The Countdown…

Well we are one week from D day, dedication day.
November 9th, was so far away, when we prayerfully scribed it onto our schedule, way back in the beginning of the year. Now we are 7 days away, and so much has happened, but so much more has to happen. To say we have been busy is an understatement….

Pat and Leslie have been so very busy, and are a God-send, we could not have done without them. Those of you who are coming for the dedication ceremony, we are looking forward to hosting you and cannot wait to share this wonderful event with you. Those of you who will be keeping up with it via the internet: keep reading the blogs and celebrate with us.

On Wednesday October 31 we had two lady doctors from the Ministry of Health Department who carried out a preliminary inspection of our facility. Their purpose was to look us over and assess if there were any obvious shortcomings. We informed them beforehand that we were not equipped yet and all we wanted was for them to see our building and listen to our vision and scope of service to the community in short-, middle-, and long-term objectives. We had asked several people to be praying about this meeting. God is so good to us, the two health inspectors were well pleased. Licensing and certification can be tedious and difficult to acquire from the health department. Remember we will be delivering babies, which means we will be witnesses to new Hondurans being born and will be certifying this event many times. Unfortunately we will also be witnesses to deaths and will also be certifying this. The legal implications are very significant.

Short-term includes enabling only out-patient service where I will be seeing patients during regular work hours. Mid-term objectives will include enabling emergency services especially on weekends when many of the violent incidents occur: machete cuts and hackings, fractures, stabbings and shootings. And long-term objectives include labour and delivery, neo-natal care and scheduled surgeries in which specialists will be visiting our centre on a regular basis. Our responsibility will be to have the patients ready for their surgical procedures. The specialists will be doing this pro-bono, which will be a big blessing to any patient who happens to benefit from their services. Many of these specialists have been my instructors and have expressed to me how much they have been wanting to do this for the people but have had no way to accomplish it. We are so glad that we can bridge this gap.

In the background of all of these events, we have been involved with construction of our dormitory. And after only two months we are almost finished with the first floor. God has been right on time, many times over, as funding comes in for the next phase as phases go by. At the same time, there has been painting inside and outside of the clinic building. You will remember when Sam and I swapped in a motor for my truck, well, other components from the donor truck will be swapped shortly, but those items are out of the old truck and not yet on the functional truck. So we are juggling truck components. Just recently we did a bit of landscaping on the courtyard and it looks wonderful. Needless to say, there has been much activity, and we are almost ready for our first guests who arrive in just two days!

We are so excited to finally be to this date. We recall the feeling when we went off to Tegucigalpa. I remember my first class in Medical School, and how distant graduation appeared. And, even farther than that was the initiation of this project. Over the years, God has been more specific as to the scope and vision of our Rural Hospital. November 9, 2007 is a landmark date and brings many of those dreams to completion and others to initiation. It is a day that will be highlighted in the minds of many of those who helped to build this building, to others who birthed the vision and to others who will take part in seeing it become all that God has planned. The dream and vision in our hearts is great, and it will take many hands and hearts to bring it to full completion. We thank you for being a part and for your support of this vision. We look forward to seeing those who are flying in to take part in the ceremony and we look forward to reporting to those of you who anxiously await photos and reports of the big event. What a day it is sure to be! We thank God for bringing us this far and for His faithfulness through it all.