Some of my earliest childhood memories involve visiting people in their homes. Because my dad was a preacher, it was part of the job description, I guess.
I hated it.
So when we started doing house visits the first week here in Arcalia, I couldn’t help but remember those times my sister and I would hang out while my parents talked and talked and talked.
Add to that a huge language barrier and it’s easy to think there’s really no point in them.
The first day we visited with three people. First we visited Cati, a woman who is a church member and has severe asthma and diabetes. We moved on to her daughter Felitchia’s house. The next day she was to go to the doctor to find out if her ovarian cancer had resurfaced. We went with Gabby, our translator and host for the month and we talked and prayed.
My teammates told me I came alive.
I don’t know what it is about house visits that has made me feel like this is why I‘m in Arcalia. Maybe it’s the realization that no matter the language, we all have things that ail us, that hurt us or make us sad. It reminded me of the many people I’d visit with and write stories about as a reporter back home. But this time I could end it with prayer instead of a newspaper article.
The last house we visited that first day was Jeni’s. She has been a Christian for six years and has been suffering from arthritis for 11 years. She’s also had another surgery (and has scars on her head) that I haven’t yet quite understood the reason. When we walked up to her house and started talking with her, a few of us felt an instant connection with her.
She’s funny, she’s kind, but she’s hurting.
She’s only 56 years old but looks like she’s at least 80. Years of pain and illnesses have confined her to a wheelchair and in the middle of conversations with us she stops, grabs her knees, legs or hips and says “Ow, ow, ow!”
We’ve been visiting her every day, sans translator, and somehow we still get along and understand each other. We laugh together. She tells us bible stories using her hands and words that we sometimes understand. We pray together even if we don‘t understand what the other is saying. And when she cries, we cry together.
Her pain goes far beyond physical pain from sickness. She hurts on the inside, in her heart, and she’s shared that with us.
And it makes me angry, how someone could hurt such a frail, kind person. It leaves me with questions of how she could even have faith. She’s in constant pain, she is beyond what we Americans think is poor. Then I realize that maybe that is all she CAN have since she’s been hurt by those she loves and doesn‘t have much else.
And then I think, isn’t that the truth for all of us?
