Relying on Him

Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ.  We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life.  Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death.  But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God…He has delivered us….and he will deliver us.  On him we have set our hope… 2 Corinthians 1:21, 8b-10

When Paul wrote this to the Corinthian people, he referred to himself and his co-workers, regarding all the struggles they had endured, and all it had taught them about God and their relationship to HIm.  But as I read this this morning, it brought to mind the struggles, pressures and pain that Tim’s many patients are called to endure day after day after day here in Rwanda, and their heart cry response, their faith-filled reaction, their completely reliant, dependent life style towards their God. 

 Heartbreaking would be the closest way to describe many of their plights.  Their lives would be hopeless without knowing a God who loves them, who can identify in every way with their lives.  He is a God who has also greatly suffered, who knows real pain, who lived a life of material poverty on this earth.   All our lives are hopeless without this God – it is just easier for those of us who live lives of comfort to forget our need of, to forget our reliance on, this faithful Friend.   

The sick and suffering we meet here, and the families of the sick and suffering, have no reluctance to rely on One greater than themselves.  They have no need to have their many questions about Him answered before coming to him, hands open, eyes expectant.  Sometimes they remind me of hungry baby birds, chirping for their parent to give them a big, juicy worm.  Or a hungry baby, crying for milk.  

There seems to be no doubt in that baby’s cry that the milk will come, or in the bird’s pleading chirp that the worm will be dropped into its beak.  They  cry out, and they are filled.  

These hurting people, too, cry out to Him for help; and they trust that He sent us to be that help.  

This is rather terrifying sometimes, as we know that we are mere humans, flawed, broken, sinful and inadequate for this task, and we do not have near the resources they need for healing, for wholeness, for the life we wish they could enjoy.  But we DO know the One who has all the resources in the whole world at His disposal!  So, we offer what we have, Tim provides all the medical care he can give, we pray for them, we give them Jesus, and we ask God to make up the lack – and it is a big gap of a lack!  At the end of today's post, I will introduce you to some of Tim's current patients.  Please keep them in your prayers.  

One place I’ve so enjoyed trying to give is teaching an English class to some of the workers here at the mission.  Rwanda recently changed its official language to English from French, so there is a strong desire on the part of everyone to learn English, and a real lack of English teachers available.  I have no training in ESL, and brought very few materials with me.  Stephen was teaching these men before he left for school, and was putting hours into lesson preparation each day.  I don’t have hours to prepare, as I am also homeschooling Sam and Ruthie. 

Our classes were going okay, but I kept feeling that we weren’t really adequately covering new material.  I wish I’d taken a TESOL class before we came, but we ran out of time at the end of our preparations to leave. 

As I prayed about it, I had a thought:  these guys love to sing!  What if they learned some English songs?  I asked them, and their eyes lit up.  We are now learning Christmas carols, which we will sing at the mission’s Christmas party.  We are also learning some hymns and praise songs.  They love them!  What a gift to be able to sing with my new friends every afternoon.  They are learning English in a whole new way, and we are getting to worship God and sing all at the same time.  So much fun!  Here is a picture of me and some of my English gang.  

L-R: Me, Felician, Ildephonse and Innocent being silly after class.

Since I have zero medical skills, the children and I have had to be a bit more creative in finding ways to serve the patients in the hospital.  First, we pray for them.  We are blessed that we don’t have a long patient list to work through medically.  We have as much time to give them in prayer as they need.  They can’t understand a word of our prayers, but their spirits know we are praying, and they are encouraged as we pray for them.  And we know God hears our prayers and is working in their lives.  The other way we love to serve the patients is by taking their pictures.  Many of them have never had their picture taken.  Almost none have a physical copy of a picture, because if their picture was taken, it was by a muzungu (foreigner) with a digital camera, and they never got to see the picture.  So, as money permits, I print out copies of pictures for moms with their new babies, or for families in the hospital, or for the mom's of young pediatric patients.  It can get a bit overwhelming, because of course EVERYONE wants a picture!   

 

I simply can't print them for everyone, or I would use up all our funds!  I battle within myself wondering if this is a wise use of money.  It costs about .50 each time I print a picture.  It isn’t a real need, like food or medicine or surgery or clothes, but it sure brings the people a lot of joy to have this treasured piece of paper with their own image on it.  And I can relate – I LOVE pictures.  I miss all the framed pictures I had at home of my family.  I know how encouraging a picture of loved ones can be.  Especially of growing children.  So, I try to be frugal and not to go overboard, but I also try to be generous with the photos, and to at least provide one copy for the mothers with their children.  Every mom needs at least one picture of her with her baby, don't you think?     J Since we can’t print an infinite supply of paper copies of pictures, we often bring my computer down to the wards and set up a slide show for the patients to watch.  Oh, how they LOVE this!  If you could just see how many of them crowd around the screen, which I set up very high, so more can see it.  I play music as the pictures scan by, one after another, and everyone shouts the name of whomever happens to pop up on the screen.  Once, I was able to show the pictures on a large white bedsheet I nailed to the ward wall at night.  You’d think it was the world premier of an Academy Award winning movie!  If only I had a large popcorn machine and could give each one a Fanta and a box of popcorn!  I think my favorite memories of this place will be showing the Jesus Film, which they ADORE, and showing their own faces on these picture slide show "movies" to them on the wall.  They look forward to these events like nothing else, and it makes me SO happy to be able to provide encouragement and some happy, light hearted moments for these people whose lives are normally so full of lack and suffering.  

