   Applying for a residency position through the Match is a daunting task. So many voices urge you to make the best decisions for yourself to make sure you “get in” to a program. But could a random process like the Match be an opportunity to reflect Christ? Come hear about how God used a challenging residency application season to glorify His name, through the Match.   

AMEN 2019: Christ in You

<div> <div> <div> <p>Applying for a residency position through the Match is a daunting task. So many voices urge you to make the best decisions for yourself to make sure you “get in” to a program. But could a random process like the Match be an opportunity to reflect Christ? Come hear about how God used a challenging residency application season to glorify His name, through the Match.</p> </div> </div> </div>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Adventist Medical Evangelism Network (AMEN)

Brian Schwartz

Plenary

Us in Christ and Christ in Us

Amarachi Nwankpah

Six Words Every Physician Should Know

Kianna Simmons

Evaluating the Final Impressions

John Shin

A Case Study in Faith

Adrien Charles-Marcel

Reflecting Christ in the Match

Sebastien Braxton

I Believe in Miracles

Mark Finley

God’s Glory Revealed


Father in heaven, thank you so much for your goodness and for your grace and for giving us the opportunity to be co-laborers with you. Lord, we don't deserve this. And we are insufficient for the task. But I pray Lord that through your Holy Spirit, you would empower us to be reflective of you, to be the people you've called us to be, and to faithfully carry out your work, and to help to hasten your coming. I pray that this morning, as I share this story, that you would speak through me, and that it would be an encouragement to somebody, and that you would help us to be more committed to your work, in Jesus' name we pray, amen.

So, oral and maxillofacial surgery is a specialty of dentistry that is a little bit more like medicine, especially when you're in residency. We admit patients to the hospital, we take them to the operating room, take care of them as they recover, as well as run an inpatient consulting service for the hospital, both covering odontogenic infections, which is any type of infection that arises from the teeth, which can include small abscesses inside the mouth, large abscesses in the neck, the face, and the head, as well as covering maxillofacial trauma, which is basically any trauma that occurs to the face all the way up to the scalp. So it's a wide departure from general dentistry. And nobody in dental school will teach you how to put in an NG tube, how to replete electrolytes, how to stitch somebody's ear back on, or anything like that. So needless to say, it's a huge jump to go from being a dental student to being an OMFS, as it is known for short, intern.

However, there's something that stands in the way between most would-be applicants to oral maxillofacial surgery and actually getting into specialty, and that thing is known as the CBSE. It's called the Comprehensive Basic Science Examination. It's basically a shortened version of step 1 for medicine, covering all the same topics, and it would be pretty accurate to say that it strikes fear in the hearts of most people that think of applying to oral and maxillofacial surgery because you have to study and master many topics that you don't learn in dental school. And Despite the fact that that stands in the way, even if you do take the exam, many people who don't get the score that they want on that exam end up repeating multiple years after dental school of non-categorical internships, which is basically one-year programs where you're doing oral and maxillofacial surgery as a resident, but you're not in a track that leads to a certificate. And so many people will end up doing 1 or 2 or 3 of these years before they finally match.

So this was the world that I stepped into 2 years ago as a slightly naive fourth year dental student. I took the CBSE for the first time with only 3 months of preparation during a very busy time of dental school where it didn't make sense to study for and take that exam. And then my score reflected that fact. And even the story of how I ended up deciding on oral and laxal facial surgery, that's a story for another day. But needless to say, I didn't see that as something that I thought God would be calling me into until late in the game, so halfway through or partway through my fourth year dental school.

Then about a week before graduation, I ended up getting accepted into 1 of these one-year non-categorical internships, which was a wonderful blessing, but it was also not the best of timing either because that didn't make for a very smooth transition from dental school straight into internship. And So when I started my internship in July of 2018, I had a plan in mind. I had graduated from Loma Linda University. I had a mission-minded outset, and I wanted to go back to that institution for my training. But I was also open to applying to multiple different residencies.

There's about 60-something of them across the country. So I was open to applying to different places and seeing what might be out there. But I was so intent on wanting to go back to my alma mater that before I even started my internship, I scheduled a week long of shadowing back in California in the department as a way of increasing my chances of matching there. And for those who aren't familiar, I assume most people in this room are familiar with how a match works, but basically a match is when you're applying for a position, you interview in multiple different places, if they give you an interview, and then at the end of that season of interviews, you have to submit a list of your ranking, of where you would like to go first, and then each program that you've interviewed at also submits their own list of who they want to possibly match into their program, and then a computer puts those 2 things together, and if there's a match, then you go to that program. It's a little bit nerve-wracking, to say the least.

