In the middle of the night, our neighbors showed up to our door with their 7 month old grandson. He was sick with fever, upset stomach, diarrhea...they did not want to go to the hospital as it was night and it was a Sunday so I gave them medicine for the fever to get through the night and they agreed to go to the hospital in the morning, as I was already scheduled to go there, I would drive them. The next morning the baby's mom showed up with him and we drove together. The doctor assessed the child on our arrival and agreed he needed to be admitted for hydration and intravenous malaria treatment. He received attentive, prompt care...he was sent home after he stabilized and responded well to treatment. He was given oral medicine and follow up instructions were given to his mom and grandmother. The family joked, laughed and felt relief as we drove home from the hospital. Even the child's father joined in on the playful celebration...many times it is difficult to locate young fathers, so this was a blessing.
During times of struggle here, things are not always as they seem so with that comes the need for great discernment, grace and in some cases mercy. We live amongst a culture of deep fear, but I am learning that Western culture is the same it just manifests differently. In our village, when people are sick, fear drives them to exhaust all options available to them while deciding if the illness is spiritual from a curse, an indwelling spirit, tormenting spirit in their home or if it is a true physical illness. It is difficult for many to have the courage and knowledge to access an actual medical doctor to help assess this so many seek other traditional methods or assistance from their elders. But in reflecting, how is the Western world any different? We go to the doctor to discuss our abnormal test results, then the surgeon, get a second opinion and then a third opinion...we go to the Naturopath...we start chemotherapy and change our diet, when it fails we try another type of chemotherapy, we go to church for prayer, to healing rooms for intercession, we use essential oils and apply to energy points on our bodies...and then the day sometimes comes where we have exhausted our resources and death is lingering within our next breath. Are we really any different then our Mozambican neighbors?
The risk you take when journeying with some during illness can be huge...it means opening yourself up to frustration, disappointment, judgement, pride, trust issues, spiritual realms and death. What added to our neighbors situation is the reality of the child's grandfather...a man with his own issues. Years of physical, spiritual struggles and mental instability. He actually met his wife during an appointment at a traditional healer's house where she was also seeking assistance for her physical ailments. A very different scenario then our Western match making sites such as church, the bar and the Internet! He is known to still talk to himself, to those unseen around him as he works in the field...he is a man gripped by many demons mentally and spiritually. We have sat with him and his wife several times discussing day to day life, hearing his stories and watching them struggle to make beneficial decisions.
So...the story, stories that followed the celebration of a young child's recovery drastically took a turn over a weekend. Last we heard from the grandfather was the child was still improving. We attended our prayer day in Malawi Saturday and returned filled and ready to rest for the weekend. Sunday was relaxing, uneventful and quiet. Monday morning we decided to visit another neighbor while the boys started their language lessons...our neighbor was not home but as we returned we walked by the house of the neighbor we had just helped and we noticed another friend visiting so we asked to come in to visit them all and we were received.
We took our seats as we were welcomed onto the mat and responded to each person as they greeted us...there was something heavy in the environment although all were calmly sitting, chatting and even smiling as our mutual friend had to leave. As she left, I asked the grandmother how the 7 month old was. She immediately looked frightened, and I was sensing something was wrong as the child's father was visiting and not at work in town. The grandmother got up, went into her home and brought out the child...she placed his shriveled, limp body into my arms. Ian sat next to me as I unwrapped the blanket from his body...the little child I saw just a few days ago was almost unrecognizable. Mouth dry with sores, chest retracting with very short, shallow breaths and eyes rolling back half open. We could sense instantly what had gone on and with a quick physical assessment it was confirmed. This precious boy had been taken to a traditional healer and medicine was given...and he was now only breaths away from death. He had a new, large string type necklace around his frail neck which is often coated with herbal medicine and chanted/prayed over by the traditional healer. I looked at Ian and he knew by my eyes what was going on...he calmly asked the father, the decision maker in the moment as he was the only male there and the grandfather was out in the field, if he would like the child taken to the hospital. Everything in me wanted this child to live and that is what we began praying, but everything in me knew he would take his last breaths this day. I knew it was important to manifest hope in any small way possible and not just watch him die. His father desperately wanted assistance for his son...we would find out later the next day that he was not around when the grandfather insisted his daughter take herself and the child to the traditional healer during the night.
