Spiritual Blindness and Hardened Hearts

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by Mike Ratliff 

And he cautioned them, saying, “Watch out; beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.” And they began discussing with one another the fact that they had no bread. And Jesus, aware of this, said to them, “Why are you discussing the fact that you have no bread? Do you not yet perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear? And do you not remember? When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up?” They said to him, “Twelve.” “And the seven for the four thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up?” And they said to him, “Seven.” And he said to them, “Do you not yet understand?” (Mark 8:15-21 ESV) 

Last week my mother was hospitalized again. The diagnosis now is congestive heart failure. We traveled down there the weekend before this and tried to get the medical people at the skilled nursing center where she is staying to contact her doctor since her ankles were very swollen. Nothing happened. Thursday last week her lungs nearly filled up with fluid and she was having very bad chest pains. She tried to get help, but since her stroke, she is very hard to understand. Somehow, she had the staff there place a call to my sister. She talked to the nurse taking care of her, but he said her vitals looked okay. However, when the day people came in on Friday they panicked because she could barely breathe and was in a great deal of pain. They rushed her to the hospital. She got very good medical care there and now her lungs are much better and she is not having chest pains. We rushed down to OKC from KC on Friday and spent the weekend with her. 

When I found out how she tried to get help on Thursday, but was unable to get anyone to understand what was going on I became very upset. I was very close to going to the place that is supposed to be taking care of her to set them straight, but my sister took care of that in a very diplomatic way. I prayed about it all weekend and from that I came to have a great deal of peace as I trusted my mother in God’s care. As I meditated about the grace of God and how He takes care of us beyond our comprehension I felt ashamed for thinking I could make a difference by intervening, et cetera. It was then that I remembered our post last week titled A Little Leaven Leavens the Whole Lump. 

When our Lord told His disciples to beware of the leaven of the false teachers of Israel, they became confused and thought He was lecturing them on the their lack of planning in forgetting to bring bread with them on the trip. He then made it clear to them to stop fretting about things like having enough bread. Why? He feed five thousand with five loaves and four thousand with seven loaves with a great deal left over. God takes care of His people. He is our provider. He manages the details of our lives. Instead of worrying about food, shelter, and clothing we need to be about drawing near unto God, digging into His Word, prayer, and obedience. 

Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. (Matthew 6:31-34 ESV) 

I mediated on this in light of my mother’s health problems and the level of care she is receiving. God is ultimately in charge of our health. His sovereignty extends to all parts of our lives. He is the one who will take my mother home when He is ready. We must pray that her care will improve. Her doctor was very concerned about what happened; I pray that he will make sure this does not happen again. I pray that those nurses who care for her everyday will be very professional and give her the care she needs. 

As God took me through this I could see very clearly how He is using it all to work in all of our lives to draw us closer to Him and each other. I have talked more with my sister in the last couple of months than I have in years. We are seeing clearly that it is God who will determine when each of us dies and goes home to be with Him, not the medical profession. 

Please continue to pray for my parents and our families. My dad is still in a very nice Alzheimer’s unit  not very far from where my mother is right now. It would all be very sad and depressing if it was not for the joy and peace given to us as we trust in God and accept His will as being perfect in every case. 

Soli Deo Gloria!

23 thoughts on “Spiritual Blindness and Hardened Hearts”

  1. Hi Mike
    It is wonderful to hear that your mum is getting better care, and so wonderful to hear that the Lord is drawing you closer as a family. Yes, it would be indeed sad and depressing if it were not for the joy and peace given to you as you trust in God and accept His will as being perfect in every case. I will continue to pray for you all.

    The Lord does walk it all with us, every single step, and it sometimes does take circumstances in our lives to bring us back where this is made so apparent. He is so precious to us.

