I've Been Tagged

No, this has nothing to do with the UN takeover of the port here in Liberia (see previous post). And don't worry Mom and Dad, I don't need to seek immediate medical attention.

It seems there hasa been a little game going around the blogsphere the past few days and now I've been included. Thanks Michele, I always hated being left out. :)

Here's how it works: I pick 5 occupations from the list below and complete the statement. I then "tag" 3 other people to post their answers on their blog. If I tag you and you don't want to do it, that's fine. Let me know and I will tag someone else.

Here's the list to choose from:

If I could be a scientist...If I could be a farmer...If I could be a musician...If I could be a doctor...If I could be a painter...If I could be a gardener...If I could be a missionary...If I could be a chef...If I could be an architect...If I could be a linguist...If I could be a psychologist...If I could be a librarian...If I could be an athlete...If I could be a lawyer...If I could be an inn-keeper...If I could be a professor...If I could be a writer...If I could be a llama-rider...If I could be a bonnie pirate...If I could be an astronaut...If I could be a world famous blogger...If I could be a justice on any one court in the world...If I could be married to any current famous political figure...

My Answers:

1. If I could be an athlete... I would ride in the Tour de France and win it of course.

2. If I could be a lawyer... I would work for an organization like The International Justice Mission that fights for the rights of those that can't speak for themselves specifically in the area of injustice of the poor and oppressed.

3. If I could be a justice on any one court in the world... it would be the War Crimes Court in Sierra Leone to make sure the people responsible for the horrific wars in Sierra Leone and Liberia would be brought to justice.

4. If I could be a musician... I would learn to play the piano and play it well. I could sit and listen to the piano for hours.

5. If I could be a linguist... It would make my job right now easier! I would study languages and help people learn to read and write in their own language. I would also help the people at the Jesus Film translate the film into the most remote languages.

So there you have it. Whose idea was this anyway?

The last part. I need to tag 3 people to post their answers on their own blog. I don't know many people who blog that read mine consistently that haven't been tagged already. I think I will pick two now and if you read my blog and would like to be the third just go for it! My two: Sandra and Keith.

Poverty, Corruption and Hope

My home life on the Mercy Ship Anastasis, docked in the port of Monrovia, was disrupted from its usual routine this past weekend. It seems some corrupt people at the port have not been playing nicely and the big guys with the guns had to take care of it. If you want a little more detail than that the BBC explains the UN takeover of the port better in this story.

How was I affected? Shore leave was cancelled from Saturday afternoon until Monday morning. Not only could we not go off the ship but we were asked to not go on the decks of the ship during this time. The white tents of a Nepalese UN camp appreared right outside our gate within days and the security around the ship and port is tighter. Other than that it has been business is usual. The UN takeover was relatively peaceful.

How has the nation of Liberia been affected? Hopefully the goods that come into this large port will go to the people they were intended for and not the few corrupt people of power. Hopefully it will be a warning sign to those who are acting injustly that it will not be tolerated. Hopefully this is just one time of many were injustice and corruption will be exposed.

Corruption is a huge problem in this country and is a contributing factor to the extreme poverty. But this is not the only factor. To read more about global poverty issues check out from the salmon's series on poverty.

The latest post The End of Poverty points out that it all comes back to us believing in the hope and proclaiming God's kingdom .

I Once Was Blind But....

Meet two-year-old twins Assan and Alusan.


Due to being born with catatracts in both eyes about all they could do was detect light and dark but were unable to see. Their family fled neighboring Sierra Leone in 1999 and have been living in an IDP camp since then. They, like many people in Liberia, are unable to afford this simple surgery as they struggle to live on less than a $1 a day.

After hearing about the Mercy Ship docked in the port, Ellen, the boys' mother came to the ship on April 15th. Even though she didn't have an appointment, the staff examined the twins and scheduled them both for a free surgery the following week.

This past Thursday Assan and Alusan had their cataracts removed and on Friday the patches were removed. The improvement was apparent to all around. Their eyes were no longer sunken and unresponsive. Now both boys were able to follow the movements of hands and balloons. It will take a few weeks for their vision system to develop and soon they will be able to see their mother's smile.


Father, bless Assan and Alusan and may they come to know the One who causes the blind to see.

Are You a Doctor?

That's a question I am asked often whenever I go into town. It's understandable since I work on a hospital ship. Truth be told, I've been known to feel faint at the sight of blood.

Lately I've been asked the medical question not just by Liberians but by people who are reading my blog. It occurred to me that I haven't written much about what my job is here in Liberia with Mercy Ships.

This past September I moved from the Chaplaincy (member care) department and began working with the Adult Basic Education team, teaching adult literacy. Our international team is currently made up of 3 women; from France, Lithuania, and myself from the US.

