Posts Tagged ‘End of Life’
When It’s Our Time
“However, if you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name” (1 Peter 4:16, NIV 1984).
I love my brother’s wife. Tonight, I sat in their home surrounded by their children and told her she had an aggressive cancer. When I returned to my home, my son called and told me his infant daughter has suffered head trauma and had a bleed in her brain. This was a bad day for those I love.
Read MoreA Temporary Inconvenience
“And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen” (1 Peter 5:10-11, ESV).
There was an open mike and I was compelled by His Spirit to speak. “As a rule, I don’t attend the funerals of my patients, and I have never spoken at one. But I have been so blessed to walk with Mark and his family through their struggle. I hope that all of you have watched them. This is the way that followers of Christ do this.”
Read MoreFive Questions
This week Ron was in his wheelchair, at the end of his journey with cancer. I asked him if he had any fears.
“No, I am all right. I know where I am going.”
“That’s great,” I said. “We were reading John 11 in Bible study this week and I have been reassured about my own death.”
“I love John 14:2,” he said. “In my Father’s house are many rooms…” (NIV 1984).
“You are right on,” I said. “You should also check out John 11:25.”
Read MoreAs Best I Can
He sat across me with a swelling on his arm, one-fifth the size it had been before. “You know you are a miracle, don’t you?” I asked. “Most people with your cancer would be in heaven now.”
“He doesn’t want to talk about heaven,” his wife answered for him.
“My brother is a preacher,” he said. “I don’t talk to him much. I’ve been good as best I can.”
“That won’t get you there,” his wife responded.
“If you love Jesus, that will get you there,” I suggested.
He changed the subject, and we finished our medical business. He really was miraculously improved.
Read MoreWhere’s the Oil?
My friend was stuck at home with a history of strokes that had left him with fair cognition but difficulty ambulating. I ran by today to check on him and had a mostly cogent time of catching up. As we looked back on the mistakes of our youth, we voiced our mutual gratitude that Jesus has forgiven us. My friend, who may be closer to heaven than I, began to talk about Jesus returning. “One day Jesus will come, and he will be sitting across this table from us. I can hear him saying, ‘Didn’t I tell you so?’” Then he added, “That’ll be the day we should have got it right the day before.”
Read MoreWhat’s in a Name?
In this week’s blog post, Dr. Joy Riley discusses how verbiage makes a big difference in how physician-assisted suicide is promoted and transformed to make it more palatable to the general population.
Read MoreCouncil on Judicial and Ethical Affairs
Compassion & Choices uses every trick in the book to get physician-assisted suicide legalized in individual states, and they never give up. They fund polling with leading questions in the vein of, “Would you like to die in terrible pain hooked up to a machine by doctors who won’t let you die or should physicians aid you in dying?” They then tout the results as overwhelming support for the legalization of physician-assisted suicide to the media and anyone else who will listen.
Read MoreA “Bot” Too Far
In our technological world, it’s easier sometimes easier to have conversations with computers than with people. Dr. David Stevens just spent 35-minutes having a conversation about end of life options with Emily, an artificial intelligence robot. He shares how this is bad for you, as both a healthcare professional and as a patient.
Read MoreOpening the Conversation About Death
Excerpted from “How doctors want to die is different than most people,” CNN. August 11, 2015 — Dr. Kendra Fleagle Gorlitsky recalls the anguish she used to feel performing CPR on elderly, terminally ill patients. “I felt like I was beating up people at the end of their life,” she says. It looks nothing like what people see on TV.
Read MoreMinistry Through End-Of-Life Care
A generation or two ago, when medicine was primarily low-tech, a majority of patients died quickly of acute illness, usually in their own homes, cared for by families, neighbors, and church friends. But things have changed. Now, 90 percent of North Americans die slowly from debilitating disease (organ failure, malignancy, dementia, etc.).
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