Can you sing that sparrow song you always sing?' We opened with prayer, and, in the quiet room, I asked Vinnie if he had a special request. Music and monitors somehow fit in, too, all around his bed. Church is coming to you this morning.' Everyone who had gathered in the solarium, Nancy and her sermon notes, my kids, even strangers and staff that morning, crowded into Vinnie's room, spilling out into the hallway. I kidded him: 'Hey, buddy, don't you go anywhere. And I took a cue from the look in his eye. 'Are you going to have the music?' he managed to ask - that's what he called our services. I small-talked and finally said I had to leave. One Sunday I stopped in Vinnie's room before our service in the solarium. He couldn't move most of his body he could barely speak he couldn't get out of bed, much less hop on the old treadmill. He made the usual return to the floor for recuperation, but burly Vinnie started wasting away. As sometimes happened with heart transplants we witnessed and lived through, 'everything' was right, yet Vinnie suffered a stroke on the operating table. The donor program found a perfect match… on paper. Some weeks the treadmill was in the solarium, where we held our services, so he occasionally hung around the back door or sat by the window, looking out over Philadelphia, waiting for us all to leave. Vinnie could often be found on the treadmill - I began to suspect that he didn't need a heart transplant, but was on the floor in some witness-protection program. It was usually gruff when we invited him to makeshift services. One guy, a rough-cut, white-haired old Italian laborer from New Jersey, was gruff or friendly, depending on his whim. Many stories, many salvation decisions, many laughs and tears, many healings, and many mysteries - the sweet God-mysteries - came from the six years we wound up serving patients and their families. Sixteen years ago, when my wife Nancy was waiting for her heart transplant, our family was led to start a ministry on the Heart Failure floor of Temple University Hospital. TEACHING His Eye is on the Sparrow By Rick Marschall More Bible Study & Theology on Spiritual Life

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Eye on the sparrow