Sweet Fellowship

While the Moore Family was here visiting at the end of July we scheduled to have a Sunday get together for lunch and an afternoon singing.  It was a wonderful day.  Everyone was visiting with one another.  There are some in the group who rarely speak, actually they don't at all unless they are spoken to, and others that love to chat.  I always say it takes all kinds to make the world go round.  He knew what he was doing.

Everyone stayed for the singing.  I couldn't get everyone in the photo.  : )

 Visiting

Brother Jorje

From Left: Martha, Julito, Felecia & her granddaughter

This particular Sunday that we had our get together after services a new family had visited our services for the first time.  David had previously met her before and visited with her very briefly.  She joined us with her two children, a six year old little boy, and I believe a 9 year old girl.  She asked us to pray for her husband because he had cut his hand the previous day with a machete.  Automatic nurse instinct is to think the worst.  I am thinking he has a mangled hand that was chopped with a rusty machete.  They do not have seguro (the national insurance) because they are unable to pay, like so many people we know here.  

Later that afternoon on the way home, David and I stopped to visit their family.  We were very thankful to assess a hand that had a small cut to one finger that would heal fine with a peroxide cleaning, clean gauze, antibiotic ointment, and some band-aids.  I did ask to see the machete, and as I thought, a really nasty and rusty piece of metal.  I explained, at this point David is translating, that he really needed a tetanus shot.  Tried to also tell him that it would be a good idea for him to have it anyways since he works with a machete everyday and could potentially harm himself with it.  He did not want it.  We couldn't understand why.  We told him we would get the medication and I could give it to him.  He refused because he did not want to be stuck with a needle.  He said if I gave him a shot in his arm he would not be able to work.  I tried to explain that he would be able to work, but if he got tetanus he would not be able to work.  Oh well, we tried.  God answers prayers and his finger is all healed.

We headed back to the house from a full day of "like back home" Sunday fellowship.  On our way home we passed an ambulance flying down the road with crater-sized potholes.  David and I both commented that someone must be in a bad way.  Because in the entire year we have lived here, I have never, and I repeat NEVER seen an ambulance move in rapid manner.  They drive like normal with the their lights flashing.  No one moves to the side of the road.  No one stops at intersections to let them pass.  They sit in traffic like any other vehicle and I envision people dying in these things, because they are never going to make it to the hospital.

A few minutes after we got home we received a completely frantic phone call from Demaris.  Her son had been run over by a motorcycle.  They were in Atenas and were soon heading to the hospital about 45 minutes from here.  She asked for us to pray.  David called everyone from church to let them know what had happened.  We heard from her again that night that her son had sustained some head injuries, possible some internal bleeding, and they were doing some more scans.

The next morning we learned they were sending him home and he had some follow-up visits in the following days.  We went to go see him the next day and for a little boy who had a motorcycle run him over at a high speed and went down the entire middle of his body, he looked good.  God had answered a many of prayers.  Prayers from so many people, people in Costa Rica, people in the United States.  He obviously had some swelling in his face.  He had no broken bones, only nine stitches on his forehead, and not a single bruise or any swelling visible on the trunk of his body.

Since then, him and his family have been at services every Sunday.  His stitches are gone, he lost a tooth, but his smile is back.  He is a quiet little boy with a smile behind his mother's leg when we talk to him.

The power of prayer is a miraculous thing!  I need to get some pictures of that shy smile, so everyone can see the miracle.