Letting Go of Expectations (and Picking Up a Sack of Seed)

Being a missionary nurse doesn't always look like I thought it would. Take this week for example. I have started more IVs, administered more medications, and consulted more nursing textbooks this past week than my previous six months in Burkina. The funny thing is this: my patients weren't even the people of Burkina. They were American members of the team that arrived about a week ago from Oak Hills Church in Texas. 

Life, health, and hydration are not easy things in Burkina. Our Oak Hills group learned that lesson pretty quickly when three people became ill by the middle of their trip. Thankfully, they brought an amazing doctor with them on their team, so together we went quickly into action. First, Micah got a staph infection that went wrong and ended up on IV antibitoics for several days. Next, a team member got dehydrated and has been having headaches likely related to a medication interaction. Then, another lady had a combination of dehydration and infection that also merited her IV fluids and antibiotic therapy. 

We turned the Richter household into the most comfortable hospital in Burkina Faso, and I got to be the night shift home health nurse that I always wanted to be. 

I am now happy to report that all our patients are now feeling better and no more IVs are needed. God has answered our prayers for healing in this hot, dry, dusty, bacteria-infested environment that we aren't used to, but where he loves to come through for us. 

I have also enjoyed following the doctor around this week and learning from him about the different cases that we find. Again, missionary nursing is not always what I thought it would look like. For me, it doesn't look like working in a hospital, making rounds, and performing nursing skills. Most of the time, it looks like randomly finding sick people and then figuring out how to help them, whether that means simply buying antibiotics from the pharmacy, or maybe doing a little wound care, or even organizing ambulance transportation to a nearby city for a surgical consultation. Sometimes, it's just praying with someone who has a illness with no options or resources to fix it. One might say, "There's nothing else to do, so at least we can pray." Except I don't really like that. Praying is not the least we can do; it's the most we can do. It's not the last resort; it's the first priority. In the U.S., we can get away with saying that medicine heals. Here in Africa, that's not so evident. What is evident is this: God is the Healer, and we seek him first and foremost for the complete healing of our bodies and hearts. 

So I suppose my nursing hat looks different here than I imagined it would. I have learned to let go of those expectation and just pick up whatever comes my way. This comes in the form of many different types of hats, and I believe the Oak Hills group has seen that side of mission work as well - the side of many hats. 

We put on our construction hats to help repair a broken well in a village that has not had clean water since the well was installed over two years ago. We put on our VBS hats to do a kids' club with 70 plus kids who are attentive to the Word of God. We put on our momma hats to take care of and love on babies and orphans in our infants in distress program. We put on our painting hats to clean and paint the walls at our local nutritional center for children. We put on our shopping hats as we search in the market for items needed to put together gift sacks for widows. We put on our friendship hats as we go to visit the new home of Daniel, which is still under construction, to pray for its completion and dedicate its foundations to the glory of God. 

In all these things and in all these different roles, we still have one identity. No matter how many hats we own, we still have the same head. No matter what we do or where we go, no matter what our job looks like or what we think it should look like, we are servants of Jesus Christ for the sake of gospel. We are builders of the kingdom of God. We are seed-planters. 

I was greatly encouraged this week by a passage found in 2 Corinthians 9:6,10.

"Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness."

I picture us as sowers, walking among the rows of a field with a sack of seeds just like the Africans do - backs bent over, laboring hard and diligently with hope and expectancy for a great harvest. And I picture the Lord, filling up my little sack with more and more seeds to sow. "Here," he says, "Plant these seeds wherever you go and in whatever you do. Don't be shy, I will make sure you won't run out.  And I will also bring the rain and produce a great harvest." 

O Lord, increase the seeds in our little sacks. Seeds of love and hope and healing and boldness to share the gospel. Help us to sow generously so that we can reap generously by seeing many people come to know you. Give us many hats, but help us to keep our heads and know our identity in you as servants in your kingdom. Even if our job doesn't look like we thought it would look like, may we let go of our expectations and pick up our sacks of seed.