10th June 2019
The Vessel
i said, “ i am emptied. i have nothing left.”
He said, “Yes, my love. You are emptied.
Emptied to be filled.
Emptied, filled to overflowing and emptied again.
I am your sustenance.”
And i knew it was truth.
Has the potter no right over the clay?
Those same hands of creation
Are hands of ongoing work
The same One who makes does not abandon
He is also the water of life
Soothing cool filling to the bend of convex meniscus.
How can we not be poured out in response to such grace?
What honour to be part of the Creators work.
He chooses this vessel to be filled with tears
That i might show something of His love
By mourning with those who mourn.
I wrote the first few lines of the above poem last year and didn’t know the end of it until this week.
M died last night. Three premature babies I had given so much attention and care for also died this week- I hated that I had lifted the hopes of their dear mothers- they worked so hard only to see death. My heart has been utterly crushed. I have wept with beautiful mothers; one mother smeared mud on her body in grief, all wrapped and re-wrapped the tiny forms of 885gram or 1kg babies (premature labour often caused by malaria). Yet every time I think I am spent I am astonished at how God refills me for another day. Replenishes me so I can invest again, hope again, love again. And my experience of this suffering is merely vicarious.
So much death, so much war, so much starvation, so much pain- and these women bear it with dignity and genuine smiles.
The patriarchal nature of this society is suffocating yet they find joy. It has been a source of significant frustration as I am the only woman working in the ward. I was told that one mother couldn’t make a decision about herself and her daughter because, ‘she is not responsible for herself.’ — how those words cut me as we waited 3 days for her husband to come and tell us what he would allow. How my heart ached as a colleague celebrated with me that now she has given her husband eight kids she has the ‘freedom’ to invite guests over for tea without having to ask permission. And these are light examples compared with the sexual and physical abuse, the polygomy, the life of endless work from when they are girls and the powerlessness to make decisions in their lives. One coworker told me she came back to the village where her family lived after some time away when she was a teenager to be told by her father that she had been given in marriage, the bride price paid. So she went.
A group of women from In Deed And Truth meet for Bible study on Friday afternoons and have been sharing their testimonies- it has been completely humbling. Stories of such struggle from women who display peace, joy and strength has been astounding. I delight in them.
I feel so honoured to have the chance to hear the stories and to mourn with the mothers and grandmothers of the ten babies and children who have died since I have been here. What a privilege to weep with them, to hold babies and hug mothers, to pray with them, to whisper to one baby, ‘know that you were born into a world where people fought for you to live, know that you go out of this world into the arms of a loving God.’- these things are not of myself, not in my own strength or from my own mouth. I have nothing in myself that I could give, I am a vessel and rely on being filled daily.
Romans 12 vs 15
‘Rejoice with those who rejoice,
Weep those who weep.’
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