Medical Clinic

Bullet Explosion by Stephanie Williams

Late one afternoon, as the clinic was closing down for the day, a boy walked up with his hand wrapped in a bloody towel. He and his parents had traveled from a far village by car. Normally, it would have taken a day to walk the distance, but this time, they drove. They explained his hand was all cut up after a ‘bullet explosion’. (Huh?)

Unwrapping his hand, we all cringed to see the mutilated fingers hanging limp and dead. The story fell together piece by piece as we prepared to suture. As a goat herder, he stumbled upon a bullet while wandering the fields and picked it up. Curious and as any nine year old boy would be, he decided to see what would happen if he beat it with a stick. I am not sure how long he hit it, but eventually it exploded, taking several fingers with it. There was even charred residue glued to his skin. It was bad. Fortunately, by the time he reached us most of the bleeding had stopped.

Once his hand was properly numb, Dennis (our clinical officer) removed a finger which barely hung by sinew and muscle. He left the main bone sticking out, saying it would die and eventually fall off. The other fingers were then stitched and wrapped tightly in gauze.

As he sutured, the boy’s mother, kept peeking at the carnage and mourning her son’s pain. She was a wreck. In fact, the boy kept comforting her: “Don’t worry mom, it doesn’t hurt at all. I promise.” It was really quite sweet.

I asked him if he was ever going to play with bullets again, and he shook his head emphatically. This lesson was costly but effective. I told him to tell his friends to stay away from bullets too, and reminded him that he was fortunate he only lost a few fingers. The realization of this truth stopped us all up short, and together we thanked God it was not worse.

Today, he came in for wound dressings. I’m happy to report that it is healing nicely. Pray for a full recovery. Perhaps one day, he’ll warn his son the dangers of playing with bullets… I hope so.

Medical Clinic, Ministry

Ayen’s Story by Sabet

Ayen is a mother of three children. She came to the clinic with her one year old son Akeej. Akeej is sick and her other children have gotten sick many times before. Ayen loves her kids and she wants them to be healthy. For that reason she has been seeking a way to improve their health and ensure a happy life for her kids and also for her as a mother. Unfortunately, one of the ways many Sudanese people seek treatment is through witchcraft. They visit the witch doctor who often gives them a charm to wear. They are told that it will heal them and if they remove it, they will be cursed.

George our lab technologist has been praying with the mothers that come to the clinic. If he sees them chewing tobacco, he educates them in the harmful effects of it and encourages them to give it up. Now in the lab, he has collected a giant pile of tobacco containers from many people who have vowed to stop using it. George also looks out for those who are wearing charms and shares the love of Jesus with those who believe in the power of witch craft.

Akeej had a charm around his neck and Ayen had one around her neck too. As George was getting the blood sample to check for malaria, he noticed the charms around their necks and he immediately starting sharing about God and His power. At that point George called for me because his Dinka is yet to be perfected. When I got there, I found Ayen already understood what was required of her to put her faith in God and the love of Jesus. She told me she desired her kids to be healthy and that’s why she was looking for a way for that to happen. Her kids have been regularly sick for a long time now and she is tired of living with the fear that she will loose one of them or maybe all of them. She wanted something she could rely on that would give her peace. I shared with her how God created us, loves us and wants the best for us. That’s why He sent us His son Jesus Christ. He wants us to have His son in our heart. George and I told her the sickness of the children many times could be just simply from the unclean water they drink, because she is not using a mosquito net or perhaps the food is not good. However it could also be from the power of the enemy at work since they are wearing charms. She accepted to pray and remove the charm from her neck and her little one’s neck too. Right then, she prayed to accept the Lord and after that she asked if she could bring her other children the next day for prayer and to remove their charms. This is a huge step of faith because the witch doctors tell their clients that if the charms are removed, they will be cursed.