So, when I started back to July of 2018, I started my internship. My plan was to study for the CBSE again, bump up my score, get a more competitive score, apply to, I was thinking about 4 or 5 well-selected programs that fit my interests, and then see what happens. Now, most people were saying you should apply to 30 or 40 programs. So my perspective was a little bit different from most. So I started the internship.

It was very demanding. I was living about 30 minutes away from there so I was commuting back and forth every day and the work days were at least 12 hours or more so I didn't leave too much time for studying And I realized quickly that this was not going to be as easy as I'd hoped. Well, the CVSE is offered only twice a year, and so that year it was offered in August. So I did the best that I could, studied for the exam, took the exam, and when I got my results it was exactly the same score that I'd gotten the first time, which was discouraging. Pretty discouraging because that score was not a competitive score.

It was not anywhere close to what you would want if you were trying to match into a competitive program, especially 1 that there's 2 different types of programs. There's four-year programs, six-year programs, and at the time, Momolindo was only offering the six-year program, And those tend to be a little bit more competitive to get into. So when I got my score, I didn't quite know what to think. And I was pretty discouraged. I remember texting 1 of my mentors, who's sitting right here in the front, Carlos.

And I said, hey, I got this score. And it's exactly the same score that I got the first time. I remember he told me, don't let that get you down. Keep working hard. And if you match, you match.

If you don't match, then you just have a decision to make at the end of the year. And I liked that perspective, and so I kept working hard. Well, my 4 to 5 idea of applying to 4 to 5 different programs got whittled down to 2, as I realized that my chances of matching anywhere were pretty slim, and so I didn't want to spend a lot of money on going to interview at places where, first of all, I may not even get an interview, and second of all, I didn't have a good chance of matching. And so I applied to these 2 programs and waited. And waited.

And it turns out that I found out that my second choice, They offered me an interview, which was great, but it was gonna be the exact same week that I was gonna be gone, shadowing out in California. And that was a little bit unexpected, because that means that if I forgo that interview, then I only have 1 potential interview. And at that point, I didn't even have an interview. So I had to decide, do I go with what is sure, that I'll at least have an interview here at this place that was not my first choice, or the potential of getting an interview at this other place. I decided to go with the potential.

And they graciously said they would reschedule my interview at my second choice, and that was nice of them. And I continued to wait, hoping all this time that I would get an interview invitation, because you can't match into a program you don't interview at. Well, as it turns out, time went on and it was the week before I was going to be going out to California, foreshadowing. Everyone else that I knew of that had applied to that program had already gotten an interview invitation. And so at that point I realized, nah, I'm probably not gonna get an interview, but I'm still gonna go.

And what does this all mean? Interestingly, at that same time, I was also preparing a sermon to preach that weekend. And it was in the middle of October, and so it was a fitting time to be thinking about the Great Disappointment. And the topic that I'd felt led to, and I'm sorry, I didn't mean it that way, but it was a good time to think about what had happened in 1844, and to reflect on on what the believers went through at that time as they were preparing for Jesus' coming, and how they had to sacrifice everything that they wanted and all their plans for the prospect of Christ's return. And as I was preparing the sermon, it was challenging me deeply because I realized that I was also being called to think about, why am I doing what I'm doing?

Why did I feel led to do oral maxillofacial surgery anyway? It was because of the call of the mission field and the needs that exist in the world that I felt God might be giving me the opportunity to help fill. And I had to put in perspective what's the most important thing? Is Christ and His coming the most important thing or am I getting to do exactly what I want to do. Well, I got to California.

I preached the sermon. It was the hardest sermon I have ever preached. And started the week. And I didn't know what was going to come out of that week. I was there.

I found out the interviews were going to be exactly the week after my being there, and that was totally unplanned by me. And I just put it in God's hands. As the week progressed, through more convoluted ways than it would be able for me to explain right now, person after person found out about my situation and went behind the scenes and did things so that I got an opportunity to be considered for an interview. And this was Thursday of that week and interviews were Monday. And there was 1 thing that was standing in the way that my, as I found out, my score on this exam had been 1 point lower than the minimum required.

