goodbye to the Government Maternity Hospital

We finished our time at the Hosptital. It seems like yesterday that i walked onto the compound like a schoolgirl--nervousness, excitement, and expectancy all churning in my belly. Now we commit the babies born, the mothers loved, and the seeds of hope planted into the hands of the Almighty...

A view from the roof intoone of the courtyards full of waiting families.

Our prayer corner on the roof.

3 Generations...

Where thousands of screaming babies have been weighed and welcomed.

GHM is a place where God taught me that grace could be found in unusual places.

Hundreds of stories of the King were shared, i think the babies will pass them on...

Noel spelled H-E-N-R-Y

This Saturday morning I went strolling down Abids. Abids is a busy street where life happens. My nostrils took in the polluted air, but it didn't bother me like it did when we first moved here. Buses, cars, and rickshaws zoomed past us and occasionally a rickshaw would stop to see if we wanted a ride. I dropped a rupee into the hand of a sweet elderly woman, her severely deformed legs peeked out from under her skirt. A group of school children clothed in uniform stared, giggled, and then shyly waved. The school children, especially the girls, always wave. I was not alone, in fact I was in great company. My friends Hollie and Noel walked alongside me chatting and taking in the sights, smells and sounds. Although it all sounds quite glorious, one actually grows used to it. All the specifics fade into the sum of the city... Back to my company, we have all grown quite fond of Noel. Maybe it's his gentleness or his secret intellect or his genuine care for one's well-being. He is famous for saying, "My name is H-E-N-R-Y but you can call me Noel." I can still hear him spelling it out, never actually saying "Henry." Noel lives somewhere close by, although I'm not sure quite where. Maybe he sleeps on a street corner that he calls his own or in a makeshift shack. I wouldn't call Noel a begger, he's never asked for anything. You see Noel used to work in a bank and was even in the peace corp for a while. You wouldn't guess that about him unless you talked to him for a while. He has long grey locks that are always slicked back, a wiry frame, a kind face, and an unabashed smile revealing several missing teeth. He has one shirt, one pair of pants, and a pair of sandals that have holes worn all the way through. Noel wanders the streets in our neighborhood, and when he sees us he always politely asks how we've been and if we have "taken breakfast." This morning Hollie and I took Noel christmas shopping. A whopping $8 bought him a plaid button down, long-sleeved shirt and a new pair of trousers. He picked the cheapest. Once a bright little school girl told us not to talk to Noel because he was a begger. Hollie smiled and responded, "He's my friend."
Why do I introduce you to Noel? Because he's precious and he teaches me about life. I'm not sure how to put it all into words, how can an individual be put accurately into words? words no matter how extravagant cannot perfectly describe something living, breathing, changing, moving, feeling...although somehow i try.
One night i was walking home past the small chapel near where we stay. there were people inside and the priest was leading them in prayer over a loud-speaker in a deep, mono-tone voice. there were people looking around and teenagers talking. and then i saw him. i stopped and a tear built up in my eye. in the pew closest to the exit sat Noel with his hands in his face. i think Jesus would have been friends with Noel had they ever crossed paths....
but maybe they have, and maybe they are...
maybe i just want people to love people more...especially the outcasts, the poor, the lonely, the mistreated, the misunderstood. i think Jesus was that way. He loved people. Free of charge. No strings attached. Without thinking about how He might be blessed. He loved people.
Lord, grant that I may seek rather to comfort than to be comforted; to understand than to be understood; to love than to be loved; for it is by forgetting self that one finds; it is by forgiving that one is forgiven; it is by dying that one awakens to eternal life. --Mother Theresa

i'm dreaming of a white christmas...

