Medicine as Mission

Though Jesus called for all Christians to make disciples, he gives believers different ministries to live out this call. Dr. Amanda Lucashu considers medicine her mission field, so she’s grateful for how her mentorship with Drs. David and Janet Kim has provided guidance on how to effectively integrate her faith with caring for her patients’ health. She shadowed the Kims a few times at Beacon Christian Community Health Center and was struck by how they took a few seconds to pray before seeing each patient.

“They would pray both for the patient and whatever health complaint had brought them into the office, but also just pray for the sensitivity of the Holy Spirit to be able to be aware of what the Holy Spirit was doing in the patient’s life,” Lucashu said. 

Lucashu decided she wanted not only to be sure she prayed for her patients before entering their rooms but also to offer to pray with them like the Kims often did. However, the conviction to pray for her patients didn’t erase the nerves Lucashu felt the first time she actually did so. 

“I asked the Lord, ‘God, give me a sign. I need an easy one to be my first to pray with.’ I walked into this patient’s room, and she had her Bible out on the bedside table. I was like, ‘OK God, thank you.’ I said a quick prayer with her, and she had asked me to come back and pray with her again later,” Lucashu said with a laugh. 

After praying with that first patient, Lucashu gained the confidence to pray with others, and now she offers to pray with patients most of the time. In addition to prayer, Lucashu believes that the Holy Spirit’s leading can be important in helping her understand how to best help her patients. She remembers a patient who struggled with her weight. The patient described the shame she felt because of her weight and her inability to follow her diet. 

“I was able, with the sensitivity of the Holy Spirit, to realize that her weight wasn’t the biggest issue at that appointment. I said, ‘The Bible tells us that God wants us to have life and have it to the full. Right now, I think the issue that is keeping you from that full life the most is the shame and not the weight or other health issues,’” Lucashu said. 

After finishing medical school, Lucashu accepted a spot in a Christian residency program where in addition to praying with patients she sometimes offers to connect them with a church or a Christian addiction and mental health support group. Since Lucashu plans to serve overseas, she appreciates how her residency is training her to be a doctor that can help her patients both physically and spiritually. 

While Jesus places a calling on the lives of believers, he doesn’t tell anyone to live out that call alone. Regardless of a person’s job within the medical field, Lucashu believes Christians need to build relationships with other believers who work in medicine, whether that be through formal Christian residency programs, mentorship or fellowship with Christian coworkers.

“The Bible tells us that we can spur one another on towards love and good deeds,” Lucashu said. “It’s really vital to be able to maintain one’s distinctively Christian nature as a physician and to surround yourself with others who are also trying to figure out how to be doctors in the footsteps of the great physician.”