A Year and Some Change

Hello Everyone! 

A Year and Some Change.....

Hard to believe... but it's been a year and some change since I moved to Gabon!

What an adventure, a blessing and a learning experience it has been this first year.

I was taking some time to reflect on my first days here in the Jungle...

On the kitchen door- my friend who comes to say "hi" in the afternoons.

...the first time I made the rare find of lettuce in the market and had spent the better part of 20 minutes painstakingly completing the necessary bleaching, rinsing and drying of each leaf (due to the Gabonese interest in human fertilizer) and as I went to gather the leaves from the counter on which they were drying to make the special treat of a long-awaited salad, a lizard jumped right down from the wooden cupboards and tap danced his way right across every single one of my rare and freshly cleaned lettuce leaves! 

I ate the lettuce anyway. 

...or the first time I sliced an onion here and thought almost the entire thing was rotten, only to discover that's just how their onions are coloured here.

I couldn't even do a simple thing like slicing an onion without having questions!

I felt so dependent on those around me. 

...perfecting my ninja moves while sporting my crocs and rubber gloves, as I tried to skillfully turn off water in the shower that shocked me every time I used it for the first month after moving in.

Often I would get shocked through the water out of the shower head too....I took a lot of sponge baths. 

Using the kitchen sink was literally a shocking experience too.

I am still amazed that I have both running water and electricity in my house in the middle of the jungle.

They just don't always play well together.

(After a month they finally found a set of wires had been chewed away - I was getting shocked because there was live current bouncing back and forth between the 110 and 220 lines and was touching a water pipe- I could have had a decent fro I think).

Celebrating the Gabonese holiday, Women's Day, with the residents' wives

I remember having people over the first weekend I had moved into my new home.

It took me all day to prepare as I started learning to make everything from scratch.

The workmen were fervently trying to fix my electrifying water system and my house helper mama Germaine was helping keep up with the never ending residue from geckos, ants, wood bores and termites.

I had also just recently had an ape or some other unidentified jungle animal leap onto my side kitchen door a couple nights in a row from the mass of jungle bordering my house. We think he was injured or something, for it looked as though he had found solace in my attic for the last hours of his life and as his carcas quickly decayed in the equatorial heat, maggots proceeded to fall from my ceiling.

I had gotten used to heating my water for washing dishes and for bathing because there had been no hot water for the majority of the first month.

Then the cold water went on strike too.

Then the workers hit a water pipe and water was literally pouring through the ceiling from the attic into my kitchen.

I was still getting shocked at the sink, in the shower and while touching certain appliances.

So there I was that day in my sweaty kitchen, rolling out my first crack at homemade tortillas, getting shocked at random intervals, no running water, a waterfall pouring from the attic and maggots falling from the ceiling and company coming in under 2 hours.

By God's grace we ate more than canned sardines that night. 

Enjoying fellowship with some of the missionary ladies

Remembering going to the capital for the first time for the yearly grocery shop with my mentors Terry and Barry, and realizing even then, how much I had "gray scale vision." It was as if everything around me was a different shade of grey, in that everything seemed to look the same. There were no definitions in my mind. I remember driving with them down the road and Terry shouting and pointing excitedly, "look a plant nursery!" Barry pulled over so she could check out the trees and small budded plants for sale. "A nursery?!" I thought to myself. 

It looked just like all the other countless wood/tin/concrete block shacks we had passed the past 5 miles and were sure to pass for the following 5. 

How did she spot these things in the sea of seemingly non-purposed shacks? 

Colour vision. 

I was excited for the day when I would one day be granted colour vision.   

I remember what a relief it was at the beginning to visit Mbolo- the large french grocery store in the hub at the capital for our yearly shop- 9 hours from Bongolo. What fun to see Western foods and packaging, lots of fresh veggies, meat, yogurt, chips, cereal, even ice-cream (if you're willing to pay the price- 3 slices of ham was $12.99- I didn't get the ham : ) all in a nice clean store with no goat poop, no rat droppings, no checking your rice and pasta for creepy crawlers and no drunk men trying to grab you as you headed out the door. 

Out to dinner with Mom and Dad at one of the local restaurants in town

But I found myself back in the capital 6 months after living at Bongolo to see my parents off back to the States and we went to Mbolo again, but I was surprised at what I experienced. 

We had jumped into a taxi on the inner-city back roads where the missionary guest house was, filled with make shift shelters for stores and restaurants and headed to the large westernized grocery store.

We walked in - and immediately I felt overwhelmed.

It was big and bright and people were hustling and bustling around the place in their European fashions and the shelves were filled with so many choices! Oh were there choices!
The yogurt aisle alone- I almost could see the white pearly gates at the end of it.
I walked around in an amazed daze, trying to wake myself up every few minutes to make sure I wasn't actively drooling over the beautiful displays of fresh vegetables.
Everyone and everything seemed to be moving so much faster than I was.

I felt so out of place.

I felt like a jungle bumpkin. 

I felt out of my comfort zone.

We grabbed another taxi, carrying our groceries in our arms, and made our way back to our little street where the guest house was on.

The taxi left us off at the corner.

People were walking by in bright patterned cloth, head scarves and carrying babies on their backs.

Goats and stray mangy dogs trotted out of our way as we walked through potholes as wide as the street itself and dodged the plastic bags and trash that littered the street, out of a wooden shack we passed, floated the yummy aroma of “coupe coupe” chicken, kids ran past us laughing and playing with home made toys.

