27. The Urgent Call to Obedience for Christian Physicians in This Season

The Urgent Call to Obedience in Medicine: A Christian Physician’s Perspective

In this episode of Heal the Healers, host Inga Hofmann speaks directly to Christian physicians navigating an increasingly uncertain and rapidly changing medical landscape. With cultural shifts, institutional pressures, and burnout on the rise, Inga issues an urgent and heartfelt call to radical obedience—rooted in Scripture, prayer, and the ability to hear God's voice clearly.

She shares why obedience isn’t just about personal piety; it’s about aligning with God’s will in a time when discernment is essential. As medicine is rapidly shifting, so must our spiritual posture. Knowing God’s voice becomes a lifeline—for ourselves, our patients, and our calling.

Through personal stories and biblical encouragement, Inga invites physicians to re-anchor their identity in Christ, cultivate authentic community, and prepare spiritually for the days ahead. Stay tuned until the end to learn about the Quiet Time Reset Challenge—a powerful opportunity to go deeper in your walk with God and rediscover your purpose in medicine.

📅 April 11th-13th, 2025

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Transcript

Restream recording Apr 07, 2025 • 08:12:23 PM: 0:00

Well, hello there to another episode of Heal the Healers. Today we're gonna talk about why it is so important, and this is my urgent plea to you to be obedient in this season as a Christian physician. To know your word, which means know the bible, know how to pray, and know how to hear the voice of God. It is so critical, important in this season. I wanna share a little bit why this has been on my heart, and we will be right back after the music, and so stay tuned. Welcome to the Heal the Healers podcast, where we explore the intersection of faith and medicine. Discover your God-given potential and experience Christ's healing in the midst of medical burnout. I'm your host, Ingar Hoffman, a pediatric key mock doc, physician, coach, and follow of Jesus. Together we will navigate the challenges of medicine, integrate faith into our personal and professional lives. Experience spiritual renewal and find restoration in Christ. Welcome to the Heal the Healers, where Christ heals one physician and one patient at a time. Well, hello there and welcome back to another episode of Heal the Healers. I'm Inga Hoffman, your host, and I am really excited to be back today and actually have a. Urgent message for you really. Now, the fun thing is I recorded this about a week ago, and then I realized as I was trying to edit it a few days ago, that somehow the audio was tinkered with, in any case, I did not have audio on the entire video. Now I will rerecord this and I hope. This is still coming across with the same sense of urgency and just by the spirit of which I recorded this the first time around. But who knows? I always believe there's reasons for everything, and maybe the Lord had it just in his plans that it will show up this way. So I'm very blessed. To be here with you today. If you have not subscribed to the show, then I encourage you to please go ahead, subscribe to the show, whether on YouTube or on the podcast, and also share it with others because. This is really a time to spread the message amongst physician believers, those that call Christ their Lord to really lean in and actually share and spread right the message of the gospel and to really get serious about our faith. And I'm saying this with all compassion and with all my heart and love. But I'm feeling this so urgently. This is actually why I am. Recording these episodes and why I'm also hosting a bunch of things to equip you and I'm gonna share about that in the end. Because how I had to fit the rescheduling of this recording in my schedule, it might be a little bit shorter and I might. Do a part two, but I really didn't wanna sit on this any longer. Also if you could do me a favor, follow us on YouTube follow me on YouTube, Facebook, wherever you are following me on that will be amazing at Heal the Healers. This will really encourage me, it blesses me and also helps others to really see the content and please share it with you. Your friends, but without further ado and much introduction, I wanna dive right into the message for today. And this is less of a teaching, but rather a message to you that has been on my heart for a while and I think you need to hear and you need to heat the moment. Last episode I recorded, I talked about. Why God is calling physicians to be obedient. I shared a bit of a personal testimony, how I heard the voice of the Lord, and in a practical example, going over to a Boston, to the Harvard Medical School campus. And pray over the property and over that entire area as a representation of medical enterprise and really praying they are an interceding for medicine. We live in a critical hour at this time and medicine our healthcare environment. Which has been broken for quite some time is no different. I also wanna make clear from the very outset of this, I'm not making a political comment or having a political conversation. I'm speaking from what I've been steward in my spirit for a while and while I'm even doing this podcast, while I started equipping physicians because it felt out of this urgency, number one. We need to be equipped. We need each other, we need to build community. And that was at first sort of, oh, this would be really