If you read our newsletter from March 31st, then you were able to hear me complain a bit about the unexpected moments in life that sometimes cause you to wind up in an Emergency Room. Well, this past Monday was the (hopefully) final bout with this latest set of moments. I went under the knife and had surgery to remove my gallbladder. It's a routine procedure. It's laparoscopic, so it isn't exceptionally invasive. There really isn't any cause for concern (but I'll take all the prayers I can get).
Nevertheless, as I write this, it is before my surgery. When you read this, it's after. I am physically different when you are reading this than when I wrote these words you're reading. If the surgery goes well, then the only difference will be that I will have traded my gallbladder for some scar tissue on my stomach. Either way—I am irrevocably different. And, if I can be vulnerable, I am pretty scared. This is my first time having true surgery. I've had my wrist broken under anesthesia and my wisdom teeth removed, but this feels riskier somehow.
This fear has opened up in me something that I've never experienced. I am realizing that nothing I've done has been truly risky. I've taken some medium leaps, sure. Anytime we enter a car or airplane, we own some risk. But, even with a routine and fairly safe surgery, I am coming out a literally different person. It's a bizarre feeling.
Imagine if the spiritual risks we took were even close to this kind of danger. Have I ever really considered the possible side effects of loving people radically? Maybe it's the fear and anxiety talking—but I hope I take the Body of Christ half as seriously as I take my own flesh and blood.
Yorumlar