My first experience was in Benin where our team trained 18 local facilitators to teach literacy classes. I oversaw 6 classes, in a village called Hevie, that began in December and are still continuing even though the ship has left. A friend wrote about one of the classes in Hevie here.

Now in Liberia where statistics say the literacy rate is around 40%(the local people laugh at that statistic and say it is much lower) our team has been training 11 facilitators for the past 3 weeks. We are set to open up 3 classes this week. I will be overseeing and teaching for the next month and slowly handing the class over to the facilitators who will keep it going after we leave.

Here in Liberia we are focusing on equipping the churches. So, we are working closely with United Methodist Churches(UMC) and The Association of Evangelicals in Liberia(AEL). It has been a privilege to work alongside the churches in a country that desparately needs the healing work of Jesus Christ.

I would ask for prayer as we start up the classes. The location I will be working in is called Congo Town at the Victory Outreach Church. Directly across the street from the church is a large building that once was the Minstry of Health building before the war. This site was sacked and burned during the war and now has become a squatter camp for people who have no where else to go because their homes were destroyed by the rebels. I am praying for an opportunity to visit this site and invite any interested to come to the classes.

Stay tuned for more...

Dancing Again

A couple of months ago I wrote about the VVF surgeries performed on board while the ship was in Benin. You can read that story here and here.

Now we're in Liberia and there's a whole new group of women receiving surgery during our 3 month period here, 32 in all. These surgeries not only help the women with their physical problem but for many it restores dignity to their life.

"On Tuesday morning, the ward onboard the Anastasis resounded with drumbeat, song, and dance. Five Liberian women in bright new dresses with matching headscarves, surrounded by nurses and newly-made friends from the ship’s crew, prepared to return home. They are among the 32 women receiving treatment onboard the Mercy Ship for vesicovaginal fistulas (VVF), a condition of incontinence caused by obstructed childbirth. "

"Mercy Ships is also partnering with a Liberian surgeon to help women living with VVF in northern Liberia. Dr. Willacor, surgeon at Ganta United Methodist Hospital near the border with Guinea, repairs fistulas but performs relatively few operations because many women cannot afford $150 US to pay for surgery. At the recent Mercy Ships screening at Ganta Hospital in March, HealthCare Services Administrator Norma Forrest promised to find funding for 15 women to receive surgery – a total of $2250 US."

"Each week, the crew of the Anastasis makes a donation to a specific cause and, on April 7, Forrest nominated the Ganta VVF surgeries. Crewmembers – despite being unpaid volunteers supported by the donations of others – gave $5,461."

"Visiting surgeons from around the world are completing six weeks of VVF surgery onboard the Mercy Ship during the present three-month field service phase. More surgeries will be scheduled when the ship returns to Liberia in November for seven months. "

You can read the whole story from our communications department here.

Perspective

It's 11:30 on a Friday night and as I lay in my bed in my cabin on the ship, I see lightning outside. I can hear the rain pounding on my porthole. There's something comforting about being under the covers safe and dry and hearing the rain outside, I always sleep well to the sound of rainfall.

Then I remember where I am and my thoughts quickly turn to the people that live just a few hundred yards from the port, my home in Liberia. The people that live in shacks with roofs that leak or will fall from the weight of the water. The people that live by the river and the water comes rushing into their homes and they lose the little they have.

Lord, comfort those who are affected in a negative way from this pouring rain. May they feel safe from the lightning, may they know your protection and presence. And may they sleep well tonight.

The Story of Liberia

I am presently serving in Liberia, W. Africa. Mercy Ships has committed to work here until early Summer 2006.

Liberia has a rich history and the only W. African country with such a strong connection to the United States. The flag of Liberia, pictured on the right, is a good indication.

"The present-day Republic of Liberia occupies 43,000 square miles (slightly more than Tennessee) in West Africa. It is bordered on the southwest by the Atlantic Ocean and surrounded by Guinea, Sierra Leone, and the Ivory Coast. From antiquity through the 1700s, many ethnic groups from the surrounding regions settled in the area, making Liberia one of Africa's most culturally rich and diverse countries. Settled in the early 1800s by freeborn Blacks and former slaves from America, Liberia, whose name means "land of freedom," has always struggled with its double cultural heritage: that of the settlers and of the indigenous Africans."

"In 1816, a group made up mostly of Quakers and slaveholders in Washington, D.C., formed the American Colonization Society (ACS). The Quakers opposed slavery, and the slaveholders opposed the freedom of Blacks, but they agreed on one thing: that Black Americans should be repatriated to Africa. The Quakers felt that freeborn Blacks and former slaves would face better chances for freedom in Africa than in the United States. They also saw repatriation as a way of spreading Christianity through Africa. The slaveholders' motives were less charitable: They viewed repatriation of Blacks as a way of avoiding a slave rebellion like the one that had taken place on the island of Santo Domingo, today's Haiti."

