Nine years ago this morning, I was in the Intensive Care unit at Summerville Medical. I wasn’t sure whether I would live or die; and, I was afraid and hurting physically. It is quite a vivid memory. It’s an unusual anniversary to be thinking about on this beautiful low-country morning, but it is one that was a defining moment in my life.
I have something called small blood vessel disease which means just what it implies: I have many blood vessels that are unusually small, and if my blood pressure or cholesterol goes up, one of those little vessels could shut down on itself stopping the flow of blood. Nine years ago, one or more small vessels shut down in the left Pons of my brain and that shut down the flow of blood to my right side. It’s not the clot type of stroke but it did make me immobile for several months.
The initial goal after a stroke is to live; the next goal is to re-train your brain through therapy and other treatments. Some people recover, and some people don’t. I’m one of those who recovered, thanks to some wonderful people at HealthSouth and my doctors. I will forever have a great debt to these folks.
On this anniversary of the stroke, I am reminded that it was a defining moment for me because it pointed out areas of life that needed to be tended to with greater intensity: physical, relational, professional, and spiritual. And it got my attention in all those ways.
One of the primary things it did was to strengthen my hope. Tim Keller says that we underestimate the effect of our “believed in future” on the way we live our lives. He’s right. Covey's practice of “Begin with the End in Mind” is actually the only way to have a true north in life. Unless there is clarity on the ending, the way to get there is muddled. How does it all end? What happens when we die? What is the purpose of my life? Unless one has an answer to these questions, one simply goes from day to day or goal to goal without any real direction.
When the uncertainty and pain and disabling effect of my stroke occurred, I found the only place to stand was in my hope in the God who is good. The God who has restored me to a relationship with Him through Jesus has a future planned that is Biblically termed "a new heaven and a new earth". It is a wonderful, indescribable future where intimacy with God is the most compelling feature. And if I lived, that hope, that future, would be realized one day; and if I died, that hope would be immediate. Because of my hope, I was ready to go and ready to stay.
Now, through the Holy Spirit, I have the beginnings of that intimacy which will one day be fully realized. In the nine years since the stroke, I have rediscovered the awesome life changing power of Hope. I’m grateful to be here for sure, but I am most hopeful for the hope that I have in the God who is good and faithful and who holds me in His hand. And the recent death of my mother is not as hard to bear because she had the same Hope.
Just thinking…
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