Put on the Full Armor of God

This battle against cholera is a spiritual battle.

I think of the mom who sang to the Lord while she labored to deliver her stillborn infant; she recovered and went home later that same day.

I consider the woman who was slowly deteriorating before our eyes. We released her to her family for transfer to another hospital better equipped to diagnose her problems She needed medical help which was beyond the scope of our CTC (Cholera Treatment Center). Instead, they took her to a Voodoo doctor. She died later that same day.

I remember the young man asleep at the foot of his ailing mother’s bed, waking from a heinous nightmare and fleeing the camp, knocking over IV stands and startling patients and their families as he ran by. The Haitians all said it was a result of Voodoo influences.

That same night, we heard Voodoo chanting off in the distance.

Yes, we come with lots of IV solution fluids, some clinical expertise and servant’s hearts. But the work we do is the work of the Lord. It is only He who saves. We press into His presence, waiting for a word from the Lord, a reminder that when we are weak then we are strong, Perhaps He will whisper that He loves us and approves of us. Sometimes we just need to be still and soak in His grace. Then we can put on the armor of God.

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Ephesians 6:12

mattpowellphoto.com Used with permission of Samaritan's Purse

Though He slay me, yet will I hope in Him

Photo: www.mattpowellphoto.com Used with permission of Samaritan's Purse

She was 25 years old and nine months pregnant, happily anticipating the birth of her fourth child. Then, cholera struck like lightening. She was admitted early Wednesday morning with severe dehydration.
She wasn’t surprised by my news; she hadn’t felt the baby move since the day before. Losing a baby is part of life here, something to accept and move on from. In fact, she was able to sing to the Lord between contractions, still finding something for which to be thankful.
She progressed rapidly and gave birth to a beautiful, perfectly formed but lifeless baby girl. She had a chance to see and hold her, but also needed to collect herself to recover from this deadly disease so she could return home and care for her three other children.
While I observed her over the next several hours, I cleaned up, put unused supplies away, prepped the infant’s body for burial and made rounds to make sure that the rest of the staff were handling their responsibilities alright.
She was stable, and I could find plenty of other things to do, but God prompted me not to forget her. I went in to check on her about 2:30 in the morning. I can’t tell you how thankful I am that God had me check on her. She was tossing and turning, agitated and cramping everywhere like many of the other cholera patients I have seen when they are on the verge of cardiovascular collapse. Her pulse and respiratory rates were dangerously high. What was puzzling was instead having of a weak and thready pulse, hers was bounding. We confirmed a dangerously high blood pressure accompanied by hyper reflexes, suggesting pre-eclampsia, a serious complication of pregnancy. 
Was she about to start seizing from severe pre-cclampsia? Or was she about to go into shock? What to do?
Lacking more diagnostic tools, we had no choice but to rely on the Lord to guide us. With His guidance, we started a second IV line and ran in a liter of fluid as fast as possible. She began to respond as we had hoped. Praise the Lord!
By the grace of God, the next afternoon she was able to go home to her children.
How thankful I am that God watched over our little OB ward that night. I consider it a miracle that in the midst of a cholera treatment center, in the middle of the night, we were equipped to help her. He is a personal and loving God who knit her infant daughter together in her womb and knew the days He had for her. He smiled on that mama as she sang songs of praise between labor pains. It would have been very disheartening to lose both infant and mama. He was gracious to us.

I know that the Lord secures justice for the poor and upholds the cause of the needy. Surely the righteous will praise your name and the upright will live before you. —Psalm 140:12 & 13

Though He slay me yet will I hope in Him. —Job 13:15

Responding to Cholera

Haiti Cholera Appeal.mov

Meeting Jesus, Face to Face

My son keeps telling me that I should expect to meet Jesus in Haiti. I have met him. In this case, His name was Lexie, but among ourselves, we called him “Legion”.

An outcast of Haitian society, this homeless old man suffering from schizophrenia somehow found his way to our clinic to be treated for cholera. He was more at home lying on the hard ground than on a cot. It was hard to tell how long his nails had gone untrimmed. But they were long enough and thick enough to dig a hole a few feet in diameter and several inches deep.

