Catalyst

Archive for February, 2010

People waiting for medical treatment at mobile clinic

What does hot, cold, and rewarding have in common?

They are the ingredients of a recent medical mission trip to Nicaragua. For three days, a team of over 20 doctors, pharmacists, nurses and volunteers associated with Health Talents International brought medical attention to the poverty-ridden people of Managua.

The needs were great. Conditions such as parasites, infections and malnutrition drove almost 1200 people to wait in lines for 8 hours a day.

The weather was hot. The showers were cold. With winds whipping over a barren parcel of land at what seemed like the ends of the earth, dirt coated everything.

Why would anyone spend a week of their life in such conditions? For me, I found three benefits.

It elevates my vision. In a culture the massages the message of “it’s all about you” into the soul, a trip like this forces you to look beyond yourself. You see needs more clearly, blessings more thankfully, and others more compassionately. As a pampered American, I need to become less spiritually nearsighted.

It sharpens my wits. The enemy of mental sharpness is the dullness of routine. I, like most people, follow a mindless regimen. Seldom do I get jarred out of my mental lethargy. I just don’t have to think. Nicaragua forces a different diet, enduring cold showers, and long days of doing something besides working in an office behind a computer. The long days of helping people who are hurting shifts my mind into high gear. I come back able to think expansively and with clarity.

It enlarges my circle. Everyone who goes on the trip is a volunteer. The take vacations to give to others. Eating together, working together, praying together, and talking together provides something most people lose–perspective. When I return from Nicaragua, I have had the pleasure of getting to know people whose heart makes my heart purer.

As the team was breaking up on the trip home, we all expressed a similar thought. The trip was not fun (in the way a vacation is) but it is rewarding. That is what gives purpose to the difficulties.

I am grateful to those who went and for the changes I experience.