"I am the LORD, and there is no other, besides me there is no God; I equip you, though you do not know me, that people may know, from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me; I am the LORD, and there is no other." Isaiah 45:5-6
I have been thinking about what to write about all that God did in Nicaragua. This post won't include all of it but it's a start! :-) This year was my third time to Nicaragua. Every year I am amazed at the ways I see God. :-)
What do you do when your plans fail? This year God showed His Sovereignty and Power. As Emily and I were on our way to Nicaragua we got a call from the team leader saying that the rest of the team will be delayed until Monday, instead of arriving on Saturday with us. (Also, at this point, all of our cargo that was sent months before was still in customs and it didn't look like it was going to be relased.) We arrived in Nicaragua ontime and later that evening about 6 more people arrived. Out of a team of 50 or so we had 9 people. Monday morning arrived and we were all so excited to leave for the village, set up and wait for the rest of the team to arrive. However, once we were all packed and ready people started getting text messages saying there was a problem. All of us gathered in the main room to pray and pray and pray..then we got the final word...they weren't coming. So many things were running through my mind at this point. I didn't think we were going to the village. I mean, how could we? It was a medical and dental team and we didn't have any doctors in our group, they were all stuck in the states. There were only 9 North Americans and about 20 or so translators. How could we take care of thousands of people? Not too long after this the missionary in charge came in to ask if we were ready to go. "Go where?" I asked. "La Fundadora!" he said. We were heading to the village anyway, trusting God to provide everything the people in the village needed because He was the only one that could do it! We had a 6 hour bus ride to the village and once there we needed to set up the clinic to start seeing patients the next morning. In order to see patients, though, we needed some doctors. A few of the missionaries started calling around and visiting clinics to see if any doctors would be willing to help. In one day God provided 6-7 national Nicaraguan doctors, many of whom just got a moments notice! All they were offered was food to eat and a mat to sleep on the floor. We were able to see and treat all the people that came to the clinic that week! Most importantly we were able to share the love of Christ with them. It was evident to everyone that the glory belongs to God alone that week. We were small in number but God is big! We didn't have all our supplies, but God provides! During this week the team saw over 2,800 patients and during the 2 weeks I was in Nicaragua the teams had the privilage of seeing over 190 people come to know Christ as their Lord and Savior!
It's amazing to see the contrast in the two weeks. The first week we had a small number of people but the second week we had over 70 people on the team not including the translators. With the translators it was probably closer to 100. God can work in any and every situation!
Here are some numbers as to what God did during these two weeks:
5, 132 people seen in the medical clinics
over 9728 perscriptions filled
over 80 people seen in the dental clinic
109 women screened for cervical CA and 8 were treated
over 1174 animals treated through the vet ministry
$3500 of rice and beans given away
250 Bibles given
The best part...we now have over 190 new brothers and sisters in Christ!
Here is a video of my two weeks in Nicaragua that was made for church. ENJOY!:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLEVoOC4244