nice and helpful to people, but I now feel the pressing urgency that this is actually a critical season and why I believe the Lord had me lead up to this over the last. One to two years. He has been stirring my heart. Over the last year, I've been really walking this out with having a mentorship program for Christian physicians called the Heal the Healers Mentorship Program. You can learn more about that at another time. I will share more. I also hosted a retreat last year to really heal and restore, equip and send physicians back out, and this was a first. Ground building stone for what is to come. But at this season, I really feel this very. Big weight and urgency in the spirit to really have us physicians be equipped for this hour. And I'm gonna be very blunt and bold. I think there is no reason to beat around the bushes because I really care. About all of you physician colleagues out there, I love you. I pray for you. I pray and intercede for the physician community, for colleagues individually as well as at large all the time. This is what I feel steward and, and called to do, and that means I have a big weight on my heart for your wellbeing in the Lord. So I want you to hear this very specifically, so that you don't think I'm just kind of saying this to make you feel guilty or to just for whatever reason or for clicks and likes and any of that. No, no, no, no. I want you to be well and. Really with the Lord. I want you to be well in your inner most being. I want you to have the most deepest connection with the Lord and wherever you are in your faith journey to build this more and more. So, and here's why this is important and why I believe obedience in this season is important. So we talked about obedience a little bit last time. It means obedience means. The Lord says something to me and I do it. That obedience could be either by, okay, I read the word, I read my Bible, and I'm going to be obedient what it is teaching me, and let the word by the power of the Holy Spirit transform my life. That is foundational Christian ABCs and we can talk more about that for sure. At another point, I think you know this already, I do realize there is a point where we like, are we doing this? And I will share something at the end that will really help you with that and. A few other things. So stay tuned and listen all the way through the end. This is gonna be pretty short today because I have another appointment coming up, but what I want you to hear today with both your heart is also I. That we need to be obedient. What the Lord tells us individually as well as what is the spirit of the Lord saying in this epoch of time and season we are living in right now, and we can do a number of things. We can listen to a bunch of people. And sometimes there is wisdom and wise counsel, but let's be real. There's also a lot of noise out there. So what I always go back to, at the end of the day, we need to know how to listen to the Lord for ourselves. You have the Holy Spirit. You might be like, I know I should, and the Bible says so, and there are people that say that can hear from the Lord. But I'm not really sure. I totally understand. I used to be this way too. Have grown a lot in this area, thanks to Jesus. Thank you, holy Spirit. And again, stay until the end and I will have a special announcement to train and equip you in these areas of reading the word of prayer, of hearing the voice of God. But what I'm saying, foundationally, you have to have these three things. You need to hear from the Lord and you need to be obedient to what he says. And that means on our individual level as well as what is the larger thing, what we feel like is happening to the church through the body of Christ, what has happened to us Christian physicians. So, switching gears a little bit. So we need to be obedient. Why is it important right now to be obedient in medicine? Well. It is no secret that medicine has been rapidly changing. I'm sure I mentioned this on this very podcast, and you can see it in the natural right. A lot of things are happening in medicine. It has been broken for a long time. Then covid hit and everything went sideways, and now is even more emergent. What is broken and. In a natural way, people trying to fix it by policies, procedure. And you and I as believers should know that neither politics or governmental authority or procedures, policies, SOPs, hierarchical structures and hospitals administrative things will ever fix things for real. Because we are living in a broken world. We're all sinners, and for most, of the time we are functioning by our own flesh. And that's just how it is. But I think we are entering a season even more so where there's even more shifting happening in the medical community. That was a reason why I felt the Lord really pulled me to go to Boston and pray. I don't know all the reasons and the outcomes of that prayer and intercession assignment that I went on, but what can tell you is that the directive of to go to Boston and pray on these grounds was highly specific, was. Increasing with urgency, and it was weighing on my heart. I can, this was crazy and there's a reason for that. The Lord usually warns us. He prepares us because he cares for his people and he wants everyone to come to the fullness of God. So Madison is shifting in all sorts of arenas. Whether it's in the patient care facing side, where it's in the pharmaceutical industry, that is pretty much a disaster, whether it's in the