We Must Stop the Hemorrhage!

If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God. Hebrews 10:26

A red blood cell is so tiny that over five million of them exist in every drop of blood. That’s 30-trillion in the average sized adult. Thirty trillion! Now that may seem like overkill, but it’s not. For in the vast ocean of formed elements that fill our arteries and veins every one of those red cells is vital for life, so important in fact that God created a second type of cell, called the platelet, to keep the red cells from leaking out. Platelets are sticky. Tenacious. They work together, to form a tight mesh, and ultimately to stop the hemorrhage…

“EMS report for medic-seven…Hemorrhage.”

The loudspeaker made me jump. We were receiving another dispatch, and I just had removed my boots. I pulled them back on and began to lace them up as the dispatcher continued.

“We’ve got one bleeding at 415 Maple Street. Police on scene request a code-three response. Code-three.”

Code-3 means get there fast, someone’s about to die. I finished tying my boots and hurried toward the ambulance. My partner was already behind the wheel with the engine running when I climbed into the passenger seat. I clicked on my safety belt, then I switched on the emergency lights and keyed the truck’s radio mic.

“Medic-seven en route. Responding Code-three.”

“10-4. Medic- seven,” the dispatcher continued, “be advised, you have a twenty-five year old male bleeding heavily. The caller states he punched his fist through a sheet of plate glass. The patient is not breathing.”

“Ten-four.” I replaced the mic and glanced at my partner. “Sounds bad. Let’s go.”

My partner drove out of the bay and hit the gas. I pulled on a pair of blue latex gloves, hung my stethoscope around my neck, and then sat back to think. Would it be a simple laceration? A horrific bloody mess? I’d seen enough trauma to realize the severity of the call. We’d need to act fast, to stop the bleeding before it was too late.

My partner made a hard turn onto Maple Street and slowed the truck. I switched off the siren and lights. He drove to the end of the street and set the brakes. I jumped out and grabbed an orange bag containing trauma supplies and IV fluids. Then I started for the house with my partner by my side.

Halfway up the sidewalk we heard angry shouting. On the front steps a loud scream. Then a soul piercing wail echoed from within the house. “No, no, nooooo!” I stepped onto the front porch and walked carefully across the broken shards of glass that littered the planks. The door hung on its hinges, its plate glass window smashed. I walked into the house and stopped. My patient lay in the center of the room in a wide pool of blood. His blank eyes stared at the ceiling. His skin looked dull and pale.

“Oh Lord! Oh Lord!” A weak kneed middle-aged woman stood on the other side of the room shouting, supported by family members struggling to hold her up. “God,” she cried, “no, no, no, not my baby boy!”

“She found him about ten minutes ago,” one of the cops reported. “I don’t think you can do anything for him, but we called you just in case.”

“No,” the woman cried, gazing at me through tear-stained eyes. “My boy, my boy, tell me he’s okay. Please tell me he’s not dead!”

But he was dead. There was nothing my partner and I could do. The man’s blood had already been spilt. It was too late to stop the hemorrhage.



You know when God designed the human body he created a marvelous mechanism to control bleeding. Platelets respond to the site of injury. They adhere to one another. They form a tight mesh. And once piled upon by circulating fibers, an impenetrable barrier forms. It’s called clotting. But if the damage is too severe and the clotting mechanisms fail, there’s no stopping the hemorrhage. Death will surely come.

Our life in Christ is much the same. If we grow too attached to the world, if we deliberately continue in sin, our souls begin to bleed. So we must become like those platelets. Sticky and tenacious. Obedient to God’s Word. And we must encourage one another by adhering to our fellow believers and working together to stop the hemorrhage in our lives before it is too late. If we fail to do this, more souls will bleed to death and silently slip away.

Don’t allow that to happen. Stop the hemorrhage in your spiritual life. Christ’s blood was shed on your behalf. Accept his marvelous gift of life, and live.

Follow Me!

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” Mt 16:24

“Follow you? That’s impossible. I can’t do it!”

On 20 October 1944 the leading elements of the 3d Battalion, 34th Infantry—one of the units of the U.S. Army's 24th Division—hit the Philippine island of Leyte on a beach defended by Japanese soldiers occupying a number of large, well-camouflaged pillboxes. The objective was simple: establish a beachhead in order to take the Philippines and break a vital supply line of the Imperial Japanese Navy.

The soldiers hit the beach and almost immediately they found themselves pinned down by heavy machine gun and rifle fire. The beach landing stalled. Casualties began to mount.

To save his men, Regimental Commander Colonel Aubrey S. Newman rose in the midst of the battle and shouted, “Follow me!” And his men did. They swept forward against the Japanese defenders and crushed them. They took the beach and altered the course of the war.

When I first became a Christian, following Christ seemed easy. I read the Bible and went to church. I prayed every day and tried my best to live a good life. And it felt good. Life was easy. But when the honeymoon ended I began to backslide, and for thirty years I walked around half-blind, seeking whatever I pleased and claiming to be a Christian. I learned to frown. I grew a stiff neck. My heart turned cold to God.

