Contact Us

Use the form on the right to contact us.

You can edit the text in this area, and change where the contact form on the right submits to, by entering edit mode using the modes on the bottom right. 

         

123 Street Avenue, City Town, 99999

(123) 555-6789

email@address.com

 

You can set your address, phone number, email and site description in the settings tab.
Link to read me page with more information.

Our Blog

SUFFERING

     Thousands of miles and a whole continent in between are two women.  They don't know each other, nor will they while on this earth.  Yvonne and I know them both.  Both of them are suffering.

     Several weeks ago Yvonne was coming home after visiting a friend when she came upon Bernadette.  Wrapped in little more than rags, Bernadette was laying outside the doors of local clothing and jewelry stores, barely conscious.

     Though we did not know her name at that time, we've seen Bernadette before along with countless other beggars that roam our neighborhood.  We had never seen her in this condition.  

     Her lips were white, her eyes yellow and her hair speckled with grit from the street.  She sat in a puddle of air conditioning condensation and her own urine.  Without help she couldn't sit up, let alone stand up.  

     Someone nearby had given her a cup of water and a morsel of food, but she was too weak to lift her hand to put them to her mouth.  Two young women had stopped to comfort her, but really did not know what to do.  Mostly, people either just walked by or stood and stared.

     With the help of our translator, Gerand, we were able to extract enough information to know that if we didn't help her she was going to die.  The three of us were eventually able to lift Bernadette into a tuc tuc and transport her to the local hospital.

     Within a day she had regained much of her strength.  Within two days she was able to walk to a bathroom (without her cane) and bathe.  A week later she was able to leave the hospital.

     The curious thing about Bernadette is that she has family not far away.  They have enough to provide their sister food and shelter, but Bernadette prefers wandering the streets and begging.  We have seen her several times in the last week, right where she has been before.

     While it is apparent that Bernadette, who is 60 years old, suffers from some form of dimensia, it is also apparent that she has enough awareness to know she has a place where she could live in a semblance of dignity.  She prefers indignity.  Her family is well aware of her condition, but is unwilling to fight through Bernadette's obstinance to help.

     Back in the states, there is another who is suffering.  She did not grow up in squalor, but in middle class America.  As a young girl she contracted polio.  Now as a 74-year-old woman she is battling cancer.

     What we know about Jeannine is that she is a fighter.  She fought through polio and raised a family without the help of an absentee husband.  She persevered through adversity and was able to provide.  The ultimate fruits of her labor are two children of immense character.  

     Her son and daughter are the picture of what any parent's heart would desire; both accomplished and both with healthy families of their own.  Most importantly, they love their mother deeply.

     When we heard of Jeannine's challenge Yvonne and I really didn't know how to respond.  You see, Jeannine is a friend of ours.  We have shared Christmas and Thanksgiving together, but we did not know how to share in her suffering.  So, we prayed.

     Just recently we exchanged e-mails, and Jeannine said this: "I believe the only way I'll succeed in winning this challenge is with God's help."

     What I see from a distance is the success of Jeannine's suffering.  She has already won.  The rewards are her children and grandchildren, who are now at her side with love and compassion.  In return, Jeannine has persevered with courage and grace.

     No matter how pragmatic or accurate a doctor's prognosis, where there is God there is always hope.  And where there is hope there is love.  The Bible says, "...God is love...Now there abides these three; faith, hope and love.  But the greatest of these is love."

     You see, the difference between Bernadette and Jeannine is love.  Bernadette's family is ambivalent when it comes to her suffering.  There is defeat and separation.  There is no desire to ensure the one who is suffering any sort of comfort and in exchange they receive no comfort.

     On the other hand, Jeannine's family is tied together in love.  They are bound by compassion and mercy.  I suspect that though they might not even recognize it, that their hearts are set on the prospects of justice prevailing - that ultimately their hearts are united in eternity.

    So, one family is divided, the other united.  One is forlorn, the other hopeful. One woman suffers in bitterness, the other in love.

    We are reminded of a Savior, who's birth we are about to celebrate.  He lived, He suffered and He died...for us.  Then He was resurrected...for us.  

     Yvonne and I pray that you would know this love this Christmas.  That it would resurrect purpose in your life.  And once you know it, share it with someone who is suffering.  It is the greatest gift we could possibly give.

