Lessons from the Faint of Heart

The hardest part about donating at a blood drive should have been the needle. My high school honor society was sponsoring a blood drive, so I signed up to donate and to help others who did. I had a wonderful phlebotomist (which I’ll call a tech, so I don’t have to spell that again) who distracted me with conversation the whole time.

And then came my turn to help others…

My friend sat in the chair, and her tech wasn’t as talkative, so I figured I’d help distract the patient. While I chatted away, I happened to glance over at the tube that ran red, and the clear plastic bag filling with my friend’s lifeblood. A slight ringing started in my ears. I tried to focus on the conversation and my friend’s face, not the bag, but warning alarms blared in my head, and the room grew stiflingly hot. The tech finished and asked me to walk my friend over to the food station, where she could sit and enjoy a snack.

I’m not sure who walked who over to the food table, but I believe I leaned more on my friend's arm than she did on mine. Meanwhile, my peripheral vision started fading to black, and the light at the end of the tunnel receded. As soon as she sat, I exited the gym and groped my way to the girls’ bathroom. After splashing water on my face, I sank to the cold tile floor with my head between my knees, and gulped in air until my vision cleared.

Blood is precious. Without blood, there isn’t life. The whole purpose of having a blood drive was to help those who could die without it. But there’s also a spiritual aspect to blood that I didn’t understand at that age.    

Blood is life. The wages of sin are death, and the Old Testament Law proved that we all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. A blood sacrifice had to be made to atone for our sins, which, in Old Testament times, was done through animal sacrifice.  

Blood is powerful. God is a just God, and He is the only one who can drive out the darkness. He’s the only one who can pull us from the deep, dark tunnel of sin leading to death. God did so by sending His perfect son, Jesus, into the world. Jesus never sinned, but He gave Himself as a sacrifice so that our sins would be covered by His blood. When we ask Jesus into our hearts and to be Lord of our lives, God no longer sees our sin-stained hands. He sees His perfect child because we are washed clean by Jesus’s blood.

Blood sustains us. Blood is the delivery system for oxygen and nutrients, and it removes waste products for filtration from our bodies. John 15:5 states, “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” When we rely on the blood of Jesus, God upholds us and sustains us with His righteous right hand (Isaiah 41:10), and through His strength we can do all things (Philippians 4:13).

I believed I was doing good works by donating blood and helping others, but it turns out I could do nothing without God. Ephesians 2:8-9 states, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast.” We’re to walk humbly with God (Micah 6:8) because God’s ways are higher than our ways. And God’s grace is greater than our best attempts and our worst moments.