Authors-choice: Hope & Revival

I remember a man in the hospital where I was chaplain for a few years. He was unbelievably disfigured. His body was twisted like a corkscrew and all he could do was sit in bed, day and night. If someone came to visit him, he could not even turn his head enough to make eye contact.

Whenever I came around to visit him, my standard greeting would be, “Well, how are things today?”

And his answer was always the same: “Just fine, thank you.” Now, deep down, in my own heart, I knew that if I were answering for him, I could truthfully have said each time, “Well, things are a lot worse with me than with you,” and I could have understood.

But seeing this man suffering and hearing him answer so light-heartedly, always did something to me: I always left the room both humble and joyful.