administrative part, whether it's like you as a physician feeling just a clock in the wheel and getting shorthanded and a short end of the stick in many ways. Whether it's physician burnout whether it's. Patient care is collapsing and people waiting for months for pretty basic appointments. All of this is happening on the back end of a pandemic that we think we got over. And yet there is more to come and, you probably, if you are tuning in, you might have heard this from others. And I don't think I can share too much detail at this moment. Also, I don't have all the details that would be wise to share so that it would be a meaningful word to you, but what I am saying is. Don't think for any moment of time that we got over the pandemic and we can go return to business as usual, that is not gonna happen. And I don't believe that. And I see a lot of physician, even physician believers who are having a mindset this way. And that is not going to happen. Now, you could say in the natural, yes, there's already, I can already see other shakings happening, right? There is changes in the NIH and the CDC and the FDA, and again, I don't wanna make this political, but you could see everything is on very shaky grounds and nobody knows what's happening on a national level. Even on an institutional level, lots of people are in limbo and everybody's freaked out. So just that alone should tell you, I don't know what's going on, but Jesus knows. The Lord knows. So where do I go for my comfort on my direction, how I am handling this very stressful situation that is very stressful for many people, some believers as well. And to you, I would say. Take rest in the world, Lord. Take rest in the Lord because that is where your answers and your provision and your guidance will come from. But for those colleagues that you have that are not believers, yes, they are in a frenzy because nobody can predict. And I coach physicians that are not Christian physicians all the time. And I mentor and coach and counsel them on how to maneuver these borders that are incredibly challenging. And I encourage you, just as a side note, be, be a, a calming force, a voice of reason. You don't have to hit them with a Bible over the hand. But you can exemplify what it means to walk in peace when the world around you is getting a little rattled or falling apart, because that is a testimony to Jesus. So you should live that out. So medicine is rapidly changing and you need to know how to maneuver these waters and what to do. Any given day, any given moment, and how are you gonna do that if you don't know the voice of the Lord what to be actually obedient to? And that's why I'm saying this is very important that you learn now, right now in this very second. If you don't know how to do this already, if you feel like your relationship with the Lord is not at that level, he's always so gracious. He welcomes you with open arms. Get to act together now. I don't know how to say it otherwise. Because. We must be equipped as physicians of what is coming when all these things unfolded over the last few months. The first thing that came to mind is we need to, as the body of Christ, be able to catch the people that are tumbling and falling with all these changing and shifting borders. Another time when I was just teaching in my mentorship class and I was like. Encouraging. I started to really prophesy and the word of the Lord just came to me that physicians will be building safety nets. I have been starting to build community groups for a while, like within my church, but I started to gather physicians. Online as well as in person, and it became very apparent that that is an emerging thing. And the Lord gave me this word, safety nets. We as physician, Christian physicians need to form safety nets for whatever is to come. That means you need to know one another. You need to know other physicians. You need to be in a community of strong believers. Not the kind that just shows up on Sunday. Warms the bench and goes home. I'm sorry, I'm gonna be very blunt here today. And if you don't like that, that's okay. I just feel like let's get real. We don't have time to lose. So and, and I say this in all love, so safety nets was a key word and maybe I will share more about this another time as sort of this comes and be fleshed out. But the other part is we need to be laser focused. Not tossed around with every wave that's going around and there's a lot of drama and noise out there right now. Again, don't think I'm making a political statement here, but I'm watching what's going on and then actually I started to turn off stuff because I'm like, too much noise. I need to hear the Lord. I need to learn how to turn things off and not listen to any of these things, so I don't want you to be tossed around. By the news and updates of the day, but I want you to be laser focused on the Lord. I often tell my family and even my small group for two years I've been saying we need to be as sharp as a sniper in this spirit. And that kind of just came out to me, but it keeps on coming back for me. We need to be laser focused. We need to be really sharp and. Very targeted. So that we don't get our focus distracted. So. You must know how to hear his voice, the voice of the Holy Spirit. You need to know when the Lord is speaking, when the enemy is speaking, when your own flesh is speaking, or when there's just a bunch of noise in your head from all the distractions. We need to learn how to blend those