings. I degrade their souls.
Even though my patients are in the last part of their lives; even though their bodies are broken, ready to go to a final rest; even though the world has in some ways forgotten them, I am seeing the image of God in these individuals. I am seeing their souls.
We are not bodies, we are souls.
God has entrusted me the care of these souls. Though I know not where they will be going to after their bodies have died, I am entrusted the keeping of these souls.
It is a blessed burden.
I think my heart has grown, nay come alive. When not caring, when not serving, parts of my heart lie dormant and rot away. I genuinely love my patients. It's a difference that long-term care makes. Hospitals are in and out; not so at my home. I have relationship. I have, in some ways, community. I have memories. Memories with persons who struggle to keep their own memories.
The love I have for my patients overwhelms me. Like in church on Sunday. It was all I could do to just sit and write down ever single name of my patients. When I wrote their names it wasn't just to look at the letters associated with a face. Every stroke of my pen, scribing their names, was an act of love. I could not shake the intense love I feel for them.
I don't remember the songs we sang or the words from the elders. I remember loving my patients.
So I'm crazy you say? I don't care. I have experienced pure love from souls who are hours away from being with Jesus. Tell me when was the last time you had that.
My favorite patient. Her body is almost useless. She cannot live the life she once lived. Hell, she can't even talk. But she can love. When I look into her eyes, when she smiles her half-smile, when she touches my face, when she kisses my hand, my soul sings. I would forsake all the lovers of my youth for the affection of this woman. This decrepit, forgotten, dying woman. I will be happy when she is Home, but until then I will pour my heart out to love her soul.
