God Provides A Miracle On The Road

Sarah, a volunteer nurse from Alaska has been acting as our medical coordinator in Nimba for the past 4 months. Her heart for God is astounding. She is so compassionate and dedicated to her work in building the capacity of the clinic staff, encouraging them to pray and follow God passionately; she has small youth support groups etc. She was traveling from one of our remote clinics, the new one (we just built with BPRM funds) in Gblarlay, carrying a sick child with an enlarged spleen and blood in her urine, to Ganta hospital with her mother, about a three hour trip.

Visibility is often limited as cars and trucks pass on the dusty roads. She had just passed Grai (an hour from Gblarlay) and was approaching a small bridge when through the dust they noticed an overturned van with people crawling out of the windows. Her adrenalin peaked and she felt ill equipped wondering what she would find and how she could help. She took a deep breath of the Holy Spirit and prayed. Altogether 11 people came out of the van, including one baby. She wanted to do triage (a first-aid procedure for emergencies) but the group was too big. Some were staggering in shock. She gathered them all together in a circle and announced, “I want us all first to pray and thank God that He has spared our lives.” So everyone bowed and prayed before their Maker. She then had them each do a self-assessment, just like she was leading a fitness club. "I want everyone to raise their hands, wiggle your fingers, move your feet, how is your head, push on your stomach, (considering internal bleeding), any pain? "etc...

There were two people that obviously needed help. One had had all the luggage land on his face when they flipped and he had a large cut across his face and was not well oriented. She suspected a concussion. Another had his hand hanging limply and arm badly scraped His wrist appeared broken. She found a piece of cardboard in the car and gently laid his hand that was swelling up before her eyes into the "splint" and found her trousers in her bag and used it to wrap his arm. She told him, "That arm appears to be broken, we need to pray that God will heal it." In her mind she saw all the poorly managed broken bones of a few of our staff in recent times...Liberia is not the place to break a bone!. She prayed with him, "Lord, we ask you to heal this arm, let the bone heal in your mercy, amen." It happened that this man goes to our church in Monrovia. When they got back in the car, she repeated her concern for his arm and they prayed once again, believing for his healing. After an hour trip to Saclepea Health Center, they carefully unwrapped his arm and there were no scrapes, no swelling and full function...a miracle! God is so good!

Equip Opens New Clinic in Gblarlay

On the 22nd of January EquipLiberia celebrated the opening of a new clinic in Gblarlay, a remote but lively town in Nimba County. The clinic provides health care for an area with a population of over 25,000 people and sees 700 patients a month. Since Gblarlay is located within miles of the border with Ivory Coast, the clinic also sees a large amount of Ivorians desperate for good medical care.

The celebrations started the evening before the event as the air of festivity in the town erupted into dancing and drumming, which went on all night. In the morning the fattened cow was killed and everyone gathered around the cooking pots preparing okra, palm butter, and of course, rice for the ceremony.

The ceremony was held just outside the clinic under a vast canopy of palm branches. Representatives from Equip, the local community, the Ivorians, the government, and the County Health Team all spoke. Together they told a story of a town in need and group of people who were willing to sacrifice so much to make this new clinic possible. The speeches were spaced out by different performances from local cultural groups.

After the program was completed and the ribbon across the door was cut, the food was served. All in all it was a festive celebration of a new clinic that will bring good quality, primary health care to a large area, saving thousands of lives.

Here are some photos from the event:

The children of Gblarlay

The cooks preparing the food

Two of the cultural dancers