I made a phone call to my doctor friend as we rushed to our vehicle, I let him know we were bringing in a dying child that he had just discharged days before. After several attempts to start our car, it finally turned over. The child's grandmother carried the child into the emergency area and his parents were right behind us on a motorcycle. I recognize the nurse on duty as he whispered to me that the doctor had notified him to be expecting a dying child...he was kind, patient and after four attempts placed an IV in the child's neck, administered an antibiotic and started a fluid drip. Another nurse came in to assess with him, they both talked for a bit and looked at me dumbfounded as the child was so well a few days before, but they also confirmed from their experience with strong certainty that this was a consequence of medicines and actions given by a traditional healer. During this time, the child's crying father was yelled at and escorted out of the room as the rule is only one person at a time with the patient. I calmy but firmly said to the assistant that he knows how rare it was to see a father here in this situation and his child was dying. The assistant, usually a kind and playful man to this American missionary nurse, looked at me in surprise...the look of, you know rules are rules here no matter what...not even death can get in the way of these rules. I knew it was a privilege that I was given permission to stay in the room with his child and wife as the child's father cried at the curb of the hospital, but it was not my right. Ian had returned to the emergency entrance and quickly came along side this wrecked father. He spoke kindly to him, hugged him...he walked him slowly back into the room where his child was beginning to slowly gasp for breath. Ian directed him to speak into his son's ear as he could still hear him, he knew his father's voice. The father bent over his son and whispered in his ear, his sobbing increased as he left the room. I stood at the doorway as the father stood outside and cried uncontrollably. Ian noticed the child taking his last breaths. I walked over and placed my hand on the child and my eyes met with the nurse attending the patient across from me...the emergency room is about half the size of a normal hospital room for one person in the States and it is crammed with three gurney type beds, a couple small tables for supplies and a sink. This was a good nurse...despite our different training, different countries of origin...he could read my eyes. He stepped over, assessed the child, did a few chest compressions and confirmed his death. His mother broke into tears and left the room to be replaced by his grandmother. I asked the nurse if there was anyway to have some privacy for a few minutes so he pulled over the portable "curtain" to block the bed from others' view, to give some sense of sacred space. I walked out to take a few deep breaths, to let my own tears out...just then my doctor friend walked in to meet up with us. In passing, I told him the child had just died. Ian and I went and spoke to the shocked parents as they grasped at what had just happened. As Ian comforted the father the best he knew how in the moment, we were asked if we could help by driving the baby's body back home with his grandmother and his parents would walk a bit together and take a motorbike. We agreed...no death certificate at this time, no investigation, no call to the social worker and no report to authorities.
Then the moment that will be etched in me forever...when humanity in all its brokenness united to create some kind of wholeness as a bit of light broke through each of us. I re-entered the room where the doctor looked at me heavy with desperation for answers and empathy, he placed his hand on my shoulder and said he was sorry several times. I assured him he had given the best care last week and there was nothing else he could have done. The nurse had attentively taken out the IV and remained in a quiet, humble posture. He lives this experience day in and day out and has every reason to be quick tempered and sharp with his judgementaI words, but he chose grace on this day. I approached the grandmother and she said in tears she was ready to go. A family member of the patient a few steps across from us joined us as the grandmother was afraid to touch the child's body, so he gently helped me swaddle the child and with kindness shared in the grandmother's grief...a complete stranger but he wanted to make sure this foreigner knew how to swaddle a dead baby to prepare to transport. I humbly let him join me in this simple act although I have swaddled many loved ones in death, even my own parents. He had done this many times as well before...
We drove the lifeless child home with his grandmother. When we arrived back to our village, our neighbor met us at the car along with the uncle of the child. He carried the body back to the house and our neighbor joined the grandmother as the outward grieving process began while she walked her home...loud cries, wailing of broken hearts and deep years of suffering suppressed came out in just minutes. I walked quietly behind them with silent tears. We were met immediately at their home by a group of women called to fetch water to start the burial process...we extended the use of our borehole to them which they gratefully used. I was also met by the grandfather...he softly greeted me and then went back to repairing his bicycle as the child's mom and grandmother cried in their home.
During the night hours, the assigned men dug the grave and by the guidance of a flashlight, the child's body was carried to the cemetery while then men quietly and beautifully sang together. The path through our front yard was used for ease...it was a sacred moment. The women stayed back at the house and grieved, mourned as is their custom.
The next day I had a visit at the cilindu. I looked out to see the child's grandfather waiting to talk with me. I took a few minutes, prayed, listened and walked out to meet him. The next few minutes were filled with different stories, some blame-shifting, a lot of shame, confusion, sadness, frustration...our eyes finally met as he looked up and there was a pause...I heard in my spirit, "Forgive them, for they know not what they do." Wow, I had never really stopped to think that was a "now" word that Jesus spoke over humanity as He took on our sin and shame but it was and is! I looked my broken neighbor in the eyes, "Baba, I am so sorry life is so difficult here in Mozambique, I am sorry your grandson had to suffer and die, I am sorry you think you are alone...we should pray." With obvious physical relief, he agreed. I prayed in the name of Jesus for him, for the family, for the brokenness of all involved, for justice of it all. He then thanked me for all our help and the friendship we have extended to him, to his family before he headed home.
I attended the sadaka forty days later to remember and celebrate the spirit of this child being released...I was honored to sit amongst the community, to be served the best food that had taken hours to prepare, and to talk with those I now call friends. The child's grandmother thanked me and walked me out as the day was ending. Sadly, the grandfather's father had died just a few days before so we helped him get farther North to attend the funeral along with his own mother so she could visit her children as the had been separated by divorce.
So much loss, so much grief, so much humanity but so much grace, so much mercy, so much love...this is what being a good neighbor truly means. Love wins even when we do not see it, feel it, acknowledge it...we will not be forsaken and Love will have the victory!
"Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing."
