Wonder

Our last night at Tenwek we had a quick wrap up meeting. At the end of our meeting, Russ prayed for the team, prayed in thankfulness for the 2 weeks that had happened and lifted up our continued involvement at Tenwek. During his prayer he basically praised God for caring enough about these few patients out of all the people in the world that he would reach down and work miracles and heal their hearts. It really is astounding. The idea brought tears to my eyes...that God would love any one of us so much that he would do such a mighty thing. These events are clearly a big life event for our patients, but it is amazing to me that He would give me something as simple as a sunrise or a bird singing or a moment to not be busy during the day to rest. They are all big deals and I speed through life not noticing the magnitude.
That is one thing being at Tenwek always teaches me...pole pole. This is the Swahili phrase for slowly. It is funny because we hear our Kenyan nurses saying it a lot-to our patients, to each other....everyone walks slowly throughout the compound, there are numerous chai breaks during a day. There is a lot of time for slowly and it always takes getting used to when I first arrive. But now that I am home I miss that. I don't like the constant busy, the constant entertainment world we live in of smart phones and distraction and noise. I want the quiet and slow pace back. Even though I work like a dog while I am there, this pace is in the background and it impacts life.
A week ago Dotta passed away, so I thought I would include some photos of him. I could never get him to smile for the camera or really to even look at it. These are a few of him during the first week when he was in the unit before surgery. I continue to pray for his mother, Deborah and the rest of their family in Tanzania.