As the sun sets on another day of our 2017 medical mission
to Uganda, I can’t help but SEE all of the beauty that this country has to
offer.
Two days ago, we packed up our supplies and drove 3 hours
from our “eye home base” of Mbarara to a town called Rukungiri. Then on Monday and Tuesday we have driven an
hour, down dusty roads, to a village called Bwambara.
This is our third trip to Bwambara, but our
first since 2014. Both the drive to
Bwambara and the village are examples of Nat Geo Africa. The beautiful scenery, the agrarian culture,
the wonderful people, and the simple lifestyle are truly unique.
On the drive in on Monday, we recalled some of our patients
that we had found in Bwambara in the past.
One of the most special was Emmanuel.
We were introduced to Emmanuel in 2014 while we were doing our medical
clinic, and noticed that he had a problem with his left eye. We were able to take Emmanuel to Mbarara to
Ruharo Eye Hospital. He was found to
have congenital glaucoma and the surgeons actually had to remove his L
eye. You will not believe how well
Emmanuel is doing now! He was there to
greet us when we arrived on Monday.
Emmanuel initially |
Emmanuel after surgery |
We also met a new young friend that became a “that one
person” on Monday. I would like for you
to meet Phiona. She is a 6 year old girl
that start having a “scar” near her left eyebrow 2 years ago. Now she has a more prominent knot between her
eyebrows and some protruding of her left eye.
She still has vision in the eye and good light recognition, so hopefully
we have caught her problem early enough.
My concern, and that of the eye doctor working with us, is that she might
have a rhabdomyosarcoma, which is what our friend Joseph (from Mytiana) had. Our first step will be to have Phiona travel
to Mbarara with the other eye patients to be seen by an eye specialist.
We have scheduled 16 eye patients on Monday and 11 on
Tuesday. This brings us to a total of 78
so far over 6 clinics. We have two more
clinics, this week, before our surgery campaign starts on Sunday. Please keep all of these people in your
prayers as many of them will have to travel long distances to start this process. The funding for these patients will be
significant.
On Monday evening, Pastor Elisha came to our guest house for
a visit. We talked about many things but
one of the things that we talked about was how our “spiritual care” part of our
clinic was working. As we discussed the
150-200 patients that have accepted Christ, he talked about something that struck
me. I have heard this term before. I have even used these terms before, but I
saw it in a new way. He mentioned how we
were using the treatment of “physical eyes” to gain access to their “spiritual
eyes”.
We are seeing and treating many people, both young and old,
with physical cataracts. But how many
people do we pass on the street with cataracts on their spiritual eyes? They witness a sunset, a baby’s birth, a healing,
or a restored relationship, but they fail to “see” God in those things because
of the cataracts on their spiritual eyes.
They hear the story of Christ’s birth at Christmas and His death/resurrection
at Easter, but they fail to “see” God because of those same spiritual
cataracts. Now, I think that the
cataracts on spiritual eyes have something in common to the physical
cataracts. This is that the longer they
remain and the older the person gets, the thicker and more dense the cataract
becomes. I pray that all of these people
with cataracts on their spiritual eyes have that cataract fall off like the
scales from Paul’s eyes in Acts 9:18:
Immediately, something
like scales fell from Saul's eyes, and he could see again. He got up and was
baptized,
We have another new prayer request. Through our cataract clinics, I have made a
few contacts in the ophthalmology world of Uganda. One of the previous medical residents that we
have worked with, gave me a contact of a ophthalmologist in Jinja. I will be meeting with her on June 12 to see
if we might be able to expand our eye clinics in to the eastern side of Uganda
on our next trip here.
Ahh such a good analogy- praying some of that " falling scales" in my neck of the woods too! Great work- I will be praying for each eye touched in whichever form of treatment needed, and for the great possibility for expansion. The "EYES" have it in God's court :)
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