Dr.Glenn Geelhoed has led more than 200 medical missions to developing countries, from Burma to Ecuador to the Sudan. He strives not only to heal patients, but also to heal communities and prepare them to care for their own. The 69-year-old George Washington University Medical Center professor recently published a book about his journeys, titled “Gifts from the Poor: What the World’s Patients Taught One Doctor About Healing.” He spoke with The Washington Examiner about the lessons he has learned, and the faith that guides his service. Do you consider yourself to be of a specific faith?
Absolutely and certainly — faith is my primary motivation. I’ve been so blessed that there’s no possibility of repaying the interest. I am a Christian, a Protestant. I am a member at the Washington, D.C., Christian Reformed Church. I think I’m as orthodox as anyone can be, but within that I see room for many representations of faith. And I believe that all prayers are valid.
You’re surrounded by evidence of the good that has come of your medical missions, and yet at the end of the day, there’s only so much that anyone can fix in the world. How do you reconcile such hard work with failure?
The failures are the most intensive learning experiences one can ever have. Those are the “cutting the teeth” moments when you realize you’re not just an observer of the human experience, but a participant in it.
I don’t abhor failure — what I abhor are limits. I get very little satisfaction from my last achievement. I’m seeking to do what I can do given the limits demonstrably handed to me. I’ve sometimes been able to overcome those limits, to save the next person — and I might yet be able to turn around and give more.
What have you learned about human purpose, having lived among people of great abundance as well as great poverty?
I know that it’s not random fate. It is not about if you got lucky this time, or you didn’t. It is not that this whole planet, and whole civilizations, got here by contingencies. But there is a purpose, and there are purpose-driven lives. And there are those who are closer to that purpose because they haven’t let it become papered over with stuff — with material things. I’ve met some saintly people who’ve taught me a lot, in part because they don’t have much stuff.
I’ve had a superb adventure in my life, and I’ve earned 10 graduate degrees. But at the end of the day I have yet to learn what many people already know — the joy of living stripped of everything.
How do you balance an honest assessment of what you can’t change in the world with cultural practices that go against your core beliefs?
The loss of human potential is the greatest waste on earth ?– if you ask about drawing the line, there’s one line. Societies will always have their flaws, but I will never tolerate the second-class treatment of women and girls, or in pressing young boys into service as child soldiers.
The inability to consider someone else as the image of God, and deserving of the same reverence and respect as oneself, is unacceptable. The ability to see others as equals is something I believe is universal, and should be.
At your core, what is one of your defining beliefs?
I’ve been saved to serve. And by serving, it’s not that I’m gaining merit, but it’s a reflection of the gratitude I have for what has come to me. It is the grace that I’ve received, reflected back in any way that I am able.
— Leah Fabel
