Battle Scars

“Struck down, but not destroyed” 2 Corinthians 4:6 has taken on a whole new meaning for me. I am all of two weeks away from surviving my first block of medical school, yet after today it seems impossible even to survive!

For the last month and a half, I have been tested literally and figuratively in more ways and more often that I even thought possible! I have failed many of those tests, yet until now have felt the overwhelming presence of God. I clung to Him like never before and worshiped in the midst of what seemed like my world crashing in on me. This weekend I had a chance to go home. I actually got somewhat caught up on sleep and had fun for once in a really long time. And then I had to come back. Today I very possible failed yet another rather important test. I can feel myself cracking, as though I am about to explode all over whatever is around. I do not want to be here. I do not want to study anymore. I’m tired of trying so hard and failing. Tired of always being tired and finding no rest and feeling like there is no way on this earth that I could ever be a doctor and this was the biggest mistake of my life!

I want to think that. I want to have a little pity party and ball my eyes out. I want to be mad. And honestly I’ve handled it just like that recently. These last few days I haven’t clung to God as my only hope and strength. And now on top of everything else I feel like I can’t come to Him. I know that’s wrong. My salvation, my ‘status’ with God has never been dependent on what I do or don’t do and it never will be! Praise God! He is still the same God who keeps His promises even when I choose not to trust Him. I know He is faithful. He IS enough . . . even when I am faced with utter despair. I am nothing, and I have nothing to give. It is by His grace that I am what I am! I have to keep reminding myself that He brought me here. And even if His reasoning was not for me to become a doctor but for me to learn about Him and come to know Him more that it is worth anything thrown at me.

I have to keep my eyes on Him. He is my prize! I cannot work for a grade or a reputation or a certain status in comparison to others. What a waste of what God has given! But today of all days, I need His grace to stand on these truths. Please, pray with me! I have never been more aware of how low I really am. And praise God for that! But I’m on the verge of being destroy. Brothers and sisters in Christ I need help standing strong on His word right now. Everyday it’s a battle. May we lift each other up that together we may stand for His name sake!   

Living sacrifice

My first few weeks of medical school were difficult to say the least. Still processing my trip to East Africa and moving to different state took much more of a toll on me than I ever expected! For the first 2 or 3 weeks I could barely focus on my school work and that doesn’t bring about great results in med school! I was just barely passing every exam until I flat out failed my first exam. Microbiology. I would like to say that I got my act together, pulled my self up by my bootstraps and that was the end of that. But that was not the case. Slowly I began coming out of this ‘funk.’ I was able to study and understand more rather than memorize random facts, put them together and apply them. Through all of this God has given me so much peace about life in general. I am honestly beginning to love Him more than ever before!

Just this last week, I had my second microbiology test. Obviously I needed to do extremely well on it. The weekend before I had already gone over everything up to that point and was feeling pretty good about it. 3 days before the exam we had 4 more lectures covering all the gram positive, negative and atypical bacteria that were medically relevant. That is a lot of bacteria just in case you don’t know! We had to know their physical characteristics, how they got into the body, what diseases they cause, symptoms they caused etc. It was so overwhelming. I spent the entire time those next 2 days studying those bacteria. So here’s the scene 2 days before the exam: 1:00am I have my coffee, my laptop and I am desperately trying to finish the last of like 200 flash cards while my head is throbbing from a major headache. I got about 5 hours of sleep that night and then sat through 6 hours of lectures to come home and learn the flashcards. I knew the material, sort of. I did not know every little detail of each one but I could give you a general picture. But that’s all I could do. When I finished studying I knew depending on how hard the test was I could either fail it or do really well.

So as I prayed all that day and early the next morning, I had so much peace knowing that God knew I would be facing this, He knew what would be on the test and He brought me here still. I gave it to Him as my offering, knowing that all my hard work was not just for a grade, but to honor what God has called me to. He told me to go to medical school, so here I am. I am not here for a degree but something far greater. Once He pulled my focus back on Him the outcome of the test seemed far less significant. And, even when He didn’t have to, God came through for me on that exam. I had such a clear mind, was able to think so well, and the professor was very generous in his questions. They were not easy questions, but he gave you plenty of information to deduce the answer.  

