Shadow of His Wings

My view for the day

Verse of the Day: “Your goodness is as high as the mountains…God your love is so precious!  You protect people in the shadow of your wings.” Psalm 36:6-7

Praying with our patients before the start of the day

This verse in my devotional today was very fitting to our travels up into the mountains for several reasons but more on that later.  Breakfast was a 6AM wakeup call to fuel up for our hour and a half bus trek out of morning rush hour city traffic and into the windy switchbacks of the mountain terrain—all the while dodging dump trucks and random obstacles along our way.  This is a new area that previous teams have not yet provided for so there was a lot of logistics to work out throughout the day.  When we arrived about 100 people were already waiting for us.  We set up our base in a cement church building sectioning things out and attempting to bring order to the patients waiting to be seen. 

 

Duck, Duck, Goose

Overall this was a more aggressive and chaotic crowd than myself or any of my other team members had experienced in medical missions before.   Thank goodness we at least had a number system where each person or family got an ordered card in which to be seen.  But this soon turned into “I’m her cousin twice removed, so I’m going to get seen with her” and soon the group sizes associated with each number were 6-7 each, and there would suddenly be 10-15 adults and kids surrounding our triage stations.  With limited space in the church and further attempts to keep order, we had everyone wait outside in a covered tent…but inch by inch they would continue to slide in along the walls or in through the side doors…on repeat, to the point where we had to put a tape line across the doors to keep order. 

My clinic for the day

Meanwhile outside our hospitality team did an amazing job trying to keep the kids entertained and occupied.  These kids are not used to having much structure to their play time or any experience in arts/crafts so attempts here ended in chaos.  We were also down a couple translators and our ball pump was broken so they grabbed the only shade tree and kept them entertained and mostly out of trouble. They definitely nailed it describing duck, duck, goose via charades without a translator!

By the end of the day, nearly everyone got seen and received their care and medications and we bounced our way back down the mountain.  Some good conversation was triggered this evening looking at pulling back and viewing the situation through their eyes.  In their current state of poverty, they are in a survivor mentality.  It doesn’t matter that the person next to you is just as ill or was there before you—their goal was simply to gain provision and be loved on as soon as possible and by whatever means possible.  The verse above was an awesome picture to me on how even though we were able to provide only a small portion of their needs, God’s always got this.  He has them protected in the shadow of his wings, way up there in the mountains, and they are loved preciously!!