One question I've been asked repeatedly during this time in the States is, "Did you ever in a million years expect you'd be doing this?" The answer, of course, is "No". While I expected to be involved in missions on some level throughout my life and while I've been preparing to be a doctor since age four, I still had some vague expectation in my brain of being a soccer mom in the suburbs somewhere. I didn't expect to live my life with roosters and donkeys for alarm clocks, to raise money to build a house in Burundi (where's that?), to rarely treat an ear infection but daily treat AIDS patients, to be faculty at a Christian medical school in one of the poorest countries in the world. But then expectations are funny things. God seems to be in the habit of surprising me beyond my wildest dreams (or expectations) with His great joy and provision and purpose. And of course challenges are a part of that as well, but I'm thankful He's the One who holds my future and, as my Heavenly Father, He gives the best gifts to me, His child.
Below follow three unexpected opportunities from this past week:
I'm so thankful for the doctors, missionaries, and mentors who discipled me and inspired me during my training years. Last weekend, I spoke to medical students from the two Alabama medical schools about missions, medicine, and suffering. I didn't expect to lecture on suffering at this stage in my life. But witnessing death daily changes one's perspective. Especially when those deaths are of children who have preventable or curable illnesses. I shudder to remember one day at Tenwek when I as the pediatrician had FIVE end-of-life discussions with families. Sadly, ironically, I learned the Swahili needed to discuss these difficult things, but I never did learn the vocabulary terms for buying eggs in the market. But through processing these tragedies, I learned so much about God's presence and peace that I had never understood before. I love this Frederick Buechner quote:
"What about when the boy is not healed? When, listened
to or not listened to, the prayer goes unanswered? Who knows? Just keep
praying, Jesus says. Remember the sleepy friend, the crooked judge. Even if the
boy dies, keep on beating the path to God's door, because the one thing you can
be sure of is that down the path you beat with even your most half-cocked and
halting prayer the God you call upon will finally come, and even if he does not
bring you the answer you want, he will bring you himself. And maybe at the
secret heart of all our prayers that is what we are really praying for."
While I've always liked children, I never expected to find myself speaking to 500 pre-K through 6th graders at an affluent private elementary school on the topic of poverty! But what an opportunity to influence these future leaders for the Kingdom! Below is the main slide from my talk explaining the four different kinds of poverty (from the "When Helping Hurts" book).
Course they were most excited about the picture of the girl bit by the
hippo and the houses with grass roofs. One recommendation: if you're
ever speaking to five year olds, don't ask rhetorical questions! They
will try
to answer! :) The kids were adorable and I enjoyed hearing their
questions and comments later in the day when I spoke to just the fourth
grade classes. I've scanned a couple of the third graders' thank you
notes below:
And the last unexpected opportunity of this past week occurred on Thursday when I was invited to investigate the contents of a warehouse full of medical supplies to see what our team could use. What a huge need this nonprofit organization is meeting for medical missionaries and mission hospitals around the world! But it's pretty overwhelming to consider what supplies would be relevant and practical for Burundi. Do we need a windmill? I'm certainly no engineer to know if that would help solve our water or electricity problems. Is the roof of the hospital stable enough to hold up ceiling mounted OR lights? What would we do with a defibrillator if we have no ventilators or ICU or even oxygen on the wards? What medical supplies are available locally in Burundi? And how easy is it to get these things through customs? I'm thankful for teammates and experienced friends who can help answer some of these questions! What a huge unexpected blessing that I'm not in this alone!And thanks so much to those of you who prayed for my presentations and the events of this week - God truly did answer those prayers!
