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The Worldly Influence on our Attitudes

At a lecture today, we were given the reasons why we were asked to do a “Professional Reflective Document”. One point that was highlighted by our lecturer was that through reflection we are able to cultivate a concern for behaving in the right way. This reminded me of something that I have been thinking a lot about recently: our attitudes. I speak more specifically about medical students, as I have little idea about how applicable this is the other students, but I’m sure it will make good food for thought anyway. My now ex-role of Christian Medical Fellowship rep, I was supposed to encourage medics to become Christian doctors, and not just be doctors who just so happen to be Christians. I often focused on the fact that we can be more proactive in our faith and use the amazing opportunity that we have with out patients to share the good news of Jesus with them. Don’t get me wrong here; these things are good things to do. But a more powerful picture that people get of the Christian message is through our very own actions and attitudes. No doubt that we are constantly being examined by our non-believing peers to see what difference knowing Jesus makes in our lives. Yet often I wonder how different my attitude is compared to others. Being completely honest I have to admit that it is not always different, sometimes even ungodly. Jesus calls us to be the salt and light of the world (Matthew 5:13-16). Yet slowly through the influence of worldly ideas we are slowly being diluted, and less and less effective. Yes, so you might be thinking that you don’t get drunk, or sleep around, or lie to others But when people are backstabbing the poor lecturer because he simply isn’t blessed with a loud voice, or when everyone is making fun of the tutor who might appear to be annoying when she stands in front of the lecture theatre and asks how her students are before continuing with her lecture, who simply wants to connect to us as people; do we find ourselves joining in or worse still starting off these discussions with our friends. I am ashamed to say that I know of more non Christians with better attitudes to certain things than those of my Christian friends. I do admit that some people are slightly more annoying, and some of the work that we have to do is frustrating and sometimes seemly pointless, but before we let the attitudes of our friends affect our judgement do we take a step back to see what we really think of it ourselves. Sometimes the easiest thing to do is to agree with the others. But often I find that when I do take a look at things from a different angle that things are less pointless or silly or annoying. For example, that assignment that 3rd year medics had to complete recently, to do a research proposal, but not carry it out, might be totally useless at the time, and we all hated it, would actually be really useful if we ever went into research. Or that really quiet lecturer who no one is able to hear clearly is actually a really nice guy and wants to teach us well (and the fact that we make so much noise during the lecture doesn’t help either) The message that I am trying to put across is that we are often way too influenced by our peers, not necessarily the obvious things, more often it’s the little things that affect us. And yes there is a price to pay for being different, even with our attitudes. There have been some comments made by my non-Christian friends that I am a religious nutter and so on. But at the end of the day, if when people look at me and are able to see the real Jesus living in me then I know that I have done the right thing in my life. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. (Ezekiel 36:26-27) Brothers and sisters let us not throw away this new heart and new spirit and live by our old ways. But let us live by God’s ways.

For the Lord promises to be with you

Whenever life gets so busy and serving the Lord starts to become a bit of a chore, its hard to constantly keep in mind that God is with us. This weekend (more on this later) I have been reminded over and over again that I am walking with God. And when it feels like we are trapped in this battle alone, we are reminded that Jesus is there interceding for us, and that others are praying for us as well. At the times that I have felt most down, somehow someone always reminds me that I am being prayed for. We do serve an awesome God!

CMF National Student's Conference

For some reason, I am so incredibily excited at this conference. Usually I face these weekend aways with a dread. But this one is different! Maybe its because its something that I really am passionate about: training medical students to be the next generation of Chrsitian doctors. Doctors who will be God's workforce; holding onto intergrity and working for His glory. There's going to be so much going on this weekend. Opportunities to get to know my fellow medics better, both those from Liverpool and those from afar. After a stressful few weeks of trying to drag people to go to the conference and raise money for subsidizing students, finally the whole centre was filled out. Packed out every single bed, every room and maybe one or two cupboards (just kidding). Even if those remaining people who weren't planning on going suddenly wanted to go we wont be able to accomodate them. Maybe we need an even bigger venue next time! Im looking forward to the amazing Bible teaching this weekend holds and the seminars that would help us to understand ethics better, challenge us on hard topics or just simply to walk with God better. One thing for sure is that its going to be an extremely busy weekend, yet the ablity of having a few days away from Liverpool and the problems this place holds is all that I need to hold on to know that the busyness is worth it! Look out for photos to come!

Life as a Third Year Medic

Today I will be facing my first 24 hour shift in the hospital. I'll probably spend about 39 hours awake in total. The last time I spent days not sleeping was during the SSMs last year where I spent 3 days awake, by the end I was having visual and auditory hallucinations. Well, tonight I will start on Delivery Suite at Liverpool Women's Hospital at 8pm, and I am scheduled to be there until 8pm tomorrow. I'm pretty excited at the prospect of seeing a few deliveries and maybe assisting in some...... Last Saturday I spend going down to London for the CMF Regional Representatives meeting. It was a good meeting. But we all face the issue of lacking time. Most of us have extremely busy courses, and with that also have to run the local CMF groups as well as supporting the other medical schools in our region. Personally, I can see that I have neglected a lot of my studies over the last few weeks to sort out things for the meeting on Saturday and the National Conference we are having. But it was purely by God's grace that He sustained me through the weeks gone by. Its a wonder how I have managed to get so far already. In a desparate attempt to balance out my committements, last night I sat down and scheduled every hour of this week. To have clear cut times to study, plan for CMF, and also to rest. Unfortunately, rest doesnt come readily and housework and cooking and attending church has now been classified as rest. Right, I have got to sort out a list of things to do before tonight. Ciao

Death of the blogs

You know what I noticed over the past few months. Facebook is taking over the world of blogs. These days most people, including myself are getting lazy with their blogs and not posting on them. I blame the fact that Facebook is just much more easier to maintain than a blog. Gone are the hours of thinking for inspiration for a good post and hours of writing a readable post. And then there are so much more people actually on Facebook anyway. I love Facebook! I'm meeting people that I lost contact with over the years of moving schools and places. But with all these random groups on it friends are finding each other again!! With RSS, we can link up all the time-wasting activities onto Facebook, so I promise that I will try my best to keep this website going....... But here is my Facebook badge ;)

Male Restroom Etiquette

Take a look at this video. This is hillarious but it is quite true. Beware this video is 10mins long!!