I breathed a sigh of relief.

I was in my comfort zone again.

I had found myself in a cultural pretzel.

A Year and Some Change.....

Change in how I perceive life, culture, what is norm.

Change and growth in deeper understanding of how I understand and know my God.

Change and growth in how I expect to relate to and love others.

Change in people's lives as we live life side by side, showing them what it means to be a follower of Christ.

 Visiting with my nursing students and their families at their homes. I try to visit them every Sunday evening. We'll sit, talk, eat food, they'll teach me their local dances, braid hair, play with their kids and just pass some time with them.  In the Gabonese culture, going to someone's house is more meaningful than inviting them over. Essentially, it is a cultural way in which I can wash their feet.

Helping out doing some anesthesia in the OR

Filling in the gaps... the last several months we've been short staffed in the OR and in the ICU/recovery room. I've been trying to fill in when I can in between teaching and doing clinicals with the students. Wednesdays I would be in the OR helping out with anesthesia and keeping an eye on Rea- our recovery room.
There were many days I would literally be running between the two, having to leave a patient in the OR because a patient was deteriorating in Rea.
Thankful to the Lord for keeping all the patients safe.
Also rejoicing because God has provided staff to fill these two critical needs!
I will still be filling in as needed but it won't be as often.
Thankful for God's provision of safer patient care! 

Small Group Bible study 

Each Friday the students divide up into their small groups for Bible study. This was my group of girls this past trimester. It has been exciting to see God stretch and develop their understanding (and my own) of who God is, as we studied the names of God together.
Several of these girls have been experiencing a lot of financial hardship, sometimes struggling to have enough food to eat.
We have seen God provide for their needs and how they have grown through that.
It has been an honor to disciple these young women.

Building bridges in LeBamba.

 This past year I've spent most Thursday afternoons in LeBamba learning to cook with some of the merchant women. LeBamba has become a hub for merchants from other African countries. It has been exciting to see the bridges the Father has been building as I grow in friendship with these women.
Please talk to the Father concerning them that our friendship would continue to grow and provide good opportunities through it.

Showing a student how to recover a new born from general anesthesia after a Spina Bifida repair

Most of the mornings are spent in clinicals with the Nursing students in the ICU/recovery room, Rea. It is a great opportunity to practice their nursing skills, but also to work with them side-by-side, showing them how to think critically in taking care of a variety of patients.  

Bible study with Eric

 Do you remember Eric? He was mentioned a couple posts ago as the young man who had become a quadriplegic after a construction accident and who had decided to follow Christ after arriving at Bongolo.
We have been doing a Bible study together several times a week since mid-December.
We have studied through John, Acts and Romans and have had some good discussions surrounding the doctrine we've read and how those truths affect Eric's current world view.
It has been exciting to see Eric grow in his faith these past 9 months.
We have often had other patients and family members in Rea who have joined us.
My joy was made complete in seeing Eric's discipleship come full circle-  God has given opportunities for Eric and I to tag-team sharing the Gospel to other patients and praying them to Christ. It is a joy to hear him share his testimony of how God has changed his life with others, to see him become passionate about introducing others to Christ.

An answer to prayer! -I have been able to pass this ministry on to Barry, one of my missionary colleagues. After several months of praying for the next steps for Eric and who could take the baton for his discipleship, God has clearly provided for that transition to take place and am very glad Eric will be able to study with a man of faith who will be able to take even deeper into Scripture.
Praise God for His perfect timing, provision and answer to prayer! 

Eric and his Mom

 

 Resident's wives Bible Study

 This past year I've had the privilege of taking part in the PAACS residents' wives Bible study. It has been a great way to build friendships with my fellow sisters in Christ and we have really enjoyed studying God's word together and the different experiences we all bring to admonish one another and help each other grow.
These past several months the women asked me if I would lead a study on the names of God. We have really enjoyed growing in our understanding of God's character together.
One thing I have been really praying for for these women, is for further leadership development and discipleship. These women, whose husbands are at Bongolo training to be surgeons, will be going back to their own villages and will be looked up to as Spiritual leaders. My prayer for them has been that God would begin developing in them the courage to begin leading their own Bible study.
Our prayers were answered!
By the time I went back to visit the States in August, almost every single one of these women had stepped up to lead a Bible study session on one of the names of God. 
They also began initiating their own fellowship time together as a small group.
It is a great growing experience for them and I am so excited to see them begin these next steps of discipleship in their lives!
God is at work!

Girls' Pizza Night 

Another way God is at work, is that the wives have asked to come with me as I spend time with the women in town.
There are few times I have really experienced the fullness of the Body of Christ like I have while driving to LeBamba with a car full of women from the Congo, Mali, Gabon, Madagascar and U.S. all praying together with one mind and one spirit, for the salvation of our unreached friends.
It has been exciting to see their passion for evangelism grow.

Cooking together in LeBamba

Vaccination Day! This village had no clinic so we set up in the local church.

Hearing the Gospel while waiting for vaccinations

Sugar makes anyone a captive audience- watching the children's version of the Jesus film at one of our village vaccination clinics.

Bringing in the Sheaves ~ prepping the pineapple and coconut harvest for freezing with my Mama

It was such a joy to have my parents visit Bongolo this past year! They arrived on Thanksgiving day and stayed through mid-December. They even brought a frozen turkey with them in their suitcase for our team's Thanksgiving dinner- it was such a treat!