Aplomb

Mike Broadhurst

 

  •  Jesus said, "...Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God." Luke 6:20  
  • Jesus said, "The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me." Matthew 25:40

     We had been waiting for The Ladies from Maroantsetra since Thursday afternoon.  As the crow flies, it's only about 160 kilometers from Toamatave, but if you've taken a bus anywhere in Madagascar you can attest to the fact that "as-the-crow-flies" really isn't a great tool for determining how long it takes to get from one town to another.
 
     Suffice to say, these 15 ladies were supposed to leave Sunday a week ago, but that departure was delayed until Tuesday.  The trip to the Hope Center (where Yvonne and I work) should have taken two days.  Instead, they arrived on Saturday - four days after they're odyssey began.

     All of these ladies suffer from obstetric fistula (OBF).  It is a condition typically brought on by obstructed and/or prolonged labor, and is worsened in countries where poverty is rampant and health care minimal.  

     Affected women either leak urine or feces or both, leaving them socially isolated in most instances and ostracized by many...sometimes for a lifetime.  In addition to the psychological trauma inflicted, OBF also imposes enormous medical / financial burdens on victims and their families. When you think of OBF, think of the woman with the issue of blood described in the Gospels of Mark 5, Matthew 9 and Luke 8.

     To get to the Hope Center they saw one of their buses slide into a river; walk 10 hours under the deluge of several thunder showers; sleep on the side of the road using their meager belongings for covering and bedding; and conserve what little food they had so it would last four days instead of two.
 
     Usually when our larger group of guests arrive here at the Hope Center the transportation is in the form of either a bona fide bus or at least a 10-passenger van.  I wasn't prepared for what I saw when I looked over the balcony as the The Ladies from Maroantsetra arrived yesterday.
 
     Stuffed into a double-cab pick-up truck were two-drivers, a chaperon and 15 ladies plus all of their belongings.  A make-shift tattered canopy covered those sitting on the benches in the truck bed where no less than 10 ladies sat crammed together.  The rest of the cadre were tightly compacted in the interior seating designed for five.  It made me think of the Ringling Brothers Circus clowns I had seen as a kid - one after another piling out of a VW Bug, only I didn't think of this sight as amusing, but with incredulity.
 
     Yesterday (Sunday) I asked them about their trip.  They had to take four different "buses."  None of them were an improvement over the one in which they arrived.  "The first one didn't have a canopy," one lady told me.
 
     "Did it rain?" I asked the group.
 
     The cumulative response was a resounding "Yes!"  "Sometimes it rained so hard all of our belongings got soaked," another lady offered.  

     Suffice to say, they didn't have hotel rooms.  The ladies said on one night the road was so rough the driver pulled over and waited several hours before moving on.  They used the delay to disembark and sleep in the grass on the side of the road.
 
     Their trip wasn't supposed to include a boat ride, which I had heard about several times as we got updates on the ladies whereabouts.  It occurred two days into the trip when they came to a river near Famba (a place I couldn't find on a map of Madagascar). 
    
     There is no bridge to cross at this 60-meter-wide gap, so apparently locals have found a spot where the water is low enough that brave souls can drive across the river bed.  All of the ladies left the truck and watched as the driver made his attempt.  He failed.
 
     The rains that had fallen the night before added an element of the unknown.  As the driver entered the waters the swollen currents overtook the truck and it lost traction.  It didn't sink, but it did slip and slide until it became permanently stuck, locked between some slime-covered rocks.  To the best of anyone's knowledge there it still remains.
 
     It's then that the ladies got their boat ride...two at a time, that is.  It was on Thursday around noon that a local villager with something described as a canoe helped these ladies across the river in pairs.  Once they got to the other side, they sat for two hours before they commenced their march to a nearby village, some 10 hours down the road.  It's during that walk that it started to pour, sometimes torrentially as the ladies explained. 
 
     From there they caught another truck, which took them to another depot, where they fianlly caught the vehicle that brought them to the Hope Center.  They were in the truck from sometime Thursday afternoon until late Saturday morning.
 
     As they were finishing with their story I asked them if they were ever scared.  Again, in unison, they nodded their heads, "yes."

     "What scared you most?" I queried.
 
     After commiserating for a few seconds one of the younger ladies raised her hand and gave voice to their fear, "We were afraid that we would miss our appointments."
 
     Their fear makes me muse about the comforts of home and how something a little out of the ordinary has the power to disrupt my temperament on any given day.  On the other hand the Malagasy treat the unexpected with such aplomb that I wonder if they know what a light they are to me.  

     I pray that each and every one of these ladies are successful in their quest for the healing they so faithfully pursue.  I pray that the hem of the Master's garment is within their reach.

Comment