A lot has happened since I last posted. Few updates from last post. The little girl with the heart murmur gained a little weight. I think clipping her tongue helped her eat easier. I will see her again tomorrow and decide what to do next. I was able to give mom some formula to boost the calories of her breast milk. I had a good time meeting the Special Hope Network children. I saw about 14 kids at the two centers they have running in two different compounds. My neurology skills are being challenged with many of them having seizures. I'm looking forward to helping them. Many are malnourished also...which can be a challenge when they can't feed themselves or have lower muscle tone. Lots of learning to do for both me and kids and parents.
Exciting news! Archie and Nancy McGlawn have arrived safely in Zambia. She is the missionary in charge of me. It was so good to welcome them yesterday. Last week we wished the Elliott's safe journeys as they are on furlough now. I have shifted (how everyone says "moved" here) to their house now. Christine and the McMillens moved this week also. All but one of our team members have moved in the past month. So much change.
Before the Elliott's left, I got to spend Sunday in church with them. John spoke while Bishop Simunyola interpreted. Bishop is the "general superintendent" of Grace Ministries, one of the 3 pentecostal denominations we work with here. It was a wonderful picture of God putting our strengths together. John gave this very deep teaching about the meaning of the name, "the Lord Jesus Christ". Bishop brought the incredible passion and excitement. He was jumping and yelling and getting people to clap. The two of them made a great team.
This last Sunday, Christine and I went to three different churches to promote Balm Clinic. It is a ministry of the women at Grace Ministries. It needs some help reboosting. We are each going to work one day a week there. We want to get help from all the churches. Many of them have nurses, doctors and other medical professionals. We also are looking for financial expertise to help with the business end. Monday was a holiday. Grace Ministries held a sports day. It was so much fun. There were track events, net ball (basketball), football (soccer) and volleyball. The turn out was good and all had a good time. We ran the first aid tent. Thankfully we only were needed for sprained muscles and scrapes. We also did blood pressure and BMI screening. It was a good way to get Balm Clinic's name out there. We even gained two volunteers. We have one Zambian doctor who has really gotten on board with us also. I really like Dr. Nkole. She is a ob/gyn so she compliments my peds and Christine's family practice credentials perfectly. She has similar vision for the way to help the clinic too. We will visit the rest of the churches this month.
Two prayer requests before I close this post. We had two major setbacks within 24 hours last week. The first was with the registration and license of the mobile clinic. This is the vehicle registration that makes it legal to drive on the road. It made it fine through 3 borders on the way here but interpol says all the paperwork is not in order and was being gracious to not impound it on the spot. Please pray as this week will be more meetings with the officials. Pray for favor. The second was the loss of venue for our upcoming Community Health Evangelism conference. The place we reserved several months ago has bumped us. It is getting close to August and we have 200+people coming plus a team from the States. It is going to be a wonderful time of learning about appropriate technology and reinvigorating the groups for evangelism. Please pray God provides a venue that fits our needs and budget. Satan will not win these battles.
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