Seeing Through the Eyes of Jesus is a new resource from the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship that calls us back to the central focus of our Christian faith—the Risen and Living Jesus! Click the link to find out more. https://cbfblog.com/2022/08/17/new-cbf-resource-encourages-seeing-through-the-eyes-of-jesus/
January 5, 2022
Fifteen years ago this January 2022, I was called to serve as the Coordinator for Florida’s Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. Without a doubt, this has been the most joyful work of my forty-three years of Christian ministry. With that said and with a grateful heart, I formally submit my notice of intent to retire this year with my last day being June 30, 2022. I hope by giving this much time to allow my successor to be named and to assist that person in a period of transition. I know beyond any doubt that God will guide CBF Florida to find our next coordinator.
Allow me, please, a few moments to recount some of my highlights from these past fifteen years.
Shortly after I arrived at the Lakeland office at Hillcrest Street when the phone rang and Marti Edwards, my assistant at that time, forwarded the call to me. It was Jimmy Allen, a personal hero of mine and a champion of historic Baptist principles. Dr. Allen had called to invite me to attend the meeting of the New Baptist Covenant, a new initiative envisioned by former President Jimmy Carter to bring all Baptists of goodwill together. I went home that day giddy and grateful to be part of such a family of Baptists.
Not long after Dr. Allen’s phone call, in July 2007, I received another call, this one from my wife who was still living in Miami. She called to tell me that my mother had just died. I had seen her a week earlier on a trip that I made to Orange Park to attend a clergy peer learning group. In those bitter days that followed, Cooperative Baptists poured out their support for me and my family. I will not forget that. We truly are a familia, as my friend Rubén Ortiz is so fond of saying.
Florida’s Cooperative Baptists have enabled me to take pastors and church leaders to see and to participate in CBF Global missions in Miami, Romania, Lebanon, Egypt, The Bahamas, Cuba, Haiti, Uganda, Puerto Rico, and the Dominican Republic. I have loved spending time with so many of you and getting to know you in those amazing places. CBF Florida blessed me with a sabbatical in 2014 and enabled me to visit Baptist work in England.
During my tenure, CBF Florida has formally extended its partnerships to eight churches in The Bahamas, one in Puerto Rico, and ten in the Dominican Republic. We have signed covenant agreements with the Eastern Cuba Baptist Convention and with the Fraternity of Baptist Churches in Cuba. In fact, we are now CBF of Florida and the Caribbean Islands.
Building upon the legacy work of Pat and Carolyn Anderson, I am proud that CBF Florida has provided ministry scholarships to more than thirty students over the past fifteen years. These students have gone on to serve as pastors, associate pastors, missionaries, church starters, non-profit directors, chaplains, and even moderators of CBF Florida. To me, this is a remarkable and hopeful investment in the future of Cooperative Baptists.
I am proud of the many things that we have accomplished together with God’s help: the starting of new churches, the support of incredible missionaries, the growth of our mission engagements in The Bahamas and Cuba, the gifting of the ministry centers to Touching Miami with Love, and so much more. What brings me the most joy, however, are not these things but you, the people of CBF Florida. I have loved being with you, sharing meals together, worshiping together, learning together, playing, and praying together.
Thank you, CBF Florida, for fifteen blessed years. This wonderful verse from Luke, where Jesus teaches his disciples about a principle of giving, describes so well what I would say about these fifteen years. Jesus says in Luke 6:38, “Give and it shall be given to you. A good measure – pressed down, shaken together, and running over – shall be poured into your lap.” You, my brothers and sisters, have poured your blessings into my life.
I am so grateful!
Ray Johnson
Coordinator, Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of Florida and the Caribbean Islands
March 4, 2021
After 15 years of serving at Touching Miami with Love, I am excited to continue my 18 years of work with Cooperative Baptist Fellowship as field personnel to my new role as an Educational Advocate. Locally in Miami-Dade County, my ministry supports low-income families of children with special needs. As I provide one-on-one advocacy, my goal is to impact the school-to-prison pipeline that disproportionately affects children of color with disabilities and show the love of Christ to this vulnerable population. I recently became a board-certified Advocate in Special Education from The National Association of Special Education Teachers (NASET) and the American Academy of Special Education Professionals (AASEP).
