“Blessed and Highly Favored”

Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Second day in Akurakese

A Tippy Tap in Akurakese

Second days are just simpler. We got ready quicker, we ate quicker, we got to the village a lot quicker and then everything is already relatively organized from the previous day. The team simply grabs the bins and boxes for the pharmacy, re-stocks the table and goes. The doctors even know which tables are theirs and set out their stuff. The kid’s workers grab whatever activities and go find the kids. On top of that, Theo and Monica’s prediction about more patients walking in from nearby came true. They were ready and waiting.

The bottom line is that when all that gets added together, we saw a lot more patients before we quit for the day—about 420. Some of the most commonly used medicines are running low and Charles from Theovision is trying to get some more delivered from Accra to allow the doctors to continue prescribing them.

But second days also allow more time to look around. One thing that really impressed the group was a stroll to the village’s previous latrine—an open pit—and their previous well—an open pit with murky soup almost up to ground level. What a great improvement the new latrine and water pump will be.

Today, fellow HCJB Global missionary Jeremy Maller and I got to set up an obstacle course for a group of boys. We had high stepping, weaving side to side around some coconut halves, hurdling a stick propped up on two stumps and then some jumping on one foot around some rocks. It really got fun when we added a soccer ball and had them do the entire course while kicking the ball along with them. Great fun.

I’ve discovered that on a day like this there is often some little thing that occurs that sticks with you for whatever reason. Today, that little thing happened almost immediately after I got out of the Tro Tro van that delivered us to the village.
A young man was one of the people I greeted as I moved through the gathered crowd toward the site of the clinic. To my typical inquiry of “How are you today?” this young man gave me a poignant reply that I pondered several times throughout the day. “Blessed and highly favored,” was his answer. Not “fine” or “very well, thanks” or any of the stock replies I normally hear—but rather “Blessed and highly favored.” The smile on his face and the joy in his step gave weight to his testimony and it wasn’t long until a group began singing songs of Jesus to kick off our day. No one sang with more joy than that same young man.

I thought of him again later when someone was contemplating out loud about the future plight of some of the young women they had seen. They speculated that most would simply get married, have children, live the majority of their lives in that same village in the same way their mothers did. Indeed it is true and the inequality of their lives in comparison to ours in this world is great and convicting in its own right.

But this man’s reply to my daily inquiry made me realize that in God’s own Kingdom he is indeed “blessed and highly favored.” There is no favoritism placed on our rich nation in God’s house. The young women who marry, bear children and live their whole lives in Akurakese in glorious fellowship with Jesus will not be short changed in the long run. Sheila Leech, HCJB Global’s International Healthcare Director, pointed this out in today’s closing ceremony when she stressed that more important than the physical health of the village and Latrines and Doctors and Clean Water is the relationship between them and Jesus.

And what about me? How many times do I get caught in my own troubles, my own junk? I easily forget that we are co-heirs with Christ --the savior of the world. I am also, by His grace, BLESSED AND HIGHLY FAVORED. May this man’s joy infect my heart!

“And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. To him be the power for ever and ever. Amen.” 1 Peter 5:10-11