So it was, and this is 1 point lower than the minimum, not than the recommended. So this was not a situation where it was even high chances that I would have a chance. But they were willing to consider my application, so they forwarded it on to the people that had to make the final decision as to whether they would accept my application or not. And lo and behold, that Friday morning, I got a call saying, your application was accepted, you'll get an interview. Which was amazing, but that was not the end of the story.

Interviews happened, 6 interviews in total for that 1 spot. There were 12 of us that interviewed that day, or those 2 days. And I was fully cognizant of the fact that I was the least qualified to be there because I was the 1 that was added on at the last. But again, it was hard to deny the fact that God had worked in an unexplainable way that I was even there interviewing. Interviews went well, thank the Lord, and then began the three-month wait.

I returned back to work on the other side of the country, and of course people had questions and people had their own recommendations. I remember somebody told me that if I only applied to where I'd applied to, that I was crazy because the chances of my matching were very slim and it didn't make any logical sense to do what I was doing. Many people said, it's better to match into anywhere than not to match. But that's not quite how I felt. I felt convicted and just led to do what I had done and to approach it the way I had approached it.

And so, 3 months went by, a difficult 3 months, but yet also an expectant 3 months as I was waiting to see what God would do. And during that time, I would love to say that I was full of faith and confident that God was going to work out things for His glory and in the best way, but there were many times that I doubted and worried about what was going to happen. But on the outside I tried to to show that I was that I was trusting God and I was working in a secular setting that year. Not many actually almost no other practicing Christians around me in my work. And people saw what was going on.

They obviously could see that I wasn't going to many interviews like everyone else was. And of course, like I said, people had their opinions. 1 person in a position of authority told me, it would take a miracle for you to match this year. And I agreed, it would take a miracle. Well, match day came around January, I think it was January 28 of this year.

And that morning, went to work early, like usual. And there were 4 of us that were applying to residency positions that year. And I remember I texted my colleagues and said, hey, would you guys be open to having a prayer together this morning? Again, this is a secular setting. Everyone was willing.

And so we met that morning in the hospital chapel, and the air was tense, of course. There was the expectancy that within 1 to 2 hours, we would be finding out either wonderful news or devastating news. And I remember everyone kind of turned to me, since I was the 1 who had suggested that we pray, and we prayed, and I prayed that morning that God would be with us despite whatever happened and left it in his hands. Well, about an hour later something popped up in my email and I was almost afraid to open it. All the anticipation of what was gonna happen.

When I opened it, it said, congratulations, you have matched. And the miracle of that was not only that I had matched, I had matched into a program that was way beyond what I thought was capable of happening. And during that day, because everybody had known that I shouldn't have matched, I had full license to give glory to God whenever people said congratulations. I could say, this is a miracle. Thank God this happened.

And I remember a couple of people, 1 person who had told me in no uncertain terms that I was not with it before. When I told them, or rather when they saw me, they said, congratulations, I heard you matched. I said, well, I believe that God did a miracle for me to match. And their response was somewhat surprising because this was not somebody that I thought would have had faith. They said, I believe in miracles.

And it was an opportunity to show the power of God through a difficult time. And I don't even know all that has come out of that and will continue to come out of that in the lives of those people that were watching. But I know that in my life it was a reminder that God has a plan, even when I might not see that plan. And this morning as we think about what it means for Christ to be in us, I want to appeal to you to remember that Christ being in us is not always just for our benefit, but that it's for the benefit of those around us. And sometimes when we're going through circumstances that we don't understand, God has a reason beyond it.

I'm reminded of what it says in the book of Job, chapter 19, verse 23. Job was going through the worst time of his life, and he said, oh, that my words were now written. Oh, that they were printed in a book. He had no idea that his words were going to be an inspiration for millions of the unfallen worlds and of us human beings who go through similar situations. So this morning I just want to encourage you that As we think about what it means for Christ to be in us, let's remember the broad perspective that God has a plan for us, despite whatever it is that we may be going through, and that his plan includes not only blessing us, but also blessing those around us, and inspiring them to have faith in Him as well.

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Plenary

Reflecting Christ in the Match

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Parent Conference

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Other Teachings in Series

Us in Christ and Christ in Us

47m

Six Words Every Physician Should Know

28m

Evaluating the Final Impressions

51m

A Case Study in Faith

1h 12m

Reflecting Christ in the Match

19m

I Believe in Miracles

54m

God’s Glory Revealed

59m

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