Saving the heads to replant for next year!

One of the ways in which God has really blessed me this past year has been through my neighbors, Mama Jackie and Pastor Serge. Pastor Serge is the director of the hospital. They have very kindly adopted me as their daughter and have been taking care of me, from sending one of the boys over to kill my snakes, to helping me plant and harvest my first plantation.

Harvesting my first crop of corn with my Gabonese Mama.

Mama Jackie has been teaching me how to work the land here to plant a "plantation" (garden). She hired a local boy to burn a small plot of land for me during the dry season, then taught me how to plant once the wet season arrived. She's also taught me very important lessons- such as the many uses of a machete!

It is the only tool we used for planting, maintaining and harvesting. 

Maintaining the plantations

For Mama Jackie, this is her cultural way of "taking care of me" while I am far away from my family and not yet married. When my Mom and Dad came to visit, Mama Jackie was very quick to make sure they saw my plantation, to show them I had a source of food that was producing well and was being taken care of in their absence.
My parents were and still are very touched and grateful.

My Mom and Dad and my Gabonese Mama and Papa all in one place. Worlds collide... : )

Waiting for their Mom at the hospital

"Drive-in" car wash  : )

Little friends at the market : )

I often hear little ones like this see me in the market and whisper to each other excitedly, "Look! A CHINESE GIRL!"
Their mothers quickly shush them and correct them.

Being a redhead, I've been called many things while overseas.
This was definitely a first.  : )

My fav picture with my students- these guys are why I'm here ~ At the end of the School year, with God's help we all made it through the first year of school at Bongolo! Woohoo!

A Year and Some Change.....

Growth
Christ
Love
  People 

So thankful for all that God has done!
Thank you for praying me through my first year here on the field.
It is a joy to serve our Father with you. 

Much Love from the Jungle,

       ~Amanda 

P.S. I had an absolutely WONDERFUL time back in the States for the month of August for my brother's wedding! It was such a joyful month of vacation to spend time with family, friends, my church family, to enjoy good food and the fresh open space and air of my homeland. After 20 months overseas, it was great to be back in the land of peanut butter, pre-cleaned white eggs, sliced whole wheat bread, strawberries, fresh milk and smooth non-dirt roads.

 Thank you to all of you for your prayers, they were certainly answered and I have returned to the field refreshed and rejuvenated for the next stretch of my time in Gabon. 

New brothers and sisters ~ missing our brother Jonathan, who was not granted military leave to attend the wedding.

 FYI~If you ever wanna experience reverse culture shock, try abstaining from Walmart for 20 months. 

Choice overload! 

Look at those Oreo and marshmallow aisles! : )

Fanning Embers into Flames ~ Nursing Spiritual Retreat

Hello Everyone!

Thank you to all of you who have been partnering with us in prayer during our Nursing Spiritual Retreats at the Hospital! We have now met with three of the six groups of nurses and are praising the Lord for how He is working through the power of His Word and by His Holy Spirit among us.
We have been very vividly aware of your ministry in prayer with us ~ Thank You!

 

Group No. 2. David, our speaker, is on the far Right

As you can see the groups are very small. After asking some of the chief nurses what they thought would be most effective for their staff, we moved forward with a small group format, hoping to foster an intimate, safe environment for prayer, discussion, reflection and mutual encouragement.

 

 

Working through discussion questions

 

In the preparation and organization of these retreats, I have been learning more about the Gabonese culture and how to appropriately navigate the systems of leadership and authority that are in place.

 

 

 

 

Sharing a meal together

 

David has been sharing from Romans 12:1-3, talking about what it means to have a renewed mind and to not be conformed to this world, both personally and professionally.

We have seen the Holy Spirit convict and break hardened hearts, many have become humbled and repentant.

Others resist any truth that may be spoken into their lives, this resistance manifests itself in their approach to the physical and spiritual care of their patients -and thus into the overall effectiveness of the Hospital in providing excellence in patient care and sharing the light of the Gospel.

 

 

Please continue to pray with us as the remaining three groups meet June 21st, 28th and July 12th.

Pray for the protection and continued growth for those who have been sensitive and responsive to God's voice during these times. Pray that they would continue to listen for His voice in their lives.

Pray for those who still have resistant hearts, hearts that are not open to growth and change.
Pray for a spiritual renewal and revival of the entire Hospital staff.

 

 

 

God has been teaching me a lot about His heart in making disciples, how He desires everyone to be presented mature in Him, how He does not want any of His children to be left to bathe in the tepid waters of a luke-warm faith, how part of His call for us to make disciples in the Great Comission means fanning those embers into flames.

"Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me."   ~ Colossians 1:28-29


For His Glory,

     ~ Amanda



Pray With Us This Friday

Hello to All!

 

 

 

We are excited to announce an upcoming ministry starting this Friday, May 31st.
Bongolo will be hosting a series of small group spiritual retreats for our Gabonese nursing staff. 

Over the past few months, God has been laying the details in place for these 5 Friday evenings, continuing through the end of June. His answer comes after much prayer for the spiritual renewal and vitality of our nursing staff, who after many years of working short staffed, carrying heavy patient loads with limited resources, and pouring themselves into the spiritual care of their patients, have become weary and burnt-out.