Other patients were frightened by his behavior and we found it very challenging to care for him. But our hearts embraced him as over the days we found creative ways to meet some of his basic needs. It soon became apparent that while his cholera was improving, he was soon going to die.

We cut his nails with wire cutters. During one of his lucid moments, chaplains with BGEA, prayed with him to receive Christ. We gave him a secluded spot under a tarp to get out of the elements. We bathed him and dressed him as tenderly as if he was a family member and he allowed us to move him to a bed. Then one night his breathing changed into the pattern that warns of impending death.

Joanie sat with him for hours as his breathing became more labored. She couldn’t bear for him to die alone. I had the privilege of spelling her from time to time to care for her other patients.

Then we began to wonder, why was he still lingering? There was no earthly reason he was still alive. Then it occurred to me; God was not finished with him yet. Reminded that hearing is the last sense to go and knowing the language, I was moved to sing one of the only Kreyol songs I know, Tout bagay va bien, Lakay Papa mwen. Everything’s alright in my Father’s house. I began to pray for him in Kreyol that he would rest in his Father’s house, in His arms. I prayed that he would realize that he was a precious child of God and that his heavenly Father was just waiting to look at him face to face and say, “I love you my precious child”.

Then I saw it. A single tear gathered in the corner of his eye. I wiped it and another formed. Moved to tears myself, I tenderly spoke and stroked his face, telling him it was ok to go to his heavenly home. He died several hours later, but not alone.

My son is right; we met Jesus face to face as we cared for this man.

'Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.' Matthew 25:40

Jesus wept

Photo by Matt Powell, photographer, Samaritan's Purse

Running a 150 bed ICU with a skeleton crew, in the dirt, under tarps, in blistering temperatures. Starting two intraosseous lines and one intravenouss line in the same infant. Prepping a fresh corpse. Setting up cots for a steady stream of critically ill patients arriving one right after the other. Working  without understanding the language. Watching as patients repeatedly fill the basins strategically placed under their beds with rice water. These are daily realities.
To say this work is demanding is an understatement. Most of us push through our shift, not thinking about the reality of the challenges and conditions before us.
We seem to take turns letting down our guard and feeling the impact of what we are living through.
When that happens, we cry together. Like when Lazarus died. Jesus wept. But not when He heard the news of his death; He wept when he witnessed Mary's grief.
I ate breakfast this morning with Dr. Tom Wood, staff epidemiologist with Samaritan's Purse. He was on the team that developed oral rehydration solution in 1963 while stationed in the Philippines with the Navy. His team developed ORS for the annual outbreaks of El Toro, the same strain of cholera attacking Haiti. He told me this morning according to the UN,  an acceptable mortality rate in a Cholera Treatment Center is 5%. He then told me that our mortality rate is 0.7%. 
This could only be possible with God! 
So, we are Jesus to each other and we remember that He has won the battle.

I will help you find your way through the night

Here in Haiti with Samaritan's Purse we are fighting a battle. Our visible enemy is irascible, extremely irritable, wrathful, hot tempered, quick to strike. The enemy is cholera. The route of the word "choleric", meaning "easily angered, hot tempered". It is volatile and violent. It attacks swiftly, does its damage and moves on.
We fight another battle against a hidden enemy. The enemy of overwhelming inadequacy, fear and discouragement.
Yesterday when I was exhausted after a 13 hour night shift, I was emotionally and spiritually spent. I went to sleep listening to a movie soundtrack containing a song which contains the following lyrics:

When you are a soldier I will be your shield
I will go with you into the battlefield
And when the arrows start to fly
Take my hand and hold on tight
I will be your shield, 'cause I know how it feels
When you are a soldier

When you're tired from running
I will cheer you on
Look beside you and you'll see you're not alone
And when your strength is all but gone
I'll carry you until you're strong
And I will be your shield 'cause I know how it feels
When you're a soldier

I will be the one you can cry your songs to
My eyes will share your tears

And when you are a soldier

And the enemy is closing in
I will fight with you until the end

When you're lost in darkness I will hold the light
I will help you find your way through the night
I'll remind you of the truth
And keep the flame alive in you
And I will be your shield
'Cause I know how it feels
When you are a soldier

I wept into my pillow when I heard this song. Even though I was mentally and physically exhausted, my spirit was refreshed by my loving Heavenly Father. The same loving Heavenly Father who cares for each one of the Haitians who have fallen ill with the dreaded cholera. That He would enter into our suffering to sustain and comfort us is humbling, to say the least.