But one day while searching His Word, seeking answers to why my life had grown so meaningless, God spoke to me.

“If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”

“Follow you?” I cried. “I can’t!”

“You must.”

“But, Lord, you don’t understand. I’ve tried to follow you. I can’t keep up with you!”

“That’s because you’re carrying too heavy a load,” I heard Him say. “Drop everything. Follow me.”

When Colonel Newman’s men hit Red Beach that hot October day they left their families and their worldly possessions behind. They left behind their problems, dropped everything they owned, and picked up their weapons. Then they followed their commanding officer into battle, and the beachhead was won.

The Battle of Leyte raged for seventy-seven more days. American forces suffered a total of 15,584 casualties, of which 3,504 were killed in action. Colonel Newman was critically injured, but in the end his victory on that hot Red Beach proved to be a turning point in the Pacific campaign of World War II. The United States obtained an important foothold in the Philippines, and a vital artery of the Imperial Japanese Naval forces was severed.

To follow Jesus Christ means to live a life of obedience. To put on the full armor of God every day, and then like Colonel Newman’s soldiers, to stand up and follow your commanding officer into battle.

Jesus said, “Follow me.”

He gave a direct order. Will you obey Him? Drop what you are doing today. Take up your cross and follow Him into battle. Victory is assured, for Christ has already won.

He Is Always There

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.
Heb 11:1

"I can’t see you," I whispered. "I can’t hear you either. But I know you’re there, Lord, I can feel you all around me."

She was born in 1880, the daughter of a Confederate Army officer, a normal healthy child. But at nineteen months of age she developed a serious illness that left her unable to hear. Or see.

Her formative years were difficult. She had no practical connection to the outside world. Instead she lived in a world of silence, a dark void with no ability to communicate except through tantrums and fits of rage. At the age of six the specialists deemed her incorrigible with no hope for a normal life. After all without eyes and ears it would be impossible for her to thrive. She could never make it.

But then a miracle occurred. A remarkable young woman walked into her life, someone acutely aware of the difficulties of the deaf and blind. The Teacher, as she came to be known, taught the child to communicate with her hands. She started by using her own fingers to draw the letters W-A-T-E-R in the palm of one of the child’s hands, while holding the other under a spigot of flowing water. And it worked. The child made the connection. Her education began.

She soon learned the English language, and became proficient at reading Braille. She learned to communicate with others, to type, and even to write. And against all odds she went to college, earned a Bachelor’s degree, and then made a successful career as an author, lecturer and esteemed political activist. In short, she made a profound difference, and she did it all without ever having seen or heard the world around her.

As I consider the life of the late Helen Keller, I am reminded of the difficult challenges that face anyone desiring a close walk with God. We can’t hear His voice, we can’t see His face, and yet, it is still possible to know Him intimately. To understand how He thinks. To comprehend His will.

"But how?" some may ask. "If I can’t see him, how do I know he’s there? "If he never speaks to me, how do I know he’s real?"

By learning to communicate with Him. Our eyes and ears add the finishing touches to our understanding of things, add depth and color and dimensions that vividly brighten our lives. But they can also draw our attention away from God. Think about Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. They listened to the serpent, then they looked at the tree. Enticement gave way to sin, and death entered the world. What if they’d never seen the fruit? Or never even heard the tempter? What would have happened?

No, it is not with our eyes or ears that God chose to reveal Himself to us, but by reaching deep within us to stir our spirits and build up our faith. For only by faith can a man ever walk closely with God. But faith takes time. Hard work. You develop it by spending time with God in prayer, by diligently studying His Word, and by reaching out to others in search of His Spirit within them. And when that faith begins to grow you discover vast treasures all around you that you never knew existed.

I’ve never seen God, and I’ve never heard his voice, but I recognize the touch of His hand. I sense His awesome presence. He opens my eyes and ears to add the music and colors to my life. This builds my faith, and fills me with assurance that He is always there.

Once I knew only darkness and stillness... my life was without past or future... but a little word from the fingers of another fell into my hand that clutched at emptiness, and my heart leaped to the rapture of living.

–Helen Keller

Eternally Grateful

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God. Col 3:16

"Songs, hymns and spiritual songs? I don’t know, Lord. I don’t feel much like singing these days. I’ve tried to be a good Christian, but lately I don’t feel that richness dwelling within me. Where’s the joy you promised? Please explain it to me so that I can understand."

I prayed that prayer not long ago. After years of trying to lead a decent life and discover what it means to be a Christian, I finally reached the point where I felt haunted by my lack of joy. Something was missing from my life, and that scripture made no sense to me at all. Until recently…

"I read a good article yesterday. Think you might like it."

"Oh yeah—?"

I caught a gleam in my friend, Dan’s, eye. We were sitting in a local café. We had already chatted about sailing and about work and about our families, but as he opened his Blackberry and began to scroll through the files I could tell he had something important to share.

"A good article? What’s it about?"

"The different virtues," he said, "and the spiritual wealth hidden within them."

