Second to last day of medical clinics!

3rd August, 2009 - Posted by Camille Cotton -

Today was an amazing day! God is soooo good! Thanks to all of you who have been praying for us! We asked God to bring more patients to the medical clinic and boy did He answer those prayers! 325 patients today!! When we arrived at the Village, there were already about 25 people waiting, some of which had arrived at 8:00 am! We quickly set everything up and jumped right in to our worship service. The OAI Village children sang a few songs and Levi did a fabulous job leading us through the song, “Jesus, teach me how to pray.” Very cool! Next, David Gallagher with House Father Peter Kimeli translating, delivered a message about how we all fall short, we all have sinned, we all have felt unworthy, and yet, God loves us and is accepting of us! It was a great message. Throughout the message, people continued to arrive for the clinic. At the end of his message, David invited those that want to accept Christ to come forward….about 50-60 people came forward and our entire team spread out in front of them and laid our hands on them as we prayed together and asked Jesus into our hearts! Can we say, “Yeah God moment!” We quickly moved from that in to medical mode. The heat was beating down on us as it reached about 85 today with very little shade. Our doctors from Kenya were moving through patients as quickly as possible, but they kept coming. And so did the rain! We had all hands on deck in the pharmacy to try and keep up with the prescriptions….

Anita who has been helping organize and lead the children’s ministry, was taking care of the little ones today at the kids camp and she had seven ranging in age from Beatrice at 2 1/2 up through the age of 4. She had her hands full but said the children loved doing arts and crafts like hand painting, using glitter to decorate shells and decorating masks to wear. When the rain came, she said the plans had to go by the way side as it was a down-pour and they had to switch gears away from crafts and just keep the little one’s playing.

Helen, who has been leading the charge in the kid’s ministry, had a full day of activities planned. Being the dedicated teacher that she is, she set out yesterday to retrieve sticks for part of a craft project and took a tumble…her hip, leg, shoulder and elbow all took a beating, but mostly her elbow…couldn’t hardly move her arm and was concerned about how she would get through today….well, God heals and today she felt better. Rachel, who is a physio-therapist, gave her some exercises to do and by the time the rain came, she was on auto pilot and almost forgot about her elbow! Helen says that they did arts and crafts and made amazing pictures, but when the rain came, they had to switch gears as the children’s tent was flooding. Out came the bubbles, balloons and mud, what a great combination for entertaining children she said!!!

Rachel from England worked the Pharmacy today and she says: I enjoyed the service this morning and particularly the musical performances. Plus, being a part of all the people coming forward and receiving God was amazing! The medical camp was awesome, busy, and hectic! But, really a good feeling to treat such a big number of people! Bethany from England says: I am alive and well and not anxious to leave anytime soon! Her highlight yesterday was rolling off the table while the children and other leaders watched with amazement! Ann from Texas has proven to be just amazing and we are all in awe of her. I won’t say her age, but let me say that you would never believe it. She doesn’t slow down and is the best helper to Helen in the children’s tent. Last night after dinner, we sat in the dinning hall and cut masks and feathers for the projects today and she worked until we were done. She spends her time with the children and let me say, they LOVE her and she LOVES them! She has a heart the size of Texas and wants to give her whole heart to these children and the people of Kenya!

Brandt, Ruth, Rachel G., Rachel B., Karleigh, Hunter and I were in the pharmacy counting pills, pouring cough syrup and trying to read doctor’s hand writing. Shane and Spencer started on crowd control then headed to work on clearing another one of the Sirikwa pits before the rain came and brought them back to the medical tent. When the rain came at about 3:00 it got really crazy with the children’s tent flooding, the pharmacy flooding and the doctor’s cubicles flooding. Thunder, lightning and a major downpour of rain. It lasted about an hour, which caused some difficulty with the patients wanting to get in to covered areas and we had none! In the end, everyone was doing whatever was needed to address the needs of the patients and move people through the system. It got a bit stressed, but, all in all, we managed to hold it together and finish the day strong.

Please pray for a good night sleep for everyone! Many of us are not getting solid sleep and it is starting to catch up. ALso, pray for energy and stamina for our last day of the clinic tomorrow. And do I dare say it…pray that God will bring those patients that need medical care….we are here to serve them and will serve until we have to close the doors and pack up! Thanks for the comments, the prayers and for checking up on us! Until tomorrow…

- Shanon, Trip 4 team leader