fidzbit

Fidzbit : Hi Tom. Tell us a bit about yourself and what you do. Tom :  I am an anaesthetic registrar based in Cardiff. I enjoy lots of variety at work, and split my time between operating theatres, the emergency department, intensive care unit and labour ward. This year I have been doing a research fellowship looking at how how blood clots during childbirth and how we can manage patients who bleed more safely and effectively.  F : What have you been doing during the last ten days to prepare for the coronavirus crisis? T :  Preparation has two main parts. Firstly, preparing the hospital infrastructure to accommodate large numbers of infected patients, which includes identifying and equipping areas of the hospital which can be used either as isolation wards, or as additional intensive care capacity. The second part, which I have been more involved with is the training and education of staff. This includes training to safely use personal protective equ...

Do you remember Sundays before they changed the trading laws? I have a vivid childhood memory of how quiet Sunday mornings were then. The only people up and about were those on their way to church. There was very little man made noise. For just a few hours the city paused. It was restful. We live on a main road linking the edge of town with the city centre. It has lots of shops and regular buses. In normal times it never sleeps! But this morning it is quiet. The last few days it has been quiet. It reminds me of those Sundays. It is peaceful. It rarely happens anymore. The normal bustle of life has become wearisome because it is so relentless. It is why many of us put such value in going somewhere more remote for our holidays. Perhaps, like me, you enjoy going to the mountains or the coast to get away - where the only noise is that of the birds, the wind, or the sea. We struggle to rest without peace.  God knows this. He built this need in to us. He set the example, afte...

Fidzbit : Tell us about yourself and what you do. John : My name is John, I'm married with 3 grown  up sons, 2 granddaughters and I've worked in the NHS for 36 years this year. F : What have you been doing during the last ten days to prepare for the coronavirus crisis? J : There has been much organisation by managers and senior staff etc.   Personally I have been carrying on in my role as a Health Care Support Worker in the Surgical Short Stay Unit. The majority of operations have now been cancelled or moved to another hospital.  I move back to the Intensive Care Unit soon so  I have attended training sessions about things that I will have to do there. F : What is the atmosphere like among your nursing colleagues as you anticipate such a critical situation? What is morale like? J :  It's a difficult question to answer because I have not yet been exposed directly to the current healthcare situation.  Atmosphere and morale seem to...

During the next week or so I plan to post a number of interviews with Christians about how this crisis is impacting their work lives. Most of them are people working in the medical sphere. Today is a bit different. I asked Alun Ebenezer, Head Master of Fulham Boys School, if he could share with us. (Fulham Boy's School was deliberately built with a Christian ethos as one of its three core pillars: Faith. Boys. Enterprise . See: https://www.fulhamboysschool.org/about-us/christian-ethos/ ). Perhaps it is not surprising that he was just too busy to stop and talk right now! Alun is a great guy, always ready for some chat and banter - so this says something about the pressure that he and other teachers are under too. As we remember those working on the medical frontline, let's not forget that teachers are doing a huge amount of work too - doing their best to provide an on going education for our children via on-line resources and keeping schools open and fu...

Real faith is able to face and acknowledge the darkest realities of life and still trust God . Real faith is not burying your head in the sand and turning a blind eye to difficulties, pretending everything is ok and everything is easy. Real faith is often a battle - a struggle to hold on to what we know about God when the whole world seems to be falling apart around us. A number of Psalms and other Scriptures articulate this struggle in a whole range of challenging circumstances. This is a paraphrase I wrote based on Lamentations 3:1-33, where Jeremiah gave full and vivid expression to his great sorrows and sufferings before his faith breaks through to assert an ongoing wholehearted confidence in God. In normal times, it would be unusual to sing a song like this in church! But we are not in normal times and it might help you to voice The cry of your heart to God. It was printed several months ago in the Free Church of Scotland magazine, ‘The Record’ 1 and can be sung to the tune ...

What a horrible scene! When a loved one is on their deathbed the family want to be close by, to hold hands, to say goodbye, to be there. In those final moments we know instinctively that how important presence is. But what if the loved one is in an isolation ward? Being present will put the family at risk of infection. Even if there were enough protective suits to go around such a suit is, in itself, an undesirable barrier. It is impossible to get as close as you would like to be. What a terrible situation! The fact that Jesus is ‘Immanuel’, God with us, is good news but it is still not enough. This is only one side of the bridge - it doesn’t reach the other side of the chasm. God has come to us but how do we get back to God? Our selfish actions need to be forgiven and our selfish hearts need to be washed clean. The Bible teaches that Jesus accomplished this for us by dying in complete isolation - isolation from family and friends and society and isolation from God.  He...