out, and we need to focus on the voice of the Lord so then we can heed his warnings. We can hear his encouragement for you. You can hear that specific direction. Strategies perhaps for your very local medical center clinic, academic center, research lab. Wherever you are working, you need to have instructions from the Lord to prepare you of when there is a crisis, like wouldn't that have been nice during covid if you had a heads up and you could say. I know exactly what to do. I cannot explain it, but this is what the Lord instructed me. You would have walked those waters a lot calmer. During that choppy time myself included, I wasn't particularly scared. I was like, I trust in the Lord. I. I'm gonna cautiously watch and I'm gonna observe what's going on. I wasn't scared for my life at all, but that's another point. Another discussion for another time. The last couple things I wanna say, you must know your assignment. I. And we talk about that a lot right now in the Heal the Healers mentorship class. How to learn, what is my assignment, what is my purpose? What's the call the Lord has on my life as Christian physicians? What has he positioned me to do and what am I supposed to execute so that I can partner with the Lord of whatever he has. As a plan for me. Now, if you don't know that, it will be hard to follow the plan and then you will be following the plan that is well laid out for you by the world, by the medical establishment, and that might be not the correct version. So. That is something you need to know and you need to learn how to figure that out, and I'm glad and very happy to help you with that because I had to walk all those things out myself, and I still have to do that on a day-to-day basis. But I love it because. When I get to hear his voice, and this is just kind of a detail from, from last night, I went to a worship service and I went to a prayer meeting of that same church a few days before and back that day, in that morning, the Lord dropped a a word over the youth to me as I was dropping off my child. I. I wasn't planning to tell this testimony, but in any case, as she at that, at a prayer meeting when we had revival prayers here at a local church, and then I went ahead and carried that in my heart, and last night I went to worship service and a very similar complimentary word and prayer over the young generation bubbled up. And it was a very special moment in that worship service where we prayed over those young people and, and I was. It was amazingly beautiful and I was just sitting there praying and admiring the Lord in awe and just all I kept on saying, and it makes me really tearful, even just saying this, Lord, I love the sound. Of your voice. I love it. I mean, how amazing is that, how he converges all those things together? And I want that for you and I, I not only want that for you because it's nice and this is actually what should be very natural. To all of our faith journeys, but even more so. I want that for you because it is urgently needed in this hour. I know I'm getting very excited about this and I don't know how else to tell you, but please hear me. You must know the voice of the Lord. I can teach you and, and, and share what helped me. It's not like I have the secret to it. There's no like three step secret to hear in the voice of the Lord. I'm just gonna share the Bible and I'm gonna share what I've learned because I. Struggled with that too, and I'm still learning, but that's okay. The last thing, oh, the camera just did a funny thing, so I apologize for that. The last thing is we must mentally, physically, and spiritually be prepared. Because medicine is changing, seasons are changing. You gotta get your head straight, you have to get out of your own bs. And you have to really submit your thoughts, your emotions, to the Lord. So you gotta go mentally strong. You have to be spiritually strong. Again, wait a minute, I'm gonna share how to do all that and where you can learn about that and physically. That's something I really need to work on on my physical health. So how do you do that? You have to get in the word. You have to have a solid, quiet time routine. There is no other way around, and please don't think for a moment than living on a verse per day is sufficient. Now, if that's where you're at and that's where you're starting, hallelujah. Praise the Lord. That's good because you at least have a daily habit. But perhaps you don't even have that and there's no guilt and shame. I have been so many times in that situation, but I'm going really press in urgently on you. We all have to get our act together when it comes to our quiet time, which means you must be getting in the word for real and you really. For real have to know it. The amount of Bible illiteracy is is shocking to me. And I used to be kind of the half, but version two, but I'm really, I really learned to treasure the word of God in the Bible. Make it my daily habit to study, to read. And I've done this now for years, so, so important. So because time is short and I gotta jump off here in a second, I'm gonna do this. I'm going to quickly put this up and now I have to figure out how to do this side by side. No, that's not the one. I always try to figure out how to do this well to, make this screen okay. I'm just gonna not worry about it. And and share this with you. So, april 11th to the 13th, I'm running what I'm calling the quiet time reset. It's a three day challenge for question physicians. You can scan