Praying for the Critically Ill

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Loma Linda Department of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine

Merrick Lopez

Dafne Moretta

Three Doctors’ Thoughts on Praying With/For Patients


OK, my name is Daphne Moreta. I'm 1 of the Pulmonary Critical Care Fellows here at Loma Linda. And I have the task today to try to answer the question that you see on the screen. Should we pray with all our patients? So before I start trying to answer to that question, I just want to share with you 2 quotes that actually have carried me through my medical training, my nursing training before becoming a physician.

And the first 1 has to do with our role in praying with patients. And it says this, it is our work to present the sick and suffering to Christ in the arms of our faith. If you think about that high calling, we have to work daily in our faith and in our journey of faith in order to be able to present to Christ those that we care for. And then very simply, the very essence of the gospel is restoration. And we know about restoration in Loma Linda, don't we?

We talk usually about making men whole. We know that it's our role and our call and mission to restore the image of God in those that we care for. And I think part of that mission comes from taking care of the spiritual ailment of those patients we have under our care. So trying to answer the question, I went essentially to 3 resources. The first 1 to the Bible, and then to my favorite Christian author, and finally to some people that I know pray with their patients.

So when I think about prayer for the sick, immediately my mind goes to James chapter 5. And there are a few verses over there James tried to make a discourse about really what it means to pray for the sick and he starts with a simple question saying, Is anyone of you sick? This all-inclusive question talks to me about the need to pray for every single 1 who is sick. Is anyone of you sick? And then James starts giving a recipe with different ingredients on how to do that.

The first 1 is to pray with faith. And then he talks about something important about confession and prayer. And he says, pray 1 for another that ye may be healed. Not only the person that we're praying for but praying for healing brings healing to ourselves as well. And finally James says the effectual prayer, sorry the effectual fervent prayer of the righteous man availeth much, or accomplishes everything in God's power.

My favorite author says, with all our treatments, absolutely with all of them given to the sick, simple, fervent prayer should be offered for the blessing of healing. So imagine every time you hang a new presser, or you do a procedure, or you count calories for the patient, you move them for first time, you talk to the family. Any intervention, every single treatment, should be accompanied by a very silent, short prayer, Lord, may this be a blessing for this person. It's very simple. It takes a few seconds, but we are called to do this.

We don't have the power of healing, but we have the power available to us. And finally, trying to answer to this question, I talk to a lot of friends that I know, they're praying physicians. And it's interesting, when I ask, should we pray with all our patients? Almost unanimously, they say, of course we should. And then my question was, why don't we?

And the answer all throughout the war was, well, We don't have the time to do that. And so I just want to read to you all this interchange that we have, a group of us. And I think this has a lot of insight. Everyone has value before the eyes of God, someone says. I believe in everyone.

The question I might ask is, do I believe in God? And while this has not been a series on the existence of God, particularly talking about this seminar, it is difficult to overlook the fact that this institution, Loma Linda University, was established by people who not only believed in God, but believed that God believes in people. It is in this spirit that we bring broken, desperate to a God that has time and time again proven himself invested in broken humanity. And listen to this. What does it cost me really to bring my patients, during and between life and death, to such a God?

A few seconds? A minute? Well, excuses aside, I have that. And I hope you consider that you do too. So when I came to Loma Linda for the first time as a medical student, I was amazed and inspired by a lot of the paintings that we have in the hospital lobby.

And this particular 1 just tells such a beautiful story to me. You have a praying physician for a pediatric patient for his family and you have this little girl just in the back noticing absolutely everything that is going on. And I think prayer does that. When we pray in the hospital for everyone, we bless our patients, we bless their families, and we bless everyone who notice that we are praying. So finally, how do we do this?

I don't have the perfect formula, but I guess the main start point is just recognizing the value of your patient before God's eyes. So I guarantee you if you don't understand the value of those that you care for, you're not going to have the interest, the passion, or the desire to pray for them. So we need to start there. Pray for everyone but not necessarily with everyone. And this is very real in the ICU environment when people where people are delirious or sedated, intubated, they forgot their hearing aids, whatever it is, communication is always difficult.

But I think few seconds to pray for everyone is important. Pray with faith, pray fervently, and pray without ceasing. And I just want to finish with a very short story. If you guys were here last week, you probably saw the video about Dr. Nguyen and his testimony after his experience being a patient.

Well, when I heard that, I was a first year fellow when this occurred and I was terrified by Dr. Nguyen. Terrified. So when I heard that he had an accident, I just prayed. But I knew deep in my heart I should have gone and offered prayer for him.

And I'm so glad. I was a coward. I never went. I sent a little car. I told him that I was praying for him.

But I'm glad Dr. Hartley is here, that he took the time to do that. Because Dr. Wen's life was never the same after that experience. So just think about that.

Think about the, you know, see every single 1 as a potential soul for the kingdom of God. It takes a few seconds, so pray with everyone. Thank you for your attention. Larrin asked me to come join. Are you guys able to hear me okay?