Within the Fellowship, I serve as a consultant with field personnel, churches, and partner organization that serves vulnerable children in educational programming. I am also involved in legislative advocacy efforts to defend public education with a particular interest for protections that ensure quality access to special education services for low-income families throughout Florida.
Born and raised in Kansas City, Missouri, I received my Bachelor of Science in Education from Baylor University and always knew I would work with students and enjoyed my years of classroom teaching before coming to CBF. If you or your church has a heart for vulnerable children, I would love to speak with you. You can learn more and find my contact information at angelpittman.com
February 17, 2021
Across the years, several descriptions of the human person have captured my imagination: humans are complex tubes; we are stardust animated by an electrical spark; we are nephesh chayyah; we are dust and to dust we shall return. If you were to attend a traditional Ash Wednesday service today, you would hear the cleric intone that final description as she smudged your forehead with ashes in the shape of a cross. “You are dust and to dust you shall return.”
Those traditional services may be harder to find as we continue to wrestle a pandemic that has threatened all of us and taken some of us. If nothing else, the coronavirus has reminded us of the truth that we are dust. Here we are, after all, manipulators of the atom, possessors of the most destructive and powerful military in the history of the world, inventors of medical marvels, the self-proclaimed apex creature of the evolutionary ladder. And, a virus has felled almost a half million of our fellow citizens in a year’s time. Dust indeed.
Did you know that traditionally the ashes that are being applied today would have been made out of the burned palm fronds from last year’s Palm Sunday services? They’re a burnt reminder that something triumphant hides in the cremated remains. I think of the pastors who sit outside the windows of elderly and infirm church members to make the pastoral call. I think of the school teachers who risk their own health for the sake of our littlest citizens. I think of the chaplains who sit with the spouse and children of the person who has just been taken off a vent. I think of the nurses, the doctors and the frontline staff whose mark at the end of this day will be the bruises of a tightly fitted N-95 mask. They are, along with so many others, the triumph hiding in the dust.
I like so much how Jan Richardson puts it in her poem for Ash Wednesday, Blessing the Dust:
So let us be marked
not for sorrow.
And let us be marked
not for shame.
Let us be marked
not for false humility
or for thinking
we are less
than we are
but for claiming
what God can do
within the dust,
within the dirt,
within the stuff
of which the world
is made
and the stars that blaze
in our bones
and the galaxies that spiral
inside the smudge
we bear.
Grace and peace,
Ray
Grandma B was a member of the church that I pastored in Miami. She was full of life and the Holy Ghost, but mostly the Holy Ghost. I loved preaching when she was in the congregation, which was most Sundays, because the love of Christ emanated from her like she was a glow bug whose switch was stuck in the "On" position.
Grandma, as she insisted that I call her, was from Jamaica. On some Sundays when the Spirit was just too much for her to contain, particularly at the end of a service, she would break out and dance down the aisle reaching out for anyone who would to join her. Her joy was infectious. I once remarked to her that it would take an exceptionally powerful anointing of God's Spirit to get me, a middle-aged white guy, to break out in dance on the floor of any Baptist church. She prayed for that day to come.
Sometime before the end of my tenure at that church, Grandma became ill with cancer. On a day about two weeks before her death, I visited her at her home. A number of her extended family members, several of whom were also church members, were gathered at her bedside. As I recall, she was covered with a quilt even though the temperatures of south Florida were quite warm on that particular day. She beckoned me to her left side and reached out her hand for me to hold. "Now, let me bless you," she said, and she prayed for me, her pastor. That's supposed to be the other way around.
I honestly can't remember the specifics of the blessing that she prayed for me. I only know that as I walked out the door to get into my truck, I cried . . . because a beautiful child of God had indeed blessed me.
What I mean to say here is simply this. Black History Month is not sterile and academic. For me, it's personal. I am blessed beyond measure by the my black friends whom God has stitched into my story. To paraphrase Jesus, these friends have "given to me, good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over."
Ray
By: Angel Pittman
CBF Florida partners with some of the most talented and passionate advocates for the world’s vulnerable people. One such partner is Angel Pittman, who works to make sure that all of Florida’s children have access to a quality public education. In her most recent blog, she tells the story of a family that fell pray to the allure of education vouchers.
