God’s Timing in Hospital Ministry

The following pages offer two episodes from the wards: a mistaken lift stop that was no mistake, and a last Communion arranged by a Wisdom greater than ours.

Receive them as a modest witness that the Lord guides our steps more surely than we plan our routes.

by Hieromonk Amphilochius (Pushkarev) ⬇️

Two events I am about to recount left me marvelling at how near God is to those who bear the cross of severe illness, whose hearts are beset by doubts, and into whose souls the chill of sorrow and despondency tries to creep.

“I’ve been waiting two weeks for a priest.”

A story about taking the wrong floor

A hospital is like a small city, with many buildings and wings. When a request comes to visit a patient in a particular ward, it can be hard to get one’s bearings. That is why I am always accompanied by a sister who helps with sacramental visits. She collects the names of patients who wish to see a priest, prepares what is needed for the sacraments, plans the order of room visits, and makes sure we reach each patient.

On this ordinary visit, I met the sister, we reviewed our plan, and took the lift to the first ward on our list. Every floor has its own look, and these sisters can tell them apart at a glance. When the doors opened, she said confidently, “Yes, Father, this is ours. Let’s go.”

But when we started looking for the right room, the number we needed wasn’t there. The sister was surprised. “How could I have missed it? This isn’t our floor!”

We smiled at each other and turned back to the lift when a man’s voice called out, “Father, wait!” I turned and saw a young man on crutches practically running down the corridor.

“Father, are you coming to us?” he asked.

“No. We came to this ward by mistake. But if you need me, I can come in here as well.”

“Father, I need you very much! I’ve been waiting two weeks for a priest. They kept saying he had visited this ward or that one, but never ours. I asked the nurses to call him, but it was no use. Today I decided I wouldn’t go anywhere. I would pray and ask God to arrange it. I prayed, stepped out of my room, and saw you.”

I smiled. It was like something copied out of a book of saints’ lives. How close God is to those who seek Him. Often He Himself sends a priest to the one who so urgently needs Him. Such an encounter with Christ, in a crisis, is a true miracle.

The Last Communion

That day I arrived at the hospital before the sister who assists me, and I went straight to the ward where a patient was expecting me. To get there, I had to pass through adjoining wards. As soon as I stepped into one of them, a nurse came toward me and said, “Father, you’ve come!” It was clear they had been waiting, though this ward wasn’t on my list.

“We need to hurry. He is dying,” she said, and we went to the room. “We’re going to Mikhail. How is he? Will Father be able to give him Communion?”

The patient was in severe pain. To find any relief he kept trying to slide down onto the floor, where he felt a little better. But being on the floor made it impossible for the IVs to run properly, so they kept having to lift him back onto the bed, causing him further physical pain and the nurses fresh heartache.

When he saw me, his eyes changed. Hope appeared there. Not the kind of hope that believes death will retreat. Everyone in the room understood that would not happen.

Rather, my coming gave the hope that he was not abandoned, that with the priest God Himself had come into his life. His breathing was laboured; his eyes showed a terrible exhaustion from unrelenting pain.

“Are you baptised?” I asked Mikhail. He blinked yes.

“Would you like to receive Holy Communion?”

With the strength he had left, he nodded, urgently, as if afraid we might not understand and he would be left without the One who mattered to him most at that moment. I brought the Holy Gifts, offered the brief prayers, and gave Mikhail Holy Communion. Then I stepped out of the room.

Later that same day I met the nurse again. “Father, he has died,” she whispered.

Mikhail’s sufferings were over. The Lord Himself had come to bring them to an end and to take his soul to Himself. I kept thinking how wisely God arranged everything. I might have been delayed at the monastery. I might have decided to wait for the sister instead of going ahead. Or she might have arrived earlier, and our route would have changed. We might have started in a different ward and simply not reached Mikhail in time.

But everything unfolded as it needed to. It was the will of God that Mikhail be fortified with the Holy Mysteries. Therefore, it could not have been otherwise. God’s will is unbreakable, and no circumstance in life can prevent it from being fulfilled. We who stood in Mikhail’s room received a great gift from God: we became witnesses of the victory of Eternal Life over death.

Where human weakness seems to prevail, Christ quietly reigns. As we continue our service, may we be found ready for the “unplanned” call, quick to bring repentance and Communion, and confident that divine providence is never late.

With prayerful love,

Your OCC Team