Faith to touch his hem...

I have been worried that if I blog too much that I may wear you all out! But I have decided that the key to a good blog is actually recording random musings (thanks Steph.B for the inspiration!).
The past week has held its own share of struggles! Why not share the burden, a yoke shared is a yoke lightened hey!

First of all, Michael has been sick with "runny tummy" as Liberians call it! For 5 days now! we are both suffering! But as we promised 6 months ago... "In sickness and in health"! He has barely left our cabin! The Dr says there is nothing he can do so he must just wait it out! As a nurse I would like to find some Antibiotics which you can buy anywhere here in Liberia (but they aren`t necessarily what they say they are) and say goodbye to the nasty bug that is keeping us from a good nights sleep!

My struggle of the past week has also involved being overwhelmed again by the pain of these people! The patients we care for on the ward have often seen more pain than any human should have to endure yet to their credit most of them praise God where we would shout at him for the hand dealt to us! I am so confronted when faced with how I would deal with the same situation!.

One of our translator/ patient counselor on the ward was a patient here on the ship a year ago. She told me how she suffered for 10 years with VVF before she came for the surgery. She told me about how she was only 22 when it happened. She was so embarrassed by her leaking that she refused to see people and would spend days at a time crying. Imagine how hard it would be to watch your family and friends living productive lives while you sat in a room out the back of the house hiding because you smell so bad!. I can`t help thinking of the faith of the bleeding woman who ran after Jesus and had the faith to think that if she touched just the edge of his robe that maybe she would be healed!. These women have the same faith! They are so desperate they believe that if only I come to the ship and have surgery that they may receive their healing! What an amazing step of faith to beg someone for money and despite the embarrassment you will endure to get to a place you have only heard about you would travel for hours in the heat and rain and finally arrive to a ship where they look strange and sound strange. THIS IS FAITH!!!!!
Some receive their physical healing after their first surgery for many other VVF ladies they have multiple sugeries and for some their bladder is so ruined from the trauma of obstructed childbirth that they will have problems forever unless they have supernatural healing! It so hard to watch them go through a rollercoaster of emotions! I have a lovely lady on the ward at the moment that I have no words for!. She is sad and has had multiple surgeries! We leave liberia at the end of the year not to return for maybe a number of years! There is no VVF surgeon in this country! So hard! I have to believe that the Lord has something for her and has her here for a bigger reason!
My friend/patient Chris is here from Ghana! I still will tell you about her as she too has recieved her I think fourth surgery the other day but I will wait to tell you when she is better!

Lord I pray that you would increase my faith that I would have as much faith as these women who would do anything to just touch the hem of Jesus` robe!

"Young`s are finally out fishing!"

We are finally here!!!!!!!!! It has been nearly 6 months since the Lord spoke to us about coming back to the ship to serve in West Africa!. Last Sunday, 3rd August 2008, we arrived after nearly 30 hrs of travelling and layovers in Washington D.C (USA) and Brussells (Belgium). It was so good to walk out into humid and rainy Liberia!. We had some good friends meeting us at the airport which was so lovely!. The drive through Monrovia brought back so many fond memories for us! We had to pinch each other to check that we were really here! It is all so familiar! but then we arrived at the Dock in the Port and our beloved old Anastasis (the ship we were on last year) is gone and the Africa Mercy looms out of the Ocean like a huge white box!. She is not as pretty on the outside as the Anastasis but she is bigger and more modern inside and much more functional especially in terms of being able to help more people which is wonderful!. Our cabin is awesome!!!! It is definitely a good thing to be married when it comes to having more space! We have a big bed, a lounge area,desk and lots of cupbooard space and even a kitchenette and small bathroom. Its sort of the size of a small motel room and about as functional!. We are looking forward to making it more homely when our own bedspread and pillows arrive in the next shipping container (we put them on the container in texas being sent from the base there). Our room faces the dock otherwise known as port side!.

Work wise: I (Sarah) am back on the ward as a ward nurse taking care of the patients who have had surgery! It is such a privlidge! I still love it! I have had beautiful babies to play with who have had club feet repairs! They cry for the first 2 days post op then they start to smile and play! they are in casts for many weeks so it is frustrating for the poor little things who just want to play! There are also VVF ladies being operated on for 6 weeks!. I haven`t been taking care of them yet but I hope to this week as this is probably my favourite type of patient! I love seeing Jesus touch their heart! They are patients who need a lot of love and we love to show it to them! Their testimonies at the end of their stay here make me cry every time! They are so rejected and such outcasts and they have often not been touched in years and then they come here and they are fussed over and have their nails painted, a surgery, lots of love, making craft, worship and a new dress to celebrate their new life and they are forever changed! These women have often had multiple pregnancies with not even one live child to show for it! Can you imagine what that is like? I don`t think we can really understand how much grief these people have been through!
I took care of a baby the other day who was called "Small Joe" He had a twin brother called "Big Joe" but he died and so did his mother so his fatther has lost a son and a wife in less than a year! and this baby he has left has been unwell with an infection in the bone! So hard! Hard lives and yet they keep going because they must! It is a fight to survive! If small joe makes it to 5 yrs old he is a miracle! Arggggggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!! Things are improving here in Liberia but still such along way to go! Nowhere near enough health facilities or the ability for people far from the city to get treated for minor problems that grow into Large ones!

Michael is working in the sales department at the moment! This is the ship shop (our little shop that sells all the necessities like toiletries etc), snack bar and cafe! Yay for Coffee! very cheap coffee too only $1 for a Latte! The nice part of working here is there are some perks! It is a contradiction of worlds as we live with internet access, satellite telephone and even TV and then outside is the 3rd world! I know its a little crazy but it means we can actually achieve and do more work here in the country because our time is not spent on surviving! This is modern mission work, not like the old days when people took their coffin to Africa because they were never coming home!
Michael is on the Fire team again which he loves! He loves all that manly stuff!

So I guess I have wrote too much already but want to try and give you some idea what our life looks like here!
I will write again soon! Oh I have a great story to tell about a patient named Chris (a VVF lady) who is a lovely girl with a beautiful story but I will share that next time....
(I have to keep you hanging)
Love always
Sarah and Michael :)