mercy teams
I’ve heard a lot from people who say that short-term trips aren’t really beneficial, that the money should just be given to the organization rather than paying for plane tickets when the people on the team aren’t really going to have that much of an impact in two weeks.
Yep, that’s me. So, why am I wrong?
We sail to a new port in January, untie everything that’s been secured for the sail and scrub down the hospital before setting everything up so that we can function. We train the crop of new nurses, hold screening and admit the first patients for surgery. For the next ten months, we operate and care for the patients on the wards and in the outpatient clinic and eventually it’s time to close up shop and move on. We double-bleach every surface, pack everything away in carts and on pallets and we tie everything back down to the bolts in the floor. Somewhere in December we sail away to a first world port so the crew can have a break and maintenance can be done on the ship. Christmas, New Years, and it’s January again. Lather, rinse, repeat.
It can get old.
Not the surgeries and the patients and the lives changing in front of my eyes. That will never be commonplace. But all the in-between. The cleaning and packing and unpacking and setting up. It’s an endless set of jobs that we have to do every single year, and I’ll be completely honest when I say that I’m not a fan.
This is where the Mercy Teams come in. They don’t live this cycle year in and year out,so they don’t remember how much their knees hurt from scrubbing the floors just a few months ago or how tired they were after securing yet another strap. They don’t remember because they weren’t here.
… And you know what? It wouldn’t matter if these guys and girls never even talk to a single Togolese person while they’re here. They’ve blessed and encouraged and strengthened those of us who will be here for the long haul. We’ll go into this Field Service energized by their energy, more ready than ever to pour out our lives for the people here in West Africa.
That’s good to know. Thanks for sharing, Ali. I’ll try to be less critical of short term missions trips.