Pray for God's annointing on the teachers of His word during these retreats and that the Holy Spirit would speak to His children and break the strong holds of long-hardened hearts.

We are excited about what God is going to do in our midst.
Please consider partnering with us in prayer in the coming weeks. 
Consider praying for one, two or all of the Friday evenings as a small group, as a church Body, as a family, as a group of friends or in your personal prayer time.
The evenings go from 5:30-9:00 pm jungle time (12:30-4:00pm EST).
May 31st, June 7th, 14th, 21st and 28th.

Thank you for praying for this critical piece of the ministry here.

 

It is a joy to serve Him together with you.

 

 

 

Love from Jungle,

         ~Amanda 



"So all of us who have had that veil removed can see and reflect the glory of the Lord. And the Lord—who is the Spirit—makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image."
~ 2 Corinthians 3:18

 

 

 

 

Hostility --> to Love

Dear Friends,

HOSTILITY --> to Love.

I'm sure in reading this title, you expect some great story of God's redeeming love and transforming power in the life of a student, a nurse or a Gabonese woman I'm discipling in a Bible study.

You're right, the first part is true -- except this is in the life of someone else - the life of me.

 Not what you expected from your faithful missionary nurse serving in the African jungle?

I have heard many paradigms to describe the process of cultural adaptation. They all seem to revolve around  words like CHAOS, bridges, Settling, UNSETTLED, Squaresville to Roundsville, NEW home. However there is one paradigm that has stuck with me as I've moved overseas.
It comes from a dear couple with whom by some "chance" meeting I met on a train coming back from the Paris airport, at a point when I was missing home, tired and discouraged. They had served many years in embassies and in missions during their career, and amidst lifting my spirits with their joy and compassion, the advice they gave me was this: 

Honeymoon -- Hostility -- Humor --Home 

They said, "you will probably transition through every stage when you move to Gabon. One might be longer than the other, but the important thing to remember, it that HOME is coming."

HOSTILITY

I don't like that word. 

I don't think there is any positive connotation one can retrieve from it in our language.

I shuddered at the thought that this would one day describe me. 

Then, 6 months after moving to Gabon, I found myself smack in the middle of it.

It came on suddenly like a savage fever and left a bad taste in my mouth. 

I was frustrated by everything around me it seemed.

There were little things like not ever being able to finish baking before the swarm of ants plague the kitchen, the lizards who claim our entire home as their outhouse, the drop-dead-ly snakes who play tag outside our front door, the oh-so-lovely mold that covers everything from socks and jewelry to sweatshirts and passports. (I'm surprised my hair wasn't molding!)

And yet those are things we can deal with, or adjust to. But there were things I could not fix, things that ran deeper. These were my perceptions at that point in time:

Unteachable spirits among the hospital staff. 

Lack of spiritual growth and depth in the National church.

Mentalities of entitlement.

Hoarding of knowledge. 

Laziness.
Persistent blindness to plank in their own eye amidst teaching in the National church.
Patient care centered on needs of nurses instead of needs of patients.

Acting out the story of Lazarus and the Rich Man with some of the ladies for their Women's Spiritual Retreat

For a couple months I was able to shadow one of the discipleship courses held at a local church. Along with being trained to teach the course later at the nursing school, I enjoyed the opportunity to get connected with believers in a small group setting. The study was deep and thorough and highly applicable. I was impressed by the material and the amount of personal study each lesson involved. It was exciting meeting the group and they seemed to have some really good discussions. The weeks passed, and every Friday evening the leader and I would watch as the attendance waxed and waned dramatically. 16 to 3, 8 to 5. Save 2 faithful men in the group, the rest were like playing Russian Roulette.
It was hard not to feel discouraged, but as the study drew to an end, the numbers started remounting up to 16 and it became time to review what God had been speaking to us and sharing it with the church. 

The leader, David -a deacon of our local church- asked one of the men, a long standing Christian who had faithfully been there every week, to share what he had learned that would help him to continue growing in his walk with the Lord.

I sat there in eager anticipation to hear how God had been working in this man who had been so faithful in the study each week. 

His response: 

"To pray to Jesus and obey the 10 commandments."

My brain did a double take. 

That was it.

A "yes Johnny that's right" Sunday school answer. 

What happened? Did I have unrealistic expectations?
I asked David about it on the way home.
He said, "It's interesting that you should notice. It has been one of the things most frustrating for me in moving to Gabon from my home in Burkina. The Gabonese do not seem to have a desire to go deeper with God. They do not hunger or thirst for something more. They are content with where they are at, as though it fulfills all their needs."

I felt disillusionment.

Then dreadful sorrow. 

What treason to become satiated with spiritual immaturity.
What loss to become inebriated by spiritual milk.

Visiting one of the local pastors and his family while hosting a vaccination clinic in his village

"Go to Réa." I was walking past the doors to Réa, our hospital's ICU/ recovery room on the walk home from church, when I very clearly heard the Holy Spirit say this to me. He had said something when I woke up that morning too, I was getting ready for church and it was as if God was like, "oh by the way, while you're putting on your mascara, don't forget you're going to stop into Réa today." 

I had thought it was a little odd, but one of the patients had coded a couple days before so I thought maybe I needed to check on her. 

