In celebration of provision

Scott unloaded the UNICEF boxes over the weekend, so these stacks
greeted me when I opened my medicine store today. I quickly unloaded
the new scale and length board and set to work measuring everyone on
the ward. After rounds I got all the boxes onto shelves, since they
can't be stored in contact with the floor. The disbursement we were
sent almost perfectly fills the store room--I remember when Scott
built it that I was thinking it was way too big to be of use, but God knew that
we would need the space. Just like He knew we'd need the food for the
continuing arrivals of the desperate. Today's newest patient:
Mackline, not yet a year old, whose mother died in a village on the
other side of the mountains (2 hours' DRIVE from here) and who then
ended up in the care of a great aunt in Ntandi (more than ONE HOUR
drive away). She is more than three standard deviations below normal
weight, and a good portion of that is the edema fluid that has
accumulated in her protein-deficient tissues.

Some of the packets spent only a matter of minutes in the store before
going right back out to feed the hungry. Week before last (Faces of
Hunger and Healing, July 16) I posted pictures of children who were
cured, and at the bottom of the list an anxious girl clinging to her
mom, and a hungry little girl holding her red cup. Those two should
be discharged within a week, the first now smiles and laughs and
greets me, the second is up from just over six kilos to NINE today!

From the hospital I biked straight up to Karen's for our semi-monthly
nutrition team meeting. As Karen prepares for Sudan, she is getting
all the accounting in ship shape to hand over to Sarah while we wait
for more team help. Sarah majored in economics, and with Luke going
to boarding school and Acacia to Sudan, half of her teaching time is
being freed up. We were all relieved when she volunteered to step
into Karen's role tracking and distributing the $65 thousand a year
that flows through BundiNutrition into four major areas: direct
purchase of food for the malnourished, dairy goats for milk for babies
whose mothers have died or who are HIV-infected, the chicken coop for
eggs and demonstration garden for fodder, and the salaries of the
three extension workers who manage the nitty gritty of all this.
These funds come from you, our friends, people who organize their
friends to buy goats or who decide to invest in the Kingdom by
providing food for the least of these. Every month about 150 kids get
some kind of help: nutritious eggs and beans or gnut/soy paste, goat's
milk, in addition to the UNICEF food. Some are HIV-infected, others
are orphans, some have mothers who are unable to manage, all are in
need of a boost to cling to life. That's 150 families who directly
experience the provision of God, and many more who are related to
those and see what is happening.

And amazingly, if all pledged funds come in, we should have exactly
what we need. Just like the store being exactly the right size. This
week one of our donors wrote that God moved her to give a bit above
her pledge, and a few months early . . . Over and over we see evidence
that it is God who cares for these children, and God who provides, who
anticipates the next Mackline and makes sure that there is milk. We
merely watch on the sidelines and give you commentary so that you can
also rejoice.