I recently spent 2 weeks with a surgical team in Juba, South Sudan performing cleft lip reconstruction surgeries on 78 patients. They came from all over the country, many from refugee camps. Among the 78, we took care of a father and daughter, and 2 sets of siblings. Our youngest patient was 6 months old, and our oldest was 60 years. I can't even imagine all the 60 year old woman, Miriam, had been through during her life. She told us before her surgery that she just wanted to be able to hold her head up, look someone in the eye, and not have to cover her face with a scarf. I so badly wanted to jump on a plane and go back with one of the groups and experience their homecomings with them. I was in awe every time a patient came out of the operating room. The transformations were nothing short of amazing. It never got old to watch them come into the recovery room and see their new faces.
The culture in which they live is not accepting of any kind of deformity. People with cleft lips are usually ostracized and treated very harshly. They are considered to be cursed or demon-possessed. Throughout their lifetimes, they have had very few people love them or accept them just as they are. These patients and their families are some of the bravest people I've ever met. They have endured things I cannot begin to fathom, and then one day someone tells them that they can have surgery done to fix their lips. When the plane comes to their village to pick them up, they have to decide whether or not they will trust white people they've never met, and get on a plane to a place they have never been. I wonder what goes through their minds when they arrive at the hospital and we poke them with things, take lots of pictures, and ask them a million questions through 3 interpreters. I hope that through everything they can see that God loves them enough to bring us to them from the other side of the world so that we could help them in such a tangible way. In addition to physical transformations, we were also privileged to watch many spiritual transformations occur. For the first time in their lives someone told them that there is a God that loves them unconditionally. We had Sudanese pastors working with our team that did such an amazing job building relationship with the patients and their families and sharing the gospel with them.
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After talking with one group, almost all of them accepted Christ and they took
off all of their amulets and charms and asked the pastors to burn them. |
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-Our God is a consuming fire- Hebrews 12:29
One day near the end of our time, we had 4 patients with the same name, a word that meant "deformed". They were 2, 13, 16, and 22 years old. Following their surgeries, they picked new names. John, Elizabeth, Grace, and Hannah now have new identities inside and out. They don't ever have to answer to "deformed" again. I can't really explain what it was like to talk with them as they chose their new names and the pastors prayed with them.
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| John, Hannah, Elizabeth, and Grace |
It was such a privilege to be part of this team and watch these patients' lives change so dramatically. Here's a recap from our trip:
Here is a
link to pictures. I am still working on a more organized "before and after" album from the surgeries, which I hope to have up soon!