I spent a few hours this morning getting my bearings at Samaritan's Purse Cholera Treatment Center in Bercy before  I return tonight for a long night shift. Bercy is a small community just north of our base. The CTC  now consists of 12 tents with 8 to 12 beds apiece. These beds are wooden cots with the requisite hole cut out of the middle, lined with the ubiquitous SP blue tarp. A basin sits strategically placed underneath. To say the conditions are rustic is an understatement. Even so, every precaution that can be taken is being carefully adhered to.
When we arrived this morning to relieve the night shift, all of whom were worn out, we had to quickly adjust our North American standards to third world (or fourth? fifth even?) survival mode. This adjustment can be difficult to say the least. 
The realization that not all will be saved doesn't sit well for some of us. If they get to us in time, if an IV can be started, if there are no underlying risk factors or complications, they have an excellent chance of returning home. Once they have ceased vomiting and are rehydrated enough to urinate, off they go to make room for the next stricken person. This morning I sent 6 people home. Their beds were immediately occupied.
And then there is the fear in their eyes. Will I get better? When? Will my family be spared? What if it comes back?
Only Jesus can speak to their fears. That is the primary reason we are here. At least that is why I am here. I am not an infectious disease specialist, epidemiologist, IV whiz, or public health expert. I know a bit of the language and have decent assessment skills. But more importantly, I know Jesus. He can save. He can heal. Heavenly Father, let me Jesus to these who suffer.

Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go. Joshua 1:9

"For such a time as this"

I've been hearing the phrase, "for such a time as this" quite often lately. Do you ever have moments in your life when you can see that many things in your experience has prepared you for just this moment? Now is one of those moments for me. 


Who would know that a new nurse-midwife yanked from language school on the heels of a revolution to assist with trauma cases would one day return there to serve the people of Haiti in their fight against cholera?  Who would know that a nurse-midwife reluctantly thrown into international community health nursing and later trained to teach WASH principles would have the small opportunity to combat a deadly water-borne disease? 


Just received word that I leave Friday for Haiti as part of Samaritan's Purse's most recent response to the cholera crisis in Haiti. I will be working in their clinic in Cite Soleil, a slum in Port-au-Prince. I believe I will be working as a nurse, but could be working in several different roles.  


To say I am excited to go, is not quite accurate. That is not to say that I am reluctant or afraid. And yes, there is a bit of excitement as I think about the challenges that lie ahead. But mostly, I feel very humbled and sobered. That God would pluck me from my comfortable and privileged life here in the foothills of the Oregon Cascades and trust me to serve Him in this way fills me with awe.

For if you remain still at this time, relief and deliverance will arise for the Haitians from another place and you and your family's house will miss the blessing. And who knows whether you have not attained your present position for such a time as this?
 Esther 4:13-14, my personal paraphrase

But right here, right here for this time and place

You can live a mirror of His mercy

A forgiven image of grace

            Wayne Watson, “For Such a Time as This”

God is Gracious

Haiti is digging out of a quagmire of mud as a result of flooding following the narrow miss with Hurricane Tomas. God heard the cries of His people there and spared them a direct hit. Thank you Father. You are gracious. Now please spare them the ravages of a spreading cholera outbreak.


God is also gracious to our family in so many ways. David and I returned from a trip to Africa. He spent six weeks photographing for an evangelist, an adoption agency, a water ministry, a missionary vet and the small medical team I was a part of.


One of our sons has safely returned from Cambodia and Thailand where he served with YWAM on an outreach mission of  three months. He is now focusing on "friend" raising to return to YWAM on staff. His hope is to co-lead teams to Haiti within the coming year.


Our other son, a self-proclaimed "prodigal", has returned to the fold. Our family had a the sweet privilege of participating in his baptism with his small group at Calvary Chapel in his college town. God is so faithful!

For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus. Philippians 1:6