This Christmas morning i awoke to the sound of a crackling fire and the smell of freshly made coffee. i layed for another moment in my cozy bed indulging myself in a few more minutes of dreaminess. oh it is Christmas morning, what a merry day! i arose and stretched, oh the bliss of a quiet, still dawn. presents, friends, laughter, tasty treats...i glanced towards the window and what did my eyes behold?? could it really be?? was i dreaming? i jumped up and almost stumbled over my slippers as i raced towards the window. my eyes focused in on the flittering snowflakes, carelessly floating down from the early morning sky. as i gazed into the courtyard i saw the cook's 2 precious girls placing the final touches on a perfectly jolly snowman. a sweet carol began to fall from my lips, and then to my pleasant surprise all my room-mates joined in. we sang in perfect harmony and then began to dance around the room with perfect grace and balance....yeah right. and then frosty came alive and joined us for morning tea and cookies.
well Christmas in india has been good, but not exactly as i explained above. not even close, really. we spent a quarter buying each person stocking stuffers. yes, a quarter on each person which is 10 rupees. we received bracelets and earrings and chocolate and pens and gum! we don't have a tree, so we gathered around a nativity scene that we each contributed to. i made mary. my friend hollie made baby Jesus, she even crocheted Him a little hat...the whole gang was tacked to the wall from the angel to the shepherds. they were a motley crew, but hey we made do. after we had opened all our little treats, we sat around and laughed and chatted and played silly games. some of us went to a midnight mass at the catholic church on the compound on which we are staying. we sang songs and stared at all the brightly dressed indian women and the children in new outfits. we gladly went inside when they announced that although they were glad that visitors had come to their service, holy communion was only for catholics. i was nodding off at that point, it was almost 2am. today we slept in and awoke for breakfast and the exchanging of "secret santa" gifts. and no there are no fire places, crackling fires, or snowmen. it was so stinkin' hot today we thought about going swimming. we ate a buffet lunch and stuffed ourselves. swimming, yeah right. we went home with our full bellies for an afternoon nap.
this is my first Christmas away from home. i guess it's not too bad because it still doesn't seem like it's really Christmas. no lights. no people ringing bells on storefronts collecting change for the poor. no sitting in my living room decked out in my pajamas with my dear family to open gifts. no driving around and admiring the christmas lights and decor. no children's christmas pageant. it's just another day. no that's not true, it is a special day to remember one of the most historic moments of all time. God came to earth. and He came as a baby. innocent. dependent. perfect. He came down to us and lived a life of suffering, humiliation, compassion, and servant hood. He died a criminal's death. what does it all mean? what does it mean for human kind? what does it mean for me? for you? this is a time for pondering. for searching. for finding. for loving. for giving.
merry Christmas

*me and my 2 german team mates, renate and aline. aren't they precious?

for christmas day

Did Mary say to Joseph tenderly,
'Such little hands, such little feet!
They be like little shells we've found beside the sea,
the sea of Galilee'?

And did wise Joseph answer,
'For love's sake our love shall shelter Him, inclose, and hold,
As the low hills about that silver lake shelter it, fold on fold'?

Across the stable, like a wind-a breath-
'The wicked have inclosed Me,' it saith.
'Thou hast brought Me into dust of death.'
Into the dust of death.

And then did Joseph's father-like surprise,
As round his finger little fingers curled,
Call smiles and tears to Mary's mother-eyes?
He clings who'll save the world.

And as the Child in His soft manger lay,
Did gentle oxen in their language say,
'A mangerful of our sweet-smelling hay --
Our gift this Christmas day'?

Again that breath -- An unregarded tree
is growing somewhere, making wood to be,
One awful day, the Cross of Calvary.
The Cross of Calvary.

O Lord, we adore Thee!
The wicked did inclose Thee;
Pierced were Thy hands and feet for us -for me-
O Child of Bethlehem,
Christ our dear Redeemer,
We come and we adore Thee,
We come and we adore Thee,
We come and we adore Thee,
Christ our Lord.

Merry Christmas everyone!

*Poem by Amy Carmichael

life in pictures

from becca's heart

"I held a perfect little boy the other day, newborn and beautiful. But he didn't have breath. During the birth we knew he was expected to be dead and we spoke as many words of life as we could.
He arrived silently and limp. His mother cried when we put him on her chest and she touched his perfect face and looked away. I cried too.
I took him into the newborn room, weighed him and held him in my arms, listening to his silence.
I wanted to yell and shake him, or let loose a piercing wail to defy the silence of his perfect body. I had never seen a stillborn baby look so perfect, so capable of being alive and crying and growing and loving.
But I just held him and stared and some tears escaped and the world continued to spin.
If Jesus were in the room I would have shouted at him--if you're the son of God, then raise this baby from the dead. And go into the labour room and take away the pain of all those women. And while you're at it you might as well turn some rocks into bread or rice because there's alot of hungry people outside.
Jesus has heard those accusations before. We want these acts of power, we want him to violently overthrow the Roman soldiers or instantly change a terrible situation. We want him to make everything better.
And he will. But he chooses a different way than we would. He sits in a temple in Nazareth, he stands holding a dead infant in India and says: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has annointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind and to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favour.
And there is much I do not understand. Every so often he does raise a little one from the dead, and I feel the first breaths of ressurection in my own heart and now and then. But Jesus chooses the way of suffering love, of feeding people with a child's lunch, saving an adulterous woman from being stoned, sitting with a Samaritan woman at a well in the heat of the day. Maybe he does some healthcare teachings in a slum and makes some children laugh.
We want him to kill the Roman soldiers. He disarms us with stories and tells us to take up our cross. And somehow this is the way of the infinitely vulnerable IAM God and the patient salvation of the world."
--becca carter, my beloved outreach leader