For me merging individual support of students and their families with legislative work is just two sides to the same advocacy coin—the following captures a view of my educational advocacy work and why legislative engagement right now is essential.
I recently received a call from a community partner in the south end of Miami-Dade County about a Mom in need of support. Believing that "private school" was better than public schools, she had enrolled her two children in a small private school using one of Florida's many “scholarships." These vouchers were specifically for low-income parents to send their children to private schools, and it seems like a perfect fit. Like all the available schools, this voucher program didn't pay for the full cost of schooling. Mom earns her living by the hour picking vegetables in the fields and Dad works construction and for years they made it work, thinking this was the best choice for her children.
To continue reading click here.
To view the CBF Florida State Meeting which took place on Friday, June 26, 2020 click here.
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On May 11, 2020, Gerry Hutchinson (CBF’s Chaplaincy and Pastoral Counselor Manager) facilitated a conversation on Spiritual Self-Care for pastors and chaplains. The background presentation of photos and poetry was compiled by Corinne Causby, a CPE intern and former divinity student at Wake Forest University. Corinne is also the photographer who took the pictures.
Lance Brown, led a Zoom video conference on how to do online worship in this coronavirus age. Lance is on the staff of Christ Journey in Miami, which had more than 2,000 online worshipers this past Sunday. A number of churches were represented on the call. If you would like to check out the video click here
On July 20-27, CBF Florida hosted a very talented group of 22 people out of Kentucky at the forgotten coast of Port Saint Joe. The team hailed from FBC Middletown, KY, with team leader, Charles White (CBF Disaster Response Coordinator of KY). Together with Kenny Phillips, CBF Florida’s Disaster Response Coordinator, the team completed hanging sheetrock and 70% of the finish work for one resident. As the week wore on, the team split into three groups and did a yard clean up for one family, and installed a sink and built a cabinet for another resident. Great week and even greater team!
By Carolyn Anderson
Pat and I became friends with Joe and Sarah Johnson when they moved to Lakeland in 1989 and joined Lakeside Baptist Church where we were members. We quickly realized that we shared common passions, including missions and concern about the radical changes taking place in the SBC. Their story together began in 1938 when, as children, they arrived as new residents at the Florida Baptist Children’s Home. They became friends, then high school sweethearts. They both attended and graduated from Stetson University and then got married in 1949. They were both employed by the Florida Baptist Children’s Home after graduation and were relied on at the highest levels.
Six years after Joe passed away in 1999, Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast; Sarah volunteered to go with the church’s co-pastors, Tom and Joyce Cleary, to help CBF Florida’s Disaster Relief Team with cleanup in Mississippi. Joyce Cleary said that Sarah’s enthusiasm impressed others in the group. At the end of the week, she was recognized for being the oldest and best volunteer of the week. Joyce recently said, “I was blessed to have known Sarah and to have worked with her for a few short years of my life. I will never forget her dedication to every task and her devotion to our Lord.”
Tim Sizemore, her pastor at the time of her death, shared that Sarah was a missionary Christian promoting missions, organizing local work, and sometimes disappearing for a few days to make personal deliveries to one of the Florida Fellowship’s various ministries. Her heart was always with the less fortunate. In her last years she would read to her neighbors in the retirement residence where she lived.
Craig Sherouse, Joe and Sarah’s pastor at Lakeside Baptist Church, summed up two lives well lived with these remarks: “Joe and Sarah were the best kind of Christians and Baptists I have known, deeply committed, broadly generous, who loved children and young people. They loved the Lord, the local church and the best ways that Baptist do missions. They were deeply committed to and involved with the formation of the CBF Florida. Their bequest to CBF Florida, paid after their passing, is another of many ways that their humble generosity continues to strengthen the work of the Kingdom and to illustrate their faithful stewardship.”
Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord...that they may rest from their labors, and their works follow them. Revelation 14:13
We celebrate Joe and Sarah, faithful servants who understood how to continue helping the work of God even after their lives on earth have ended
Wow what a weekend. I love it when fruits of labor are realized. After much logistical preparations in PSJ and taking the time to search out local partners, we had our first mission groups roll in. Thirty nine students from GA Tech and seven from FSU. The FSU students were a last minute add on requested by our local contact Diana Burkette from CCDF a local non profit. She asked if I minded them hooking up with us. Diana had 5 worksites identified for our weekend crew. Mostly clean up, debris removal and some small repair work.This may seem like trivial work but you have no idea how much junk is still on the ground. This was actually a pivotal time in this community. The state is suspending their debris removal and turning it over to the city and county. I know for a fact that PSJ does not possess the HEAVY equipment that the state has. The dead line is for the end of the month. Everyone is scrambling to get all their debris out to the road sides for the last pick up. After that, not sure what’s gonna happen. I’m sure it will take many, many months maybe years for the municipalities to catch up on the trash. We had a total of 46 volunteers and they were matched up in 4 teams in different locations. PSJ, Simmons Bayou, Mexico Beach, Northport, Jones Homestead and Highland View were the work sites. We were able to the two groups between St. James Episcopal and Oak Grove Assembly. The students worked incredibly hard and truly left an impact on this community. The locals were humbled by this effort. Our shower trailer worked out perfect other than I need to search out a larger discharge container to hold the gray water from showers. I may have a solution. Praise God from whom all blessings flow.
Kenny
CBF Disaster Response Florida
My Impressions of Our Mission Trip to Uganda
Julius Edward Francis, Jr.
First, let me take this opportunity to thank the management at CBF Florida for affording me the opportunity to travel to Uganda. This is my first time taking a trip to a foreign country for the expressed purpose of completing a mission assignment. This was quite a revelation for me as my overall knowledge of the plight of refugees has been somewhat limited. Uganda is unique as it allows over 1.6 million refugees to inhabit their borders. The lives we saw being impacted came from all levels of society. There were some that were very impoverish to some that had professional credentials. One thing that struck me was the grateful attitude that appeared to be expressed by each refugee. They were being treated with dignity and with opened arms. Sometimes its not the size of a country that counts, but the size of that country’s heart.
One of the heartbeats of the refugee assistance program is Refuge & Hope International located in Kampala, Uganda and in Alabaster, Alabama. The missionaries Jade and Shela Acker, the founders of Refuge and Hope are so impressive. To see them in action up close and personal was a blessing from God. If my own children were to find a cause to immerse themselves in I pray it be identical to the depth and breadth of the organization created by the Ackers. Starting with twelve students in 2008 to over a thousand students today, their vision has been and continues to be blessed by God. The number of programs being provided not only reaches any interested refugee but are available to citizens of the host country, Uganda. It is impossible to bless someone else without being blessed yourself. I have so much more to say but I will be obedient to the limits placed on this article.
My life has been forever impacted by the mission trip to Uganda, Africa, that I took through CBF Florida during the first two weeks of March 2018. I often describe my experience to others by stating that I am humbled, but also hopeful by work that is taking place there. My heart was overwhelmed to see the country that has opened its boarders to so many refugees who’ve had to flee their countries due to persecution of many different forms.
The transformational part of my trip was witnessing how the work of Christ is being carried out through the missionaries who represent CBF: Karen Alford, Missy Ward Angala, and Jade and Sheila Acker were all such a joy to be around, and they have inspired me to want to do more as a pastor in the area of mission work with my local congregation. The entire team exemplified the ministry as identified in Matthew 25:35-40, being the hands and feet of Christ.
As stated earlier, I felt (and still feel) humbled and hopeful as a result of this amazing trip. I was humbled seeing the lives and less fortunate conditions of so many in both Kampala and Mbarara, but also hopeful in witnessing first-hand the transformational ministry taking place through CBF’s Missionaries.
I continually promote the work that is happening through the efforts of CBF with my congregation, local pastors and political leaders in my community. I even had the opportunity to share on a local Christian radio station here in Miami, LifeFM 90,9. I was truly blessed to be a part of a phenomenal group, Ray Johnson and Tammy Synder (CBF members), and Julius Francis. I expect to fully participate and partner in some capacity with CBF and its local, national, and global efforts in the future. Thank you, CBF Florida, for allowing me to be a part of this amazing experience!!