I spent Friday afternoon recuperating. This weekend I have been catching up on all the lectures I ignored last week because of micro and studying for my 2 tests next week, one on Monday and one on Wednesday. See, it never ends. And it doesn’t seem as though it ever will at least not for the next 7 years. But yet again God has proved Himself faithful to me.

Saturday morning Macy and I went to the CMDA (Christian Medical and Dental Association) Bible study. It is run by 3 second year students at my school. What an encouragement these ladies are to me each week! We have been discussing Galatians and how our relationship with Christ is based solely on what Christ did for us, how we can never ‘do’ anything to make Him love us less or more. How He is our purpose, our prize, and when we focus on Him He adds in the rest.  Praise His name!

A test of faith

I believe part of why God works in our life is so that He can use what we learn and struggle with to help and encourage others. Therefore in this blog I will try to be open and honest about my imperfections and struggles.

Tomorrow morning I will take my 7^th medical school exam. Thus far I have been below average on all of them. Ok not too bad I realize these are medical students! On two exams thus far I have barely passed, and yet haven’t been too stressed because I know God wants me here and that success is in obedience not outcome. Today however, I found out I failed my first test ever! Like not even D+ failed it! The bad thing is that I studied so hard. I really thought I knew it! I thought things were going to improve but they only got worse. I wanted to melt and throw a fit and ask God why He would bring me here to fail. And then I remembered what I wrote for my facebook status this morning: “Faith must be tested, because it can only become your intimate possession through conflict . . . Faith is absolute trust in God- trust that could never imagine that He would forsake us" Oswald Chambers in My Utmost for His Highest.

Faith, oh ye of little faith! Tomorrow I have my final for pathology. The first exam we took I made a 74% and it is half of my grade. I need a 70% to pass. Staring into this seemingly overwhelming situation, I have so much peace! If I fail, I have not failed. I have obeyed God in coming, and I have grown to know Him in a way words cannot explain. Yet, I do not think it is His will that I drop out of medical school. Somehow I think He will pull me through it. Probably because it is so incredibly obvious that I cannot do it alone! Let it be known, if I make it through this test, it was God alone; His grace, His wisdom, His way!

So for now I have to get back to studying, but please pray with me that He will give me understanding, the He will clear my mind and help me focus, and that no matter what the outcome that He would be glorified!

The Secret Place

1 Corinthians 7:30 says, “and those who weep, as though they did not weep; and those who rejoice, as though they did not rejoice; and those who buy, as though they did not possess; and those who use the world as though they did not make full use of it; for the form of this world is passing away. But I want you to be free of concern. One who is unmarried is concerned about the things of the Lord, how he may please the Lord; but one who is married is concerned about the things of the world, how he may please his wife.”

May first few weeks of medical school, I have spent a good majority complaining. I didn’t want to leave Knoxville, my family, my friends. I wasn’t ready to start working hard again, and I definitely didn’t want to work as hard as I had to. I still wanted to sleep in and have fun, but I couldn’t. I was miserable. Don’t get me wrong I was and am still so happy to be here, but it is NOT fun!

My quiet times were suffering, and I had very little joy. I knew I was only here because God really wanted me here, but I couldn’t understand why I was so miserable! He was my ONLY motivation for getting out of bed every day and going to class for 5, 6 or 8 hours and then coming home to study until I went to sleep. It has gotten better, but still I could focus on Him for the storms I saw around me. As I tried hard to focus on Him, I came to this verse this morning after I made myself get up an hour early to make sure I had time to seek His face. He reminded me that it doesn’t matter what my emotions are. Emotions change with the wind. I need to ‘shed’ all my emotions, good and bad, so I can come to Him alone and let Him fill me to over-flowing with His joy and peace and strength that don’t run dry!