I listened as he continued. He mentioned loyalty and faithfulness. Self-discipline, integrity and strength.

"But the greatest virtue of all," he explained, "is gratitude."

"Gratitude?" That didn’t resonate with me. How about love? Or compassion? "How could gratitude be the greatest virtue?"

"Well," he said, nodding and tapping his Blackberry screen, "think about it—you and I are extremely blessed just to be here."

"Yeah, today I might agree with that, Dan, but there are other times I might not. I don’t always feel blessed. In fact sometimes I feel downright ungrateful."

"Then you need to hear this," he said. "It’s from a book called, A Short History of Nearly Everything, written by a man named Bill Bryson. Listen to what he says…

‘You have been extremely - make that miraculously - fortunate in your personal ancestry. Consider the fact that for 3.8 billion years, a period of time older than the Earth's mountains and rivers and oceans, every one of your forebears on both sides has been attractive enough to find a mate, healthy enough to reproduce, and sufficiently blessed by fate and circumstances to live long enough to do so. Not one of your pertinent ancestors was squashed, devoured, drowned, starved, stranded, stuck fast, untimely wounded, or otherwise deflected from its life's quest of delivering a tiny charge of genetic material to the right partner at the right moment in order to perpetuate the only possible sequence of hereditary combinations that could result - eventually, astoundingly, and all too briefly - in you.’

"The point is," Dan said, "the odds against your being born were astronomical. You shouldn’t even be here. But you’re part of God’s plan. You might even say, He invited you to be here. So you have a lot to be grateful for."

*

This morning I witnessed perfection. The sky, just an hour before devoid of any light, burst forth with living color. The eastern horizon glowed with the warm tinted hues of morning. A light fog drifted skyward from the trees and meadows as if God Himself were lifting it to Heaven.

As I drove along thinking of the beauty and the majesty behind it all, I was reminded of my conversation with Dan and suddenly it all made sense to me. God had invited me to be there, at that exact moment in time, to behold that beautiful sunrise. He wanted me to see it.

Each of us received a personal invitation from Almighty God—to be born, to live on this planet, and to enjoy His marvelous creation. Are you humbled by this? I am, for I now realize my purpose—to love God, to teach and admonish His people, and to praise Him with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. I have been filled with riches and joy, and for that I am eternally grateful.

What about me?

“Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For everything in the world—the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does—comes not from the Father but from the world.” 1 John 2:15-16

Okay, I admit it—I love the world. I always have, it’s a great place to live. But there was a time when it had me in chains, dying to get out there in it, to live a little. But my situation wouldn’t allow it. And God? He never seemed to answer my question, What about me? So I decided to put my foot down. One of two things was going to happen: he’d talk to me, or I’d run until I dropped. I had to get his attention…

“Lord, do you hear me?” I took off down the lakeside trail shaking my fist at him as I ran. “Are you listening to me? There’s so much I want to see. So many things I want to do. All of my friends are having fun. What about me?”

Silence.

“Why won’t you answer me? All I ever do is work. I deserve more.”

More silence.

“It’s not fair!”

And, boy, I sure showed him! I ran until I couldn’t take another step, but still God remained silent. Finally I stopped in the middle of the trail and doubled-over, dejected and frustrated, sweating and gasping for air. Physically and emotionally I felt drained. Spiritually I was spent.

“Oh, God,” I cried, tears flooding my eyes. “Where are you?”

A funny croaking sound answered me. I turned and watched a frog leap into the lake. “Very funny,” I muttered. “Is that the best you can do?” Then a deer caught my eye. She lifted her head from the water’s edge, glanced at me and trotted into the woods. “Hmm.” A fish jumped and landed with a splash. “What is this?” I murmured. And then I noticed this dragonfly. Crazy thing buzzed past my face, landed on a small branch less than three feet away, and sat there staring at me. I felt puzzled. Was someone trying to tell me something?

Then a high-pitched mechanical sound caught my attention. Distracted I looked up. A fancy motorboat zoomed across the lake. I glanced back at the dragonfly. It sat perched on the end of the stem watching me. I felt a strange paradox in my heart. Then another boat cruised past. My face hardened again. I wanted a boat so bad I could taste it. I balled up my fist and opened my mouth to yell at God, but something stopped me—His voice. It came to me, powerful and resounding, and yet as gentle as a whisper…

You listen to me now. This world…all those things you so desperately want and can’t get your hands on…don’t you see? You love those things more than you love me.

My problems were still waiting for me when I got home, but something about me had changed. I ran into the woods that morning angry, frustrated, and shaking my fist at God, but I walked out at peace, quietly acknowledging Him and thanking Him for my life.

*

Are you angry with God? Do you ever shake your fist at Him? Demand your rights? Then maybe you love this world just a little too much. Put your foot down. Run out there and find Him. And when some silly bug lands on a branch in front of you and boldly stares you down, close your mouth and listen for God’s voice. Then follow Him out of that deep, dark forest. He has a better life waiting for you…a life of contentment, of hope, and of joy.

* * *