Suffering with terminal maladies can bring the results of fear or acceptance!

Suffering with terminal maladies can bring the results of fear or acceptance!

Visiting with anyone who is in a state of extreme pain with no way to cope with their condition can bring sadness to the patient and someone who is close to them.  It may be hard to determine which condition is the most devastating.  Cancer, Crohn's, Kidney failure, brain or heart conditions that threaten the very life of loved ones are some of the most severe.  Perhaps the most vulnerable are children when their lives may be cut short by something they don’t understand has compromised these innocent boys and girls.  

In my early ministry as a deacon, one of my duties was visiting patients at Mercy Hospital and included in my rounds were children in wards with terminal conditions.  Getting off the elevator on the floor where they were you could smell the obvious odor that identified the conditions of many.  However, upon entering the bed-ridden children my eyes were opened to a sight I never expected.  Many of them were sitting smiling, speaking to one another, their voracious attitude said a lot for the way most faced an expected prognosis.  The experience of coming out of my visits with them placed a whole new perspective on suffering and the way some people, especially children, could look at something most adults could not.  It appeared that most if not all of these dear members of society had a special grace that overcame the obvious future of their precious lives.

Perhaps as we grow older and become burdened with finance, being responsible for the people we may employ, or the outlook of the money we are suddenly losing with this illness.  That could be a loss of power and distinction if we lose our battle with life’s ending prognosis.  Yet, no one gets out of this world on a peaceful trek.  Some may die in their sleep but death eventually has its victory.  

I often think of those children who are blessed beyond terminal cancer or other sad conditions, but marvel at how they view life’s insidious manner of attacking them.  Their very acceptance of something they had no control over sets an example of the early vision of God’s presence with each one not setting a precedence of theology or philosophy.  They are as Jesus said; “unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”  (Mt 18: 2 - 5). What does that have to do with the suffering many go through?  It shows all of us that when the approach to life gets the best of us, whether in sickness or health, the crisis we seem to hold onto becomes too much with all of us making decisions that we cannot control. 

The whys and wherefores we as adults try to be in charge of fall short of intellectual conclusions.  Be like children in the acceptance of the serious results that will end up making or breaking our attitudes of maturity.  The children in Mercy, with terminal outlooks, accepted their final call.  The many adults who struggled with the same outlook were living in fear.  This fear is not unusual, but trusting in God and his ultimate reaching into our weakness at death will make a difference.

Ralph B. Hathaway