Day one — A fresh mind, a fresh start, and a brand-new Nokia smartphone buzzing with hope. My lab coat was blindingly white—stiff at the collar like it knew nothing of blood, sweat, or sleep deprivation. I wore it like armor, stepping onto campus with the quiet pride of someone who believed they were exactly where destiny had led them.Yes,I knew that I had made it. From village to the city,here comes the Champion! I was ready to become a doctor. Not someday—that day.
I thought medicine would greet me with stethoscopes and applause. After all, the doctors I grew up admiring wore them like royal ornaments. But no one handed us stethoscopes. No one clapped. Instead, we got ancient textbooks like Mungai’s Dissector ,Netters Atlas and course outlines that read more like punishment than promise.
Still, I was focused. I came to read. Before class, after class, between meals. Complex concepts were made clearer by Indian tutors who would welcome everyone to their YouTube channels. I wasn’t here to play. I wanted to be the best. The one who made it. The one who mattered.
Back in the village, the celebration hadn’t ended. One of their own had finally crossed into medicine. I heard whispers of hope—how they wouldn’t need to pay consultation fees anymore. One of them was now a doctor. The idea alone could heal their chronic infirmities. But how could I explain to them that all I knew so far was stratified squamous epithelium?
It was a Thursday evening, just after a long, smelly anatomy dissection, when a friend casually mentioned the Medical School Christian Union.
A doctor? And God? How? Wouldn’t the patient die before you finished praying “Amen”?
Still, I was curious.
I walked into the fellowship hall and paused at the door. Someone was on the guitar, another on the drums, and the keyboardist? He knew the assignment. The worship was rich, layered, alive. Someone could have thought that they had hired a band. Doctors don’t have time to practice songs—they practice medicine.
But I was very wrong.
These were senior medical students—sharp, grounded, compassionate—and yet, they found time to serve God joyfully, unashamedly. That evening, something shifted. I knew, right from the beginning, that I too would live to serve God, even as a student.
Tuesdays soon became sacred. Prayer meetings by at Riverside—raw, honest, refreshing. This fresh environment would also allow my dirty lab coats to breathe fresh air after six hours of formaldehyde suffocation.
As the years passed, dreams shifted. Some were met. Some never came true. Others quietly expired in the harsh light of reality. But through it all, one truth remained unshaken: there is a God in heaven who loves me deeply.
I thank Him—for the Riverside prayers that anchored me,
For the late-night Bible studies that lit my path,
For the gospel missions that stretched my heart,
For lifting me when I was down,
For welcoming me back every time I strayed.
The list is long, but the message is simple:
I began this journey with books in my hand and ambition in my chest,
Ended with something far greater—
A story of grace, written in the margins of medicine.
~Johnex.