To Try is to Succeed

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, "Your baby is gone! Why are you thanking us?" But then I remembered a Tanzanian saying that, when translated, literally means:

To try is to succeed.

Then it began to make sense. Even though the child passed, the mother noticed that we took her baby and did everything we knew to do to help. In her eyes, to try was to succeed. And so she was thankful.

Why else would a family member thank our doctors for doing CPR on a man in the floor of the men's ward for thirty minutes, only to leave her with loss? Because to try is to succeed.

Why else would we be thanked for attempting to resuscitate an infant for an hour, only to leave the table in seeming defeat? Because to try is to succeed.

I was constantly amazed at the endless gratitude of the Tanzania people. It truly impressed me, and it challenged me to live the same way.

Just like the Tanzanians, Christian people should be a people of gratitude. The Christian culture is a culture of gratitude. We are called to be thankful in all circumstances. In light of Christ and all He has done for us, constant thankfulness is the only response that really makes sense. And after my experiences in Tanzania this summer, watching the Tanzanian people has encouraged me to live a life of thanksgiving. In life or in death, in suffering or in joy, in light or in darkness - no matter what, I have reason to be thankful because of Jesus.