Pastor Theo Johnson, III, Th.M. Senior Pastor Sweet Home Missionary Baptist Church
After many years or wandering in the wilderness, in verse four of this passage, we learn the people grew impatient on the way and they spoke out against God and Moses and asked, “Why have you brought us out of Egypt to die in the wilderness where we have no food or water?”
In Kampala, Uganda, I had the privilege of meeting many people who are “on their way.” These people are refugees from The Democratic of the Congo, Rwanda, Sudan, South Sudan, Burundi, Somalia, Eritrea and more. In contrast to the Israelites, these people are being very patient and thanking God that he has brought them to this this beautiful respite, called the Center for Refuge and Hope. Here, Muslims and Christians, side by side, in harmony are learning English and new skills to hopefully one day, when the conflicts are over, return to their home countries. They have dreams of eliminating poverty and empowering their people by becoming leaders, teachers, social workers, politicians, missionaries and mentors through their opportunities at The Center for Refuge and Hope.
Here are some words they shared with me what life was like before they were a part of the Center for Refuge and Hope:
“God took me away from my family, so he could form me into something different and something new.”
“I was just living without a dream and without God.”
“Before the Center for Refuge and Hope, there was no signpost for my life.”
“Most of my life I’ve been broken, but from that came good.”
As all of us are “on our way” in our lives. May you learn, as I have, from these precious, hopeful and very hospitable people to live with hope and anticipation understanding that God knows exactly where we are going.
Love, Tammy
A Pentecost Reflection by Rachel Gunter Shapard
In recent weeks I have seen firsthand one way in which the winds of the Spirit are blowing in Jacksonville, Florida. In a community on the north side of town that was hit by the devastating effects of Hurricane Irma eight months ago, an entire neighborhood is striving to get back into their homes that were flooded by waist-high water. Many of their belongings were destroyed except those stored up high in closets and upper cabinets. They lost most everything, including their privacy, for in order to remain in their homes the drywall had to be stripped out at least two-thirds of the way up to stop mold from making its home within their walls. The people who live on and around Ken Knight Drive have either left their uninhabitable homes to sleep on a family member's or friend’s couch, or those who had nowhere to go have figured out a way to remain in their homes in the midst of ruin.
But the winds of the Spirit have been blowing and beckoning those who would heed them to open their eyes to what has been a forgotten neighborhood. For if we are honest, we have to acknowledge that the people in this neighborhood were struggling long before the floodwaters of Hurricane Irma rose around them, but it went unnoticed. A small but mighty gathering, not unlike the disciples gathered behind locked doors, has felt the very breath of God and received the invitation of the Spirit to walk alongside the community on Ken Knight Drive in their time of crisis. Although it is difficult to view human suffering, this group has not allowed the painful stories of those who live on Ken Knight Drive to debilitate them, but instead, propel them to action. Slowly and steadily, homes are being rebuilt. Those who felt forgotten are sensing acknowledgment of their existence and struggle not only from those in their community, but from those who have traveled across many miles to stand (and work!) in solidarity with them.
Five homes have been restored, and just this past week, one family that lost most everything received the gift of furnishings for their home. They had been living in their rebuilt home with nothing inside it but a mattress on the floor. When members in the community heard about their need for furnishings, an unlikely assemblage of different races, varying socioeconomic statuses and differing religious beliefs came together to clean the rooms, move in furniture, and turn a shell of a house into a home fit for living. This unlikely assemblage might never have come together or even met one another if it weren’t for the beckoning winds of the Spirit. Now they are brothers and sisters, they are neighbors who know one another’s names, they have borne each other’s burdens. Even amidst their differences, this gathering that would have looked strange to some, was transformed in receiving the invitation of the Spirit to create not just the semblance of heaven, but the true realm of God right here on earth.
May it be so for all of us this day and everyday, as we take in the very breath of God and exhale the life-giving winds of the Spirit in a broken world. Who knows what we might accomplish if we heed these winds and come together, despite all our differences. We are better off for all that we let in.
Ruben Ortiz, CBF Latino Network Coordinator
1. Pray. A large part of the Latino community consists of first-generation immigrants. In the midst of the country's current situation, data shows that violence against minorities has increased by 48% in the first six months of 2017 compared to the same period last year. The Latino community needs your prayers.
