Stories Of Hospitality In Our Hospitals – Dr Rena Ng 

7 MINUTE READ

From Luke’s Journal June 2024  |  Vol.29 No.2  |  Christian Hospitality

My husband David and I have been enormously blessed to have encountered faithful offerings of hospitality that have moulded, comforted and spurred us on through our years of medical training. Here are some of our stories. I pray these encourage you to reflect on God’s remarkable hospitality, and to be a vessel of this hospitality to others – in small or big ways.

Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.
(Revelation 3:20 NIV)

As a medical student on rotation in Armidale NSW, we were introduced to a local Christian GP. I would see him on his rounds of his nursing home patients at the hospital. One evening, he and his wife invited me and another Christian medical student over for dinner at their beautiful country home. The conversation was easy and light, and they showed genuine interest in our lives. I was humbled by how they spoke to us with no pretension – as peers rather than a generation below them, which we were. I still remember the dinner of salmon with smashed potatoes, along with a salad from her phenomenal country dream backyard garden. For them, that night would have undoubtedly been less memorable. But for me, it was a treasured moment of homeliness, a stark difference from the lonely dinners I had been having while away from home.

One Christmas Day as a junior medical officer in Newcastle NSW, I was unable to fly home to be with my family as I was rostered to work. I didn’t recognise at the time how homesick I was. It was serendipitous that I bumped into a wonderful Christian occupational therapist whom I had met while in Armidale. I received an immediate invitation to her family home to join them for their Christmas Day Lunch. We had a simple yet delicious lunch with her elderly grandparents, parents and sister’s family. We were joined by another young mum with children who they had extended the same hospitality to. She even bought me a small kitchen canister as a gift so I wouldn’t feel left out when presents were exchanged, which I still use to this day. She felt embarrassed by the last-minute purchase, but I felt incredibly loved to have been invited into her family for that special day. 

During my rural term in an Emergency Department as a junior medical officer, I had my first medical encounter with a patient presenting with abortion-related issues. It was a confusing and unsettling experience. It was God’s providence that I was paired with a godly Christian GP as part of the CMDFA Newcastle Mentoring program. We already had a few meetings in her home, meeting her friendly dogs and having cups of tea. That evening, I walked out of the Emergency Department and found her number on my mobile. She patiently and gently encouraged me to treat her with empathy and dignity just as Jesus would have. Rather than minimising the terrible situation, she encouraged me to lift it up to God in prayer.

“Throughout my years as a medical student and junior medical officer, formalised hospital fellowships became a huge source of support and strength for me”.

Throughout my years as a medical student and junior medical officer, formalised hospital fellowships became a huge source of support and strength for me. My experience began with Ian Johnston, who was the late Baptist chaplain at the John Hunter Hospital. Over lunch at the basement cafeteria, he filled our hearts with extraordinary stories of his daily conversations with patients earnestly seeking God within our hospital corridors. It was humbling to witness and partner with God’s incredible work of hospital chaplaincy in prayer. It opened my eyes to expect and even seek to facilitate God’s work in that seemingly secular place.

The next fellowship I joined was at another hospital in Newcastle, where a local pastor joined us for a weekly lunch meeting. The structure was simple. We discussed a bible verse, and then discussed two questions: What is this verse saying? And how does it speak to our work here? That visual placement of God within the four walls of my workplace was unforgettable. It helped me see my colleagues and patients as they are – immortal beings loved by God and in need of the good news of Jesus. It also helped me recognise that God cared immeasurably more about who I am in Jesus and my character, than the work I do.

We moved to Sydney in 2018 for my paediatric training at the Children’s Hospital at Westmead. I was invited to a fellowship with some of the paediatricians in their offices. We lifted up Christian doctors in leadership. We grieved together over deeply personal issues in the lives of our group. We prayed for families of dying patients undergoing complex grief, and the teams caring for them. We rejoiced in God’s constant faithfulness and providence which never failed to amaze and sustain. Again, the amazing humility and godly dependence modelled to me were transformative. 

As we moved around to Sydney and Tamworth, we were blessed to join various hospital fellowships in Blacktown Hospital, Belmont Hospital, Calvary Mater Hospital, the Children’s Hospital at Westmead and Liverpool Hospital. What did we learn about facilitating a successful hospital fellowship? It was as simple as picking a time and place, and committing to it. It was always amazing to see Christians come out of the woodwork, once the word spread! The fellowships took various forms, ebbing and flowing in number with the constant flux of staff at different sites. But never once was it time wasted, even if it was just one person lifting the others up in prayer.

The fellowship opportunities opened our eyes to the spiritual and existential dimension of the physical suffering of our patients, and encouraged us to offer referrals to the local chaplains. Involvement of the chaplains was often the hallmark of long-lasting fellowships.

Each encounter of hospitality was accompanied by the call to pray personally and corporately, and at all times – on the way to work, at work, and after work. Before work, to open our eyes to the work God has prepared for us to do that day. During work, especially when feeling stretched and in need, usually in between tears from a bathroom stall! After work, to viscerally thrust all the burdens of our day upwards. Some of those busy exam-sitting lonely days and nights were only managed with upward glances for strength.

Being with seasoned workers helped us cast our eyes forward, past our next college exams, past our next supervisor meeting, past our suffering and dying patients, to the Ancient of Days.

Would you consider starting a hospital fellowship at your hospital this year?

If you’d like to find a Hospital Network Fellowship near you click here.

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