faithful healer

* note: the beginning of this update was written this past Monday (September 17th) *

Ekisa has this little boy named Sam. Sam, who is super snuggly and cute and funny. Sam who has the laugh of an old man. Sam whose smile brightens up the entire room. Sam, who sits on the couch with me and listens to John Mayer and Rend Collective. Sam, who played play-dough with me one evening, making everything from Pippin (Ekisa's dog) to boda bodas (Ugandan motorcycles). Sam, who wears pink pajama pants to bed and watched the movie "Up" 2 dozen times in the hospital a few weeks ago.

Sam had surgery on his foot about three weeks ago.. and now he has two crater-sized wounds in his foot that are healing. About 3 days ago we got him off the couch and into a wheelchair, so he could enjoy some outside air. And just yesterday morning he got a new pair of crutches. Very carefully and slowly (and sometimes painfully) he makes his way across the Ekisa house on slightly-too-big-for-him crutches (he's a pretty tiny guy, that Sam).

His foot has to be cleaned twice a day.. a process that takes about 30 minutes each time. No matter where you are in the house, you can hear his heart piercing screams. Hearing a little boy's screams and seeing his tears -from both fear and pain- breaks your heart in an indescribable way, especially when less than an hour before, you laughed and played with that boy and saw his bright, happy smile. For the past week now I've helped with cleaning- either holding Sam's foot or unwrapping gauze and cleaning solutions and things.

Awful is the only word that comes close to describing the whole thing. Completely, totally awful. 30 minutes have never dragged on so long before. It's intense. And while I want to say, "This sucks, and that's that," the words ring in the back of my mind, and I know He's whispering.. a sacrifice of thanks lays down our perspective and raises hands in praise anyway, always. 

And so, while it's awful that Sam endures such fear and pain twice a day.. I am thankful that Ekisa is here, and caring for him. I'm thankful he has a nurse who knows what she's doing and is keeping his foot as healthy and clean as possible. I'm thankful that he has feet, and will hopefully one day be chasing his little friends around the yard on them again. I'm thankful for his tears, because they make the smiles that much more wonderful. I'm thankful that each time we unwrap the bandage, his wounds look better and better (the human body is amazing. God is amazing). 

Thankfulness in difficult times is hard. I don't want to find reasons to be thankful during those times. But how genuine is my thanks when I praise God only when things are going how I want them to? "Blessed be Your name," is so much easier to sing when the world is a right and happy place. But oh, how much more it means when hands can be lifted in praise in the difficult times. I'm not very good at it, at all. Actually I pretty much stink at it. I'm thankless more often than I'm full of thanks.. but I'm trying to work on it.

I wrote the above post about a week ago. This past Thursday and Friday morning, Sam only cried for the first and last 7 minutes of his dressing change, whereas he's usually a mess throughout the entire process. And this morning, we had absolutely no tears during his dressing change! He was actually laughing several times at the movie he was watching, and was playing with "Auntie B" (one of the volunteers here) during the whole thing. It. Was. So. Awesome. 

Updates like this are kind of hard to read, and I thought about not posting it because of that (and because Sam's dressing changes are no longer as intense as when I first wrote this post.. at least, we're praying they won't be anymore) but I want to share with you the way God has been so good and faithful, even in something as small as a little boy's foot dressing changes twice a day. Watching Sam's foot healing physically has been reminding me of how our God is a God who heals us- both inside and out- and I stand thankful.

On a different note.. I just recently found out that Zuena was put on Mt. Olive's prayer chain list. That's so, so sweet :) I wanted to thank you so much for keeping her in your thoughts and prayers! She came home from the hospital yesterday, praise God! It was the sweetest reunion I have ever seen. Rachel (one of Ekisa's kids) was literally screaming and crawling around in excitement upon seeing Zuena get out of the car. haha. The kids all flocked around her, laughing and kissing her. It was so sweet :) Thank you so much for your prayers for this sweet little one! I'm sure you'll be hearing lots more about her now that she's back home at Ekisa. Your support and love not just for me but for these precious kiddos I am serving, really touches my heart.

Here's Sam, on his -slightly-too-big-for-him crutches he just got two days ago. Isn't he handsome? :)