That’s why we’re here…

Ruthie, Sam and I have seen much less of Tim than we’d prefer lately, as he’s been operating a ton.  We miss him, but we are so proud of his work.  He saw 70 patients on Monday, and will see about the same number every day all week.  SEVENTY!  I remember when 30 patients in a day in Kerrville felt like a crazy-busy number.  Allow me to introduce you to a few of his patients:

 Monique: 

She’s the cute one-year-old sweetie pie with the skin grafts which are healing nicely from the severe burns she received on her head, her arm and thigh when she fell into the family cooking fire.

Another poor one year old: 

  This little guy came in with severe burns all over his rear end and on the backside of his upper thighs.  Someone slipped and knocked over a pot of boiling water near where he was sitting, and the water burned him that way.  He will also need skin grafts to heal.  It’s amazing how many burns happen to young children due to not having stoves.  The open fires families must use to cook with are not child-proof at all.

Ruthie’s dad (not our Ruthie, of course), from the Congo: 

Due to the unbearable pain, even with strong painkillers, this sweet, patient, long-suffering, kind man has pleaded with Tim to amputate his leg for over a week, after being in our hospital for two months with the most bizarre, grotesque condition and infection of his foot and lower leg.  Tim has searched and searched all the medical literature he had in hopes of finding some way to cure him rather than amputate, but finally Tim knew it was incurable and he must cut off the leg.  Tim amputated his leg yesterday.  The man had an incurable, out of control fungus which had grown into his bone.  He had been in excruciating pain for months, and was so happy to have the leg cut off.  Tim performed the surgery using spinal anesthesia, with no Valium or anything.  Even when the power saw was whirring at high speed and volume, this man was smiling, completely alert, and thanking Tim as he operated.  Now, that’s one tough man. 

Mary: 

Please pray for Mary (not her real name), whose husband beat her with a machete on her head, hands and side, and then ran away with all their money. It probably wasn’t much, but she now has nothing, except a broken heart, a 1-year-old child to feed and raise alone, and a hospital bill to pay (I’m hoping we can get use our charity fund to take care of that).  Our family is trying to bring her and her child food, which is a bit difficult, as everyone sees us doing it.  Even though this woman has a special case, really, everyone needs food.  We don’t want to cause jealousy or confusion as to why we aren’t bringing food to all the others.  Tim’s trying to learn how to mend the severed tendons in her hand, which is a tricky injury, but only God can mend her crushed spirit and heart.  This is the most bereft looking woman or man I’ve seen since coming to Rwanda.

 Daniel: 

Daniel's leg may need another surgery, to remove some of his dead bone.  New bone is growing in nicely, but Tim thinks he may need to remove some of the old, dead stuff, which is more difficult than it sounds, as it is all in there together, and he has to wait until there is enough new, live bone to support the leg’s structure before he removes the dead stuff.  Daniel is doing so much better.  We will always thank you for your prayers for him!  While we do want him to get 100% well, we will miss him dearly when he leaves.  We are looking forward to, and dreading that day, all at once!

Deste: 

Our phone rang last night, and it was an English-speaking friend of Deste’s care- taking relative in the Congo!  Evidently, Deste has been “weeping incessantly” for “HIS” Ruthie ever since they left, and he won’t eat because he lost her.  The relative was hoping if he heard her voice, he might feel a bit better.  However, our phone was disconnected before we could talk with him, and we can’t understand how to call back.  Poor little Deste!

Another Domestic Violence Patient:  

A young man limped into the E.R. yesterday who had been attacked by his irate wife with a HOE.  She almost completely severed his nose from his face!  He needs a plastic surgeon, but once again, he gets Tim. These kinds of injuries seem to be the saddest of all, because they aren’t accidental, like falling in a cooking fire – they are offensive assault against another human being.  The betrayal and loss expressed in their faces is so different than the faces of those who are “just” extremely ill.   It seems the heartache and shame for these victims hurts worse than their physical injuries. 

Tim says he feels like a resident all over again, except he has no attending to observe and critique or aid his surgical efforts.  Wisdom from God isn’t a luxury, it is a necessity.  Please pray not only for wisdom and discernment for Tim, but also for energy, stamina and strength to perform all these surgeries, many of which he was never trained to do nor has ever done before.  Tim is very grateful for a book about Surgery in developing countries/tropical medicine, which Dr. Pope gave him before leaving Kerrville.  That book has come in handy so many times!  Many, many nights, I’ve gone to sleep while Tim stayed up reading about the next day’s procedures from that book, and many mornings, I’ve found him doing the same thing.  He usually takes the book with him to the hospital.  Thank you, Dr. Pope! 

We’ve been battling a respiratory virus here at the mission – first Julie, the nurse had it, followed by some others, followed by Tim, then Sam, Ruthie and now me.  It comes with a persistent, nagging cough and very sore throat and the usual aches, pains and fever.  No big deal, but it’s kind of slowing us all down a bit. 

Until next time!  Thanks for reading, and thank you for keeping us and this mission in your prayers!