A Mission that Matters

The Macha hospital was established in 1954 by Dr. Alvan Thuma. While he was bringing medicine to the area, he also led the effort to make and fire bricks for the construction of the first hospital in this region. His challenges included lack of modern medical tools and traditional doctors (whom we would call witch doctors, who people trusted when they were sick).   Jaeron DeBoe, wife of James DeBoe the head doctor at the hospital who practices surgery and family medicine, gave us a tour.   There was a new dentist chair and dental assistant who does extractions and has begun filling cavities. As we continued our tour, Jaeron noticed a local women sitting on a bench in obvious grief. Jaeron put her arm around the woman and asked what was wrong. She pointed to the bed behind us and there lay the body of her infant under a blanket. It was a heart-breaking and helpless feeling. There is still great need in Macha.  But there is so much going on here that is positive. The inci

When going to Africa, people tend to say, “I am going to Africa.” But people on the continent prefer to say that one is going to a particular country. It was clear yesterday on our drive from Lusaka that Zambia and Malawi are very different places. Walking to church We got to the Brethren in Christ Church Macha at 10 a.m. There were services before that starting at 8 a.m. for holy communion, baptisms and foot washing. We waited outside meeting local Zambians, an ophthalmologist from Holland and his family and a doctor who supervises the hospital and his wife from Virginia.   It was a special Sunday with a service for 16 local churches, and we had to wait for seats to become available. We got seated at 10:30 a.m. and the service concluded at about 1 p.m. The music was beautiful with songs sung in Tonga, but most of the tunes were old gospel hymns that we recognized. Along with other first-time guests, we were asked to stand in front of the congregation and say ou