(Warning: slightly morbid, not for the faint-hearted)
This is written while I'm on call.
As a medical student and doctor-to-be, I have the privilege of seeing more blood and coming into contact with more blood than most people have in a lifetime. Unless you happen to have been in a serious road traffic accident before, or gotten into a bad fight. *ahem* So here's some of my observations-
I was rather surprised by the first time I saw blood. It was so much darker than I thought it was. We all have been fed this idea by cartoons and pictures that blood is bright red, like the red of SBS buses. But it's not. It's dark. It's sometimes ugly. When it's clotted it's even black. Blood doesn't flow like water. It's thicker, more viscous.
Arterial blood is a brighter red. When it's drawn, you can see it spurting into the syringe in time with the pulse, with every beat. It's almost alive.
Patients universally hate to have blood taken. I didn't quite understand until I donated blood one day. Granted, it's probably a different experience from the patients, but it still feels horrible. There's almost a sense of violation as something goes into somewhere it shouldn't go, the needle into a vein that has been peacefully channeling blood all your life.
So here I am, just 10 minutes after having drawn blood from an edematous patient - this means that the person has fluid in the tissues beneath the skin, making it hard to locate the vein - and I've come to the understanding that it's really hard to wash blood away.
I spilled some blood while securing the cannula in the vein. Got some on the tray, got some on the skin, got some on the glove, got some on the scrubs. Even with alcohol swabs one has to wipe a few times to clean it off the skin. Even a tap at full blast doesn't quite get rid of the blood on the tray immediately. One has to use a measure of soap and violent rubbing to get the tray back to its clean state.
As I looked at the blood on my hand slowly fading away under the flowing water, I finally realised why Jesus had to die.
It's really hard to wash blood away.
Water's not enough.
A flood's worth of water couldn't purge sin from Noah's world.
Only Jesus could.
My hands are bloody with the violence I've done to man - with my lying, my hatred, my anger, my self-righteousness, my bitterness... And it's impossible to wash it away.
But Jesus did.
Blood paid for blood.
Think of the 1.5L bottles that soft drinks come in. Imagine 3 bottles. 4.5 litres, 4.5 kg. Can you feel their weight in your hand, your arm straining to carry them to your house? Now imagine those 3 bottles filled with nothing else but blood. That's the average volume of blood in the human body. Dark red blood, slowly clotting in the bottle. Now pour out that blood...
And a wooden cross was slowly stained red and black by the blood of one Man... the ground with a spreading stain from the cross. Wherever the blood is, redemption is there. Wherever the bloodstains remain, there is peace and salvation.
Isn't it good that blood's so hard to wash off?
