Praise Jesus!

We should be praising God. God deserves our praise. He created everything you see; He gave you every good thing you have.

Instead of praising God, we often do things that are shameful, things we regret. But God has mercy, and He sees us as if we’ve done nothing wrong. If you’re a redeemed murderer, God sees you as if you were an infant.

He stills our souls in a way nothing else can.

Have you ever been in a church during prayer? People scatter about when they enter church; they chatter with their friends; they shuffle around in their seats. The whole sanctuary is full of noise and movement–but when the pastor prays, the rows upon rows of people are silent. Heads are bowed. No one moves. It happens in every country around the world each Sunday morning–He calms the people like He calms the waves.

He calms the rain that falls on our farmer’s fields–thousands of miles of crops. Oranges, broccoli, apples, wheat, bell peppers, lettuce–all with leaves blowing in the breeze, soaking up the sunshine of providence. We harvest it all in a cavalier style, piling it into trucks that rumble down dusty roads, leaking corn as they head to the cities. It ends up in our grocery stores and spills into the aisles. People look through piles of veggies and pick out what they like, and they go home with bags of food.

Even the wilderness is full of verdant beauty. Winds howl over mountain peaks and rustle wildflowers in the fields, barely nudging the near-endless forests of swaying pines. We visit on vacation, we plaster pictures of it on our computers, on our walls. The images of beauty are burned into our minds–everyone can picture a quiet island, an ocean, a mountain, a forest. We think of them sometimes, and they are a cathedral in our minds–a structure built to praise the Lord, that we can recall any time we please.

Shouldn’t we be praising God?

[This is a meditation on Psalm 65.]

Then I will know fully

“Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.” -1 John 3:2 (ESV)

I once heard someone say that you become a conglomerate of the six people you spend the most time with. In my own life, I’ve found this to be true. But I’m especially similar to my dad, who raised me, taught me to read and fix cars, took me hunting and fishing, and generally spent a lot of time with me. I have a very sweet relationship with my dad, but God is my Father now. I wish I were skilled enough with words to tell you how beautiful it is to be a son of the Creator.

But I still sin. I’m still imperfect. All Christians are still imperfect. We’re like our Father, but we’re also a lot like small children, who can barely imagine the world from another person’s perspective. We fix our hope on God, and we’re being made pure (1 John 3:3–the verse after the one above), but we’re not pure yet.

In this world, we see everything dimly. We don’t totally understand ourselves, God, or how we should allow Him to change us. We sometimes imagine that we’re done losing our temper, or degrading women with our lustful thoughts, or chasing after money, but then we fall again. These failures are shortcomings in our relationship with our Father. If we could see Him as He is, then we would be the kind of people we ought to be. How could we possibly retain any of our imperfections if we are in a perfect relationship with our Father? For now, we see dimly, but then we will see everything fully.

“For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.” –1 Corinthians 13:12 (ESV)

People like people

There must have been at least ten of us all crowded into her room. She seemed very sick, and she probably would have rather kept sleeping. I felt bad waltzing in with my classmates to startle her, but our attending physician didn’t seem to care.

“How are you feeling today?” He said it cheerfully, as if he were seeing an old friend for the first time in awhile.

She whispered that she was feeling a bit better than yesterday. A few of us said hello, and she nodded slightly.

The doctor asked her to lean forward. She did so–painfully–and he moved her gown aside to expose her back. One by one, we placed our stethoscopes over her lungs and listened for a few moments while she breathed. By the time it was my turn, she seemed more alert.

“That’s a pretty shirt, sweetheart,” she said to one of my female classmates. The girl was a little surprised, but she smiled and thanked the old woman. Our attending physician then began explaining what we were hearing–I think he had a chest x-ray and some other data on the computer, but I wasn’t really paying attention. The woman had woken up a bit more, and she was now curiously looking around the room. She seemed relaxed.

“Okay?” said our physician.