I also read in “My Utmost for His Highest” by Oswald Chambers today that “Having a secret stillness before God means deliberately shutting the door on our emotions and remembering Him. . . when we truly live in the 'secret place' it becomes impossible for us to doubt God.”

As Peter kept His eyes on Christ alone when he walked with Him on the water, I too need to keep my focus, my efforts on Him no matter what the waves are doing around me! When I focus solely on Christ, I can only focus on His truth. His is worth it! He is enough!

Divine Intervention

These first two weeks of medical school have been a whirl wind. When I moved up to Christiansburg VA, I was still very much jet-lagged and trying to process all God did in East Africa. Every day I woke up early with my stomach in knots with so much anxiety I couldn’t think straight. The weekend before I started school I drove home to see Julie when she came home from over-seas. It was great seeing my family, but still I could not relax or even sleep very much. For the life of me I couldn’t understand why I was so anxious. Yes I was starting medical school the next day, yes, I had just moved away from home, and yes, I had just returned from a summer long trip to a very difficult culture to live in, but I didn’t think any of those things themselves were keeping me awake; maybe just the combination of it all.

It was incredibly difficult to drive away that Sunday afternoon. Those four hours to VA in the pouring rain seemed to take forever! I couldn’t eat, and so I just drove. About ¾ of the way there I hydroplaned on the interstate. The left side of my truck slammed in to the guard rail and spun me around. I slid off the road before I realized what was happening and could react. The airbag did not deploy and my truck could still run. I got back on the interstate and slowly made my way to the next exit. There I parked at a burger king and called my dad. My entire left headlight was gone and part of my bumper was coming off, but it could have been so much worse! After I settled down some and made myself eat a few fries I got back on the interstate and made my way the last hour to Christiansburg.

The next day I started class. Needless to say I was a little distracted and in a fog. It was so hard to concentrate on science subjects I hadn’t studied in years. When I got home I called dad again and sent him pictures. I took it to a local place to get an estimate for the insurance. Long story shorter, it was totaled. I couldn’t believe it because I had just driven it an hour on the interstate. If that wasn’t Divine Intervention I don’t know what is!

That week I woke up every morning and had to reorient myself. Remember where I was and that I had to get up and go to medical school. I made myself go to some of the welcome week events to try and meet some people. I didn’t want to be around people, but I also didn’t want to be alone. Discontentment was the overarching theme. That Saturday I went to a Bible study held by other second year medical students. Oh how I am thankful God directed me there! The second years were giving us all kinds of advice. Things like don’t let school dictate your life because it will run over anything you don’t deliberately take out of its way. In the midst of all the great advice, the question was posed, what idol is God telling you to give over to Him? As I paused to think what it might be, my family, my friends back home, TN sports (haha j/k), I heard the still small voice whisper ‘comfort.’ Man, it hit like a ton of bricks. That was it. All summer I was uncomfortable hoping that once I returned home I would settle back into a comfortable life like normal. But I didn’t. And I wasn’t comfortable, actually I was very uncomfortable!

Every day I woke up and went to school where I sat through 5, 6 or ever 7, 8 hours of science lectures. Then I would go home and study all that information because I had another 6 hours of class the next day. I didn’t have time to sit and chill, play basketball, watch the Olympics. I didn’t have anyone familiar around me to keep me going. And yet every day I had the opportunity to learn more and more about how amazing our bodies are, how awesome our God is! God has provided for my every need yet I still complained like a child. I was so focused on how ‘uncomfortable’ I was that I couldn’t see the amazing blessings right in front of me!

That Sunday I went to the church of one of the girls from my Bible study. I settled down and took some time to rest. Dad had come up on Saturday to give me his car for the week until I found one and finally I was beginning to get over myself. Needless to say this week was much better! I am already behind some on keeping up with my lectures and studying, and I am already very tired, but God has given me a renewed purpose. He reminded me I am there for Him. Yes I want to help people, but more than that I want to please Him! That has given me so much peace this week! Peace about finding a vehicle, peace about classes, about friends and settling into a new city. I had my first test on Friday and I actually didn’t freak out!

