Prayers Promises and Needles

Coincidences for some are just that; for others, it may be an answer to prayer.

We had our family, me and my three, a steady job, and a dream to someday buy a home. I almost had it all, but the one thing I went to school for--the ministry. It was an unfulfilled calling. It was a piece of me that wanted something more in life.

Pastors loved to have our family in church, and for me to be a work horse. They would say, "You're not ready to pastor until you prove yourself."

On one of those ho hum days, I found myself driving down the road on the way to work praying. "God steer my life where you want it. I'm a man without a ministry. Bring people into my life like you have before. Show me great and mighty things." Then I would add something like, "You didn't bring my family all the way up north, just leave us in the lurch."

I didn't know it at the time, but God was ahead of me on the curve to come. I was wrestling with God. It was what I called a spiritual tug of war.

I drove into the city and went up to the third floor where my office was beneath a stairwell and tucked away from those who may not want to see us. We were cleaning scabs working to thwart the union at the power company. Our main job was to find ways to get the janitors to work more than 4 hours in an 8-hour day.

I strode into our big hole in the wall without windows and one large metal desk. Our secretary Linda was there to greet me once she put the phone down. She looked worried. Her brown eyes moistened. I thought, oh boy, her car broke down or maybe her hairdresser cancelled. But what she told me next turned my world upside down and spun me on my axis.

Linda pummeled me with her words. "I just got off the phone with a friend. She's in the hospital. We don't know if she's going to make it out of the hospital. She needs a pastor. Didn't you say you were one or something like that?"

My jaw dropped so hard and fast, I was speechless and frozen in place. Hadn't I just been asking God to use me in a big way?

"Tom, can you help them or find someone who can from a church? My husband and I have Chris and the two children at our home, but we can't do it long term."

Okay. We had only moved back to Syracuse months ago and are still visiting churches. I said, "Sure. Better give the details. What hospital and room number is she in? And you said her name is Kathy?"

Linda sighed and slumped, as if an invisible weight slipped from her shoulders. Then she stiffened again. "I need to tell you, maybe warn you. She's dying from AIDS. Her husband has it too, but it's not as severe. The kids have just been tested, and they don't have it. Thank God."

Back then in the early nineties, having AIDS was considered a death sentence. People were afraid to be around others with it. It was a modern-day leprosy!

She looked at me again. "You will visit them, won't you? They are not from around here. They are at the end of their rope."

My mind was racing a hundred miles an hour. I didn't have time run and find a pastor. Linda expected me to dart a few blocks over while she covered my shift. There was nowhere to hide, not from this. I was already working from inside a place that felt like I was Jonah in the belly of a whale. What could possibly go wrong?

Since I was dressed for work, including a tie, I figured the hospital would take me for a legitimate pastor. After all, I was a youth pastor once. After parking on a side street, I climbed a steep hill and made it to the vestibule of the main entrance. I pushed my way around the carousel and quickly found the elevator. Once again, I found myself praying on the move, this time in an elevator floating up to the fifth floor.

As the doors sprang open, the floor looked busy. Nurses in blue and white uniforms scurried about. Doctors had white lab coats. I did my best impression to act like I belonged there. I'm not sure what I told them at the nurses station, but it worked.

Going down the hall someone with mobile IV shuffled past me. His hollow face and protruding bones made me wonder if it was an AIDS wing. Looking down the hall there was a young man in his twenties sitting on chair. The air between us smelled and tasted of a strong disinfectant.

Arms folded, he turned his head my way, then stood. His jeans were baggy and falling down his hips. his face was somewhat sunken.

"Are you Chris?," I asked. I offered my hand, in part to let him know I wasn't afraid to touch him. Well, to be honest I wasn't sure how to feel. His grip was surprisingly firm and warm. "Your friend Linda asked me to come over. I'm the night manager for Service Master at Niagara Mohawk.

"Kathy is in the room and our kids are visiting her."

I turned to look in the room. Kathy was on her back in the hospital bed. I saw a daughter who looked very much like her mother, with long, blonde straw hair. The boy who was held down on the bed by his mother's rail thin arm looked like his father with sandy-blonde hair.

