It all depends how you look at it

This was a pretty rough day. I was grumbling to myself about it this morning when I felt convicted about my attitude. There's always a reason to rejoice in the Lord, regardless of the circumstances.

I ran home from work last night about 6:30. I had about an hour to eat dinner and help get the kids off to bed before running back out to go to a funeral visitation. I went right back to the hospital from there and, after doing a completely hideous operation on a 15 year old girl, got home again about 1:30 this morning. When I arrived, H was crying so I went in and rocked her for a while before finally getting to bed about 2am. I was rudely awakened by my pager a little before 4am. I spent the next hour talking to the ER and making calls to reassemble the OR team. I got about 15 minutes more sleep before heading back in to operate again. Needless to say, I wasn't feeling my freshest.

After finishing up in the OR I had a little time to make some rounds. The first patient I saw had taken a turn for the worse overnight. His family had decided they didn't want to continue with any aggressive treatment and instead give him "comfort care" only. I think it was the right decision, but letting someone go is always a sad thing to do.

From there I headed to the office for the first item on my schedule for the day - a very unpleasant meeting at which we had to tell one of our office staff she was being let go. By the end of that I was thinking about going somewhere to cry or throw up. Or maybe both.

It was only 8:15 and I realized that rejoicing was going to have to be a choice today. It certainly wasn't going to come naturally.

Here are a few of the reasons I found to be thankful:
1. God is good, all the time.
2. That half hour rocking H in the night was the most time I got to spend with her in the past 2 days. I'd have rather had that than a few more minutes of sleep. I'm thankful my little girl loves to snuggle.
3. I was able to be used by God to help save 2 young lives. That's better than sleep too.
4. It wasn't my child having emergency surgery in the middle of the night. My children were healthy and whole at home in their beds. Thank you, God!
5. It's not ever pleasant, but it is quite a privilege to be involved in an intimate way when a family says good bye to someone they love. Pure religion and undefiled before God is to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction. Holding the hand of the about-to-be fatherless and widowed must count for something.
6. As for that last meeting, I can't quite find something to rejoice in that yet. It was just plain awful. I'll have to fall back on "God is good, all the time" - even when the circumstances aren't.