*From Uganda which was in August*
In Uganda we taught to some children at schools, we preached
at churches, and we prayed at hospitals. Surprisingly, the ministry which had
the most impact on me during August was praying at the hospitals. At first I
was really nervous about going and afraid of being disappointed. I mean, what
in the world could I do for people who were seriously sick? What if they were
bleeding or I had to see needles: I’ll be passed out and need a nurse myself.
But as the Lord would have it, my world was rocked.
I want to try and describe what the hospital looked like; as
it looked NOTHING like an American hospital. It looked old. The first visual I
have to compare it to is the movie “One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest”. The beds
are old metal frames with rust and paint coming off. The mattresses were torn.
Nothing felt clean. No curtains between beds, no privacy. There were 4 wards
(children, maternity, men and women) and that’s all there was too it. It didn’t
matter the severity of your illness, there was no ICU unit or no true
specialists.
On the weekends, when we went, no doctors were present; just
a handful of nurses. They (as in the nurses) don’t serve you food, don’t change
your bedding, don’t bring you pillows,
or even empty your bed pan: they simply deal with IV’s and sometimes
dressing wounds. So, who does those other things for the sick patients? Their
family. When a family member is sick, at least one member goes to the hospital
with the sick person to stay with them, bath them, feed them, and take care of
them. Unfortunately, there are people who have no family, and thus they don’t
receive as much as care. As we saw a man laying on a bed with his feet all torn
up, dried blood on the bed, passed out/asleep, and no one by his side.
Ironically, the first weekend, the most depressing ward was
the maternity ward. As my teammate informed us about what she had seen, all of
our hearts broke. Not only were there women who were about to have a baby or
had just had a baby; but also women who had just miscarried. That first
day 50% of the women had lost their baby
to complications with their C-Section. We aren’t even talking about super high
risk pregnancies, just normal C sections. Unfortunately the hospital doesn’t
have the training/equipment to handle many surgeries. Hailey really felt it on
her heart to pray around the ward the next time we were there and the following
time, 100% of the C-Section births survived! Praise the Lord, we believe that He
heard our prayers.
Being in the wards, I realized, was an opportunity to bring
joy, life, healing and hope to people who were hurting. After praying for the
first few people I found myself smiling, almost uncontrollably. I found myself
filled with such joy. I felt God telling me that my presence and my smile in
conjunction with my prayers was bringing healing to the people I was around. I
don’t know how many people accepted Jesus in their heart, I don’t know how many
people received miraculous healing when the doctors came back, I don’t even
know how many people understood what I was praying over them (don’t worry we
did ask them for permission to pray for them by someone who could speak their
language); but none of that is even important. What I do know is that we
ushered in joy by sitting with people. That we ushered in the presence of the
Lord in a place where satan would like to have complete dominion. That we
planted seeds and showed people that there is hope & a difference in the
Lord. It was such a humbling experience to me and a beautiful expression of how
God desires just to sit with us, and love us where we are at. It also really
made me miss volunteering and all the time I spent at the DuPage County
Convalescence Center 🙂