2. Consider creating a small group Spanish-only Bible study and/or introducing the Spanish language in worship at your church. Studying the Bible in one's primary language (i.e. the language of the heart) makes such a difference in the understanding of God's Word. Including some phrases in Spanish within the hymns and choruses you sing in worship can also be a meaningful way to connect to the Latino community. You might be surprised by the reaction of church members when they realize they just sang in the same language that more than 30 million Latinos worship in each Sunday!
3. Find out more about DREAM ACT, DACA, DAPA and SNAP. By supporting just laws on legal immigration and paying attention to poverty in the Latino community, you contribute to the Latino Network of CBF, encourage your congregation to get involved in this type of advocacy.
4. Encourage your missions committee/team to consider engaging in missions in a Spanish-speaking country. CBF Florida can help you with this! Puerto Rico, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Central America - the list is long of more than 20 Spanish-speaking countries where you can engage in missions.
5. Discern the voice of God. You may receive the call to visit a Spanish-speaking country or get involved with Latinos right in your own community. You might even discern a calling to be a missionary in the Latin countryside. CBF has alliances with Baptist groups throughout Latin America and there are plenty of service opportunities!
For more information on the CBF Latino Network of CBF, contact Ruben Oritz at rortiz@cbf.net. To learn more about mission engagement opportunitues in Cuba, Puerto Rico etc., contact Rachel Shapard at rshapard12@floridacbf.org.
As an update for those who may not have heard: I am working in SW Uganda now as a programs advisor with an organization called Medical Teams International (MTI). My job has many facets and involves working with many programs. As I get to know and work with each one, I’ll be sharing stories and experiences about them all, but the first one I want to highlight is the obstetric fistula program.
The World Health Organization estimates up to 2 million women in sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia suffer from obstetric fistulas. Humanitarian groups who work with these women estimate that number to be far higher. Uganda is ranked third in the world for the highest number of fistula cases, with an estimated 140,000 to 200,000 women affected, and 1,900 new cases occurring annually. Obstetric fistulas are usually caused by difficult births. Many women in sub-Saharan Africa give birth in the bush or in their banana plantations – without a midwife or any other medical assistance. If there is prolonged pushing or if the baby is in the wrong position, tearing can occur and no one is present to stitch it up afterwards. Girls who get pregnant in their teens (either because of early marriage, rape or lack of birth control) are at high risk for this as often their bodies are not yet ready to allow passage of a baby through the birth canal. And finally, gender based violence at any age can also cause tearing and tissue damage leading to fistula formation. Either way the damage goes far beyond mere physical as the girls or women are then ostracized from their families and communities. The fistula can affect any or all parts of the genitourinary tract from vagina to anus. The resulting tears cause the women to leak urine and/or feces uncontrollably. The smell becomes a source of shame and embarrassment, and their inability to properly function as wives and mothers further devalues them in the eyes of their communities. Forced to fend for themselves and live in isolation in the bush, many die of starvation or infection, others live as half animals in the jungle, hiding during the day and coming out to forage and steal food or supplies at night.
Thankfully, surgery to repair these fistulas is fairly simple and can restore these women to full physical health, even allowing them to give birth again. Finding these ostracized women and then convincing them to have the surgery, however, is not as simple.
Medical Teams International, partnering with the Ugandan government to provide health service to refugees, began a fistula clinic at the end of 2015, and performed its first successful surgery in April of 2016. Since then, 59 women have had the surgery with only 3 not successfully healing. Their goal is to expand services and efforts to reach more women as awareness of the enormity of the problem continues to grow.
One challenge is the long recovery period. Women must stay at the clinic for up to 3 weeks following the surgery and then cannot resume normal activities of daily living for another 3 months. Families, and particularly husbands, overjoyed at getting their wives back are often not content to wait the 3 months. One of the first women to have the surgery was ruptured almost immediately upon returning home by her overeager husband who was not willing to be patient. Fortunately he has become one of the program’s champions and voluntarily talks to groups of men educating them to not make his mistake, and to wait the allotted time.
