A farmer went to sow some seed. Some fell on a path and was eaten by birds, some fell on infertile soil, some fell among thorns, and some fell on good soil, reaping a bountiful harvest. We are all familiar with the story,[1] but how does it relate to us as students in medicine?
The seed that fell among thorns represents those who hear the good news of the gospel, but the pressures or desires of this life crowd it out. As a second year Birmingham student, I discovered one or two such thorns at medical school.
I turned to Christ at 15, coming from a fairly secular background. Jesus brought me out of a self-centred teenage lifestyle, converting me into someone who gave up three evenings a week to help with a church children’s group, played in a band and spoke at my school’s Christian Union. Medical school, however, was a big change, with new experiences, people and demands on my time. Excuses were the theme of the day, and I began giving up activities that I was involved in before. It wasn’t long before I abandoned CMF as well (because I ‘hadn’t the time’).
Slowly, but surely, I fell back into sinful ways. I remember an occasion when my friends and I mocked a girl in class by saying she looked as if she had Down’s syndrome. This was barely a year since I had helped care for a Down’s sufferer at church. I judged people on the basis of their looks; I became a lost sheep.
Despite my sinfulness, God’s amazing love covered over all, by graciously calling me back through Christ. As Pope John Paul II lay dying, I was struck by the grace and dignity he displayed, and remembered the grace and dignity with which Christ died on the cross for my sins. Somewhere deep within me, God was at work, reminding me of the gift of salvation, what it meant to be one of God’s children, and what it was to love God. I prayed for help but found it difficult to forgive myself, let alone approach God for forgiveness.
God provided the answers while I was locked in a perplexing struggle with my conscience. I came across a book, I Kissed Dating Goodbye by Joshua Harris.[2] The title appealed to me: I quite liked the idea of aiming to be content as a single, instead of focusing on those things that don’t matter eternally and being a depressed self-centred mess. Partly through this book, God brought me back to the cross. He reminded me that I was forgiven, that Jesus carried my sin and died in my place, so that I could approach God with confidence and receive his Holy Spirit of love and life! God put my life back in order with Christ at its head. One result of this was that a fellow student recently said that I was one of the kindest people she knew. She couldn’t have been more wrong: I knew what I was like and my heart’s sinfulness. Only through the Spirit of God do I have any goodness at all.
Is it possible to avoid my mistakes? Not without God. He instructs through his Word, our consciences, through those around us and in many other ways. I came to realise that listening to God involved making time for him in my life, stopping my faith being choked by thorns. I would strongly encourage you to make time to pray, read Scripture and to spend time in fellowship with other Christians. Christ can feel like just one more thing to juggle, but the truth of the gospel is that he is the only thing that is essential.
In prayer, ask God to work in all parts of your life, strengths and even weaknesses. Bear witness to God’s work in your life now. As I read them, I realised that there are few words more powerful than these: ‘Go home to your family and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you.’[3]
It was easy for me to put medicine at the centre of my life, but in reality, the cross should be there instead. Therefore take risks for what is right and good (ie for Jesus)! Indeed, ‘faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead’.[4] What is the reward for the risk? Jesus tells us that ‘everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields for my sake, will receive a hundred times as much and will inherit eternal life.’[5] I believe that we should work hard to be good doctors, but be prepared to serve God outside medicine, even if this impinges on study: whatever we do, we should do all for the glory of God.[6]
Just as he worked in me, his word stands: ‘neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.’[7] I was in need of a miracle, and I experienced one. I hope you can learn with me that with Christ, nothing is impossible!
