How can I repay?

With my parents in 1992

Just a few hours before getting admitted in hospital for my surgery, I read this in a friend’s status message in Facebook. She has shared her friend’s story of how a hysterectomy done in her body turned complicated and became almost a life and death issue. Thankfully it did not scare me, but only made me feel how worthless I was and how much I needed God’s grace. I did not tell this to my parents who were getting ready to accompany me to hospital. My parents, both in their seventies have to be specially mentioned here because they have never been on a hospital stay so far, which itself is God’s grace. On the other hand, they both were scared and I had to encourage them and speak confidence to them often. But within me I had to hide my tears whenever my husband’s face flashed before me because I was missing him who was then in Bangladesh, miles away. With all this in the background, I was confident in the Lord however because of so much of love and prayer support I was privileged of.

With a partial anaesthesia, waist down, as the surgery process started I kept praying, first blessing all those who showed love to me in various ways including prayer. I prayed for the team around my bed who were performing the surgery. I prayed that my body would cooperate with what the doctors had to do. In an hour or so, the surgeon shook hands with me. I started smiling and talking to the lady doctor who was heading the team. My parents could hear me speaking as I was moved out of the theatre. There was happiness everywhere. We thanked the Lord. I spoke to my husband over phone, who was then trying to reschedule his ticket in the airport. He came the next morning to see me sitting in a chair - drips, catheter all removed before his arrival. One last word the doctor said before leaving the hospital on the third day was that I should be careful enough not to catch a cold or a cough in the first week. My brother who had come to take us all back home in his car stopped on the way in a medical store. He said, “Children at home have some infection. One has a cough and another has cold!” Praise God! I did not catch any infection and the kids too became alright soon. Things moved normal from then on.

Two weeks passed. I was brooding upon this one verse that said, “I will fulfil my vows to the LORD ​in the presence of all his people.” I was longing to go to church.  Sunday came. My portion in my ‘One Year Study Bible’ on the Sunday happened to be Psalm 116. I was thrilled when I reached verse 12 and then the following verses. ”How can I repay the LORD for all his goodness to me?...” I will fulfil my vows to the LORD in the presence of all his people.”

Looking back to my friend’s sharing in the Facebook, it was also a testimony of how God miraculously saved her life after almost a month’s ordeal of complications resulting out of a hysterectomy procedure. God shows his grace to people in different ways. It is not always the same. Sometimes God causes death, so says the next verse in the same Psalm 116. But with every fresh unleashing of life, every pulse of us must repay the Lord for all his goodness to us.  Praise the Lord!

How can I repay the LORD ​for all his goodness to me? (Psalm 116:12)