Thursday, April 30, 2009

Dear God,

My friend is septic, sick, very sick. Her husband drove her all the way to the hospital from Florida, more than 1,000 miles. She is in intensive care now getting the help she needs.

I stayed with my friend all night. I listened to her moans of pain. I watched them try to insert a line in a vein in her neck but they were unsuccessful. She needs more fluids.

I have witnessed the fragility of life. I have seen how a person can be perfectly healthy one moment and deathly ill the next. I understand human mortality.

But all during the time I have seen how fragile human life is, I have noticed the constancy of God. Who are you if not God? Where are you if not beside each one? What are you if not pure love?

You are
constantly faithful,
Great God;
you speak
and your word rumbles
in our souls.
I cannot travel
beyond your presence.
I may
be sick
or sick of heart,
but I
do not have
to hunt
for you.
You are
as near
as my breath.
I call
on you
for my friend.
I ask for
your intervention
to stem
the tide
of her infection.
I know
you are
with her.
I lean
on you
for comfort,
for you alone
are God.

Love, Andrea