Monday, June 6, 2016

Experiencing the Lord in the Hospital

  Just last week, my mom experienced a bad fall while coming out of church. It had been raining heavily and the blacktop was slick and down she went breaking her hip, pelvis and some vertebrae.
  Now, my mother is a very sturdy woman, instead of laying there between two parked cars and hoping someone came by quickly, she got herself up, continued walking to her car and drove to my home where she knocked at the door and told me, "I think I may have hurt myself."
  What an understatement! 
   But you see my momma has big faith in the Lord. The entire time she kept telling Jesus, "Help me Lord, just get me to Lisa's"
   When I saw her and the pain she was in I repeated this plea myself, "Help me, Lord, just get us to the Emergency Room!"
   Six hours, several x-rays and a cat scan later, it was confirmed that she had indeed hurt herself with a hairline crack in her pelvis, crack in her hip and cracks in vertebrae. So began the hospital stay. The next day we were buoyed up by the presence of a Extraordinary Minister to the homebound who visited my mom's hospital room and blessed us with his good humor and his genuine love of the Blessed Sacrament.  He looked at mom and me after exchanging warm greetings said, "And course you both will be receiving the Lord today?" 
  I loved the way he wasn't timid about it.  To him it was the most natural thing in the world to be receiving Jesus among the wires, alarms, bandages, tubes, needles and everything else hospital. 
  I hadn't realized how very tired I was at the time, having not slept for over 25 hours, concentrating on what doctors were saying and nurses were doing, my efforts to make sure Mom felt safe and secure in this strange place had put my prayers in the background.  But now, here was Jesus right there in the room with us, saying, "Just take and eat and I will help you!"
I gratefully received our Lord, thanking Him for the reminder that He was with us and everything would work out.
   The next day the same gentlemen was back, with his good humor and twinkle of Christ in his eye. This time, two of my sisters, and a niece were in the room too. He didn't bat an eye but again repeated, "And of course you'll all be receiving the Lord today?"   We did with much love and thankfulness for this God who sent His Son to us, in all occasions, in all strife and adversity to be sure we knew His love for us never wavers especially when we are going through hard times.
  We received Him gratefully for the encouragement He gave to our spirits and souls that day.
   By the end of the weekend we found out my mom would not need surgery but just plenty of rest to heal.  I found out again, as I have so many, many times, how very much I need the Lord in the Blessed Sacrament to help me.  "Help us Father, help us know how very important it is to receive you in the Body and Blood of your Son." 
 

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