My classmates nodded that they had understood whatever he just explained, but I was watching the old lady, who was now reaching across her table for a small plastic bag full of Dum-Dum Lollipops. She picked it up, and extended her the bag with a smile, the IV lines dangling from her forearm.

“Want some candy?”

We all smiled, and a few of us took a lollipop. As we walked out, the lady settled back into her bed, and she seemed more peaceful than she’d been before.

I’ve seen this often. Unless they’re very ill, people who are at first tired and sick often perk up when a troop of medical students walks into their room. I don’t think they’re startled; I think they just like company. People like people–strangely, it took me until college to realize this. So for the past few years I’ve been trying to talk to strangers and new people, because everyone seems to appreciate the attention. I’m not very good at it yet, but I’m getting there.

“The second is this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these.”

And the scribe said to him, “You are right, Teacher. You have truly said that he is one, and there is no other besides him. And to love him with all the heart and with all the understanding and with all the strength, and to love one’s neighbor as oneself, is much more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.”

And when Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”

Mark 12:31-34

[Just FYI, none of the patients I talk about are real–they’re composites of various patients and people I’ve met over the past four years or so.]

I have never put my hope in any other but You, O God of Israel

“I have never put my hope in any other but You,

O God of Israel,

who can show both anger

and graciousness,

and who absolves all the sins of suffering man.

Lord God,

Creator of Heaven and Earth,

be mindful of our lowliness.”

This is an English translation of Spem in Alium, which is easily the most beautiful song I’ve ever heard. If you want to know why I’m a Christian, it’s in large part because knowing God makes me feel like this. The song was written by Sir Thomas Tallis in 1570 for eight choirs of five voices each. I have heard that it’s rarely performed because of its complexity.

I enjoy tests because I’m prideful

Essentially, I enjoy tests because I love knowing things. C.S. Lewis would rebuke me for this. In his lecture, “Learning in War Time,” he stated that it’s dangerous to love the fact that we know something, rather than being intrinsically interested in the thing itself. To Lewis, loving the fact that we know something is the beginning of arrogance.

I’m inclined to agree with him. Still, I enjoy the gradual accumulation of knowledge culminating in a test. Pride is one of my vices. But I wish I’d been writing last year, and I wish I’d told you how frustrating my first year of school was. It was full of small facts without context. Only at the end of the year did I realize we had systematically surveyed all the intricacies of the human body. I may have forgotten 60% of what I learned, but the fact that I recall 40% means I know quite a lot.

But knowing something is morally dangerous. In whatever we do, we need to ensure our motives are pure. To be interested in science is to glorify God. To be interested in acquiring more knowledge is to glorify myself.

Perhaps this is one of the things that makes Christianity unique. The actions we take are important, but our intent is more important. God commands us to love him and to love people, but love is an emotion. God commands us to change our attitudes and our way of thinking. Once we do this, our actions will change. Enjoying the fact that I know something is arrogant. If I don’t recognize that, I may waste a lot of time trying to acquire knowledge so that I become greater. Instead, I should love science because nature displays God’s glory, and I should use the education he’s blessed me with to help others in any way I can.

“The Lord does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”
1 Samuel 16:7 (NIV)

 

“I have calmed myself and quieted my ambitions.”

“My heart is not proud, Lord,
my eyes are not haughty;

I do not concern myself
with great matters
or things too wonderful for me.

But I have calmed myself
and quieted my ambitions.”

-Psalm 131:1-2

For the past few years, this verse has been written on a note card and taped to the wall next to my desk. It reminds me that being great is not my concern. Having a great influence, effecting great changes–these are not why I’m here.

Max Lucado says the world needs “cardiac Christians.” The world needs people who are going to find something they’re good at, work at that thing until they become excellent at it, and never stop doing it until they’ve finished.

