This evening we looked at a passage from the Book of Philippians, a letter Paul wrote while in a Roman prison. Obviously, a Roman prison was lousy place to be confined and Paul had no desire to be there anymore than any of us would want to be in that situation. Yet, Paul finds reasons to be joyful even then. All of us either at present or in the recent past have probably found ourselves in situations at work, with family, finances or relationships that make us cry out “I don’t want to be here.” As we read Phil 1:12-26 the members of the group were instructed to think about those situations that you are in which they really do not want to be in. Read More

We began our discussion by sharing who we each remembered investing in us or mentoring us as young physicians and how we saw that displayed. Many members of the group mentioned their residency or fellowship program directors as being very influential and how they experienced mentoring. A few participates had trouble coming up with anyone who was particularly helpful and they even may have resented the fact that no one had taken as much interest as others had experienced. Then there were some members of the group who had a clear mentor-mentee relationship and were able to discuss how beneficial it was to them. Read More

The days of the doctor being viewed as “The Captain of the Ship” seemed to have past us by as there are more and more people and authorities that seem to be telling us what we need to do administratively and even what we are to do for our patients. Yet, as physicians, we remain in a position of authority over many of those we encounter in our practice. We began our discussion identifying the types of people we oversee. This very much depends on our individual practice situation. The group mentioned receptionists, LPNs, physician extenders and nurses in our offices, technicians and nurses on the hospital wards, the ER and OR, medical students and residents. Read More

We began our discussion with sharing what words we commonly use in each of our particular specialties that may not be understood readily by our patients. Many mentioned anatomic names of the part of the body we care for such as thyroid, esophagus, a variety of bone or muscle names. Then there are the multitude of procedural names that are part and parcel of our practice that are completely unfamiliar. In addition the names many conditions and diseases are often new to many patients. All of these things are readily understood when we speak with our colleagues but when we are discussing these with a patient if we do not explain the nomenclature it is as if we are speaking in a foreign language. Read More

Before starting our discussion of retirement, we began with a very basic question: Why do you work? There were, as expected a variety of answers. Work gives our lives a sense of purpose and a feeling of being useful and it allows us to use the talents that God has instilled in us. We derive a part of our identity from the work we do and we find the work stimulating to our lives. Then there is the very practical reason that we need to earn money to support ourselves and our families. Read More

We began our discussion by sharing what we think society usually bases its judgement on of a person’s value and worth. Answers centered on their financial worth, their employment situation, how they dress or speak and what they own, where they went to school. Unfortunately society also counts their gender and race as factors all too frequently. We see this play out continuously in how some people are acknowledged in a crowd and other ignored. Studies show that women and non-white employees continue to be paid less then white men. We also discussed how sometimes when we meet a new patient in our practice we make snap value judgements based on some of these factors. Read More

We began our evening discussing what we might mean by a person’s ‘defining moment’ in their life. We came up with a time in which we experienced an event that in some way altered the path we were on and resulted in affecting our life’s path from there on. We then shared what we perceived were the defining moments of our lives. Events that are often mentioned are meeting or marrying our spouse, experiencing the birth of our children, or some event that determined our career path and certainly when we accepted the Lord as our savior. Whatever that event was it often leads us to a position of leadership in one realm or another – whether that be as a leader in a family unit, being called into a ministry Read More

Each month when we gather together we exchange prayer needs and often these involve someone dear to us who is unwell and we desire to lift them up in prayer. In addition, just about every week we each get requests from friends and family to pray for a health situation. We began our evening raising the question, why do we do this? What is our expectations? It was discussed that as physicians we are men and women of science. We are clearly reared in the need to seek out the best treatments for our patients based on scientific evidence. We expect that the medicines we give and the procedures we do lead to a patient healing. So it may be more difficult for people in our profession to believe in or expect a miraculous healing. Read More

Competitiveness seems to be a part of human nature. We started the evening’s study by telling a story about one of my granddaughters. We were on a family vacation at the seashore last month and had a wonderful time. The evening before we left I found my granddaughter busily writing out on paper plates elaborate awards for each member of the family. Everything from who gathered the most seashells to who made the best sandcastle to who jumped the most waves. It struck me that even at her young age she wanted to point out who had done the best in every category she could think of. This made me think about competitiveness and how it is hard wired into each of us. Read More

We are concluding our study of the passages of the Sermon on the Mount with a discussion Matthew 7:13-27. We started out with a discussion as to what most people base their security on. The answers are fairly obvious – money, family, their job, their power, themselves. The problem with all of those is that they are all limited and if those worldly things fall away for whatever oadeason their life will come crashing down on them. Read More