Fidzbit:  Tell us about yourself and what you do. Simon :  My name is Simon and I am a General Practitioner working in a village just outside Leicester. I am married to Allison, and we have 3 children. F:  What have you been doing during the last ten days to prepare for the coronavirus crisis? S :  I have mostly spent the last 10 days in isolation with suspected coronavirus! So I haven’t been doing much to prepare for it, although before I became unwell I had  tried to keep up to date  with the  ever-changing  government advice to GPs about managing patient’s with suspected coronavirus.   F:  So you’ve been in isolation! Sorry to hear that. How did it feel? What was the most difficult bit? S :  It did not feel good. I felt unwell with high temperatures  and a cough  but mostly I’ve just been worried for my family. My wife has been doing a lot to keep everything running smoothly, and I obviously ...

Have you ever stopped to think about ‘touch’? Me neither. At least, not until the last few days. It is only as I try not to touch my face and wash my hands that I have started thinking about how much I do touch my face and how many surfaces have my finger prints on them: door handles, fridge handles, kettle handles, taps, books, phone, computer, cutlery, plates, mugs, bag handles, TV remote, chip and pin pads, pens and stationary - the list is endless! Then there are those more relational touches, when I hold my wife’s hand or pick up my children for a cuddle or to gently clean the latest skinned knee. It is difficult to imagine having to go without these touches for a few hours, let alone days or weeks! What would it be like if you couldn’t touch anything? What would it be like if you couldn’t touch anyone ? In Jesus’ day, no one would dare to touch a leper. It may still be like that in some parts of the world today. As well as the fear of infection there was a social stigm...

Two of my friends are about to come out of isolation. Having developed virus symptoms they followed government recommendations and stayed locked in for several days. Their quarantine time has now passed and their personal restrictions can be relaxed. How do we come out of isolation when our own selfishness and sin have isolated us from God? It is no easy thing to do. The Bible describes our spiritual self-isolation as ‘falling short of God’s glory’, being at ‘enmity’ with God, and being ‘dead in trespasses and sins’. At heart sin involves the rejection of God’s infinite love. The consequences of this are not easily undone. It is not a temporary infection but a chronic, terminal illness which, left untreated, leads to an eternal isolation from God and permanent exclusion from Heaven in a terrible place the Bible calls ‘Hell’. Many people try to treat themselves. They try a bit of moral reform or religion to improve their condition. The problem is that this only covers the symptom...

One dear friend responded to yesterday’s post with the words: “It feels very dark in the valley ”. In his first letter to Timothy, Paul URGES   that “ supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions.” At this time of crisis we need to take this even more seriously than usual. So I’ve just made my list .  It contains the names of The Queen The Prime Minister Boris Johnson The Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon Our local MP Ian Murray It also contains the names of: Two dear friends and a close relative who are hospital doctors. Two dear friends who are GP’s. An uncle who is a critical care nurse. Family members of colleagues who work in midwifery and the ambulance service. The GP’s who work at our local surgery. These people on the front line of this crisis need our prayers. They need our prayers NOW as they prepare themselves. Other personal messages from fr...

This morning the UK woke up to stricter Government-imposed regulations on our movements. They had hoped that if people were informed about the right thing to do we would choose to comply freely. Alas! We have seen pictures of crowded parks and beaches and people crammed together in queues to buy fish and chips. Their selfishness  in flaunting their ‘freedom’ means that we are all just a little bit more isolated now.  This is a helpful illustration of what the Bible teaches about sin:  ‘Self’ really does cause isolation! Jesus said that God has given us two stand-out commandments. The second of these is: ‘ Love your neighbour as yourself ’.  This is the ‘spirit’ of the famous Ten Commandments, which spell-out what loving your neighbour means in practice: honour your parents, and do not murder, commit adultery, steal, lie, or be jealous of other people. In other words “Don’t be selfish! Selfishness is the opposite of love. It only causes division ...