God didn’t intend for us to be experts at everything, and he didn’t intend for us to be wealthy or highly-respected. I’m interested in a lot of things, but God has only given me the time and talents to focus on a few things. I also tend to be prideful, to want to be the better than everyone else, but this is also a wrong attitude. God doesn’t want a bunch of gunners all wanting to be the best. He also doesn’t want a bunch of distracted, semi-competent Renaissance men. God needs cardiac Christians–people with purpose who are not distracted by “great matters.”

So calm yourself. Quiet your ambitions. Don’t be proud. Your pride will misguide you, but only God can direct you and make you profoundly useful. Seek God, and do something worthwhile with your life–even if that means doing something you regard as completely insignificant.

The invisible work of being married to me

I get a variety of responses when I tell people I’m a medical student

“Wow, you must have worked hard.”

“You’ve got to really want it if you’re going into medicine.”

Most people tend to praise me, but almost none of them praise my wife. Awhile ago, my wife and I were having lunch with a mutual friend. Somewhat randomly, this friend looked at my wife and told her that she must be a wonderful lady, that it must take a lot of strength and patience to be married to a student, and that she deserves a lot of credit.

My wife takes compliments about as well as I do, so she smiled a shy smile and spoke a quick “thank you.” Later, she told me how much she appreciated someone recognizing what she does. For all the successes of the feminist movement, people still fail to recognize all the effort and energy my wife puts into being what women have classically been–a wife (and someday a mother). She has a pretty impressive job, and people are more likely to remark on her achievements in the workplace than on the effort it must take to be married to me. She already knows she’s a star business woman, but it was a breath of fresh air to hear someone recognize that she’s a star wife as well.

Because being married to me means sitting alone while I study in the other room. It means finding hobbies she can do without me. It means worrying about where we will go when I graduate, what kind of doctor I’ll be, and how I’ll perform on the next test. It means going to bed alone three hours before I sleepily tumble into the covers next to her. It means scheduled date nights, quick dinners, and vacations constrained to scheduled academic breaks.

Yet somehow, she still manages to love me in a way I’ve never been loved. With her, I can talk about anything–even the interesting tidbit I learned in class or the strange experience I had with a patient. We share vacation memories, watch shows together, play games. She encourages me when I’m doing well, cries on my shoulder when she’s frustrated, and laughs with me about the ridiculous things in life.

She’s a wonderful lady, and she deserves for more people to recognize the effort she puts into our relationship. At the very least, I can take note of what she’s doing for me, because I certainly couldn’t make it through medical school without her.

The sound of a low whisper

This weekend I’ve been frantically studying for a test on Monday. My routine is to wake up, study all day, and then go back to sleep to study again the next day. I usually manage to take a few breaks with my wife, but test weekends are hectic. This evening my wife is in bed, and I’ve taken a few moments to read Scripture and pray.

It makes me wonder why I ever let busyness push these quiet times out of my life. All the noise of school and responsibility stops, and everything feels silent. It reminds me of being in a dense forest, miles from any road, with thick, fat snowflakes muffling even the sound of the breeze in the trees–the quiet is complete.

Somehow, this is when God speaks. It’s nothing profound, but he’s here.

Scripture is a very, very good gift. It gives me times of silence like this. God speaks through it. For some reason, the Lord has chosen to work in our world this way–quietly and slowly. He shows himself through small, insignificant things.

God could work more obviously and with greater haste, but I imagine the world as we know it would cease immediately. We would all be so terrified, loved, and humbled that all our culture and commerce would fade to silent awe as the world was purged of evil and glorified to show God’s goodness.

Instead, God remakes the world silently and slowly, through quiet moments.

“And behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire, the sound of a low whisper, a thin silence.”
-1 Kings 19:11-12

Me. A timid, white-coated kid with fake patients

No, no, I should use a deeper voice to sound more authoritative…

“Hello. My name is Ben, I’m a second year medical student. Today I’m going to ask you a few questions about your problem. I’ll also conduct a physical exam, and then I’ll consult with my attending physician. So, why did you come to see us today?”