Ayen arrived this morning with her two other children (a seven year old son, Majok, and a five year old daughter, Bagich) shortly after we had prayed for her and her family during our staff devotion. We were happy to see her and hear what she had to say about her new commitment to the Lord. She said is not going trust witchcraft and it’s power anymore even when her kids are sick. Instead she she is going to trust in the Lord. So we encouraged her, prayed for her family and we cut the charms from the little ones necks and committed her and her family to the Lord. She invited us to pray in her house so it will be sanctified and bless her home with the new faith she has.

George has prayed with many patients and has encouraged them to bring others to be prayed for who want to stop chewing tobacco and give up their tobacco pots and also because they want their charms to be removed. Many people won’t ever remove the charms themselves due to fear so we don’t mind taking it off for them. They even fear for us since they believe the curse falls on whoever removes the charm. However, we can show by example that we are not afraid because we know greater is He who is in us than he who is in the world. Let the name of the Lord be known among the Dinka, Bongo and Jurchol tribes here in Tonj so they would trust Him, proclaim His name and call upon Him for salvation! For “whoever calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved.” Rom 10:13

Ministry

IDAT 1st Annual Women’s Retreat

We went to our women’s retreat last week and it was so wonderful. We left Monday morning and headed to Nakuru. It’s located about three hours from Nairobi. We stayed on a dairy farm called Kembu Farm. The Nightingale Family own the dairy farm and rent cottages on their property. Suzy could not have picked a more perfect place. It is beautiful. We split up into two cottages that both were amazing. After being in Sudan, we enjoy simple luxuries like flushing toilets, hot showers and sinks.

I loved everything about this place. The family that owns the place were so nice. We brought food and made most of our meals except for our last night when we ate dinner with the family, Andrew, Zoe and their son. They were very kind. We had lots of different types of pizzas (yellow pepper and salami was my favorite), salad and cake for dessert. They have quite a few dogs that added to the charm of the place. My favorites were Tink and Buster. They would hang out at the cottages with us and even spent the night sometimes. Buster would accompany us down to the dairy. Tink wasn’t allowed so when we got to the gate, we had to say “Go home Tink.” Tink was very obedient and would sadly lower his head and go home. I fell in love with Buster.

Buster is owned by Andrew’s mom who runs the Kenana Knitting Project. They are famous for dying wool (yarn) using flowers, vegetables and other plants. Their products are sold world wide. They have 240 ladies from the community work for them. In addition to selling items, they also provide many community services such as HIV testing/treatment, literacy programs and other health programs. We got a tour of their facilities and enjoyed shopping in the gift shop.

On Wednesday we went on a safari at Nakuru Lake Park. It was really fun. They are known for their flamingo population. We also saw giraffes, rhinos, baboons, gazelles, zebras, monkeys and one lion’s back. I once again fired up my Lion King soundtrack on my ipod and listened to it as we drove around.

The theme of our retreat was forming Godly relationships. It was based on the book “The DNA of Relationships.” We had wonderful sessions of teaching from Dena and good discussion time. God was very present during our time together and much was done to solidify our relationships. I learned a lot about good ways to communicate and how to honor others. The topic was perfect and God really blessed us with Dena.

This retreat was just what I needed after coming out of Sudan worn out. I am so thankful for the beautiful place and relaxation we experienced. Thank you God for knowing what we needed and providing it abundantly.

Teams

I Will Carry You In My Heart by Pastor Rob

Freckled sunlight danced at our feet in the clearing under the konyuk tree. Crude wooden benches stretched out from the clearing, all facing the tree. Arrayed on the benches the occupants of the Lachook leper colony sat and sang at the top of their lungs and clapped in time to a worship song to welcome us, their visitors.

Sabet presented Tom and Dave and I to them.  They liked Dave and Tom’s names, informing us that “Tom” in Dinka means to give someone an injection, so his name was very appropriate.  My name however was foreign and difficult to pronounce and it would have to be rectified.  Sabet asked the colony to give me a name in Dinka.  An old and gentle man, missing most of his toes and fingers, as well as part of his nose, called out “Deng Mallou”.

Sabet nodded and smiled, looked at me and said as if to present me afresh, “Deng Mallou!” to an eruption of clapping and cheering.