Yeah. And it's kind of a change in the program, and he opened up his spot to me. I went to last week's meeting, and prayer is an important part of just my own life and how I deal with patients. I went here, I also was a nurse here, and went here for medical school, residency, fellowship, and I've been attending now for 5 years in the Peds ICU. And the biggest reason is because I believe in the mission of this hospital and the fact that we can pray with patients.

And I'm thankful to be here. So I'm gonna give some practical tips to echo a little of what Carrie talked about. And then I'm gonna talk about a case study and then also share from the Ministry of Healing. I know she mentioned Ellen White, and this is something that I get a lot of inspiration and tips on how I deal with patients. So we're gonna talk about how to ask, when to pray, and how to pray.

So as far as how to ask, you know, just looking for hints in the room. You know, when you pass by, is there a Bible? Is there a religious book at the bedside? Are there religious pictures? Is there a rosary hanging?

Is there something there that you're like, these people, this family may be spiritually inclined. And in our unit, we deal with patients from a few days of birth to even like 20, 21 years of age and various family members. The other thing is listening to them. Do they mention, there's a lot of people praying for us or you know on Facebook we have a large prayer group. And so when you hear some of these things and it just attunes you to the fact that they are spiritually inclined.

Do they mention their church? Do they mention their pastor or their priest? And then ask them. I like what Carrie said, how she said, would it help if we prayed? As a medical student, eager to pray with patients and their families, I wanted to do something.

And so I would say, can I pray with you? And it's almost like forcing myself upon them. And it would be almost like an awkward situation, especially if they didn't think so. So I learned from Dr. Xu, Stanford Xu, 1 of the ped's neurologists here, to ask this way, would it be helpful if I prayed with you?

And 80, 90 percent of the time, families will very readily accept and they'll be excited for the opportunity to be prayed with. And for those who are a little reluctant, you know, we just say, you know, there are very, I will be praying for you and there are people here in this institution that are praying for you as well. So that 1 was 1 of the biggest things that helped me asking would it be helpful if we prayed. And then when to pray. I liked what Daphne had said is that you know you pray for every patient but you don't necessarily pray with every patient, because just because of how the logistics are, workflow or other things, sometimes it may not be appropriate or a good time.

But whenever, Ellen White says, sometimes we'll miss the most precious blessings by neglecting to speak a word in season. If the golden opportunity is not watched for, it will be lost. So just being attuned and being ready to pray. I know last week we were resuscitating a girl in the pediatric cardiac ICU. She's 2 years old.

It was on and off chest compressions for quite a bit of time, and I'm trying to focus on reviving her and taking care of her, but I know we called the family in. We had the chaplain there, and so while I couldn't break away to pray, we brought him at bedside to make sure that he laid hands on them with the family and praying while we did things. So just not missing those opportunities. And then 1 other guideline that she has is, you know, when you're at the bedside of the sick, you know, no word of creed or controversy should be spoke, just pointing the sufferer to the God who is willing to save all that come to him in faith, and earnestly, tenderly strive to help the soul that is hovering between life and death. And so it's very important.

And that transitions to another part of prayer. You know, we spoke last week with Larin about other faiths. My boss, the chief of Pediatric Critical Care is Dr. Shamil Abdallah, and I've gone on several mission trips with him overseas to Egypt. You know, he's a very devout Muslim, and we talk a lot about things.

We pray with each other, and because of that experience, I'm comfortable offering prayer to other religions or other faiths, And if I'm not as good about, with 1 certain faith or another, I will make sure to bring someone in who can address their spiritual needs because bringing the spiritual part of it is what I think is very beautiful about Loma Linda and helping to achieve whole person care. So, but again, at that point, I'm not going to be talking about like my doctrine or like what they, we worship or things like that. It's very important too that they feel that you're caring for them. So how to pray, you know, we spoke about with other faiths and that's so important. And 1 of the last things I will focus on with how to pray is It's not our will, but rather His will.

And 1 of the things in prayer for the sick, we have to remember that a lot of times, we don't know what we should pray for. And that is 1 of the most important things that I've learned. And so, you know, we, you know, I've seen patients, you know, a three-year-old with incurable cancer, you know, a 15-year-old who was paralyzed from transverse myelitis, a seven-day-old who had severe pneumonia, intubated, had a prolonged course, had a head bleed. These are some of the patients that we pray for and that we think about. And some of them have healing that we pray for and ask for, and sometimes there's a different kind of healing.

And again, my favorite book as far as this, I get a lot of inspiration from, it's the Ministry of Healing. This is a chapter 16 prayer for the sick. And 1 thing that is mentioned in Luke 22, 42, this is Jesus speaking, that while presenting our petitions with earnestness, we should always be submissive and say, nevertheless, not my will, but thine be done. And a lot of times that is very difficult. And if you're familiar with Jesus' story, before He was going to die, He pleaded and was praying in the Garden of Gethsemane for strength.