the QR code here. It's entirely free. We are gonna spend three days together, and what I will teach you is and share. We are gonna read the Bible. I'm gonna share some really practical tips, some testimonies. I'm gonna get really real with my personal struggles and how I overcome, because I want you to get to the next level too. So this is really day one. We're gonna focus on some foundations in the board of God, like getting a consistent quiet time routine. Despite your busy schedule, whether you have kids or not, doesn't matter and get you reading the Bible. Getting through the Bible in a year is actually not as hard as you might think. Like, and I would strongly encourage you to get started on that. Day two, we are gonna spend on prayer. That means prayer. That is really giving you faith and building your faith and not feeling like either a. A to-do list of requests for the Lord or a hit and run operation like I like to say it where we just say, oh, I wanna do this. Lord, help me with this. And then we just. Take off. We don't even wait for an answer. Have done that too. As you can tell. How do I know otherwise? And then day three, we are really talking about hearing the voice of God. This is gonna be script based. Yet very practical. And I will share some testimonials and my personal stories and my journey because let's face it, we all struggle with that. So scan the QR code right here and sign up. It's a free challenge. There's an upgraded version if you want extra ministry time and q and a time, both mentorship and coaching and prayer in the, I hope to pray over people really individually for. Whoever signs up, that's why space is limit for the VIP section, but it's free to anybody. Invite your friends, your colleagues, Christian physicians far and wide. Bring as many people as you can because we need to start to arm ourself in this season. So the and then no matter where you are in your faith, you might be like, Hey, I have a really started quiet time routine. Good for you. But there's always another level, right? You might read your Bible, but you are like, my prayer feels a bit distracted. I'm not sure God is hearing me or what to even pray. Or I can pray for a minute and then I'm kind of done. Then this is for you. You are like, I'm pretty good with prayer and the Bible, but you know. I'm not sure I can hear the voice of God. I feel like it's probably just my own voice in my head. I never know the difference. Or maybe it's just the enemy talking or who knows. Maybe I'm making stuff up, but I'm not sure it's actually God. Well, we're gonna talk about that on day three. So then it's for you. Now, maybe you are one of those rare birds and you're like, I. I'm doing all those three things and I'm feeling really solid about it, then praise the Lord, number one. But then you also already know that there is always another level. I do those three things, but I'm like, Lord, I'm hungry for more. Just last night I'm like, I love the sound of your voice and I want more. I want the whole enchilada. Everything that's in the Bible. So please do yourself a favor. Sign up again. Here's the QR code. One more time for the quiet set. Quiet time reset challenge, and show up. Friday to Sunday. It's Palm Sunday weekend. There is no better weekend to really dedicate, devote your time back to the Lord. And again, it's all about obedience. We have to be obedient. And without those three things, you cannot be obedient. That's really hard to do. And obedience really starts with the ABCs of Christian faith. And that is reading the word, praying to the Lord, listening to what he says. That's pretty much it. If you get those three things down here, pretty good shape and you can only grow from there. So I, God bless you. Let me just. Pray over you and and then I let you go on your day. share this episode with as many friends, take a friend, share it with others, and share about the quiet time reset challenge. So, Lord, I thank you for these precious doctors that are listening right now to the sound of my voice, whether live or in a recording or maybe much time later, I bless them in the name of Jesus that there will be, real. The word soldiers comes to mind. Planted people in the kingdom of God, wherever they are, in the hospital, private practice, or any in healthcare environment. Lord, I praise you and I thank you for everything. One single one of them. Thank you. Have placed them there. Some of them you might reposition. Others, you have planted them already in preparation for what is to come. Lord, I pray that you, that you equip them, yet you pull on their heartstrings and that you stir up their spirit to to hear the voice of God, to heat the moment and to get really close to you. Above all, I pray that our relationship with you will become stronger and that we know you more intimately. Lord Jesus, we love you. I bless all those people that are listening and in Jesus name we pray. Amen. Thank you so much, and you have a wonderful day Until next week. My prayer is that you were encouraged, strengthened, and perhaps even convicted with this episode today. If this podcast has blessed you, would you help share it with your friends and colleagues and even share it on social media? Also, leave us a review on the podcast platform where you are listening to this content. It would help us a lot. Together we can share the good news of Jesus and transform medicine one physician. And one patient at the time. Have a great day. God bless.