Doctor and Patients

“ It is not the healthy who need the doctor, but the sick.”( Mk.2.17)

 

Patients need doctor. Does doctor need patients? Can a doctor be a doctor without a patient? Can a nurse be a nurse without someone to care for? Can a mother be a mother without a child? Can God be God without someone to bless, to heal and to forgive?

Jesus went to the house of a tax collector named Mathew because he is God. The nature of God is forgiveness and mercy. God is God when he forgives. Jesus keeps company of sinners because it is in their midst he is fully God. God takes the first chance to forgive. Everyone wants to be the best persons they can be. God is best to himself when he loves and forgives. Patients need the doctor, so too doctors need patients.

Pharisees ask the question, “Why does he eat with tax collectors and  sinners?” In answer to this question in the Gospel of Luke (Ch.15) Jesus tells the best three mercy parables. The heart of God is revealed in these parables.  The shepherd searches ‘until’ he finds.  So too the woman sweeps and searches ‘carefully until she finds’. The father runs until his hands are on the shoulders of the prodigal son.  If God searches until he finds who can be lost? God has a celebration every time a lost sheep, a lost coin, a lost son is found. Every moment of heaven must be a celebration time!

Like the Pharisees we too often do not understand and keep on asking questions. We  doubt God’s ability to search and to find. We doubt his capability to run. Where patients are, there doctor is found.  Give God a chance to forgive. Give God a chance to be himself. Give God an opportunity to celebrate.   Come home. Return. The best part of the story is, you don’t have to walk all the way home.  Just take the first step, the father  will come, the rest of the way.

                              -Fr T.V.George sdb