Convincing the women to come to the clinic can take weeks and even months of visits by MTI staff to gain their trust after years of being reviled and humiliated. One woman living in a lean-to she built with banana leaves resorted to alcohol to numb her isolation and loneliness. She hid from the MTI team who came to visit her for 3 weeks before finally agreeing to talk from behind the tree where she was hiding as long as no one came any closer. They brought her sugar, salt and flour, luxury items she hadn’t had access to in years. Finally she accepted the gifts and agreed to meet with the doctor who would perform the surgery. But when they came to get her on the appointed date, they found her too drunk to travel. They had to come 3 more times before she finally agreed again and only when they promised that she could sit by herself in the back of the Land Cruiser. Most of these women have been forced off public transportation and publicly humiliated because of their smell, so she could only feel safe if she knew she would be alone and sitting far from the rest of the team. Her surgery was successful and afterwards she moved in with her mother. When the MTI vehicle drove to her new location she saw the vehicle coming while it was still far away. As they drove up, the staff saw a woman they didn’t recognize dancing beneath an avocado tree. It took them a few minutes to realize it was her. She was clean, her hair was no longer in tangled dreads, and she had gained enough weight that her bones no longer protruded. She was dancing with joy and tears streamed down her face as she welcomed them by showing off what she could now do. After talking to her for a while one of the team noticed there were no alcohol bottles or wrappers lying in the yard. She asked the woman if she still drank. The woman snorted in disdain and then shrugged, “I don’t need it anymore.”
The women all receive individual counseling but are also required to take part in monthly group meetings with other women who have received the surgery. For many, finding out they are not alone is the first real step in healing. The group sessions are an opportunity for them to share experiences openly with others who understand perfectly. One of their favorite topics is talking about their husbands. One woman confides she didn’t tell her husband he had to wait 3 months: “I told him he had to wait at least a year.” The others roar in laughter. One woman who hasn’t said a word suddenly stands up and says, “You know what I can do now? Watch.” And she takes off running. Her 8-year son, who has only recently been reunited with her, catches up to her, grabs her hand, and they run together laughing in circles around the group sitting under a tree. Other women jump up and start running too and suddenly everyone is up either running or dancing, laughing and crying.
Sometimes they share more personal stories. One woman recalls growing up in the Congo where war was part of her earliest memories. Different tribes or political parties have always fought over land rights, and violence, to ensure terror, is part of the warfare. When she was 10 her village was attacked. She was outside hanging laundry when people started screaming. She watched as her 6-year old brother was struck down by a machete. Then she was surrounded by men and brought before her parents who were being held down by others. Boys can grow up to be soldiers so are instantly killed. Girls aren’t so lucky. At least a dozen men took turns raping her in front of her parents. Others ransacked their home. Her 4-year old sister was found hiding in their house and tortured. She died from internal bleeding and injuries later that night after the marauders left. When they fled across the border into Uganda their family of 6 was down to 3: her parents and herself. Another brother was never seen again and to this day she has hopes he escaped. After fleeing to Uganda, her father left one day and never came home. Her mother who was also raped that day contracted HIV and died a year later. With no family to take her in, this woman had been living alone since age 11. Because she smelled and always had dirty clothes, no one wanted her living with them. Now for the first time, roughly in her 20s, not only is she healthy, she finally has friends. Now MTI is struggling to come up with the space needed to expand the program. Because the women require such a long convalescent time, they can only do a few surgeries at a time because there aren’t enough beds to accommodate the women for 3 weeks. The surgeon who has been trained to do the surgeries also needs better training. He learned at a 3-day seminar with a larger group of surgeons from other parts of the country and had no hands-on time with the instructors. Finding funding to get better training for him, train new surgeons, and build a 10-bed ward just for fistula patients are some of the challenges with which we are faced. But the local staff who work with this program remain committed and passionate as they admit their lives have all been touched and forever changed by the amazing women so far this program has been able to help.
Pray for these women, the doctors and the Medical Teams International organization and me. You may donate to this cause as this site - https://www.classy.org/campaign/karen-alford/c113452
Peace,
Karen
Mail donations to:
CBF FL and the Caribbean Islands
C/O Bayshore Baptist Church
3111 W Morrison Ave.
Tampa, FL 33629
Email: tsnyder@floridacbf.org
Phone: 813-810-7499
Address: 3111W Morrison Ave. Tampa, FL 33629
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