…Doing Good, As Unto A Faithful Creator

Sometimes It’s The Healer That Needs Healing

In both medicine and ministry, we are trained to serve, to sacrifice, and to care for others—often without pause. But behind the white coats and the pulpits are souls that feel deeply and hearts that sometimes break. This story is deeply personal, and sharing it is not easy. Yet I believe it must be shared—because sometimes the healer also needs healing. Recognizing our own humanity does not diminish our strength; it deepens our compassion. And in the shared experience of pain, we often find our greatest capacity to minister with sincerity, tenderness, and grace.

In the midst of the flames

I was a resident physician at Florida Hospital in the Family Practice department. My wife Cherie and I already had our daughter, Heather, at the beginning of our first year of internship, and she was growing up beautifully. We were excited to find out we were pregnant again. What a blessing!  We celebrated with joy!  I was now in my second year of residency, and I was on my OB rotation at the time.

One day, our OB attending called me urgently. “John, get down to the hospital now and bring your wife. I need to talk to you.” I asked, “What’s going on?” He said, “Bad news. The triple screen is bad.”

I picked up Cherie and told her, “We need to go to the hospital. They found something in the triple screen test.” She asked, “Is it bad?” I couldn’t bring myself to say yes. We dropped Heather with our dear friends and then drove in silence to the hospital.

At the hospital, they took us aside and began an OB ultrasound on Cherie. I knew how to read ultrasounds, but this time, something didn’t look right. I pointed at the screen and asked the sonographer, “What is that? Go back, show me that again.” The sonographer didn’t answer. I got up from my seat next to my wife and put my finger on the ultrasound screen and demanded, “What is that?” The sonographer avoided my gaze, ignored my question, put down the probe, and left the room.

In a moment my attending, Dr. George Lens, came in. He was a wonderful man and I had implicit trust in him as our physician. He picked up the ultrasound wand, scanned Cherie’s belly for a moment, then put the probe down. “John and Cherie, I have bad news,” he said. “Your baby has no brain.”

I was stunned. He explained the condition, anencephaly. Out of the 3.5 million babies born in the US every year, around 400 babies are born with anencephaly. The problem occurs early, so a woman does not even know she is pregnant by the time the problem is fully developed. Most die before birth. If they survive to term, they cannot live long. Our baby didn’t have the brain or skull structure to engage in the birth canal, making delivery risky for Cherie. We learned this condition can be prevented with a small amount of folic acid, something we didn’t realize was so important at the time.

Cherie was heartbroken. She loves life—every living thing—and she would’ve given her life for that baby. But there was nothing we could do. Our baby was essentially a hospice case. Eventually, the baby was born. It was premature, and I delivered my son with my own hands. He opened his eyes, took a single breath, and then died in my arms. There was nothing I could do.

Walking through the pain

Twice in my life, I have held one of my children as they died. This was the first. I felt helpless. The nurses kindly gave us a small fabric-lined box for the body, but I became upset when I saw them whispering and pointing. I told them, “Please, take my baby to the morgue. This is not a show.” Already, well-meaning friends had asked the question, “Why you? Why did this happen to you?” But those who asked this question had nothing to offer for encouragement. It seemed as if the question was to remind us of our pain. I am sure I was hypersensitive at the time, and I know they were trying to help, but the words hit me like the words of Lot’s wife when she told Job to curse God and die.

We went home devastated. Cherie became quiet, moving about the house mechanically, tending to our daughter automatically. Watching her stare into space, I could see her heart broken. I was in the same state. As a physician, I was supposed to help people and save lives, but I couldn’t help my own child.

It was Christmas Eve. Cherie was pacing the kitchen in silence, and I knew we had to do something before the grief consumed us. I read a promise in 1 Peter that said, “Beloved, don’t think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you as if something strange is happening to you, but rejoice to the extent that you partake in Christ’s sufferings…” I was reminded in these words that God the Father also knows what it’s like to lose a son. The verse continued…

That hit me hard. It meant that if we trust God, we must show that trust by doing good, even when suffering. I decided to obey this scripture, even though everything in me cried out not to; All I felt like doing was retreating into my grief. However, we discussed it and decided our family would obey the scripture and demonstrate our trust despite our pain. So I said, “Sweetheart, let’s go to Costco.” At Costco we bought 50-pound bags of rice and beans, and some cases of the large #10 cans of canned goods, and packed them into the car. The next day would be Christmas, and in response to our pain and loss, we decided to feed the homeless on Christmas Day.

Making it real

We pulled up to the Salvation Army on Christmas Day in downtown Orlando, and I walked in the back door to the kitchen with a 50-pound bag on my shoulder and a case of canned goods on my hip, while Cherie carried our daughter Heather. As we entered through the back, a man spotted us and said, “Hey! Did you bring more food?” They had been afraid of running out of food, and we were suddenly heroes of the kitchen staff.

After unloading the food in the kitchen, we were invited into the main hall and given an assignment. The door to the hall would open in about 15 minutes, and I was asked to stand at the door and greet the homeless as they entered. Our task was to find one person and ask if we could serve them. We were to speak to the guests kindly and show them warmth and dignity through our presence and words. Cherie sat at one of the cafeteria-style tables, holding Heather in her lap, while I went to wait by the door where the line would soon enter. The host told me that the homeless lined up for blocks outside that entrance, knowing they would be offered a place to sit and be asked gently, “May I serve you?” by someone who cared. It was a small way to make a big impact, and we were honored to be part of it.

