Update #2 (4 August, 19:30 Africa time) : 164 names have been spoken for. God is stirring up hearts, and I am so humbled to be a part of His process in all of this.
Update #1 (4 August, 12:30 Africa time) : 102 of the names on the pink sheets have been e-mailed out across the world, and people are starting to pray.
Six hundred pink sheets.
They were the ones we turned away. The ones who were too sick or not sick enough. The ones who missed their surgery dates and couldn't be rescheduled because there were hundreds more to take their places. The ones we tried to call but couldn't reach.
Six hundred of them, and when I looked at all the pages strewn across the room I wanted to scream.
Because they've always been there. They're in every country we visit, but we've never seen them before, never made it to their villages to peer into the darkness of their little mud huts and bring them into the light. And this time we did, this time we drove to meet them and we said we'd call if we could help and then we never did.
Instead we laid them all out in an empty room and we did the only thing left to us. We prayed. We didn't finish today; there were too many, so we're going to do it again tomorrow. We prayed over each one of them. Over Yema, the little boy who just turned one in July, too small for his cleft lip to be fixed but probably not getting enough to eat at home because of it. Over Maka, eight years old with a left arm that can't straighten and fingers crippled from the burns he suffered when he was two. Over Abel, a young man with a hernia the size of a football who we tried to call and who never picked up his phone and so his paper was moved to the back of the pile again.
I cried this afternoon. Frustrated, angry tears, and I don't think I've ever been so aware of the scope of the need here in West Africa. By the end of an outreach, we usually have a few pink sheets left in the drawer in the OR office, lumps and bumps that didn't quite make it into the surgery schedule but weren't going to mean the difference between life and death. This time we found the forgotten, called out to the ones who've never heard the voice of hope and then we turned away because the time was too short and there were too many of them.
Six hundred pink sheets. Hundreds and thousands more sleeping on dirt floors tonight, nursing their pain and their fears as we get ready to sail away.
Pray with us. Please pray with us.
If you'd like to pray specifically for a patient, let me know in a comment or an e-mail, and I'll head down to the office and choose one or five or twenty names for you. If it's children who touch your heart, I'll find you a child to pray for. If you're drawn to those who have suffered burns, there's a whole pile of them. There are mamas and papas, old men and little girls, and they have all been told no.
Wouldn't it be incredible if we could find six hundred people willing to pray for these six hundred?
Please pray with us.
siby12@sbcglobal.net
Thank you!
Send me names and I'll pass them on--and pray myself! And I'm praying for your tears also. I know they come from your heart, but I'm praying that they don't break your heart.
Shaf
I'll pray for 5. No five people in particular, just five who, like the other 495 need prayer.
Psalm 50:15
And thanks from here, for all you are ABLE to do there.
Melissa
Please send me the name of a child - it would be a privlege to hold him or her up before the throne of grace!
jcrow@covlife.org
Can you please send me 2 names?
Love and peace to you.
Gerda
Blessings,
Laura
God bless you in all that you do and give you peace comfort, strength and encouragement.
auflag (at) yahoo (dot) com
Also, I've been lurking on your blog for years and have never said something that's always been on my mind: I am not a Christian and I never will be, and I don't pray the same way you do. But the truths you speak here are universal. Religion and geography and everything aside, the power and wisdom and strength of your work come through loud and clear, and I am honored to be able to witness it and learn more about the people you serve. Thank you for writing.
Please send me names to pray for, I'm on it. I have no preference, just send me the ones you feel I should pray for. Thank you for getting us involved in this, sometimes I feel so helpless sitting here at my London desk. While the work I do is aimed at combatting poverty, it still doesn't feel as productive as being there.
Love Naomi
I'm the new admin. assistant in the Canadian Office for Mercy Ships. I came across your blog a couple weeks ago and look forward to reading each new post. Please send me the names of 5 people, including a couple children. My husband and I will pray. Thank for writing, thank you for doing what you do and thank you for helping us to be more involved.
Alicia
Please send me the name of a girl to pray for. May God bless these people!
Anna
Susan
fynche68 (at) gmail (dot) com
what a privilege to stand in the gap for them.
thank you!
It will be a great joy to team up with everybody here in prayer. Please send me whatever names have remained and I will be sure to pray for them.
God bless you Ali.
God bless your ministry!
Sarah