This weekend I came home to Knoxville in hopes of finding a vehicle and being done with this so I can focus better on school. I made it Friday in time to see part of the Lady Vol soccer game. Wow what a blessing it was to see so many friends after the game! It was so refreshing to have so much fun and see great friends! This morning I was able to get a lot of studying done while dad went to a meeting. We headed out in search for a vehicle and after a few hours, thankfully, we found one!

So, tomorrow I will drive back to VA in my new vehicle and study late into the night for my big test the next day. Then I will begin another day. One day, then another and another; I have three tests this week. It is hard, extremely hard. But this is where I am supposed to be right now. The thing that gives me the most peace when facing how overwhelming med school can be is that I am here for God. Right here right now I am obeying Him. Each day that is my focus. It’s not to pass a test, to get through this or that, or even to become a doctor. Every day I approach it as a chance to obey.

Grace upon Grace

“It was good for you to come today,” she said as she walked me home, “I did not know before that Jesus died for MY sin.” This was the third time we had met for me to tutor her in English. She could not get enough Truth. During our second meeting we began going through John together. She was amazed by this Jesus and commented, “I think Jesus was a good man, but I think He was more than that. I think He is the Son of God.” I sat in complete amazement that this woman would openly confess Jesus as the Son of God.  Upon our third meeting she had read through 11 chapters of John in both English and her native tongue, and had written out several questions for me. Questions like, what is sin, why did Jesus die, what is resurrection. We even talked about the Holy Spirit and His role in our lives. How He is our comforter, counselor, and He shows us Truth in scripture. When she asked about the trinity, I hesitated to explain knowing that with the little bit of English she knew I may only confuse her. But as I tried to explain she said, “I think the Spirit is giving me understanding.” It was rather obvious that God had been at work in her life and was calling her out! The fourth time we met, I brought the English teacher with me to help translate and explain some of the harder concepts. Even then it amazed us at her hunger to know Him! My last time to meet with her came after a tragedy killed many people from her town. We talked about how God is in control of all things, but that He uses them for good, and that He promises to walk through them with us. God never promised we would not face trials, but He promised to always be with us. She stopped me and struggled to ask, “how do I  . . . the Spirit . . . in me . . . how do I get the Spirit? I want to follow Jesus”

Never before had God allowed me the privilege of this moment. To witness Him raise the dead. Right there and then I had the honor of sharing with this precious woman that if she asked, God would forgive HER sin and give HER new life. She then asked if she had to pray in English, with eyes open or closed, hands open or folded. It was totally new to her to be able to come before God just as she is, and talk to Him straight from her heart. That day, the day before I headed back to the States, she walked into new life. Grace upon grace! I did absolutely nothing, and yet God in His grace allowed me to walk with her into life! He never ceases to amaze me!

The past 6 weeks I have been in East Africa. I did not really know why God wanted me to go this summer, the summer before I start medical school. I almost regretted staying so long because one week after I returned I must move to Blacksburg, VA. But now, I know. God took me out of life as I knew it here in comfort and ease, and took me where He could humble me and show me Himself in a way that will help me trust Him throughout medical school. This was a very hard trip for many different reasons, but the fruit that came of it was worth it all and so much more! Not only did He use me, but He taught me each and every day. He reminded me that I am His, He called me by MY name. He is enough for whatever I face, especially when HE called me to it!  

So many great things happened in East Africa this summer! But because I must now switch my focus to packing, moving and preparing to start school, I will have to wait and write about the rest later. But for all of you who lifted us up thank you so much! God did amazing things there this summer and He is still working there! Please continue to pray for our new sister in Christ. Pray her faith will grow and spread like fire. Pray for her family especially her husband to be drawn to Christ as he sees a difference in her and as she has already begun sharing with him. Grace upon grace, this is our God. Amazing grace!

Andrew's graduation