As I stood there waiting by the closed door, I felt hesitant. I was in pain—deep sorrow lingered just beneath the surface—and I wasn’t sure I had the emotional strength to offer kindness to anyone. When the door opened, people began to flow into the building.  I kept motioning people past me, almost like I was directing traffic, but in my heart, I was struggling to connect as I watched the line enter. Then, as one man stepped forward, our eyes met. There was a heaviness in his look, but I knew he was the one I should serve.  I pointed to him in the line and gestured for him to come out of the group he was standing with and come ahead. He walked toward me, his clothes worn, the smell of the street on him. He didn’t say a word, just looked at me as I asked softly, “May I serve you?” Inside, I was still aching. I didn’t feel like being kind. But I stayed—because Scripture said to do good, even in suffering—and I believed God to be a faithful Creator, even in my pain. My obedience was a quiet declaration of faith.

The man accepted my invitation by nodding. I asked him to follow me, and we went to the table where Cherie and Heather sat. I took his order for food and made sure to load up his plate generously. Then, I returned to sit with him while he ate, making small talk and just being present. It wasn’t much, but it was an offering of trust, a way of saying that I believed, “God is still good, and He is faithful.”

I tried to keep up a conversation as he ate, but the man remained silent. While he ate, he hardly looked at his food. He stared intensely at me.  He seemed to be studying my face. He barely looked at his plate, blindly using his fork to get another bite while staring with an intensity that made me pause. Then, while I was talking to him, he started staring at Cherie with the same intensity. It was uncomfortable. He shifted his gaze again to my 1-year-old daughter, Heather, and studied her for a long time. It was very awkward. In her innocence, Heather held his gaze while she beamed back at him with a smile. His eyes again shifted back to Cherie’s face, and then to mine. Quietly, he put his fork down on his plate, put both hands to his face, and began to cry. His shoulders trembled as quiet sobs overtook him. I was startled, unsure what to say. This was not what I had planned for this day, and not what I felt we needed for our own healing. Here we were trying to deal with our own issues at the moment. I did not want to deal with someone else’s issues.  But instinctively, I reached out and touched his arm. “Are you alright?” I asked softly. “Have I offended you somehow, or said something unkind?” He took a moment, slowly lowered his hands, eyes red and glassy, and whispered, “No, you have not done anything, it’s just… I was remembering.”

“Remembering?”

“I have not always been a drunk living on the streets.

“Yes, I was remembering.” He went on to explain. “I have not always been a drunk living on the streets. I had worked at a radio station. It was a good job.   I had a beautiful wife and a nice little house.” He then looked off into the distance momentarily as if visualizing his past.

I asked, “What happened?”

An Unlikely Connection

He came back to focus and went on. He said everything was going along nicely. Then one day, He and his wife were both joyful and excited when they discovered they were pregnant, but the child had complications and was born with no brain. It was a shock that sent them both into despair.  As a result of that trauma, he had descended into depression and started drinking. He left his job, his home, and his wife and had been living on the streets ever since, and had never gone back. I listened to his sad story in wonder.  I felt his pain, and I recognized the unlikelihood of it all.  Out of 3.5 million babies born yearly, only 400 are born anencephalic in the US.  Somehow, two hurting men connected, brought up the topic that would likely never be mentioned between strangers, particularly two men, and now those men began to talk about their experience. I recognized that we could have finished the whole meal, and this issue that was so acute for both of us might never have come up.  We would have had an interaction and parted ways without knowing the pain the other was going through, which was exactly the same as our own.  God had orchestrated a miracle, not just in time, place, and circumstances, but in my heart.   

I began to minister to him with a willingness and clarity that had been previously absent. Looking back on that interaction, I am amazed at God’s gentle compassion and creative power in orchestrating it.  

Learning to Trust

In suffering, we draw near to God in a way no other created being can. Angels, unfallen worlds—they may behold pain and suffering, but they do not experience it as we do. Only humans and Jesus Christ share this experience. When we trust God in our suffering, we enter into a unique aspect of God that no other created being can understand. To trust Him when it is hardest, there is something powerful about this kind of trust—choosing to believe when nothing is clear, holding on when everything is breaking.

It was Jesus who endured suffering with full knowledge of its cost. He was crucified not by accident, but by choice—” for the joy that was set before Him” (Hebrews 12:2). That joy was us. He trusted His Father for the outcome and stepped forward despite the pain. And now, when we suffer but choose to do good as a response of trust, we walk in His footsteps. That Christmas, it was through our own wounds that we were able to help someone else find healing. The severity of our pain provided the greatest power for service. Not the power of position or strength, but the power of understanding. Of presence. Of compassion that comes only by walking through the valley ourselves. That night, we walked into someone else’s sorrow with hearts full of our own sorrow—and somehow, God met us there.

My wife and I went home that day with the same grief, but a different peace. We had not received answers, but we received presence—God’s presence. In comforting a grieving father, we ourselves were comforted. We saw firsthand how God meets us in our brokenness. The chaos of the world hadn’t changed, but we were reminded that God had not moved. He is still in control. Still faithful. Still near. It was as if God was saying, “You may not understand why these difficult things happen to you, but I am with you. I am still in control. I see you, you are not forgotten, and you are never alone.”

Sharing this story is not easy. But it is shared for a purpose. For those of us called to heal, to minister, and to serve, we must also learn to receive healing. We are not immune to sorrow. We are not less spiritual because we grieve or because we hurt. Acknowledging our humanity does not weaken our ministry—it strengthens it. It makes us more compassionate, more real, more like the Savior we follow. When we choose to trust, despite the depth of our pain, we experience again that God is still trustworthy, He is still with us. Because sometimes, it’s the healer that needs healing.