So I walked in and she seemed fine, but across the room in the corner I could see everything was not ok. It was Eric (see previous post). He was having trouble breathing, his mom and dad were rocking beside his bed, weeping -as if it was already too late, and standing around his bed were three of my 1st year students who had just stopped in to say hi and were now standing there -having never seen anything like this before-with that stunned deer in the head lights look.

Oh Boy. I dropped my purse and Bible down on a chair at the nurse's desk and ran over to Eric's bed thinking to myself, "great idea to wear this dress to church today Amanda."

I started assessing Eric and what was going on as I called out equipment for the students to grab. 

We couldn't get a blood pressure or an O2 sat, and his heart rate was elevated. He didn't have any IV access, he was drifting in and out of consciousness and was having trouble breathing. Oh crud, we're in trouble-  and I'm all alone. I quickly glanced around the room for what resources I had. 

Oxygen.
His bed is the furthest from it.

I see four portable oxygen concentrators across the room. 

I go to grab one - it's chained and padlocked to the wall. No key. 

Same for all of them. 

"Oh right!" I think to myself. "I forgot we do this because if we don't bolt them to the wall, people will just walk off with them- because in the this culture, everyone shares everything material. Wonderful!"

Ok, Plan B. 

Move Eric to the Oxygen. 

"Well," I think to myself, "he's a quadriplegic, so, he's a big guy anyway and he'll be a complete dead weight. (No pun intended if we can't get something figured out soon!)" 

Plan C -move the bed.

Frantically we all start trying to push and pull his bed. Six of us! Nothing. Doesn't budge one inch.
I look under the bed for what could possibly be blocking us. 

It's the weather of all things. 

The humidity here destroys rubber to sticky, crumbly pieces, and rusts metal together. 

His wheels were completely rusted and the rubber was half crumbled off of each one. That bed was not going anywhere. 

Ok, Plan D.
Send one of the students to go get an unchained O2 concentrator from the nearest place- across the hospital in the medical ward.

Ok, our hands are tied with the O2 until she gets back.

Monitor.
There's one above his bed. --- Of course it is the only one in the entire room that doesn't work. Great.
I sick one of the students on constant manual BP duty and start looking for IV access on this guy, send a student to try and see if any of the Doc's are lingering around outside talking after church and start yelling and tapping Eric trying to keep him engaged with us. 

I need help.

Is there a nurse?

 

No nurse. 

Then I remember- we are so short staffed, that on nights and weekends we don't have enough nurses to cover everybody, so there is no nurse in Réa, someone just comes in to check in from time to time. 

By this time Eric starts vomiting. 

I am just praying for extra help and that God would spare Eric. 

In walks the student with the O2 concentrator that she had to roll from across the hospital on the gravel to get it to him. We hook him up and he finally has O2- we start getting an O2 sat.

I'm not finding any veins.

In walk Zach and Jen, 2 of our surgeons who, praise the Lord,  were still out talking after church. They come in and start getting set up to put in a central line. The reinforcements are here.  

We give him O2, fluids, some other treatments, his vital signs stabilize and later we find out he needs surgery, but he's going to be ok. 

I was so relieved and so thankful to the Lord for helping us and saving Eric. 

And I was so incredibly frustrated how everything had transpired. 

I don't know if I will ever forget the powerlessness I felt as a nurse,

standing there with a deteriorating patient, 

with 4! oxygen sources in the room

and all of them just out of reach and bolted to the wall.

Réa

What was wrong with me? Didn't I love the Gabonese people? Isn't that why I came to serve the Lord here in the first place? Now here I was, feeling hostile and bitter towards them. It wasn't just feeling bitter that I was in Gabon, it was feeling that way towards them, as a people. 

Why am I here? What am I even doing here? If they don't want to grow spiritually, don't want to receive teaching professionally, if they don't want to see their work at the hospital as a ministry to their own people, then what in the world am I doing here? If no one wants to take a leadership position because culturally the rest of the group will just see them as a target because they tried to be better then the rest and they'll just shoot him down, then how are we ever to hand over this ministry to the Gabonese people? How is this ministry ever to be independent? How are we to work ourselves out of a job? How are we to pass the baton for the Gabonese to reach their own people for Christ? 

My heart and mind and soul wove themselves into these elaborate knots. 

I remembered the counsel of that sweet couple on the train from Paris. 

HOSTILITY

~

HOME is coming.

I went to one of the more experienced missionaries on the team and sought counsel. 

What do I know? 

I know that this phase is a normal and expected part of the cultural adaptation process. 

What do I not know? 

How do I navigate through this period in a productive and God-honoring way?

After she listened to me vent for a LONG time, we prayed together.
Then we came up with a game plan.
Then we prayed again. 

I had been spending a lot of time in prayer just communing with God and refilling, but hadn't spent a lot of time praying specifically for the ministries I was involved with, the people who I was touching. 

So I committed to pray for this group of people that I was specifically involved with- everyday.
So everyday I brought them before the Lord.

...........................................


By a couple months later, the hostility had been erased. It wasn't instantaneous and it wasn't conscious. 

I didn't wake up one morning and suddenly say, "hey, I'm not hostile any more!"

But gradually I began to feel a foreign presence in the depths of my heart and soul - a Love that did not find it's source in me.

Did I not really love the Gabonese when I committed to come here 2 years ago? 

Of course I did. 

But I believe God is teaching me that love in ministry is kind of like romantic love.

