MRI Meditation
Over the last couple of weeks, I have become frequently reminded
of my mortality. Let me briefly recount the ways:
·
Two Saturdays ago, I had the privilege, the honor, of conducting
the memorial service for a preacher friend that I've known for 25 years. His
name was David, and he pastored a church in Redondo Beach was a fine man.
·
Last Tuesday, I had the privilege of taking my wife to Vada’s
birthday party, celebrating her 100th birthday with her daughter and son-in-law
and the many friends at the facility she lives at. Several church members also
went there and I very much enjoyed myself with her.
·
On Saturday last, my wife and I attended the birthday party of a
fine Christian woman who was a member of the first church I served as pastor
thirty-five years ago. She celebrated her 80th birthday.
So, I have
been reminded and reminded and reminded of mortality and the advance of age.
Now a separate line of thought. Several months ago, I began noticing
certain sensations on the soles of my feet. I made an appointment with a
neurologist who checked me for diabetic neuropathy. He concluded that the
sensations on the bottoms of my feet (which are not painful) were not diabetic
neuropathy. Whew!
The neurologist wondered whether or not the sensations in my feet were
a consequence of a long-ago back surgery that I had, when my L5 lumbar
vertebrae was fused to my sacrum in January 1969. I was a 19-year-old kid who
had a weightlifting accident several years earlier, was subsequently discharged
from the United States Air Force Academy because of it when it was discovered I
was no longer ejection seat qualified or even flight qualified. That diagnosis
resulted in me taking a discharge.
I decided to get the extreme back pain taken care of once and for
all by checking into St. Vincent's Hospital in Portland, Oregon for the fusion
surgery. From then to now, it has been what 51 years and the neurologist
wondered if perhaps there was a connection between the back surgery and the
sensations now occurring in the bottoms of my feet in my 69th year since
neuropathy was ruled out as a cause of the symptom.
So today I went to get an MRI. When the narrow bed that I was on
was pushed into the MRI machine, I experienced the very close quarters for the
first time in my life. “Ah,” I thought to myself. “This is why they asked me so
many different times if I was claustrophobic.” Of course, some people are so
claustrophobic they can't take the confinement of an MRI machine. Additionally,
I had not before been aware of how loud the noises are when an MRI machine is
operating.
While lying still (hard for an itcher and scratcher like me to do),
it suddenly dawned on me that sometimes people are diagnosed with stage IV
cancer as the result of an MRI scan, having had no pain or any other noticeable
symptoms. Imagine. Inside an MRI machine for about 20 minutes pondering the
possibility that the doctor might diagnose me with cancer. Is that what is
causing the weird sensations in my feet, cancer destroying that part of my
lower spine that no longer has sensations due to the surgery fifty-one years
ago?
At the time, the surgeon informed me that two very long scars
would remind me of the back surgery, but that the incisions were unnecessary
for the fusion. Rather, it was the protocol in 1969 to kill nerves to alleviate
pain following the surgery. Hence, the long incisions. It ran through my mind
that addressing a potential pain issue then might leave me without
symptoms of something far worse now. The mind does wander.
I won't know anything for two or three days. The neurologist has
to get the MRI results, and I have to make an appointment to see him. But in
those few minutes in the MRI machine, I was reflecting on how much closer I
might be to eternity than I imagined myself to be at the age of 69 without
cancer.
Understand, I don't know whether I have cancer or not. I don't know
whether there's anything there. The doctor is just taking a shot in the dark
about something going on in my lower back as a result of my surgery long ago
that might now affect the soles of my feet.
But the entire experience was orchestrated by my gracious Father
to cause me to think about eternity. It is always good to ponder eternity. And
what thoughts ran through my mind as I pondered those things, I would like to
share with you. I was overwhelmed with peace. I was overwhelmed with gratitude.
I was overwhelmed with contentment. I was thankful to the Lord for the opportunity
that He has given me to serve Him for many, many years.
For a long time, I have had the privilege of ministering to people
I love and care about, and I want to reflect in this Musings of a Gospel Minister
what kind of feelings run through the mind of an old preacher who ponders how
close he is to eternity, by the grace of God, and the comfort of God, and the
blessedness of the indwelling Spirit of God. It's not a bad feeling. It's a
comfortable feeling. And it's a confident feeling knowing that to be absent
from the body is to be present with my glorious Lord.
I surely hope that should some occasion come into your life shortly
where you ponder your mortality as I did this afternoon, that God gives you the
comfort of mind and soul that He gave to me.
Bless you, preacher.
Our job this late in life is to finish well.
By the grace of God, I hope you finish well.
My friend David finished well.
I want to finish well.
