Lectures are half over and that is just simply amazing because it doesn't feel that long! I just have no words for this week. I'm just amazed at the power and awesomeness of God! Again, simply so I don't forget to talk about the medical side of things- this week and next week, we are actually talking about community transformation. It reminds me a lot of the medical sociology class that I took one semester. A lot of the stuff we talked about on Monday, we talked about in that class. After talking about it this week and being reminded, I realized that I did not incorporate those concepts into my actual nursing practice very well, which means that I did not give my patients the very best care, and my patients deserve the utmost best care from me. Medical care isn't just focusing on their physical ailments; it needs to be about sitting down and talking about the why's and the how's and what they believe about all of it. From the perspective of community transformation, it means recognizing that a group of people may not fully believe that disease is caused by germs. It reminded me of the book that I was supposed to read for that class (I only read part of it.) called The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down. It was about a Hmong little girl with epilepsy. The American medical system failed her and her family because no one sat down to understand their beliefs. In their culture epilepsy was seen as a gift from the gods, so her mom never gave her the medication as prescribed. Unfortunately eventually, a massive seizure caused permanent irreversible brain damage, and the end talks about how if someone had sought to understand their perspective, they may have been able to phrase the necessity of the medication and the dangers of epilepsy in a way that the parents could understand. I remember one of my patients was recently diagnosed with heart failure and I knew she was upset over it. I consoled her some, but I never sat down to understand fully her point of view. What if I had? What if I had taken the time to understand her view point, understand what she believes, and be able to speak into that? I definitely want to add that to my everyday practice.
Before I left, someone told me that they hoped I would find what I had been looking for during this trip. I have found what I searched so hard for and more! Oh if only my words could describe my excitement to the fullest extent, but my words fail me. I have found God in the most intimate, most incredible way that there are simply no words to describe or explain it. Even if I tried, my words would fail me. How do you describe the glory of God? How do you describe His faithfulness? How do you describe His goodness, His love, His holiness, His beauty? There are no words to describe those things because He is simply too great and too beyond all imagination to do that. This week, I have intimately met with Him multiple times, I have learned so much about just the power of the Holy Spirit, I have watched Him move. I could tell so many stories here, but that would make this far too long. One night at dinner, Bethany looks at me and says, "Morgan, you are one of the people that look so much different this week! Your whole countenance has changed. When you came, you were rather gray, and now you are full of color!" And that is simply the best description on how I feel too!
One quick story, a couple weeks ago, I was supposed to go running with Dani in the morning, but she cancelled. I crawled back in bed and decided to just chat with God. I remember He very specifically said that He deeply cared about people's hearts. This week, He spoke more into that and also reminded me about that conversation. He explained that it is by no accident that I am a cardiac nurse- I work with hearts. Hearts get me excited and fascinate me, and I love it. God cares about physical hearts and He cares about spiritual hearts. That is what I'm passionate about. I'm passionate that hearts get healed physical and spiritually. I was sharing this with Noga on Friday, and she says, "And what a testimony that you will be to that as you will have a freed and healed heart."
I love the conversations that we get to have here all the time. Thursday night as a house, we were praying for each other as a room plus Dani and speaking into each other's spiritual gifts. Today, a few of us walked down to a cafe and had the most incredible conversations and then even prayed for our waitress. I get to have awesome conversations about what God is doing and has done and will do. And it takes me breath away. As we walked back from the cafe and were having an incredible conversation, I could feel God surging through the conversation. It's so awesome!
As we are entering spring here, it is currently lambing and calving season- there are literally baby lambs and calves every where. During our walk, we saw a just born calf that hadn't even stood up yet. It is so descriptive of all that is happening here through our school- new life is being birthed and coming into being! Now, if only a little lamb would let me pet him, I'd be really happy 😁
"You split the sea
So I could walk right through it
You drowned my fears in perfect love
You rescued me
And I will stand and sing
I am a child of God"