There is an initial love, we could label it an infatuation, that develops.
This infatuation is not worthless, it has a purpose- it is motivating and inspiring, it commands our attention and moves us to respond. It's the love we feel when we see an orphaned child, the desperate need of an impoverished people or an urgent need for a position that we have the skills to fill.
We learn about the people and see them from afar, and we don't understand them, but we have a love for them. 

But God has taught me that there is a Love that replaces that initial infatuation, a Love that goes deeper, a Love that says, "I Love them despite knowing their culture. I Love them BECAUSE I - (in part)- understand them," a Love that is not simply emotive, but an essence of being that spurns us to an action, a Love whose only source is in God Himself.

I do not claim to have "arrived" in understanding the Gabonese culture. 

I do not claim that I am no longer frustrated by anything in the culture or that I will never again feel hostile towards the Gabonese. 

What I do claim, is a new Love for the Gabonese, because of how I know them, a Love that does not originate, or end, with me.

 Sometimes I wonder in the U.S., if we ever make it past the infatuation love in ministry. Do we push through the frustration phase in ministry, do we ever get to the other side? Or when things get tough do we simply say, "God is redirecting me in ministry," or "this ministry doesn't really fit my spiritual gifting now," when really God longs for us to push through, to give us a Love for those in our ministry which runs deeper, which Loves them because we've taken the time to know them, a Love which does not begin and end with US. 

.....

On April 9th, I was walking from my house to one of the missionary's. The late afternoon was beginning to relax for the evening as if it's day's work was done. The sun was starting to set- early here on the equator as it always does- the light mist of evening was starting to settle in, and it was as if the trees with their larger-than-life, green leaves were sighing with contentment, basking in the cooler evening air.
I started stepping down the the cement stairs outside on the hill towards her house and I took a moment to soak in all that was around me, as I had done many times before. This time something was different- as I looked around a sense of peace and of being settled overwhelmed me.
In that moment I knew - for the first time in 18 months ~ I was HOME.

At Home in the Jungle, 

         ~Amanda

  

With all my students

Faces of Bongolo

Hello Everyone!

Thank you to all of you for your continued love, prayers and support. 

Thought you might enjoy seeing some of the "Faces of Bongolo" - lives you have touched in these past 8 months as a ministry partner with us here at Bongolo Hospital.

Learning to walk again with the help of the Nursing students.

Seeing this elderly man's face makes me smile every time. He was brought in after a car accident with a femur fracture. He had a couple operations, after which he was stuck in a bed in traction- with a metal rod sticking out of his leg-for 6 weeks! 

Once out of traction, it was time to push him to get moving! Every morning the students and I would head in to get him up and walking in the corridors and every morning he would protest and protest, smiling and laughing all the while, "Madame! Madame! You're not going to make me walk with this metal rod thing in my leg are you?!?"- then he'd give in and let us walk the corridors with him. It was also an opportunity to teach the students how to correctly measure crutches for a patient and how to safely get patients out of bed. 

The students and I also discovered an abnormal heart rhythm on this gentleman while taking routine vital signs. The doctors were able to do further testing and discovered he had a severe heart condition. We were able to send him home with prevention strategies related to the health of his heart. 

It was a great example to the students to demonstrate the importance of taking accurate vital signs on patients- every single time.

These ladies always had a huge smile on their face every morning =)

Broken legs and Barbies

Broken legs and Barbies, waiting on a leg to heal....play time on the pediatrics ward, enjoying toys sent from churches in the U.S.

A patient from NYC!?!

 A patient from NYC!?! Yup, that's right! The lady on the left has been living in Brooklyn for the past twenty years with her husband, she was on vacation visiting her children and extended family in Gabon with her sister (pictured right) when they were caught in an automobile accident. The two ladies are both believers and we got to pray together every morning. They were a real encouragement and light in my day. Praise the Lord their injuries weren't too devastating and they were able to carry on with their visit after a week or so.

Eric

This is Eric. He has a remarkable story that I'll be continuing in the posts that follow, but for now a little back ground story. Eric is 26, he was working on a construction site up in one of the big cities, Port Gentil, when he fell off a scaffold and landed on his head. His injuries left him paralyzed from the neck down, and he consequently went to several medical facilities in the surrounding areas. He had four friends who stayed with him, and after months of him being neglected in hospital beds and left for dead, his four friends decided to act. They had heard about Bongolo, and in a sort of modern day replication of the four friends lifting their paralytic friend down to Jesus through a hole in the roof, Eric's four friends brought him from the big city to the stick's, to Bongolo, desperate for help for their friend.

I was teaching the students about bed sores and the importance of preventing them the day Eric showed up in the ER. Eric had massive stage 4 pressure ulcers on his coccyx and hips, going all the way to the bone. I asked him if he wouldn't mind the students seeing his wounds to show them just how important it is to turn your patients in bed. He said yes, seeming like he understood the importance and wanted to prevent this happening to someone else. The students entered, quietly and a few at a time, seeing first hand all that we had talked about in class. Some had to leave the room for a few mins, others were almost doubled over with the weight of the suffering of this young man. As they all came in and saw, it was as if their eyes had been opened. I could see that Eric was starting to feel vulnerable, so I hurried the students up and we recovered him and got him comfortable. A golden light, with a tint of green started shining into the ER through the curtain around his bed, I asked if someone would pray for him and one by one each student started quietly lifting their voices up in worship and crying out to God for Him to ease the suffering of this man around his bed. They started praying, all 16 of them out loud at once, and I watched Eric's face- tearful and and glowing with a sense of hunger for this demonstrated Love that overwhelmed him. We were all bonded from that moment on. A few weeks later, Eric decided to follow Christ. 

