The hits just keep coming…

Just last week Scott, Cam and I went to visit our friend and worker Francisco.

He’d been unwell on and off for a few months. The doctors at our local hospital didn’t seem to be too sure what it was… a chest infection, asthma, heart failure, witchcraft??? Who knows… I’m really just guessing based on the plethora of medications he would come to work and show me. He thought at one stage that someone had cursed him and spent a few weeks off in the bush with some of the local witch doctors getting treatment. He recovered a bit after that and came back to work for a little while but it wasn’t long before he was out of action again.

So we went to visit and we sat and talked and listened to how he was scared, how he was tired of not getting any real help from the local hospital, how not many of his friends had been to visit, how he’d been talking to God about his troubles. We prayed with him about all sorts of things. We prayed for healing. Ten days later he died.

And all I’m left with are questions…
Why God? Did I do enough? Looking back, I think he had CHF…  should I have figured that out earlier? Could “they” have done anything anyway or is it just hopeless? Was he just destined to die? Why doesn’t anyone seem to care more? The last time he went to the hospital they told him he had high blood pressure because he was thinking too much. That’s just crap medical work. Why are things just so hopeless here? Did he know Jesus? How is this a good plan God? We go pray for someone… everyone knows we did… then he dies. How do I tell the kids? Do I tell the kids? Where does the balance between protecting them  & helping them deal with the tough things in life lie?

So many things that I don’t know the answers to. But I do know that one day shall come to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” And in the meantime I’ll try my best to be steadfast, immoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord my labour is not in vain. Cor 15: 54-58

We’re always still learning we’ve just gotta keep praising God through these difficult times. So I’m going to finish by saying thank you God for a great guy, full of mischief, patient with my kids and their “helpful” ways, a perfectionist in everything he did and full of joy. I’m hoping the next time I see him we’ll both be jumping around in heaven like he was at the end of this video!

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