How Does Your Christian Faith Influence Making Life’s Toughest Decisions?

A friend of mine recently shared his struggles concerning making certain tough decisions regarding a beloved family member who was hospitalized and living on life support. The doctors had informed the family that the time had come to consider making some serious decisions about their loved one’s long term care.

These are gut wrenching decisions that no one ever envisions having to make. Yet, they are made daily.

Personally, both as a friend and a chaplain, I’ve sat in a room with family members who are faced with masking these types of decisions. It’s unbelievably difficult.

I also had to make these types of decisions about my late Father. So, I get how traumatic these decisions can be and how the weight of them can follow you for a long time afterwards.

At the time, all I could rely on is what I believed my Father would have wanted me to do if he could tell me in his own words. Having suffered his second massive stroke in five years, Daddy was incapable of communicating his wishes to me. His first stroke had left him with the inability to make short term memories and it had robbed him of any long term memories. He literally lived life in the moment.

Adding to the difficulty was my Mom, who understandably wasn’t ready to say goodbye to the love of her life just yet. But, Mom also knew that Daddy would not have wanted to live out his life dependent on medical science to keep him alive and breathing. And he certainly did not want to exist in any sort of vegetative state.

Yes, it would have been helpful had my Father written any of his wishes down on paper. But, he didn’t.

In addition to leaning on what I believed would be my Father’s wishes, I listened carefully to the advice of his attending physician and the highly-skilled brain surgeon. I needed their expertise.

My Mom and I talked, argued, and prayed. Then we talked, argued, and prayed some more. We faced an excruciatingly tough decision.

In that most difficult moment of moments, Mom and I each turned to our faith. I asked several close Christian friends for their guidance. I talked and prayed with my Pastor, who had faced a similar experience making this type of decision about his first wife.

I talked it over with Terri, who was my longtime girlfriend back in those days.

Mom talked with her friends and family.

We agreed that we would not look back once we made the decision. So, that meant we needed to be as sure as we could be in this incredibly difficult circumstance.

Ultimately, since my Dad had left nothing in writing, the decision would be up to the surgeon. He had agreed to make the decision after listening to my Mom and me separately and individually. He was a praying man who leant not only on his own ability and understanding, but on God’s wisdom and guidance also.

So, dear reader, why am I sharing something so deeply personal with you right now?

Excellent question.

I’m always interested in hearing how someone lives out their faith. I mean, if we read the Bible and believe what we read, then we should except it to influence how we live our lives.

So, dear reader, can you share a personal experience where you relied on your Christian faith to provide you with guidance during a difficult situation?”

Just curious.

Thanks for reading my blog. Feel free to leave a comment and share your thoughts.

Rainer Bantau

The Devotional Guy™

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