Stay tuned for more of Eric's journey...

This guy was a trooper from the very beginning and his wife so supportive. He was involved in an accident and came to us with a femur fracture ("8! Say 8!" - Brian Regan anyone?) Anyway, he wasn't walking as much as the surgeons needed him to be, so I started showing the students how to get him up and moving and how to dig for more information as to why he was so reluctant to move. After talking with him and his wife about what he was experiencing and looking through his chart, we discovered that his pain wasn't being very well controlled. So Monday on rounds the students and I brought it up to the surgeons and they added a different pain medication at night. By Tuesday he was walking the halls and Wednesday he had walked all the way across the hospital campus to the lab to get his blood work done! He was doing so much better that we sent him home that week. It was a good opportunity to teach the students the importance of really talking with your patients when they are not progressing to see what is really going on and to make sure their pain post-operatively is well controlled.

Herbert

Herbert is an energetic, out-going young man in his 20's with a good sense of humor. He came to us because of his leg- a classic Tropical Medicine case of Elephantiasis. It is caused by a parasite which blocks the flow of the lymphatic system, fluid starts to pool, causing an irreversible malformation of the extremity. He has been with us for several months undergoing several operations for a type of grafting to give him better use of his leg. He is a believer and we are very excited for him that will soon get to leave the hospital! Stay tuned for updated photos!

This young woman and her son, "Chance", were with us for several months on the surgical ward. She's 21, she had an epileptic seizure and fell into a fire, badly burning her feet and legs, even losing some of her toes. She was with us for months while we grafted her burns, and thus so was her little baby Chance. Grandma stayed with her to help care for him, but he learned to toddle here at Bongolo and was quite busy for his injured mama and tired grandma. So I'd bring him with me, putting him on my back or just carrying him, on rounds or working with the students to give his mama and grandma a break. He was my little helper throughout the mornings and helped keep the students in line =) The surgical ward and all the students were sad to see his joyful, little, toddling self leave when his mom got better and went home.

So there you have it- just a taste of some of the lives you have touched through your prayer and support out here in the jungle at Bongolo Hospital. It's really fun to share with you all some of the faces that have encouraged me to keep on keepin' on as I strive to remain faithful to His calling. I think I can speak for the entire team when I say we are very thankful for your partnership in this ministry with us. 

Thank you!

Love from the Jungle,

  ~Amanda 

Growing Through Grief from Afar

 

Hello To All,

As some of you may have heard, my dear Grandma recently left this earth to be with her Savior.

Her last days came suddenly upon us and I was unable to return to the U.S. to be with her in her last moments, or to be with my family for the funeral.


In moving overseas I had put the possibility of such a scenario in my mind, but I think little can really prepare you to grieve alone, away from family, away from familiar cultural grieving experiences and without accepted time away to process- in essence- grief from afar.

Working in an ICU, I have spent so many late nights holding the hands of family members and singing patients into the presence of Jesus while attending to their final medical needs, as the incessant "Beep. Beep. Beep." of the heart monitor slows to a silence. 

But this time I wasn't there. 

I can only hope a nurse was there for my grandma.

The morning after her death I was scheduled to do some anesthesia in the OR.

I tried to push past the numb reality that she was gone and the vat of loneliness which tried to swallow me, in longing to grieve in the arms of my family.  
But one by one the surgical cases rolled in and with it, the responsibility before me. I welcomed the busy distraction, but with every "Beep." of the monitor came the pungent reminder that I hadn't been there for her.

As each patient lay before me, fearful and anxious in remaining awake during the operation under spinal anesthesia, I found God giving repeated opportunities to bring comfort and peace.
In fact that day, I was able to connect with patients more closely than I ever had in the OR, and God brought an opportunity to pray with every single patient after their operation to rejoice with them that God had brought them through-each with a smile spread wide across their face.
God has brought me here.
My Grandma wouldn't have wanted me anywhere else.

I have discovered that cultural adjustment does not stop for anyone- not even for grief, in fact I have found that it is perpetuated by it.

In coming overseas I expected I'd be giving condolences differently, I never expected I'd have to receive them. 

I was somewhat caught off guard by the way people greeted me. They would very sincerely come and shake my hand and say how sorry they were for my loss, all the while smiling and giggling! At first I felt taken aback and then I tried to remember not to feel hurt, since it was something I definitely did not understand. I sat down with Mama Jackie, my Gabonese mama a little while later and asked questions about death and dying here, she said when a grandparent dies, the grandchildren are expected to make elaborate skits about the grandparent, humorous skits that "mock" the quirks of their grandparent, they move around the coffin during the performance, using humor to try and lighten the mood. Maybe the giggling while giving condolences was a heart felt effort to make me feel better.  

Mama Jackie also shared with me the deep sense of blame woven deep in the culture here. When someone passes away, whether by an accident, illness, old age, anything, someone is always to blame. It is always someone's fault, whether directly or through a curse- it was someone's fault. She said to me, "No one will ever erase from the mind of the Gabonese that when a husband or wife dies, their spouse is always to blame for taking their life. No exceptions." 

