Exchanging Bad for Good!

To those faithful readers do you remember the blog post from February 5, 2012 titled "You know you live in Africa when...?"  This past Saturday became beautiful fruit from the sweaty brow of that February blog post!  My struggle with Malaria caused me to be more aware of the illness first hand, challenge of curing, and the statistics of the many children  under the age of five dying.  I felt so terrible but truly wanted something good to come from my struggle with the illness.  I am choosing to live in a country that is filled with many different things good and then not so good!   Some of the not so good would be illnesses such as malaria but we take the good and the bad just as our Tanzanian friends.  My bout with malaria taught me a great deal and provided me with another layer of inner strength.  I also have a great empathetic understanding for the people who suffer from malaria who have no idea what it is, how they contract it, and how one can try to prevent it!  Many of you were/are so concerned for my health and safety!  I am so grateful for your prayer support and kindness to me.  Many wanted to do something to help me through my battle with malaria but there was really nothing to be done.  As I laid in bed a sweaty mess over and over again praying I realized what we together could do in this fight!  We could help provide mosquito nets!  Many across the States of various ages sent a little money here and there dedicated to training/education of malaria prevention partnered with the gift of a mosquito net.  I can now say that after nine months I finally feel good and healthy!  I am so thankful!  I also rejoice that this past Saturday we were able to hand out the first wave of mosquito nets!

We headed for Maasailand on Saturday   We are thankful that the conflict between the two tribes is at bay currently.  There has been no solution and we continue to be in a very dry and dusty month.  We continue to pray for that situation.  The church planters assured us that it would be safe to travel out to our friends in Maasailand.  It was a privilege to join Heather (my teammate,) two visitors from Hazelwood Church in IN, and Elinipa in this venture for Widow and Orphan Day!  This is a ministry to the poorest of poor within the churches to empower women and children with love, education, and a way of micro-enterprise.  Saturday Elinipa went to help teach the widows about malaria and how to use a net.  It truly is amazing to me how people in remote places understand so very little of how the body works, cleanliness, and illness.  The explanation is passed down from a grandmother who at one point told a daughter in an attempt to explain the reasoning of something are so far from the truth!   I followed the session with my testimony of my bout with malaria and the burden I had for the amount of children suffering from malaria. I also shared the kindness of those of you in the States who helped by aiding with funds for nets.    It was an emotional day for me.  As I knelt in from of the child (in the picture above) holding onto the net everything that didn't make sense nine months ago now did in an unexplainable way.  As I shared I also realized how wonderful in the closest way possible (without a ton of people getting on a plane) my worlds were coming together.  Loved ones in the States partnering through the gift of malaria nets, my thoughts of how difficult this year was, then I looked all around.   I saw the Maasai women and children who were blessed with knowledge, love, and hope!  All of a sudden this year looked pretty good!          

Enjoy the sites of this special day!  Thank you that out of your relationship with me and my struggle with malaria decided to be a part of preventative care through mosquito nets.  Out of caring the gospel is shared and hope can be found even in the poorest of places!  

Prayer Points~

• May these thirty women who were blessed with nets know that they are loved by Jesus!  That as that net covers them at night along with their children may they know the protection that they can have in Jesus Name!