Last month, my team went to a safe haven for girls who have had children due to rape and incest. The youngest mother there had been raped by a close relative since she was nine, and had her baby when she was twelve. Every single one of these girls is under the age of eighteen, and each one had a story of unspeakable horror and brokenness. They came to Heart of Christ (an organization run by a woman named Gracie and her husband, Lee) with their babies and hope for a better life. But they weren’t who I worked with while we were there….
there are three little girls with cerebral palsy at Heart of Christ. There are NO facilities in the whole country of Honduras that will take them. All three of them have been abandoned by their mothers and left for dead in a state-run facility, then dropped off at Gracie’s when all hope seemed lost. The youngest one (a five-year-old) is named Shirley.
Shirley came to Heart of Christ severely malnourished and on the brink of pneumonia. This was about a week before we arrived. Her situation looked grim, but Gracie has never been known to give up on even the darkest of diagnoses.
The very first day we were there, Becky (a girl on our squad who had been there all month) asked for a volunteer to help take care of Shirley, as she had no nanny for the week. There was a LONG silence after she asked this. I asked what the work entailed. Becky didn’t know. Longer silence. Frustrated, I spoke up. “I’ll do it.”
I wondered what I had gotten myself into, especially since I hadn’t originally planned on coming to Heart of Christ at all. Not feeling a peace about staying back, I went…but not intending to give a whole lot while I was there. Coming into month 9 of my race, I was exhausted, and this was the last week of the month. Always against my will, Jesus was pushing me into dependence on Him-and this meant pushing me to do things that I was incapable of doing. In this case, it involved taking care of a very sick, very malnourished little girl.
Every day, Shirley required feedings every two hours. We fed her chicken broth (as her cold kept her from ingesting dairy-based formula to help her gain weight) from a syringe, 1 cc at a time. She also drank a pedialyte-ish formula, and it took us 2 hours to give her four ounces. She required many different medications a day, and a nebulizer once every two hours (from 11 AM to 11 PM). I wasn’t her main caretaker; there was a girl there who was watching her for the week. I was there basically to assist in her care and sleep in the room with them in case they needed me at night.
I couldn’t help but feel that maybe my past career had been leading up to these two days with this little girl. Having worked with developmentally disabled kiddos for nearly five years prior to coming on the Race, God had crammed a ton of things into me that I just do not possess naturally; patience, perseverance, genuine compassion for these sweet little babies who can’t help themselves. This made what may have otherwise been an unbearable task…a joy. Shirley is so precious. Even sitting in a hot, stuffy room giving her a nebulizer (that she did NOT enjoy), there was an indescribable peace and sweetness in the room with us. God was there.
The second night, Shirley was up crying/coughing about every other hour, and I didn’t know what to do for her. All I could do was lie in bed, begging God, “please, help her sleep. Take her cold away.” and I wondered, “What good am I doing here? Why did You bring me here?”
The next morning (our last morning there), we took Shirley to the doctor to weigh her and get her antibiotic shot. Right before we left to return to Zion’s Gate, Gracie singled me out in front of our whole group. “Shirley GAINED WEIGHT this week. You helped keep this little girl alive.”
I was on the edge of tears, completely humbled and a fair bit ashamed. I didn’t keep anyone alive. I showed up reluctantly and volunteered reluctantly to do something beyond my ability to perform…and GOD SHOWED UP. On top of that, He then HONORED my weak, frustrated obedience by acknowledging it publicly. No one knew how little I actually did except me and God…and He, instead of calling me out on my reluctance, honored my obedience and gave me joy in the midst of it.
Speechless at His mercy in this stubborn daughter’s life.
