Too Soon

I received the first call as I was heading in to start my 12 hour on-call rotation. A young man who thought he had a chest cold a few days ago was put on life support as he battled a life-threatening case of double pneumonia.

While with his sister and mother, another family was gathering in a consulting room, where I would be asked to go and help them deal with the sudden loss of their husband, son and brother - each member esperiencing a different level of loss, but loss all the same. 

As I walked back into my on-call sleeping quarters, my phone beckoned me again. This time to a family, whose loved one was brought in for an appendectomy that turned out to be stage four colo-rectal cancer. 

I got back to my little room, laid my head on the pillow and wearily fell off to sleep.  In what seemed like moments, I woke up and looked at my watch, whose face had a blurry 4:30 am on it, and then my phone alerted me to another call for chaplain services. 

This fourth and final call, as of this writing, was for a family of a man who had recently had a triple bypass and seemed to be doing well until he had a massive heart attack and died.

Four families, two deaths and two uncertain futures. The common thread was that it was all too soon and too sudden.  They thought there was plenty of time, two families hope there will be some time left and the other two knows there is none. 

This is not just their reality, it is the truth for all of us.  Life on this earth is wrapping up much sooner than you think or will likely be prepared for - it will end too soon for you or the ones you love. As James put it, "You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes" (Js 4:14).  

So, I'm wondering, are you ready?  Jus' Askn.