Shackles, Security Guards, and Servants

Today as Tyler and I made our rounds on the assigned hospital floors, it seemed as if everyone was asleep! The last thing that I would want to do is wake someone up while they're in the hospital, so we usually make a mark on our list, and keep going. We'll come back around at least 2 more times, so hopefully we'll catch them at some point. One part of the protocol is when you enter a room, a person of same gender as the patient goes in first, then invites their spouse in with the patient's permission. But today, it seemed as if all of our patients were male, so Tyler took the reigns most of the time.
We came back to a particular room for the second time (the patient had been in with doctors previously) and since he was male, Tyler knocked and entered first. A security guard sat on one side of the bed, and as Tyler introduced himself, the patient shifted his weight to look at Tyler. He pulled off the mask (you wear a little clear one when they need to give you more oxygen) and gasped out, "I'm an inmate, so I can't have the sacrament, but I would really like a blessing." With the security guard's permission, I entered the room, to find the older man chained and shackled to the hospital bed. A member of the branch presidency had come with us, and he helped to administer to this man, who told us of an operation that he would be having shortly.
Its interesting to know that despite the choices this man had made which partially qualified him for his particular position in life, he still had faith and wanted to participate as much as he could. It helped me to grasp at a deeper definition of faith-and to hear the words that God loves all of His children-that we can always learn that He loves us, despite our silly attitudes, or our constant mistakes-to know that we are all the same in the sense that we too need to remember that fully relying upon the Lord and ultimately exercising that particle of faith should be an ultimate goal. It doesn't matter what our profession, where we live, who we are around, or what clothes we wear - what really matters is the strength of the relationship we have with our Heavenly Father. In the end, that relationship will determine all of the aforementioned characteristics, and ultimately, our character. I love this calling. How marvelous to be a servant for the Lord.