Miracle in the ER Jane Willis

Miracles happen at the strangest times and in the strangest places, and it so awesome to witness one!! I had that distinct pleasure about 10 years ago, in the wee hours of a Monday morning, in a crowded, loud, smelly Emergency room. Earlier on that cold, dark night, I had broken several land speed records to rush my elderly father to the hospital with severe abdominal pain. Normally this might not have alarmed me to such a degree, but two weeks prior he had been hospitalized with chest pain, which caused a minor heart attack and necessitated the implantation of a cardiac stint. So, my nerves were on edge and my urgency great as I, once again, headed to the ER with my sweet Daddy.

By the time we arrived at the hospital, Dad was in excruciating pain. My brother Mike, who had ridden shotgun and been my copilot on the ride, quickly grabbed a wheel chair and helped Dad out of the car. By this point, he could barely talk, was cold and clammy, pale and light headed. He had his first heart attack when I was 9, and throughout thirty subsequent year had bypass surgery, angioplasty and a stroke, but I had never seen him like this.

To the credit of the ER staff, he was taken to triage immediately and classified as critical. Without delay, they tried to secure an examining room and get him registered for treatment, even though the ER was full to capacity. Unfortunately, although they were moving at quite a clip, it wasnt quick enough for my Father, who by now had far surpassed his pain tolerance level. Dad was a reasonable, gentle man most of the time. In this case however, manners and decorum were the last things on his mind and when the receptionist asked for his insurance card (instead of injecting him with pain medicine he viewed as more urgent), he snapped as only a retired football lineman can.

I was standing between him and the receptionists, which was a blessing, because he proceeded to provide the young nurse his insurance card by transforming his benign leather wallet into a weapon. Before I could stop him, he catapulted this wallet as a missile, aimed directly for the young receptionists head. Fortunately, my left ear managed to deflect the trajectory of this thick,

Willis Ministries Jane Willis March 2013 jrwillis64@yahoo.com

hard piece of leather, and it slammed into the desk, causing no permanent damage to the ER staff member. At that point, I hissed to my brother who had his hands on the back of the wheelchair to get him out of here and I began the arduous task of regaining the empathy of the ER staff.

Fortunately, this did not take long because Dad was seriously ill, and they immediately ran tests to determine the problem. They also started a series of morphine shots to control the pain. Because of his recent heart surgery, pain medicine had to be administered cautiously, and it never provided significant relief for my father. In short order, he became very nauseas and commenced to vomiting loudly and often.

It truly broke my heart to see him this way. My father had always been a man of dignity, even in difficult times, and this was something I had never witnessed. He was defeated and scared and I felt helpless. After about 2 hours I took a break to walk the corridors of the ER and clear my head.

I have been blessed with two older brothers to help me navigate this thing called life. Mike is my oldest brother. He is nine years older than me and we are polar opposites in many ways. I am impatient and task oriented, he is empathic, warm and laid back. He has blue eyes while mine are brown. (I have hair, he doesnt, which brings me great joy.) My other brother, Tony, is my elder by 6 years. His personality is an odd hybrid somewhat like Mike and somewhat like me. He has better people skills than I do but is more task oriented than Mike. T the time, he pastored a church in a small town about 60 miles from the hospital, so as I spoke with him on the way to the hospital, I told him to sit tight until we knew what was going on. He didnt. I discovered that during my head clearing walk, as I caught his strong, straight stride out of the corner of my eyes. He was headed for Daddys room, clearly concerned. He did not see me, but I smiled at his inability to sit tight. We are an incredibly close family, thick as thieves as they say, and I should have known that he would not - could not - stay away.

Willis Ministries Jane Willis March 2013 jrwillis64@yahoo.com

Shortly after his arrival, I observed the personal miracle I referenced earlier.

Apparently right after I left the examining room for my walk Dad became violently ill. Mike was handling this alone until Tony arrived. Then, they apparently began to tag team my father. As I returned from my walk, I witnessed Gods presence and saw His glory in a way I never had before. My sweet big brothers were on either side of my Dad, each with a hand on his back. They were holding him up so he could be sick yet again, whispering words of comfort and attending to his every need.

Here were two middle aged men, each with lives and jobs and families of there own who dropped everything at a moments notice to rush to the hospital to care for their father. Their love was evident on their faces and in their actions and touched me more that I can express. I was honored to be their little sister and felt blessed beyond measure.

It was crystal clear to me, in that frozen moment in time, that they were there for one reason. They loved our father. There was no sense of obligation - no resentment at the time and the interruption no consideration of what else was going on in their lives. At that moment my Dad was their complete focus. They were the hands and feet of Christ. At that moment, they were Jesus to my father.

This got me to thinking about family, and loyalty and what our roles should be with and for our loved ones, especially those that arent all that lovable. If we as Christians are to live as Christ designed, out first priority, our most important ministry has to be our family. We are born into a specific situation by design and God has a purpose for each of us in the lives of those we are related to. On this particular late night in November, my brothers and I had one purpose to be Jesus to our weak, scared, helpless Dad.

Yes, I now, we were raised that way. We had watched our parents care for their parents. Four years prior to the incident, we cared for our Mother until her death. Yes, we were taught that you always take care of family, but that is not what I am talking about.

Willis Ministries Jane Willis March 2013 jrwillis64@yahoo.com

Most families care for their sick physically. Honestly, that is the easy part. In most cases, the sick relative is taken to the doctor or the ER and the medical professionals do the rest. No, the hard part is caring for them emotionally and spiritually. That rarely comes easy.

Why? Because our family has the greatest ability to hurt us deeply. Most of our emotional scars come from childhood and they are hard to overcome. They often interfere with our ability and desire to do anything beyond the bare physical necessities of caring for our loved ones. But we are called to do more than that. We are called to be bigger than that. We are called to be stronger and wiser than we are. We are called to look to Jesus as our role model.

Talk about potential emotional scars! Jesus was betrayed by a dear friend, abandoned by the remaining 11 disciples, considered crazy by his family, ridiculed by perfect strangers and tortured by His government. He had every reason to be resentful, angry and bitter. Yet he stretched His arms wide on the cross for the redemption of those very individuals who had hurt Him. He forgave then and asked His father to do the same. He got past the scars so He could care for them and for us emotionally and spiritually. We are called to do the same.

I will never forget that night in the ER, as I watched my brothers be incredibly godly men. Their example and the lesson learned from it will live in my heart forever. I pray that I can allow God to use me in similar ways in the lives of those I love. In the end, Dads pain was great but the problem was tiny 2 millimeters to be exact. The next day he gave birth to an itty-bitty kidney stone, which caused no permanent damage and from which he recovered. But, you never know. In reality he lived 6 more years until the final heart attack took him Home in 2009. Lesson learned, however. If we cant be Jesus to our own family, we are not answering the call.

Jane

Willis Ministries Jane Willis March 2013 jrwillis64@yahoo.com