Twenty-four hours.

Twenty four hours a day- how do we spend it? Over the past few weeks, this is a question I’ve been thinking about.

She was a sight to behold. To be honest, you could even smell her.

Boils and blisters carpeted every square inch of her body, with many of the burst ones exuding pus or baring bloodied skin. The smell came from the combination of raw skin mixed with healing cream. Her eyes barely opened. Just a glance at her made one want to flee. Worse, was the fact that she had been labeled CONTACT PRECAUTION in red and yellow letters, which meant that any visitor coming near her would have to don a mask, gown and gloves, so as to avoid infection transmission to other patients in the hospital.

Just a few days into looking after her, I could sense something was amiss. It was her cheerless disposition, the fact that she had children but no visitors, and her continual whining for attention, sobbing about being mistreated and occasional bouts of agitation and petulance, in spite of the fact that she was already more than seventy years of age.

No one wanted to spend time with her.

To be honest, she wore my patience thin in the first few days as well. She was rejecting everybody and cursing and complaining about everything. Then I realized, how much of a love deficit she had in her life. Having borne 4 children out of wedlock and worked as a toilet cleaner all her life, none of her children truly loved her. Perhaps, she had never known what true love was. She was talking about suicide and wanting to end it all.

One may think this is an exceptional story of tears, but you only need to work in the public healthcare sector for a few days to realize, that this is the reality of our everyday folk in our everyday lives. Someone out there has a life far harder than we could ever imagine.

Day in day out, we go to work. And I have been frustrated by how little time we have for patient interaction, simply because of the workload. When there is slightly more free time, our seniors then call us out for slightly longer lunches to take a break from the humdrum routine.

It dawned upon me, just how much this frustrates me.

We only have twenty-four hours a day. How do we spend it?

I want to spend time with my patients, not in a restaurant over a languid lunch (though to be honest, that is few and far between); I want to know where they came from, why they feel what they feel, where they think they are going. I want to sit down and chat with them about life, and not just see them hastily every morning for a few brief minutes.

Twenty four hours a day. How do you spend it? Some part of me is torn into two. And it’s not just been about work.

The past week has been most unsettling for me. As I pondered about the future and where I’ve been placed now, I cannot help but sense a great need for recalibration in my life.

It was upon reading a part of the bible among other things over the week where my heart was stirred and challenged to question where I’d been placing my daily focus and what I’d been spending my time on: on my needs, someone else’s or the community around me. It was then that I deeply appreciated how precious our time of singleness is, because it is truly a time where one can focus wholly on God and His needy children who have been abandoned, rejected and who are needy of love.

“I would like you to be free from concern. An unmarried man is concerned about God’s affairs—how he can please God. But a married man is concerned about the affairs of this world—how he can please his wife— and his interests are divided. An unmarried woman or virgin is concerned about God’s affairs: Her aim is to be devoted to God in both body and spirit. But a married woman is concerned about the affairs of this world—how she can please her husband. I am saying this for your own good, not to restrict you, but that you may live in a right way in undivided devotion to God.”

“Now to the unmarried and the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I do.”

“But those who marry will face many troubles in this life, and I want to spare you this.”

– 1 Cor 7

Don’t get me wrong- I’ve nothing against the institution of marriage. But as I live this crazy life from day to day, I’m beginning to see how God, who is God of my time, really should be the one who gains most of my time, affection and attention. As I ponder about relationships and observe and remember people who are or have been in one, I am reminded of how easy it is to put in an inordinate amount of time into a two-person affair, whilst neglecting God, and the crying people He has placed all around us who need just a crumb of our affection and time.

Just like how it can be so easy to go out and have a long lunch instead of spending more time with our patients, and treat this whole doctoring business like a job instead of a calling, we can so easily fall into the trap of treating our ministry to people like work and forgetting our calling in life to serve the lonely, the hungry and the heartbroken.

Of late, I’ve been wondering if perhaps, I may be better off serving God as a single woman. Single and free to serve whoever, whenever; single and free to roam in the mission field, single and free to uproot, make choices, pursue dreams and pour out my life for God and His people, without being tangled by the many worries and anxieties a relationship or family brings. Free to minister to someone after work, free to attend various conferences and bible meetings, free to meet up with other individuals to connect and make a difference, without worrying about the many worries about the future that come with being with someone else.

It’s funny how self-sufficient I can be in the daily grind of life. I’m so content with time spent alone, happy to read, draw, pray and simply soak in the luxury of “me” time. I realize, at the end of a long day being battered by so much human interaction at a busy workplace, how much I really treasure time alone with myself and God. I guess, some part of me is afraid of losing that expanse of free space and time left to play with for oneself and for God, once entered into a relationship. I remember how I always used to think, still sometimes think, it would be wonderful to be married or attached rather late in life, so that one could truly maximize one’s time in singlehood, one’s talents and resources for God and the needy to the full.

Yet I will never forget how difficult it is to be alone in the mission field as a single woman, to have men disrespect and take advantage of your kindness because you are single, to have them gawk at you and to live in such heartbreaking loneliness at times. In a foreign land of poverty, life can be overwhelming, and yet absolutely heartwarming to just have someone to share one’s hardships with.

So with that, i know a part of me longs for companionship in the mission field. And I know at that time, I will surely be much more convinced, that investing my time in a relationship would truly be good.

“How could one chase a thousand, And two put ten thousand to flight, Unless their Rock had sold them, And God had given them up? – Deut 32:30

Truly, in a wholesome and God-ordained relationship, two can be better than one. Yet, I wonder when my time will come, and when to discern that it is too early.

As of now, in this context and under this pressure, where I simply feel maxed out in work and ministry and long to spend more time with God and His needy children crying out for a bit of attention and love, sometimes I just don’t see how I can justify being in a relationship at this point in my life… When so much of my singleness could be put to better use. I’m not being utilitarian- i just don’t want to be insular; I’m not being overly pragmatic, I’m just being real.

My friends in relationships spend much time nurturing their bond, going out as often as they can and revolving their conversations and dreams around their future together- house, car, kids, the like. Sometimes I wonder, if that is where God would have me spend my time on. Sometimes I think about the many lonely, abandoned and needy people out there and how my singleness has always compelled and spurred me to go and reach out to them and wonder if this would all disappear on being attached.

It’s so easy to lose the big picture.

I know, there is a season for everything. And investing in a God-chosen relationship can be a beautiful thing. Yet with my 6-year bond to seve here as a doctor and a far way off to the mission field, I wonder if this singleness might be better off to last for months, years or more, so I can truly live out my calling to the full, and explore surgery or overseas study or go wherever and do whatever the sails of life call me to.

Today, I made a deliberate effort to talk to her, tell her that even though she felt like dying, we loved her and cared for her, and that her skin would get better and no she wasn’t ugly-God loved her, I said. And she started to smile, started to thank me, started to show a glimmer of hope in her bright eyes.

I’m not sure I would have found time to speak with her had my mind been precoccupied elsewhere.

Twenty-four hours a day. How are you spending them?