"If you don't mind, we should get acquainted. I want to know more about you and how I can help." We sat down on the chairs in the hall. "Tell me how you all found your way from Oklahoma to Syracuse."

It was as if Chris couldn't wait to get things off a heavy heart. "As a minister, you need to know we haven't led a very good life. I got some skeletons."

"It's okay." I tried to reassure him. "This is just between us. No one else, but us and God."

Chris sighed. His shoulders slumped. Then he shook his head. "Its all my fault. We got in some trouble with the law, drugs mainly. But then it makes you do other things you shouldn't. We reckoned if we left Oklahoma for New York we could start fresh, but our habits rode with us."
I nodded with agreement.

He mostly talked down to the floor, until he looked up and asked. "You know we have AIDS?"

"Yes, Linda told me."

"I'm not full blown like Kathy. It attacks your white blood cells and then you get sick all the time and a common cold can kill you."

"How's Kathy doing at the moment?" I looked over and watched Kathy, looking at me with a flicker of hope that maybe I brought a miracle in my pocket. Tyler broke free and raced over to his father. I had been told by Linda, that Stormy was eight, and Tyler four.

Chris admonished his son. He grabbed him by the shoulders. "Listen here boy," he said in that southern accent. "you go back to your mother and be nice now." As Tyler returned to his mother, Chris confessed. "We're not even married. We've lived together all these years."

I reassured him that we would focus on their health and the children, not the lack of marriage.

"They hope Kathy can pull through and make it out of the hospital. We were pretty sick with worry." I encouraged him to open up. "It's my fault," he said. "We must have got AIDs from sharing needles. I'm the one that got her hooked-on meth, then came the needles."

Chris had the tracks on his arms to prove it.

I was suffocating in my own emotions, sometimes forgetting to breathe. Then it was my turn to visit Kathy. I prayed a silent prayer as I walked through the door. "Lord, fill me with your Spirit. Give me the right words to say and in the right way. Bring us your mercy grace. Amen."


As I walked in and introduced myself to Kathy, I put my hand out. "I'm Tom. Linda asked if I could come see you."

Kathy put her bony hand out and offered a weary smile. "I'm Kathy, and those are my kids. You can see Tyler's hard to corral. I hardly got the strength to hold him in place."

I slid a chair up beside her. She did her best to prop herself up on the bed. There were big windows that allowed plenty of light, enough for me to see her thin, bleached face, and stark blue eyes. "Your kids are adorable," I said.

Kathy knew she couldn't afford to mince words. "The hardest thing is that I don't figure to be here to watch em' grow. My mom in Oklahoma is in a bad way. And I don't know who would raise them."

I wasn't ready for any of this. There wasn't a class I took in school on how to talk to someone in the prime of their life who could die in a few months if not days. "I don't have all the answers, but I do know I'm here for a reason. Together, we can pray and figure things out."

Tears formed in Kathy's eyes. "I lived a terrible life. Chris must have told you some. You must think I couldn't possibly be saved. I really have accepted the Lord. I backslid big time."

"It's okay, Kathy. You did the right thing, wanting to reach out to a minister and wanting what's best for your kids."

"I shared needles. We've been hooked on meth. And then I've done things, things I'm not proud of. Chris was desperate. He said we needed the money. I didn't want to, but I even worked at a strip club in town, just to feed the kids and our habit."

"I can tell your heart is an open book. I have to believe that God's ahead of us on this, and I know he loves us through our Lord Jesus. Have you heard the verse, "'Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls."'

"I recall that verse from Sunday school."

I squeezed her hand. "For now, hold on to that as your promise. Make it real. Make it personal with God. I don't have all the answers, but I think I know a church that will help. They won't turn you or your children away Kathy. I promise."



"I've gotten some better," she said. "I hope to make it out in a few days, soon as they can get my white cell count up, and I'm not at risk for another infection."

Maybe I should have been afraid. But I patted her hand. "I will return with some help for you and your family."

I made promises I didn't know I could keep. Before I left into the hall from Kathy's room, I got down on a knee and hugged the kids, telling them I was there to help their Mom. I told Chris I would return. I wouldn't leave them stranded.

As I went down the corridor to the elevator, I knew I was in over my head. It was time to give Jesus the wheel and not just have him along for the ride.