Purpose Asia

God is working mightily in and through the Papua New Guinean ladies’ Bible study I attend and get to lead occasionally. Here's an amazing story from a time our Bible study leader asked the ladies what characteristics of God stood out to them in particular or had been evident in their lives recently.  "God em i winman!" (God is the victor!)   From Marianne Recently Marianne has been trying to share the good news of Jesus with her friends and family. Then, with no apparent cause she started having swelling and pain in one of her legs to the point that she could not walk. Family told her that she had the same thing that had killed another family member and they began to say that she had been "poisoned" or cursed. Marianne began to think about this and she prayed. She thought to herself, if I give in and say, like my family is saying, that I've been cursed I just give glory to Satan and proclaim that he has the power, but I know that's not true. I kn...

     We open the back doors of the Land Rover-turned-ambulance and pull out our supplies. A goodly number of mothers and kids are beginning to gather under the trees and in the grass around the ambulance. Out come the scales, the umbrellas and tables and the basic medical kit and medication and vaccine boxes. Now, we’re ready. Community Health Clinic is now open.  First I help the ambulance driver check in and weigh the various children and infants that will be seen by our team today. Each wriggling baby that bounces in the hanging sling scale or little wide eyed kiddo that stands on the scale in bare brown toes is so precious to me. It’s at these clinics that I remember why I’m here. It’s the people of Papua New Guinea that have captured my heart. I love them so deeply and want so much to be a blessing to them as they are to me.     Soon all the kids are weighed and I go around the back of the ambulance to get ready for the next wave...

Checking In Patients at the Clinic I slide the key into the lock of the back door of the clinic and my day begins. I walk down the hallway past the x-ray machine, the treatment room and the lab, the pharmacy and front desk into the break room where morning devotions start at 8:00 . We sing and pray and I’m surrounded by the faces of missionaries and Papua New Guineans alike, all of us unified in our love for Christ and desire to serve Him with the work of this clinic in the lives of those in or around the center. 8:30 arrives and we all scatter to our various tasks. Today I will work in the lab in the morning and as an appointment nurse in the afternoon.     I switch on the light and run my hand over the cool black countertops in the lab as I turn on machines and prepare the lab for the day. I slip on my lab coat and busy myself with refreshing the bleach, running quality control on various machines and getting everything set up for my morning. The firs...

My Papua New Guinea "Family" The warm breeze blew in from off the ocean and ruffled my hair as I was watching the light fade over the ocean. A little girl with tight, curly hair sat in my lap and breathed deeply and peacefully. She’d fallen asleep there as she sat close to stay warm as the evening grew cool. This was my Papua New Guinean “home.” The place where I’d first lived in a village and where I’d been “adopted” into a Papua New Guinean family for the first time. I was visiting my host family in the coastal village where I had lived and trained last year. This was the first time I’d been able to come back. It felt like home. This is my family's "kitchen" and house behind It was also the first time I’d been able to go back since my host father had died in January.  I sat with my host family and heard about the events of the last year. I listened to all that had occurred with “Papa” and how the family had been doing since then. Eventually, conver...

Preparing our patient for transport to Australia I was jarred awake by the jingling of the on-call radio. I fumbled for the light with one hand and the radio with the other. Blearily I looked at my watch; 2:30 A.M.. I pressed the button to talk on the radio, “This is the nurse on call.” I waited for the crackly response over the radio. A response came through and I asked where I could call them and ended the radio call. Throwing back the blankets I hauled myself up and stumbled to the phone to find out what was going on. I called the number I was given and heard the brief story from the patient’s father. At the clinic we’d been monitoring his daughter over the last few days for suspected pneumonia. Over the course of the night she’d begun to decline and now was struggling to breathe with decreasing oxygen saturation. Now, he wanted to know what he should do. I ended the call with a promise to call back in a few minutes and I called the doctor on-call with me over the weekend. He ...

One year ago I sat in this very spot and heard the news that would turn my world upside down. It would send me back around the globe to be with my family in a twist I had never seen coming. I’d be a liar if I told you I was perfectly composed that day or in any day that followed it. Truth be told, I was a mess and I remember many tearful days and nights that followed that day as I was stretched to the breaking point and beyond in the months that followed. I was reading my journal from last year and came upon my entry from May 18, 2015. It was full of raw emotion but at the end I wrote, “You [God] are good and I trust you. You give and take away. May You be praised.” Praised. Seems like a strange response to such difficult news. However, God did not change when my circumstances did. He was the same God that was good, loving, faithful, true and caring. I knew He had my best in mind even if it looked horrible and painful. Since then, I’ve been learning what prais...

I came in the door and dumped my stuff on a chair. It had been a tough few days and I felt exhausted. Then I noticed the note on the table from my roommate that invited me to grab the smoothie she’d made for me from the fridge and to join her on the back porch for some time in a hammock to enjoy the evening scenery. I smiled and grabbed the smoothie she’d made for me. It smelled of sweet fresh strawberries, banana and pineapple. What a perfect end to the day. My roommate knew just how to cheer me up even when she herself had been very sick for the last week. I thanked God for such a thoughtful roommate and headed out to the back deck. I breathed in deep as the screen door swung shut behind me. The evening air was fresh and the view was amazing.      I turned to my roommate with a look of gratitude. “Thank you,” I said, “I really needed this.” It was true. I’d had a really tough few days and, in the generous and encouraging way that typifies ...