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'Nevertheless, I Live”
by Beatrice E. Borchardt
<(f""'1RUCIFIED with C hrist . . . I live.” Over and over I repeated these words as I lay flat on my hospital bed staring at the artistic representation of Christ on the opposite wall. Suddenly all of the words of Gala tians 2:20 pierced my mental fog: “ Crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; . . . in the flesh . . . by the faith of the Son of God, who . . . gave himself for me” This astonishing fact was true. I lived. But how did I come to this little green hospital room? Why was I here? Gradually the terrifying scenes of a wreck came back to me. My husband, his mother and I were travel ing from California, I to go by plane next morning to New York. My husband, meanwhile, would take his mother to visit relatives in Minnesota before rejoining me in the East. Suddenly all this was changed. A car, swinging violently out of control, smashed into us. None of the details of the crash could I recall, but I remembered opening my eyes in an ambulance and try ing to sit up. When I found I could not move, I called out to an attendant beside me, “ Is this real?” “ I am afraid it is,” he answered. “ Then where is God ?” The question was wrung from the depths of my being. Where was He? Once more I seemed to sense the pressure of strong, warm arms lifting me into the ambulance and was aware again of a voice saying, “ I think her neck is broken.” In the ambulance a voice came again, this time from subsconscious depths: “Underneath are the everlasting arms.” God’s Spirit was present and as I floated into un consciousness I was at peace. As I slowly returned through fog into reality that peace remained. My husband and his mother, both shocked and bruised, were in distant wards, while I, with brain concussion, skull fracture and many other wounds, had a room alone. For days I had not been able to think coherently, not even in prayer, but now the impact of the words of the Lord became vital. I had been almost dead but now I was alive. A visitors from a neighborhood church who began coming regularly brought me a Gospel o f John. At first I did not realize I could not read it lying, as I must, flat on my back, with eyes unable to focus. Yet it was this Gospel that helped to re-establish my thinking. During what I called my devotional period I could visualize scene after scene and chapter after chapter as it appeared on the screen of my memory until I had reviewed the entire Gospel. When, several weeks after we came, my husband and his mother were able to leave for their Minnesota visit, I was becoming adjusted to my limited hospital routine. Meanwhile I heard that the drinking driver of the car that smashed into us was growing gradually worse. When I first learned that he was internally injured, I wanted to go as soon as I could and let him know that
I held no feeling of bitterness toward him and that God could give him peace and comfort as He had done for me, but before I could do this our visiting pastor brought word that the man had died. I was crushed. “ Oh, then I never can tell him of God’s pardon.” “ I feel sure your prayer was answered,” the pastor hurried to say. “ The last time I talked with him the man seemed ready for death as he confessed his sins and acknowledged the Lord.” By the time I finished reviewing the Gospel of John I began visualizing the healing miracles. Each day the head of my bed was being raised and I was able to read in my Bible. It surprised me to notice how often the physical body was emphasized: “ Your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost.” “ Present your bodies a living sacrifice . . . to God.” “ Christ shall be magnified in my body.” As a teacher in school and church I was concerned more chiefly with the mental, social and spiritual needs of my pupils. The Lord Jesus, I observed, spent about as much time ministering to physical needs as He did to the spirit, and at this moment I was certainly glad dedicated people were ministering to mine. While hospital care was doing its part, another factor was hastening the healing process. Daily arrival of cards and letters gave me concrete evidence that the world was bigger than my little green room. Some were jolly and some were serious, but they brought balance to body and mind. From the Boy Scouts of my home village came a card with the verse: “ God is a refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” Here was the answer to my ambulance query: “ Where is God?” In a brief reply I said: “ Remember, boys, whenever we call to God in earnest, His Spirit is present to supply our need.” When I started sitting up, then walking, a period of restlessness began. I wanted to get away. I was impa tient to do active things, but strength seemed gone. Would it ever come back? Again came a card that gave me a verse to help in this crisis: “Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart.” That was all I could do—merely wait. Final healing could not be rushed. Even after returning home it took many months before I was able to fill a place of useful ness again. As I look back after a number of years, I know that hospital, doctors, nurses and friends each played a vital role in restoring health, but chief among the healing forces was the back-log of Scripture learned long ago that lifted my thoughts toward God. Waiting on Him in relaxed assurance brought body and spirit into balance. To a Christian this balance carries two certainties. “ To live is Christ,” whether in a hospital or anywhere else. “ To die is gain,” with the ultimate reward of ade quate life forever.
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THE KINO'S BUSINESS
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