Maybe that was a little too formal? And when should I ask the patient his name?

I was sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic, practicing to myself. Today in school I had to see three “patients”. These patients are actors, and when the interaction is over with, the actors stop acting and offer us criticism on our communication skills. My number one criticism from all three patients?

Lack of confidence. An uncertain demeanor. A little timid.

Last year, when I did this same exercise, the patients said I performed swimmingly. The difference between one year ago and today is that for the past year, I’ve been constantly cramming knowledge into my head. Last year, I was full of self-confidence for one reason: no matter how much thinking I did, I just couldn’t think of any reason why I might be wrong. Now it’s entirely different. The more thinking I do, the more and more I doubt my initial impressions.

But patients don’t want a timid, uncertain doctor, and this kind of doctor won’t give patients the comfort they need when they’re ill. I may have an exquisite line of reasoning. I may be friendly, professional, and composed. But somehow, I need to convince the patient that I do, definitely, beyond any shadow of a doubt–know what I’m doing.

Of course, I won’t really know what I’m doing for another six years. Eventually, I’ll make accurate, lighting-fast diagnoses without even lifting a mental finger. Eventually, I’ll back up my confidence with competence. Until then, I guess I’ll just have to fake it.

Why I’m going into primary care medicine in an HPSA

On Tuesday, I found out that I have been accepted into the NHSC scholarship program. This means that the government will pay for the remainder of my medical school, and in return I’ll spend at least three years working as a physician in a federally designated under-served area. Of course my wife and I were ecstatic.

To have my schooling paid for is an extraordinary privilege, and as with all privileges, I wonder whether I deserve it. Only within the past few years have I been involved in community projects and service. I know many, many of my medical school friends who have done more meritorious and more service-oriented activities than me. The best I can say for myself is that I wrote my essays and my application as honestly as I could. If they chose me, it wasn’t because I made stuff up! I have a hunch I was chosen mostly because I’m from a high-need area, and I’d love to go back. Whatever the reason, I’m excited. I look at this not so much as a recognition of my merit (I don’t have much), but as a challenge to work hard, serve people in any way I can, and make certain I’m a “good investment.”

Anyway, I wanted to post something today, so here is a slightly-modified version of my application essay. I think it’s fitting for this post:

I was 17 when I first considered working as a physician in a medically under-served population. My friends and I had driven to central Idaho to go backpacking. When we were driving down a dirt road in the forest, a small fallen tree glanced off the side of the truck and lacerated my friend’s neck, throwing him to the floor of the truck. He was injured and we were scared, but it took us nine hours to get him to a medical facility. The first physician’s office we found was closed, with a sign on the door saying the physician came only once a week.

My initial idea to become a physician faded as I considered a career in physics, but I decided to become a doctor when I realized I wanted to work with people. It’s hard to describe why I’m interested in primary care medicine in particular. I’ve always been interested in pretty much everything—I’ve gone from physics to biochemistry to medicine–so the type of knowledge required in primary care is very appealing to me. I’d much rather learn a little about everything than a lot about a few things. I want to see a lot of different patients who have a lot of different problems. But I’m perhaps most excited because primary care physicians are needed, and I want to be needed in my career.

Over the past few years, I’ve become more interested in medically under-served populations. During one summer, I trained as an EMT-B near my home to gain some experience before applying to medical school. I remember one call on the ambulance where we spent two hours round trip to pick up a lady and take her to a city where she could get medical care.

Having grown up in a rural area, I’m interested in serving rural populations that need physicians, but I’ve also spent the last six years near the city. For about a year before I started medical school, I helped out at a free clinic for people without insurance. The clinic was about an hour away through traffic, so I only made it once or twice a month to volunteer, but I’ll always remember pushing the gigantic rolling files of paper medical records—a very physical reminder that even in urban areas, there are a lot of people without adequate medical care, whether because of language or economic barriers.