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Chaplain Joan Keiser on attempting to make sense
The Incomplete Life – Or Was It?
A 22 year-old died today as the result of a motor vehicle accident. She lost control of her vehicle, crossed the center line and was hit head-on. She suffered a traumatic brain injury which resulted in brain death.
She had been married five years and was a hard worker at a warehouse. God had gifted her with the ability to play the guitar, the mandolin and the piano. She sang with her family at church and other community gatherings about God’s grace and love. Her husband told me, “She brought joy to all those she knew . . . she got along well with everyone.”
She had been working two hours extra every day the week prior to her accident. She was, no doubt, tired and may have fallen asleep at the wheel as she was driving home. She chose not to wear a seat belt.
We are a society that is living longer nowadays and so when someone 22 years old dies, we feel that is just “too young” or that it is “an incomplete life.”
Some say it is God’s plan while others feel the choices we make cause life to end too soon. What if she had chosen to wear her seat belt? What if she had not worked those extra hours? What if . . . we continue to attempt to make sense out of what happened.
Scripture asks: “What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes . . . you ought to say, 'If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.'”
(James 4:14b, 15)
In the book Five Things We Cannot Change, author David Richo talks about things in life over which we have no control and lists five “unavoidable givens.” One of those five givens is: Things do not always go according to plan.
It seemed to her family and, perhaps, to all who were aware of her death that the 22-year-old girl had an incomplete life. Was it? Or, was it a life made complete with death to life as we know it?
Chaplain Joan Keiser has been a chaplain at St. John's Hospital, Springfield, MO, for the past 10 years. She completed her four units of CPE at St. John's Hospital. Joan has a certificate of Religious Studies from Loyola Institute for Ministry, Loyola University, New Orleans. She is a licensed local pastor serving at Rogersville United Methodist Church. Her areas of hospital ministry are: Neuro-Trauma ICU, Neuro-Intermediate/Stroke Center, Breast Center, and Endoscopy. Joan also serves on the Springfield Stroke Coalition and is a member of the Mid-America Transplant Collaborative for Organ Donation, representing St. John's Hospital. She is currently applying for Board certification. She is married, has two children and six grandchildren.
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