Creative Team Building and Leadership Resources - In our Elements

Diagnosis: Mayhem

Monday, March 19th, 2012

Fellow Passengers: This week’s Primary Passage* (John 5:1-18) transports me to a weekend immersed in the turbulent waters of healing, waters that do not wait for a seasonal angelic visit, but continue to stir every day, including the Sabbath and Lord’s Day. Getting a glimpse into the deep pools of knowledge and skill that make up a Cardiac ICU in a tier one university hospital is more than awe-inspiring. The very thought of a tiny helium balloon being inserted into an aorta just outside the heart, the regular inflation of which gives the heart a chance to recover from trauma and beat again on its own, or a Swan catheter threaded through an artery into the heart to get diagnostic readings unavailable by EKG, is every bit as unimaginable and mysterious and numinous to me as an angel flying down to a pool to disturb the waters and create a healing bath. One of the medical angels we are especially grateful for is an ICU nurse named Cecile. At some point on the Sabbath day, as she kept close watch on my sister-in-law Carolyn’s vital signs, she noticed that something was not right with the heart rhythm; the response to the meds was unusual. She alerted the doctors and asked for more tests to be administered, and as a result they discovered that Carolyn’s cardiac arrests were not of the “normal” kind, but were instead a result of a very rare condition called Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, a stress induced shock to the heart that temporarily causes it to beat improperly. This diagnosis has only been part of the knowledge pool for a few years here in the U.S., after being discovered in Japan. The treatment plan for this is totally different than what they had been using, so as soon as they were able to switch the meds, Carolyn began to stabilize. Her condition is still critical, but is trending positive. Kudos to Cecile for keen observation skills and the initiative to question the original diagnosis.

When Jesus walked by the pool of Bethesda at the Sheep Gate on the outskirts of Jerusalem, his keen observation skills led him to a man who had been misdiagnosed for 38 years, and was waiting for access to a treatment in the health care system that he didn’t even need. For 38 years this man had been told, no doubt repeatedly, that what he needed was a dip in that curative Bethesda pool. Note that Jesus didn’t question the value of the healing pool, and he didn’t address any of the other invalids lying there waiting for the opportunity to renew health. No, Jesus only addressed this man, after quickly diagnosing that he was in need of a different pool of healing resources. What had paralyzed the man was not something that angel-troubled waters could ameliorate. What he needed was living water, something Jesus could offer with a simple blessing. That speaking a simple sentence to bring life back to the limbs of a troubled soul led to such mayhem and got Jesus into such serious trouble speaks to how far their authoritative understanding of both sabbath and healing had gotten from the source. Kudos to Jesus for disregarding the authorities and letting his healing water flow freely, no matter what day of the week. I trust that Jesus would find his regular time of rest, just as I hope Cecile and her colleagues build time into their rotations to honor sabbath rest.

Jesus’s story and Cecile’s story remind me of the essential nature of proper diagnoses. And the stories makes me wonder, as I listen to the news on my way back and forth from the hospital, if our body politic is not suffering from a longstanding misdiagnosis. What if all the politicos and generals and wannabe leaders who dominate our airwaves are doing little more than arguing over what kind of treatment plan is needed to address our culture’s ills and get the country’s heart beating again, but they’ve got the diagnosis all wrong to start with? What if what we really need is someone to come in with the insight and initiative to give the true diagnosis, and direct us to an entirely different pool of healing waters? I imagine that questioning our country’s core set of assumptions would provoke its own variety of mayhem, but it would be a welcome intervention nonetheless, even if it came on a Sabbath or a Lord’s Day.

How about you? Where does this Primary Passage take you on your journey of faith? Feel free to comment, and share on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.

Comments

  • March 19, 2012 at 2:03 pm

    Hi Stan,

    This is a wonderful reflection and application that you have shared! It provokes me to look more for the teaching points that can be lifted out of our everyday lives and brought “home” by studying God’s Word. I’m sorry that your sister in law is going through such a tough time, however, it is evident that God is doing good work in and through the situation. Thanks for sharing on Cecile, too, as nurses and the poignant moments related to the work we do strike a chord within me!

    Comment by Jennifer Carter

  • March 19, 2012 at 2:40 pm

    Prayers continue for Carolyn and all those wonderful medical people who are tending to her needs.
    We need people in government who have their own set of skills and also heart toward those suffering from lack of jobs, income, good health care and all those human needs to fully live the life all were intended to live. We need leaders who can see the futility of war and the mayhem war causes. We need folks who will listen to the scientists who are warning about global warming and climate change. I sign petitions and write each day on these matters. I pray others are doing the same.
    On another note I spent part of St. Patrick’s day at Greg Thomas’ church for a wonderful corned beef and cabbage dinner and participated in a workshop with Dan Buttry on diversity. ABCUSA is so fortunate to have the leadership of Dan as its Peace and Justice Consultant. Dan is a true Peacemaker and Healer.

    Comment by Janet Davies

  • March 19, 2012 at 9:45 pm

    Jennifer – thanks so much for the good words, and the work you do. Janet – so great to hear of your connection to Dan Buttry. I haven’t seen him in a long time. He’s a treasure.

    Comment by admin


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  • John 5:1-18

    Daily Passages

    This Week's Theme:
    "Healing Waters"

    This week's Daily Passages blog theme takes its cue from Jesus healing of the paralytic at the pool of Bethesda.

    Monday's Primary Passage–
    John 5:1-18
    Tuesday's Promise Passage–
    2 Kings 2:19-22
    Wednesday's Poetry Passage–
    Psalm 104:1-18
    Thursday's Prophetic Passage–
    Ezekiel 47:1-12
    Friday's Pastoral Passage–
    Revelation 22:1-5

    "Now in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate there is a pool, called in Hebrew Beth-zatha, which has five porticoes. In these lay many invalids—blind, lame, and paralysed. One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been there a long time, he said to him, ‘Do you want to be made well?’ The sick man answered him, ‘Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; and while I am making my way, someone else steps down ahead of me.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Stand up, take your mat and walk.’ At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk."
    –John 5:2-9

    *I love how we call snippets of scripture “passages,” and I love imagining these words as actual passageways that transport us to all sorts of places in our journeys of faith. Daily Passages is a weekday trek through scripture, connecting the ancient sacred words with everyday human words from personal history and culture: music, art, film, politics, literature, religion.

    As a part of In Our Elements, the blog most closely associates with the element of Fire. Think about how the Bible speaks of God’s word as a fire, and how it also describes the human tongue as a fire, for good and ill. These fiery passages connecting the sacred text with human experience remind me of the “floo network” in the Harry Potter series. This means of transportation in J.K. Rowling's wizarding world uses the fireplace and some “floo powder” to quickly get folks from one place to another. Unlike the Harry Potter floo network, though, the destination of Daily Passages is not known until we take the plunge into the fire.

    My hope in this blog is that a daily adventure through scripture and experience will provide a different starting point for our everyday conversations. What would happen if we took our cues for what we talk about each day from a passage of sacred text, instead of the set agendas we carry around with us each day? What if our talking points came from a story of Jesus, or a Psalm, instead of the talking heads on radio or reality tv? I’m not sure where that kind of shift would take us as a culture, but I’m betting that it would head us in a better direction than our present course. So join me in the fire, join me in the floo network of faith. Join me in the Daily Passage to God knows where. And if you find these passages useful or meaningful, please pass them on and share them with your networks of family and friends.