For the past two weeks my team of 8 women have been working
with the largest leper colony in Bangkok, 1,000 leprosy affected persons, of which 90% are over 60
years old. Thailand has 13 leper colonies with 3,000 leprosy affected persons. Leprosy has been around for thousands of years and exists in America
under a different name, ‘Hansen’s Disease’. Follow this link to learn more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leprosy
We have been visiting and praying for people in their homes
in the colony and in the hospital where they are recovering from surgery often from
amputations. Most of them have been cured
from leprosy, but their nervous system has been so damaged that they continue
to have deformities that cause them to lose cartilage throughout
the remainder of their lives. The blessing in the damage to their nervous
systems is that they don’t feel any pain.
94% of Thailand is Buddhist, but in the hospital and in the
colony homes, all welcome healing prayer. Many come to know the Lord right
before they meet Him in heaven. Everyone we met was so thankful to have someone
visiting them, most of them are rejected by family and friends and towns they
lived in for fear of getting leprosy, which is an air born disease.
It has broken my heart in so many ways seeing them so weak
physically, how the deformities have made daily life very challenging and the
hopelessness in their eyes just surviving one day at a time only eating and
sleeping; but God has been showing me His unconditional love and compassion for
all of His children and how amazing it is when they can come to find joy in the
midst of the storm. Though they are very weak, they find great strength in the
Lord.
Those that know the Lord are such a light in the community. Full of joy and thanksgiving for the health they do have and sharing the love of
Jesus with everyone they meet, like the man whom we got to celebrate another
year of life with for his birthday the last day we were in the colony. We’d
been visiting he and his wife who is 60% blind to help them clean their home,
wash their laundry and just fellowship with them. They are such a beautiful
example of what marriage vows mean for in sickness and in health, til death do
us part. The lovingly care for each other to remain in their home together.
He been a leprosy affected person for 44 years and known the Lord for 43 of
those years and the first thing he did upon meeting him was share his life
story with us. How often do we share our testimonies with such urgency to
complete strangers? He has served the Lord 30 of those years with all that he
can and still holds bible studies to this day. He’s the amazing man in the
sunglasses in the middle of our group birthday photo and is an amazing
inspiration to me to serve the Lord all the days of my life.
A man with leprosy came and knelt before him and said, “Lord, if you
are willing, you can make me clean.� Jesus reached out his hand and touched the
man. “I am willing,� he said, “Be clean!� Immediately he was cured of
his leprosy. Matthew 8:2-4