    I have mentioned before something that Oswald Chambers says and it is this -”If we take care of our relationship to God, He will take care of the rest.” I am becoming more aware of it happening, as I get to know Him more and go through circumstances with Him by my side and it does bring a freedom of living in Him. Being able to submit to Him in each situation as it presents itself, allows you to walk in peace, knowing that the outcome will be whatever He desires.
    Be so encouraged this day.
    God bless you brother :-)

  3. Mike, I’m glad that your mother is feeling better and that she received the correct medical attention. You are right, God does take care of His children. We visited my mother this weekend who lives in a care facility and is receiving Medi Cal funds to pay for it. Then I watched the news which was reporting about the plans the White House has for universal health care. They were discussing which funds to use to support it and taking from MediCaid is one of their ideas. Our elderly will clearly be at risk of having no coverage. They will have become “collateral damage.” If I look at all of this through my human lens it is very disturbing. I must continue to believe that God takes care of His children! We know that we have a rough road ahead of us. Thank you for reminding us where to put our hope!

    Heather

  4. Thanks Heather. Yes, things get very scary if we take our eyes off of our Lord. My mother has been is some kind of care now since three days after Easter. My Dad has been in an assisted living center all this time as well. His insurance that he took with him when he retired at the age of 68 plus medicare has paid for it all. We are looking at selling their home and their property to pay for their long term care in an assisted living center either in the OKC area or in Houston where my sister and her family live. However, every time we seem to have my mother on the road to recovery enough so that she can go to the assisted living center with my Dad, she has another heart issue or a stroke, etc. I love them both very much and I don’t want them to suffer. Your statement about them becoming “collateral damage” is probably correct. This would all be overwhelming if it wasn’t for the hope we have in our Lord.

    In Christ

    Mike Ratliff

  5. God bless you, Mike. Praise our Great and Glorious God for His care and protection during this time!

  7. Hi Mike, We knew something was wrong when we didn’t see any ‘new’ posts on PTT. Figured it was ‘mom or dad’. It is a trying situation but the Lord is in charge and he will comfort you during this time in your life. We will continue to hold you up in prayer. God is good……all the time, and all the time…….God is good. Heard that in a song :)

  8. Mike,
    Very sorry to hear about what happened to your mom. In my practice as a nurse I have seen things like that happen all too frequently. It is very unfortunate.
    It gives me great comfort to know how meticulously our Father takes care of us! Every little detail thought out and prepared and waiting His execution. What a thing in which to rest.
    Unfortunately, we have to be very proactive regarding the health care of our weakened loved ones. At times, feeling like we must force the medical prefession to give the proper care. We cannot assume anything.
    But God will not care for us like that. Praise Him. He is your mother’s Caregiver!

    Diane

  11. Mike :-) , Along with what I wrote in my first comment, and now after reading other comments, I had wrongly thought that things like this never went on in America in the medical system. In Africa, most certainly yes, but the USA, not. Was quite eye opening for me.
    Bless you

  12. Jessie, the medical system, the insurance companies, and the government have created a ridiculous system here that has now become very unwieldy and no longer capable of doing what it was designed to do, which is keep costs down while providing needed care. I work in Healthcare, but I am an IT professional, not a doctor or nurse or technician.

    Here we have insurance companies going all out to reduce their costs by denying care or refusing to pay for certain needed medications by using the double-talk in their policies to justify doing so. They also have layers and layers of decision making that makes the whole process as long and drawn out as possible in the hopes that by the time they finally give in and pay, the claimant may have died. My dad worked an extra couple of years before retiring in order to maximize his and my mother’s insurance coverage. Their insurance company would really like for them to either die or do something stupid like cancel their coverage. My sister is in control of that now so they can’t intimidate her into canceling it like they had been trying to do with my parents.

  13. I don’t understand how they plan to put the public health care bill into effect when the bill is not even ready to be read by Congress. This is just as bad as TARP. Congress was told in the TARP deal that they would be allowed to look and see where these funds were going. This as you know did not happen. Instead the banks used the TARP money to buy other banks… not a trickle down bailout like it was supposed to, in order to get credit flowing to the people who needed it. Rates on credit cards went up, while the banks spent the money on CEO’s and for purchasng other banks.