I confess that in my grief, in my sadness, I didn't want to be learning more. I didn't want to adapt to culture, I didn't want to keep finding myself outside of my comfort zone. I was so exhausted, I just wanted it all to stop for a little while so I could wrestle through my grief.
Yet there I was, in the thick of it all, learning a part of the Gabonese culture that is probably their biggest bridge to the Gospel- that Jesus Christ stepped in to claim the blame that was theirs.  

There have been many unexpected blessings from the Lord during this time of grief from afar.
Getting to say a last farewell to my Grandma through a very broken and choppy vonage connection of one of the missionaries. Both my brothers were granted leave from the Army and Navy to attend the funeral and support my Mom and Dad. A couple of the ladies here very kindly mourned with me in "attending" Grandma's funeral with me on audio skype, living out Galatians 6:2, "Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ." Finally, the presence of a peace and a joy that transcend all understanding. Despite being beyond my grasp, in the midst of the sorrow and the turmoil of grieving so far away and alone, peace and joy did come, and I knew that it was many of you who were lifting me up in prayer. Thank you.

So here I am, working to make sense of this grief from afar, and yet growing, which I suppose means it must be cultivating something good. There is still a final closure which has not yet come, though I sense that perhaps it will on a day when I can return to the States, rush into the open arms of my family and see with my own eyes my dear, sweet Grandma's grave.
For it really is just a vessel, Grandma is laughing and dancing before the Lord right now, and as my brother put it, "talking the ear off of Jesus in Heaven."

Goodbye for now Grandma, I'll see you on that joyous day when my time comes....


Love from the Jungle,
 ~Amanda

With both of my spit-fire Grandmas before I left

Merry Christmas from Bongolo!

Merry Christmas from the Jungle! 

Celebrating with new "family"

99.6 degrees and a Tropical Rainstorm Christmas...not the typical setting that comes to mind for your merry, jingle-all-the-way celebrations, but we had a marvelous time doing it! 
Christmas Eve we had a really fun progressive dinner throughout the mission station caroling all the way.

Bongolo's Christmas Eve "candle light"service =)

Later that night we went to Bongolo Alliance Church for their Christmas Eve service- talk about a cultural experience! Forget the candle lights! Bright lights, palm branches and loud songs of joy welcomed us into the packed out building. Christmas Eve here is sort of an opportunity for everyone to express their joy in Christ's coming to the world- whether that's in a reading or a song or a dance.
So there were small groups of older women reciting scripture, all the hospital staff singing a worship song, high school kids doing a dance number (think- scene from High School Musical, Africa style) and then there were the Americans who got up and sang O Come All Ye Faithful. Yup! That's right! Even we weren't exempt =)

There was actually a strand of lights up at Bongolo! We
were so excited!

Despite all the holly, jolly, merry celebration of it all, this first Christmas overseas has not been easy. It is difficult to be away from friends, family and a fiancé, feelings of home, snow, family traditions and everything that tells you deep inside that "Christmas time is here," but I think it has only magnified the reason we celebrate Christmas- Emmanuel- God with us. I am so thankful that He has been walking through this season with me.
Emmanuel- God with us. 
Below is a tangible account of that reality, what Christmas means for the world.

"Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people."

Thank you to all of you who have so faithfully been praying for the young woman from the previous post, "A Will to Live." I wanted to give you a quick update as to how God has been working. 

We had described the story of a young woman, newly diagnosed with AIDS, who had left the hospital to go back home intending to kill herself, but God had intervened! She had changed her mind and returned to Bongolo Hospital for medical help. Our prayer was that while with us, God would speak to her heart and bring spiritual healing as well. We asked you to pray with us that God would open her mind and heart to the Gospel. 

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

About a week had passed after the young woman's return to us. I was checking up on the students in the medical ward and checking to see how the young woman was faring. I was surprised to discover that she had fallen into a coma a couple days prior, and had remained comatose since- it wasn't looking good. I could see the discouragement on the students' faces as they told me, and my heart fell as well....in that week before she became comatose, had she had enough time to hear and respond to the Gospel?

The next day she was gone.

A group of us were gathered near her room, discussing whether or not anyone had had the chance to talk through the Gospel with her. No one seemed to really know. She spoke a village language, Pounou, that was not widely spoken in the immediate area. Had anyone had the opportunity to share with her?


Just then one of my students, Zita, came up to us hearing our conversation. "Madame" she said, "I speak a little Pounou. The day before the young woman went into a coma, I talked with her. She told me a woman who happened to be taking care of another patient here at Bongolo, came into her room and started sharing with her about Jesus- in her mother tongue- Pounou! She told her about Jesus- and the young woman decided to follow Christ."   

"For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord." 

What a God we serve! In her brokenness, in her illness, God kept this woman from committing suicide, what compassion that He gave her a willingness to come back to the hospital to receive medical help, what provision that He had her come back with enough time for the Gospel to be presented to her before she fell into a coma, what mercy that God provided someone not only to share the Gospel with her- but someone who spoke it in her heart language, what obedience that that person obeyed the prompting from the Holy Spirit to share their faith, what grace that God would orchestrate all these events to draw this woman unto Himself- right before she fell into a coma and died, what Love that God would send His Son into the World "that the world might be saved through him"....


This is the gift of Christmas - Emmanuel, God with us!

Merry Christmas to you all!

Love from the Jungle, 

 ~Amanda