Loving people the way they are

This is my first post on this blog in here, hope it will make a good read. I was prompted to write this blog following our recent adventure towards trying to love them as Christ would; despite of their circumstances. Ruudy.

After my parents died when I was about two years, I grew up in different homes, going through different kinds of abuse and mistreatment, but God saw me through all of these. A few months ago, it came to my attention that one of my aunts (my paternal uncle's wife; the guy who tortured me most and would beat me until I bled) was sick, diagnosed with cervical cancer and none of her children, nor the husband was interested in trying to treat her because cancer treatment is quite expensive. Memories flooded my mind of the days when I used to stay in their home. What caught my attention was that, she never at any time beat me, even though her husband would torture me but then again, she also never tried to rescue me from the beating (I don't know whether because of fear of her husband or in support of the beating). I tried to look for a reason to hate her, but I couldn't find any.

One time Beckie and I were visiting the village, she gave us her papers to look at and take for further research on treatment. However, the most beautiful thing is that, we shared the gospel with her and she received Christ! And today, three of her sons have followed suit! After Beckie contacting her friend from the states (Nancy, I'm sure), she advised that this aunt needs immediate attention otherwise, she would probably die within two years. We had financial problems ourselves and we knew if we were to help her, it would cost us a good number of thousands of shillings and then, maintaing her in Mulago Referral Hospital would also cost us something. But then after carefully praying about this, we looked at her situation with love and we sent her to the cancer hospital. Her sister escorted her there but then left her after just five days! For the last three months, she has been going through Radiotherapy alone, without anyone taking care of her, not her husband, not her daughter or any of her sons, but the Lord did! Surprisingly, she could't speak any other language apart from Ateso, which is not spoken in Kampala, but somehow, the Lord led her to people who helped her throughout! She didn't get any chance to sleep in the hospital ward while there, instead, she had to sleep outside in the cold all this time because there was not enough space in the ward.

We visited her twice in the hospital and lo, she was always happy to see some faces she knew. Today, we received her back! The first phase of treatment is over, she will be returning there in about two months time, and we know, God is faithful to His word and He is already healing her. She is so glad that she got help from an unlikely source when her own, couldn't help.

However, she told me a very heart wrenching story of two old people who were taking care of themselves at the cancer institute. The man had cancer and his mistress had HIV AIDS together with cancer! They were all sick and sleeping under the verandah with no care taker to help them out. The old lady couldn't get cancer treatment until she started on HIV treatment. She went to the HIV section and they kept telling her they were full and couldn't admit her for any treatment until either someone died or until someone got discharged. Her case kept getting worse and worse. The man got discharged from the cancer Institute and they agreed that the old man should go back to the village and convince their son to come take care of the old woman. The day the old man left, the old lady's health started deteriorating further and by 2 pm, she was fighting with death, alone under a tree, without anyone to give a helping hand. Fellow patients informed nurses, who came, loaded her on a stretcher to try to take her to the HIV section again, but it was a little too late, she died! The hospital had no records of this old lady, no phone number to ring, no nothing. Her body was taken to the mortuary and till this day, nobody has come tracing for her, neither the old man, nor the son, came back and over two to three weeks have passed since she died. Our aunt says she was terrified, since she was also there by herself, but also thankful, that she had us to rely on, to call on and this touched me, how our simple act of love, mirrored so much, in our aunt's life.

I took a photo of her with Beckie today in our home, and the smile on her face, can tell it all. Truly, Love is the greatest! Sorry I wrote it too long, but hope you learnt something. God bless you.