    Universal health care scares me a bit because of the nature of big govt and the fact that they will ‘booger’ this one up just like they did the TARP program. Govt. healthcare means that they will ultimately decide who gets helped and when. There may even be a waiting list for urgent care. Elderly people may be treated as burden and a niusance instead of a human being who needs a lot of attention. These public programs may function more like a bureaucracy instead of something that genuinely cares for each individual. If I suffer intense pain and suffering, the last thing that I want to do is to wait in agonizing pain while some bureaucrat is looking in the govt. handbook to see if my condition will get ‘A’ or ‘B’ treatment. I want what the doctors knows is best and not what some bureaucrat over them is telling them to do because the Federal budget will not pay for the thing that will make my pain go away.

  14. That seems to be where we are going Josh. The current system is really bashed in and seems to be out of control at times with insurance companies telling doctors what they can and cannot do in the treatment of people. They lie to us telling us that it is essential to have diagnostic testing done like colonoscopies, but then refuse to pay for them?!?!? My sister told me that I am just too logical…

    A few years ago I was loading some mattresses into my pickup at a local furniture store. I have lower back issues. I woke up that morning with a nagging back ache, but I could still function. At the store I bent over to tie the rope off that I was using to tie down the mattresses, but then made the mistake of doing a twisting turning motion to pick up the end after I dropped it. My back went out. I couldn’t even help unload the mattresses later. My son and wife had to do it. I went to the doctor on monday. He prescribed muscle relaxers and set me up with a physical therapist who was in our insurance network. I set up an appointment with them, but they refused to talk with me about it unless they could get a pre-approval from our insurance company. They got it and so I started a week’s worth of treatment. It was great. I have had this sort of thing before and it can take weeks before the muscles relax and I get back to normal, but the therapist had me back to normal and painless in just couple of days. I had been setup for two weeks of treatment and we ended it in just three or four days because it went so well. Well, guess what. The insurance company came up with a technicality to refuse to pay for the treatment. I had to pay it out of pocket. This sort thing drives me nuts. It just isn’t right. Why do I even have insurance if I have to pay premiums plus 100% of my care?

  15. 3 months ago I went to the doctor and paid for the visit out of my pocket ($65). I had a toenail fungus which the military refused to treat (even though I got the fungus in boot camp). They said that they considered it to be cosmetic issue, even though it was so bad that it affected my ability to run and walk. So 14 years later, the cost of the medicine is down to $4 per bottle at WalMart. Back then it was about $400 per bottle. The medication has worked well and my toenails are coming back healthy. I can walk better and I am not ashamed of wearing sandals in public. Thanks to Walmart and a private physician, I am healed! It cost me a total of about $80 to fix the problem. I can’t imagine what it would have been like if I had gone to a govt. hospital with such a small problem that was easy to fix.

  16. Oh dear. It is so wrong, and corrupt and so unfair to folks who have worked their lives to make sure they are ok when old, and be dealt with thus and almost discarded.

    I am reminded of Psalm 14:2-4
    2 The LORD looks down from heaven upon the children of men,
    To see if there are any who understand, who seek God.
    3 They have all turned aside,
    They have together become corrupt;
    There is none who does good,
    No, not one.
    Not sure if it is in the correct context here, but it sure fits.

  21. Hi Mike,

    I pray God will continue to be gracious to you and your parents. Keep trusting in him!

    I work at a nursing home, sometimes in an Alzheimer’s wing. I’ve seen firsthand how, at times, situations that need immediate attention are brushed aside and improperly dealt with (there are good nurses/doctors and bad nurses/doctors, bottom line, no matter where you’re at, and sometimes you just get a bad one) — and I have plenty of anecdotal evidence for the imperfect state of the American medical system as a whole. It can be very frustrating sometimes, but it’s always good to remember that our hope is not in nurses and doctors, but in our God, who has carried us throughout our life, and will continue to carry us until they lay us in the grave. All praise to him for his resurrection power! Keep looking to our risen Savior.

    Nathan

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