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"Give thanks to the Lord, call on His name; make known among the nations what He has done. Sing to Him, sing praise to Him; tell of all His wonderful acts. Glory in His holy name; let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice. Look to the Lord and His strength; seek His face always. Remember the wonders He has done, His miracles, and the judgments He pronounced." I used to read "remember the wonders He has done, His miracles..." and think about the parting of the Red Sea and the feeding of the five thousand and the single stone that killed a giant. But now, this Psalm has a totally new meaning for me after I have been to Tanzania and back. I have seen miracles personally, and I never want to forget them. Because of this, I rewrote Psalm 105 in my own words, telling my own recount of God's miracles that I have seen. Just like Psalm 105 tells the story of the Israelites and God's miraculous interventions along the way, so my Psalm tells the story of God...

The Tanzanian people are a people of gratitude. Thankfulness is something that they learn from their culture. For example, I tried to start an IV on this one poor woman about four times. Every time I stuck her, she looked at me with pain in her eyes and said, "Asante". Thank you. I'm said to myself, Woman, I am failing and causing you pain and you are thanking me? Imagine how different the scenario would have been if it had happened in the United States. But this just shows what kind of people they are - a people of gratitude. They truly were thankful for our work and our efforts. As one of our doctors was stitching up a man's ankle after an open fracture, he held my hand, squeezed it tightly in pain, and thanked us over and over again. A baby came into the pediatrics ward one day on the brink of death. We did the only things we knew to do, but still the baby passed away. The mother, through her tears, thanked us. I wanted to scream in disappointment, ...

Thank you, Allison Park, for your excellent photography. Your pictures are worth a million words.

I have heard the story a million times, but this time it was different. Ten people were trapped in a horrible disease. It starts out as painless pale spots on the skin, but it gradually turns into something much worse. Eventually, the victims lose sensation in their extremeties, which would leave them with giant wounds and sores on their hands and feet, sometimes even losing fingers and toes. But this leprosy not only damages the skin and the nerves, it damages the person’s heart. It destroys their relationships. Especially in the Jewish culture, lepers were outcasts. Untouchables. These ten outcasts - with no where else to go – hear about Jesus. They find Him and come to him, but when you read the story, what Jesus does is somewhat unusual. “Go, show yourselves to the priests,” he tells them. Instead of doing something for them right then and there on the spot, He gives them a referral. It almost seems like he sends them away. It is on the way to the priests that t...

It didn’t take long after her admission into the obstetrics ward for the doctors to determine what was wrong. With the patient having a blood pressure of 240/210 and seizing, she was diagnosed with ecclampsia. They called an emergency C-section to save the lives of the mother and her baby, but it was too late for the unborn child. They wrapped the baby in a cloth covering its face and set it aside, waiting for the mother to awake from her surgery.   But even when the mother awoke, she was too sick to do anything. During her seizure, she had ruthlessly bit her tongue, leaving it gigantically swollen, inflamed, bloody, and protruding from her mouth. For several days after her surgery, she was pretty much out of it, unable to respond or talk. We continued to treat her high blood pressure and severely injured tongue. We knew it would take a miracle, but we didn’t give up hope. We cared for her and prayed for her day after day. Then finally one day, we actually pray...

There is a mountain range behind the Chimala mission hospital. Every morning the sun hits the top of those mountains and they beckon me to climb to the top. This weekend, I finally got the opportunity to summit. Due to the risk of coming across a deadly poisonous green mamba while hiking, we decided to take a vehicle up the mountain instead. I was disappointed that we weren’t going to hike until I saw the vehicle in which we were riding. “That thing is like a tank!” someone exclaimed as it pulled up. It was like a mix between an army tank and an African safari jeep. It was appropriately named: Defender. We excitedly climbed into the back of the Defender and rattled up the mountain on a dirt road. They say the trail has fifty-two switch backs, but who’s counting? All I know is that we were on the edge of a mountain taking 180 degree turns on a road as narrow as a four-wheeler trail covered in large pot holes and boulders. At times, I looked out the window only to see she...

I popped my gloves off, threw them in the trash, and backed up against the wall. I let the other three nursing students who were helping with the dressing change take over my job as I stepped away. I normally try to hold it all in, to be strong. But this time as the tears filled my eyes, I just let them.   I did not even try to keep it in because I wanted to break. I wanted to feel it. When we had wheeled Ezekiel to the minor theatre a few minutes ago for this dressing change, I expected it to be a difficult procedure. I could tell by the way he smelled of infection.   However, as we unrolled his bandages and cut away the gauze, I so badly wanted to see that his burns were getting better. They weren’t. We did the best we could to cut away the dead tissue and rub ointment over the wounds. Deep down I knew that if these burns don’t heal, the infection will spread to his entire body and he will die.   We sang “Jesus loves you” over the table as we worked. ...