resolve

(*3 days after i posted this blog doctors started to come back to the hospital...praise Jesus)
so i've been remembering back to my days in oaxaca. more specifically i've been reminded of the strike that went on for months and months. protests. suffering. disagreement. selfishness.
last monday some politician assaulted a doctor, i'm not sure why. so now there is a city-wide strike. the post-grad docs have been striking for a week. this is not good because they make up the majority of the staff in most hospitals here and do most of the work. the only doctors i've seen all week are head doctors that mostly only supervise and do surgeries.
the assault happened at a children's hospital and the word is that a lot of children are dying because of it. i see it first had. the maternity hospital we've been working in is way understaffed, but that's how it is in every hospital in the city. people are suffering and dying over some stupid political argument that i don't even understand. we have been working more and sending some girls for night-shifts to help pick up the slack. the girls and i have basically been doing the work of these post-grad docs who have studied for 5-7 years.
crazy? yes. absurd.
we are doing what we can, but the strike needs to end. i have seen more deaths in the past week than i have ever seen. i don't like it. GMH sees hundreds of women a day and anywhere between 70-80 births a day. they also receive referrals from all other maternity hospitals in the area, which means that other hospitals send GMH tough cases and people who can't pay.
several nights ago i was on night shift with 3 other girls. there had been a woman there all day with a heart condition. she delivered in the afternoon a beautiful little boy, dead. he was perfect, but lacking breath. she was laying on one of the beds trying to get some sleep. i was conducting a delivery in the very next bed when my staff hollie and i saw that she was having a fit. she had turned onto her belly and every muscle in her thin body was hard and flexed. hollie yelled for the 2 doctors on duty. the next thing i knew they were doing chest compressions and mouth to mouth. then i delivered a beautiful baby girl. hollie walked past me and said, "that woman just died." my world stood still. how could it be? they had to be wrong. couldn't something be done? the husband and 3 women were brought in. there was crying. the new life on her mother's breast right in front of me, and the mourning family behind me. they left, alone. i turned around and saw the woman covered with a blanket, still. why? something in my heart says it didn't need to happen that way.
we are praying that people will come to their senses, that they would get over themselves and come back to work. pray.
please pray for us too. that we would work with passion and discernment and diligence. the doctors who have been working are worn out. they've been mostly without sleep for the past week. pray for resolve.
i will have night shift tonight and tomorrow night.
Lord send your angels to minister. Jesus, come so that they might have life, and life to the full...

strangers...

we just finished 3 weeks of fasting for the city we're in, mainly the hospital we've been working in. many of us came to a breaking point. we needed more of God. more of His wisdom. more of His strength. more of His power. more of His grace. more of His peace. more of His love. we cried out in desperation for Him to move, to stir, to act...

blow a trumpet in Zion, consecrate a fast,

proclaim a solemn assembly,

gather the people,

sanctify the congregation...
yesterday we met together for worship, thanksgiving, and to share what God had been speaking to us during our fasting. i sat under the weight of the Almighty as my dear sisters shared about my Lord. He is so faithful. He proved Himself at work and always present. a Rock in whom we can put our trust for eternity. as we took turns fasting throughout we cried out to God on behalf of the people here. not only have we seen more favor with the staff, but more opportunities to speak of the love of Christ. another girl and i were able to take 2 of the doctors out to lunch last week. i also went back with becca to visit sunitha ( a woman i posted about a couple weeks ago.) we found her this time with smiles instead of tears, and she said she had been reading a page of the bible every day! God is so good.

do not fear, O land, rejoice and be glad,

for the Lord has done great things...

God spoke to me personally from 1 Peter. i think i identified so much because the letter was written to a scattered church in a land that was not their own. his exhortations called them out to be "excellent" in their behavior and also to be holy as He was holy. somehow i think this is key. as we're strangers here in a foreign land we should try to live up to the Standard each moment. he said, " honor all people, love the brotherhood, fear God, honor the king." after reading that i stopped and pondered for a bit. i could spend the rest of my life trying to live that out. what does excellent behavior look like? Jesus. hmmm....
ok well, it's another day to pick up the cross and to deny myself and to follow Him. to speak what He spoke. to pray what He prayed. to love how He loved. to go where He went. wanna come?