"Despite opposition from many Blacks and from white abolitonists, the repatriation program, funded by ACS member subscriptions and a number of state legislatures, moved forward. In 1822, the first 86 voluntary, Black emigrants landed on Cape Montserrado, on what was then known as the Grain Coast. They arrived with white agents of the ACS who would govern them for many years. Many others followed, settling on land sometimes purchased, sometimes obtained more forcefully, from indigenous chiefs."

"In 1824, the settlement was named Monrovia, after the American president (and ACS member) James Monroe, and the colony became the Republic of Liberia. Over the next 40 years, 19,000 African American repatriates, sometimes known as Americo-Liberians, settled in Liberia, along with some 5,000 Africans recaptured from slave ships, and a small number of West Indian immigrants."

To read the rest of the story of Liberia's history, click here.

Promise

I recently posted on our medical screenings here and here .

Mercy Ships medical staff is able to help many people that don't have access to medical care. Unfortunately, we are unable to help everyone. It is heart-breaking when you have to tell that person, "I'm sorry but our doctors are unable to help in this situation". Some have spent all they have to travel to the city and I have heard more times than I care to count from those seeking help, "you were my last hope".

This past screening I was outside with the people waiting in line to see the doctors. This is where I met Promise, a young mother, and her 6 month old baby, B.K. B.K has a condition called encephalocele, protrusion of brain tissue through a congenital fissure in the skull . I have seen this condition at many screenings and I hate telling these mothers that we can't perform this type of surgery.

Promise said that we were her last hope. What do you tell a mother when you know her first child will probably die within a few months? I still don't know the answer to that, all I knew to do was sit and cry with her. Promise is a believer and knows God can heal, and we prayed for that but it doesn't take away the pain that a mother must feel.

I went to visit Promise in her home last week. She was surprised to see me and even more surprised that I was able to find her house when I just knew the area she lived in and her name. God divinely put people in my path to ask and help.

B.K looks strong but his head is getting bigger from the fluid on the skull. Promise knows that B.K doesn't have much longer to live. I plan on visiting her more often. I once heard someone speak on the "Ministry of Presence" and I feel that's what God has called me to do at this time, just be there. Your prayers for Promise, her husband, and B.K would be appreciated.

A Taste for the Unlikely

A couple of weeks ago I posted on the medical screening that Mercy Ships held here in Monrovia, Liberia. The following story was written by Claire who works in our Communications department. It gives another side of the screening and reminds me how privileged I am to work with this incredible group of people.

In the early hours of a Saturday morning, Monrovia saw the mobilization of a different force. Not the rag-tag bands of flip-flopped rebel soldiers; nor the motley militias loyal to the government; not even the United Nations peacekeepers in their blue caps and white tanks. A force bringing neither war and conflict, nor peace and negotiation. A much less likely force, bringing hope and healing. The more I work with Mercy Ships, the more I see that God has a penchant for the unlikely. It's unlikely that an ageing passenger and cargo ship, staffed by volunteers of different ages and cultures, would sail to serve in the world's poorest nations. It's unlikely that thousands of people would benefit from free healthcare, free development projects, and free educational programs in three short months. And it's unlikely that at a medical screening of hundreds of war-weary, poverty-stricken people, suffering conditions no developed nation will tolerate, you'd find joy,
peace, and love.

But that's what I saw at the screening in Monrovia's JFK Health Center on Saturday, March 19. Faced with deformed lips, cloudy eyes, and bulging bumps, the crew was ready with broad smiles, kind words, and gentle hands. From Craig, reveling in his first experience of screening as he managed the front of the line, to Deirdre, painstakingly scheduling patients at her thirtieth screening in 18 years. From Lauren, earnestly drawing out patient histories, to James, affably taking patient 'before' pictures. As I walked around the screening site, dropping in on different stations at different stages, I saw the fruits of the Spirit - love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. People working for hours, helping person after person after person, giving their time and energy again and again. Jenni talking with people waiting outside, Linda singing to those waiting inside, Ed testing samples, Sam smiling at the door, Lucy drawing blood, Kristine checking eyesight, Chuck manning the exit, Henry praying with and for those we can't help. All these crewmembers and so many more, and none doing this for money, for acclaim, for anyone they actually know personally. It's all so unlikely - yet this is the force God has mobilized.

Maybe lasting peace in Liberia is unlikely; maybe permanent stability and security in West Africa is unlikely. Then again, light is unlikely in the depths of darkness. Hope is unlikely in the midst of despair. Life is unlikely in a body hanging limp on a wooden cross. Thankfully, our God has a taste for the unlikely.