And he knew what had to happen, but, and he even asked, oh my father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. But he submitted his will to God, and if they were appropriate for him, the Son of God, how much more are they becoming on the lips of us? And before I get into a particular case, the consistent course is to commit our desires to our all-wise Heavenly Father, and then in perfect confidence trust all to Him. And we know that God hears us if we ask according to His will, but to press our petitions without a submissive spirit is not right, and that our prayers must take the form of not of command, but of intercession, and following his own example of asking for a different outcome, a desired outcome, but submitting to the will of God. This is not her picture.

You know, I'm glad Google has a bunch of pictures that can simulate things, but this is, I wanna tell you a story about Hope. That's not her name either, but I'll never forget her. She was a three-year-old who came in with a submersion injury or a drowning incident about 8 years ago. This is the first year that I was a fellow, and I'll never forget this because my own daughter, who is now 10, was the same age, And this was on the Friday before Easter, so Good Friday. And I had just come on shift and I was supposed to meet this family who was trying to decide if they were going to disconnect her from life support.

So again, how to ask. You know, I remember seeing a Bible in their room, maybe a rosary or like a picture that they keep on the crib. And so that's just 1 thing where I'm like, you know, maybe this would help if I asked them to pray. And when to pray. The first meeting that I had with them, they wanted to talk separately with the physicians, with myself, because as you can imagine, some of their family did not agree with discontinuing life-sustaining measures, and others supported them, but they wanted to talk to us.

She would have likely progressed to brain death. Her hypoxic injury to her brain was so great. And so, you know, I've had a lot of meetings where all the family wants to be there, but this in particular, they wanted to talk separately without some of the influences. So that was when to pray when we sat down, and I saw those cues in their room, and I just said, would it be helpful if we prayed? And they said, yes, please, let's pray.

And so we started with prayer, and that kind of put them at ease. And that's 1 thing is like when you start these meetings no matter what faith it is by acknowledging that that there's a God who knows exactly what's going on inside. I mean medicine is very imperfect and only God truly knows what's going on inside our individual cells and what is needed and so disarming people by saying I am NOT God but I am here to tell you what we, based on experience, evidence, diagnostic testing, we can expect. But should we be proven wrong? That's what we want.

I mean, we would want that. I would want this girl to walk out of the hospital. And so it's very disarming for families and to know that people acknowledge that God is the higher power. And then so how to pray. Again, it's not our will but His will.

And you know being Easter weekend, it kind of helped things. But since I have time, I'm going to medical school here. 1 of the issues for me was reconciling how can bad things happen to innocent people, and specifically for me, for children, because children did not do, they did not not exercise right, or did not have all these years of lifestyle issues and sometimes these things happen to them and that is often hard for me to reckon, was often hard for me to reconcile. And you know, a couple of slides back when Jesus prayed that prayer of submission, here was the most innocent human to have lived, and he didn't do anything wrong, but he had to suffer, and he had to die. I spoke with his family and said, the only person who understands what you're going through is God.

He saw his child suffer, and we know that he, even though he prayed for a different outcome, he was willing to accept God's will, which was that he would pass away so that there is hope beyond this world of a place where we'll see each other, that There's no evil, there's no sickness, there's no things like that. And as we talked about that, you know, we did pray. You know, they wanted to pray for healing, but they were willing to trust whatever outcome that was. And so we prayed there in the room, we prayed at the bedside, and they were willing to accept whatever happened. And I'll always remember, we were in that room in my attending, when he gave the order to take out the breathing tube, we were all crying because this attending, his daughter was exactly the same age as mine, as was Hope.

And we were all crying, and she eventually passed away in the arms of her parents. And when I came back, the family was holding her, but there was a different tune. I know we had come back and prayed again with them, and they were remembering how much joy she brought to their lives. And you know, we prayed for healing, but there was a different healing that took place. There was many family members who were estranged and were not talking to each other.

And this little girl brought them together. And so as she slept, They were talking about her and the joy she brought to them and what hope they have to see her again and away from this sinful world. And so, You know, 1 thing is when we have prayed for recovery, whatever the outcome, you know, it's easy to say, but let us not lose faith in God. And just to remember that if we're called to meet a bereavement, accept the bitter cup, remembering that the Father's hand who saw his own son suffer unjustly and die, so that we could have a hope for another time, that it's that Father who holds it to our lips. The last things that I wanted to say is that we all desire immediate and direct answers to our prayers and Tempted to become discouraged when the answer is delayed or comes in an unlooked form You know they say is it a yes or no answer, but it is an answer but it may not be what we're looking for, and God always answers.

But He is too wise and good to answer our prayers always at just the time and in just the manner we desire. He will do more and better for us than we accomplish with all our wishes, and that reminds me of the Ephesians 3 20 and I'm paraphrasing here because there's different versions but he's he's willing to do abundantly exceedingly more than we can ask or imagine and so you know in addition to those practical tips just to just just to know that that He is there even when the outcomes don't turn out what we would think should be. But He knows, and He will give us what's needed. Thank you. If you would like to know more about Audioverse, or if you

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