“Please tell me it doesn’t mean cow manure or something.”

“Its a very good name, it means a strong rain, it’s a good thing.” Sabet said, smiling between me and the people who bestowed this new moniker on me.

“Deng Mallou!” I said, giving my thumbs up in approval, which was met with a unified shout “Deng Mallou!” from the group.

Then in one of those unexpected moves that make me wish I were a good pastor and always had something brilliant ready to say, Sabet leaned in and asked me to share something with them.

There I stood, looking out at expectant, dirty faces; at human beings dressed in rags and missing digits and dignity.  What could I say to them? I took a deep breath and  asked God to fill my words.

“Thank you for such a warm welcome for my friends and me.  I came a long way to meet you, and I’m so very glad I did. I’ve taken pictures of you with my camera, but I’ve also hidden you in my heart.  You’ll be in my heart when I go back to my home, and to my church, and we’ll be praying for God’s grace for you.
It’s good for us to meet like this, to catch a glimpse of each other while we’re here. If we all belong to Christ, then we’re all family, and we’ll be spending forever with each other.  This is a hard world and we’re very fragile, but one day Jesus will bring us all home and our struggles will be through.  I’ll look for you then, and you look for me, now that we’ve met we won’t be strangers.
Again, thank you for having us, and God’s love be with you.”

After that we distributed bags of sugar and tea to each door of the colony, and having plenty, we went back and gave each room two bags.

Watching through the back window of the Rover as we drove away, i watched a child who wore only a shirt run after us, waving.  I waved back. “I will carry you in my heart, I will take you home with me there.”

Medical Clinic

An Extraordinary Day By Dr. Dave Pierce

Hi Everybody!
Thanksgiving is pretty much just like any other day in Sudan, but it was a most extraordinary day for me.  It started out with the slaughter of the Thanksgiving goat, which was a little out of the routine for the compound–and the honor was given to Rachel,  who is apparently only the 3rd American woman to have done it here.  Thanks to the expert skills of Suzy and the staff, dinner was pretty much a traditional American Thanksgiving dinner with the goat substituting for turkey–it was DELICIOUS!
The dinner was a somewhat anticlimactic end to an extraordinary day.  Tom and I and part of the clinic team were driven out to the village of Malone for the weekly medical outreach clinic run by In Deed and Truth.  It is very hard to really describe this experience–It was very much like time travel.  The trip started out with a not quite 1 hour drive down a fairly well graded dirt road at about 60-70 mph (honest), which changed abruptly when the driver slowed down almost to a stop in the middle of nowhere, took a hard left across the road, and ran down the embankment and off into the bush.  The attached photo is from a little later when the “road” was at least kind of recognizable.
Malone consists of a couple of huts, and the container used by the clinic to store the larger items of the operation including tables and chairs.  Most of the families live in huts scattered around the area–all are cattle farmers.  The actual clinic consists of 3 tables and the box of supplies brought by us from Tonj–all set up in the shade of a giant tree.  The morning is usually slow, as it takes a couple of hours for word to filter out that the clinic is there, and the concept that the clinic is there every Thursday (during the dry season,) is apparently not an easily grasped concept in this culture.  Once word was out, though,  the people started arriving in large numbers–all on foot, many of the men carrying spears, and rarely wearing anything resembling Western clothing.  They are dignified, friendly people who live with next to nothing.  I saw many patients who could have felt  much better had they simply access to running water and the cool shower I was looking forward to at the end of the day.  We did not see many seriously ill patients–most of them (often children with malaria,)  had already made or started the journey to the Tonj clinic. (The Malone outreach often sees 60-70 patients.)  It was one of the most memorable experiences I have had in all my travels.
Today (Friday) was a fairly “normal” day at the Tonj clinic.  Rob in the meantime continues to “Wow” the pastors with his unique teaching, but I will leave that part of the story to him. Tomorrow we are off to the Leper colony.
God Bless You all, and thank you so much for your prayers.

News From The Field