Every Tuesday morning we go and visit the hospital in town to visit and pray for the sick. The hospital is like no hospital in the states. The walls are covered in filth, the beds reek of vomit and urine, there is no privacy for any of the patients doesn’t matter what sickness they have. As you look around you see minimal supplies, and used syringes laying about the hospital.
On this particular morning as we were going around from bed to bed praying for people and we came across this three week old baby. The little baby was in the hospital fighting off Malaria since she was only one week old. Her mother told us thateach day she gets better, but a struggle because she was also born pre-mature. As we were praying for this beautiful baby girl, all I kept thinking was how God has been so present in this little girls life since the day she was born and I felt this feeling that He has a special plan for this child. She has fought and survived being born pre-mature, and now is fighting and winning against a sickness that claims so many lives, being only three weeks old.
As we moved on to visit more patients in the hospital we came across a sixteen year old girl who had a one month old baby. The sixteen year old girl needed a blood transfusion and has been waiting in the hospital since Thursday. Back in the states a blood transfusion would be considered a simple procedure, that probably would only take a couple of hours, but in Africa since supplies are so limited it takes up to a couple of weeks to get. The thing that broke my heart was the image of the sixteen year old. The girls was made up of only skin and bone. Her legs were no bigger than the size of my arm and the only thing on her arms were literally bone covered with skin. Imagining how a teenager who is only sixteen years of age, who is malnourished and starving herself able to take care of a one month old baby. As I looked at the baby and her mother, questions kept popping up in my head; will this baby grow up starving?, will she be able to attend school?, will she always be sick from not getting enough nutrients?, will this little baby girl ever make it past the age of one? As these questions came all I could was turn to God and pray that He will provide and protect this baby girl. It kills me to think that back in the states we throw so much of our food essentials away, not even thinking twice that this food could be used to save a little girls life like this one.
This trip has opened my eyes to the things that we have, the things given to us that seem so simple but here they could be the most difficult. I know when I come back I will appreciate everything that I have, and will always remember that I am truly blessed in my life.
