* This post was meant to be posted up on 9 April, after the Easter weekend.
I still remember that day. I will never forget that emotion.
It was 1 am in the morning. When I picked up the phone, I nearly flipped out of my bed. I wanted to scream, wanted to shake her, wanted to wake up again to find it was all a bad dream. But no matter what I did, the voice over the phone only further clarified my worst fears, “I’m so sorry, Wai Jia. It was an accident. I didn’t mean it. I’m so so sorry. I’m really very very sorry.”
She deleted it by accident. My list. She deleted my list and could not retrieve it. It was a lost cause.
The List. In General Surgery, the List is a sacred thing. A sheet of paper containing a list of all the patients in the team, their locations, a concise summary of all their blood and radiology results, their past medical history, present medical issues and our current treatment, it is essential to the smooth functioning of any surgical team. Because of that, it really is a thing to behold. As scary as it sounds, the function of a surgical team depends heavily on The List, and it is the duty of the junior doctor to compile this awesome sheet. From the accuracy of the information to spacing and font size, getting a good list printed out in time for the grand 7.30am patient review (or morning round) by senior doctors, after the mad scramble to update all the latest 6am lab results that dawn, is the pride and honor of every responsible house officer. On-call, it is therefore the house officer’s duty to keep a meticulous record of all the new patients that come in during that 24-hour period. All the senior doctors will depend on that document when morning arrives.
It was 1am. She, another house officer on-call, was fiddling with my list for some reason and accidentally deleted it. It had been a busy day. 18 hours down, and I had at least another 12 hours to go. I had just had the opportunity to lay down to rest for an hour or two when that fateful call came.
“Oh it’s okay,” I said. I was sure it was in the Recycle Bin.
“No, you don’t understand. It’s gone. I’m so sorry. I don’t know what happened. I was just checking it and it… disappeared. I’ll help you and start on it right now.”
Murderous, would be close to describing how I felt.
It was no use. It was gone, and all that hard work had gone down the drain. She tried to help, but she had no clue about any of the patients I had seen. I spent the next 2 to three hours till 3am trying to salvage a lost cause. By 3.30am, a flood of patients got admitted and I had no rest.
I still remember my first thought after that murderous, hot sensation arose within me when I got the phonecall. My first thought was: Today is Easter Sunday.
It was 1am on Easter Sunday, and I remember having prayed to God to show me what Easter meant. After all, while everyone would be celebrating this holy festival at church and at home, I was at the hospital working. I don’t know why, but I had a strong feeling that being at hospital was where God had meant for me to be. God is not, cannot be confined to church. He is not confined to a festival. And He is not confined to a day of the week. It was at that very moment, when the meaning of Easter became so clear and practical to me.
Easter is about forgiveness. Easter is about remembering the love of a God, who, after suffering profound betrayal, rose above humiliation and scorn and injustice to forgive. He forgave without reason, without condition, without need for compensation. And as I simmered about the lost document and pondered how on earth it could be missing from the Recycle Bin as well, I reflected on how my desperation to retrieve the lost document gave me a glimpse into the desperation that God has to retrieve, redeem and restore a lost people. In some ways, we are so lost.
Laugh if you must. But these were precious revelations to me at 1am on an Easter Sunday.
I forgave her, and joyfully completed the rest of my call. I told myself, there was no point getting angry at her. Whether I got angry or not, the file was lost. Suddenly, something someone told me before came to mind: When trials come your way, rejoice. Trials in life give you the opportunity to reflect God precisely because any other response would only be human. Choose God.
By morning, though there were 2 mistakes on The List, the senior doctors extended the same forgiveness to me, after hearing what had happened that night.
Easter is about forgiveness. Easter is about redemption. Easter, is about victory and restoring a lost cause to its fullness.
I worked on the new list that Easter Sunday morning, and it was fully restored.
“For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world.
And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. ”
– 1 John 5:4