Wood, hay and stubble continued...Marco's story

On a particularly busy day during the first week of my  surgical rotation I was summarily pulled aside by a plastic surgeon. He brusquely asked if I was on duty in surgery and I said I was. He then dragged me down a hall into a dimly lit room and pointed at a naked form on the bed. "This is your patient from now on. Do what you can." He added, not unkindly, "There isn't much to be done. I tried one skin graft and it failed." He pressed the chart into my abdomen and I grabbed it before it fell as he swept out of the room.

My stomach churned, partly because of the sickly sweet swell of Pseudomona (a bacteria you don't want to meet) and partly because I was already overwhelmed with a huge patient load and could tell this one was going to be a doozy.

Turned out I was right. Marco was a male prostitute in his 20's. He was penniless, having been abandoned by his family because of his lifestyle. In his better days he had been a flamboyant cross-dresser. He was no longer in his better days. In a jealousy and alcohol-driven fight with his lover he had been doused with fuel and set on fire. All but his genitals were a mass of raw, oozing tissue and most of it had a green, furry sheen to it (not a good sign). He was obviously in need of antibiotics, pain medication and extensive surgical cleaning. It was explained to me that he did not have the money for any of that. You see, where I live and work a hospital only provides a bed and the medical personnel. All the meds and supplies must be procured on a daily basis by family or friends of the patients as per whatever is requested by the physicians during their daily rounds. If you have no family or friends you are out of luck. I was to reluctantly become Marco's family.

First, though, I locked myself in a broom closet and sobbed with pity for Marco and for myself. I knew this would take hours of my time and require financial resources I didn't have. It would be hard to even pull mission resources for this since Marco was so far out of my team's "target group."

Once I'd pulled myself together I left the closet and went to huddle with the nurses. We drafted a plan of action and swung to it - nurses are good at that. That evening after finishing my regular work, I took a deep breath and marched myself to Marco's room with some sterile instruments. The nurse who had him soaking for me helped me get him back into bed, not without a great deal of agony. After I had him settled I said, "Marco...as you know, your situation is not good." He stared owlishly at me through seared eyelids. "The hospital has taken you in even though you cannot pay, but there are no meds for you. You need very expensive antibiotics, which I am going to try to buy. However, you also need surgery which you can neither afford nor survive. I am going to do the best I can to clean you up. I only have an inadequate pain shot I can give you because your body cannot stand anything stronger and, frankly, we can't afford to sedate you anyway. The only other weapon I have against your pain and injury is the name of Jesus. I want to ask your permission to pray in the name of Jesus for Him to help us through this." Marco only nodded. I placed my gloved hand on his and begged Jesus for mercy and help - to guide my hands and to numb Marco's pain. Then I started cutting and scraping. Marco didn't complain at all. At first I thought it was because all the tissue was dead, but as I got through to living, bleeding tissue he still expressed no pain.

The next morning I came in early to work on him before my regular shift. The wonderful nurses already had him soaking and I could hear him tunelessly singing, "Jesus, Jesus, Jesus..." I got him into the bed and pulled out my instruments to dig in. He stopped me with a hand and with his voice, "We need to pray in Jesus' name before we start." Yes, Marco. We certainly do. We did - that day and every day, twice a day, thereafter.

About ten days went by. I had worked my way from his abdomen up and down, scraping and cutting dead tissue off his face, back and limbs. I didn't look much at the big picture. I just tried to do what I could do in the time I had and to somehow make some progress every day. Soon, what I had to do daily became minimal. On that 10th day I was standing at the nursing station and glanced down Marco's hallway. The plastic surgeon was hurrying toward Marco's room. It was the first time I'd seen him since he'd "gifted" me with Marco. He stepped into Marco's room, then immediately stepped back out and looked up at the number on the door. By then I had joined him. "Is this that burned guy?" He asked. "What did you do?" I was confused and nervous. I had almost no experience with burned victims and was very unsure of whether I had been doing the right thing. The surgeon looked at me and said, "You have blessed hands. Are you a Christian?" Though now thoroughly confused I said I was, but that my hands were no more blessed than his. He took me into Marco's room and pointed out to me that somehow, over the course of those ten days, Marco had grown new, healthy skin all over his body. He then told me he had studied at an Evangelical school and had learned about prayer in Jesus' name. He believed a miracle had happened. I do, too. We explained this to Marco, who was released from the hospital less than a month later with no skin grafts beyond the initial failed one...having flatly refused to turn his life over to Christ or even to express faith in Him.

 I talked to him and pled with him. Even the nurses who were not Christians rebuked him and said, "Jesus obviously helped you! You'd better give yourself to him!" Nada. He just shook his head. I suspected he didn't want to change his lifestyle so I tried to reason with him that Jesus takes us as we are and works on us. Nope.

So, why? Why did God do that and what eternal value did that miracle have in Marco's life? I don't know. I know we can talk about the surgeon and the nurses and even my own faith being boosted. But what about Marco? I just don't know. I do know that if God Himself sometimes does miracles like this - touching people at their felt, physical need even though he knows they won't necessarily turn their lives around - then maybe we should, too. Help people, I mean. Physically, judicially - fight for justice, healing, peace...even when we can't see an immediate or even long-term turning to God. Even when those peope rather ungratefully keep going their way with barely a "Thanks. See ya around." And somehow that is not wood, hay and stubble. It reflects the heart of Christ and brings the Kingdom into a dark little corner of the world.