I was supposed to go to Ghana in November on a mission trip. They announced today that the trip was canceled because of some government aggressiveness towards the missionaries we were going to serve. The mission organization that they serve through is actually pulling them out of Ghana because they are concerned for their lives.
My heart is so deeply broken, not only because I long to go to not only Africa, but back to Mexico. My heart is so broken for the Jernigans who are having to leave behind everything they've spent years building. They have to leave behind a region of Ghana that depends heavily on voodoo priests/doctors for their medical care (for example, children that are "healed" by being cut and blood sacrifices given so they can be consecrated to demons) that they are slowly building relationships with to help them find restoration and redemption in a saving relationship with Christ. All of that they are having to leave behind because the government is taking their clinic and their hard work, and may let them live if they leave now.
This is so not what I imagined my life to be like. I'm not sure I really knew what I imagined my life to be like, but I'm not sure it was going to be something that involved having a broken heart for such things. Yet, I can't imagine it any other way.
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I can only vaguely remember you being anything short of the extremely caring woman you have become. God knows your heart and will provide another opportunity soon...
Hey,
I thought you would like to know some of the details behind the announcement from Sunday. Below is a detailed email received from Dr. Juliana Jernigan about Ghana. I had received a couple of short emails from Andrew, as well as a brief phone call last week, and so we made an announcement Sunday.
This email from Juliana give greater clarity on exactly what is going on with the Jernigans and their leaving Ghana. The announcement Ben made was only accurate to the extent of the information he had at the time - but this email gives the full and complete picture.
Continue to pray for the Jernigans.
>>>>>>>>>
HI there, Greg.
Andrew went to Kumasi to run errands for the clinic and I stayed home with the kids. I just read your email and although I do not know all that went into your conversation with Andrew or why he emailed you the letter I wrote to our leadership (which does not go into details of everything that is happening, since they were very much aware of it all), I really appreciate your honesty with this mess. I want to give you a detailed description of what is happening, so sit down and get ready to get a glimpse into a bit of the African culture. It is probably going to look like a long list of deeds at some point, but please cope with me as I try to share with you our hearts AND the facts at the same time.
While still having classes to learn Twi and Ghanaian culture, I went through the process required by the Ghana Medical Council to obtain my license, by the book, passed all the tests and interviews (after a lot of prayer since from the start there was an issue with the fact that I was Brazilian) and were told I could officially practice. Which I did up to October of last year, when we found out almost accidentally that the registrar of the Council (THE ‘big man’ of the organization) had started a witch hunt against me, alleging I was practicing medicine illegally in his country. Conveniently, all the paperwork could not be found or verified when we confronted him, so we were asked to pay for the second time a $400 fee to ‘get things going’ (I still don’t know what that term really meant). At that time, we found out that I was not the only foreign doctor having trouble with the Council and that there was an inside movement trying to stop the influx of nurses and MDs into Ghana, including Ghanaian doctors that have been practicing overseas that have come back to their own country and are trying to get their license here). It does not make sense when about 80% of the nurses and doctors that graduate are leaving – statistics from the 90ies, before the government created a ‘National Health Scheme’. That being said, many things in Africa don’t make sense and trying to understand them most likely do not help us to have favor, opinionated westerners that we tend to be.
Greg, when we last saw each other (at 4 Corners around Christmas) we had no idea we would be stepping out of Ghana anytime soon. We were going through frustrations, but were told by the Church everything would be solved while we were still in our furlough, since the bishop had a cousin that was part of the council. We had no reason to doubt it would, since not for a single moment we gave the Ghana Medical Council any reason to question my abilities or intentions. And we rarely approached the subject with our partners (we shared only with some few that asked us how they could pray specifically), partly because we could not make sense out of it ourselves, that live here, so why expect anyone in America to understand??? Not only that, but every missionary knows not to focus on frustrations and hardships of life when sharing the vision, but instead on the good stuff...
Once back from the US, Andrew and I were told by the person from the church in charge of helping us, time after time (weekly) that my license was coming (‘it’s coming’ is a very common expression and we finally learned it does not mean what it says, but rather ‘we are not sure if it is really going to happen, but let’s just wait and hope for the best’). But in the meantime I was strongly advised by our Mission Society leadership not to practice. Easier said than done, as a doctor that lives 50 feet from the clinic. I prayed about it and heard the words ‘I Peter 2:11-17’ in my spirit – please read it).
I agree: it was the right thing to do and I am glad to say I have obeyed, but with MUCH personal-theological-emotional struggle. I had endless number of patients coming to my door, begging me to assist them, many of them children. It has been the hardest season in my life. I have never felt a sense of injustice like now. Imagine a chaplain in a hospital being told ‘you can see the dying patients, and you can look at them dying, but you cannot tell them the Good News. Actually, you cannot talk to them at all.’ Considering my calling as a doctor, that was exactly how I felt, knowing that life was on the balance in a land flooded by malaria and a bunch of other infectious diseases that come with poverty and lack of basic sanitation.
So I tried going to the clinic and praying for them. It was torture. I did see a miracle happen (a patient with a stroke in very bad shape had an almost instant recovery after I laid hands and prayed for her - really cool stuff!), but most of the time I just saw the mistakes the nurses were making, since they are not trained to prescribe and yet were having to do so for the lack of a doctor. We do have a visiting doctor from Kumasi (paid by the British Church) that is suppose to come to the clinic twice a week to see the patients and that has been a major blessing during this time that I am not working.
Next I tried to ‘advice’ or ‘train’ them, but they refused it, asking me to just forget about the law and treat the patients (‘we are not going to tell anyone’, I was told) because where they come from they could not consider themselves at the same level as the doctor (discussing the cases with me), which in their minds was extremely disrespectful to me and made them extremely uncomfortable.
In the meantime Andrew was going full speed with construction projects and much needed changes in a clinic that had become busy and still had a body from 30 years ago, pretty much falling apart. In other words, there was a lot to be done in terms of physical structure and logistics. After getting running water in the clinic and staff houses, a generator was bought (go try to find a snake bite in a child’s foot at night with a kerosene lamp or explain to a mom of a child having an asthmatic attack that her child cannot receive the best treatment because there is no power at that moment to use the nebulizer...), a guest house was renovated while our house had a good ‘tummy-tuck’, a boat was fitted to do outreaches by the community nurses, much needed pharmacy and offices were renovated/built – and medicines were bought (with our salary, month after month, since the clinic was soooo on the red at that point). An ambulance was ordered by faith since Andrew was tired of having to be in two places at the same time, with emergency transportation of patients in our truck on two hour journeys, time after time, and was convinced that God agreed with him that something had to be done. Teams came and went and we saw lives being transformed, on both ends. Funds were donated and walls were built and tiles laid and roofing material ordered and eventually delivered. Time after time it happened as we went from one building to the other. We finally had an outpatient clinic that had a real lab and room for the patients to seat while they wait. On top of learning engineering work he also did most of the clinic management, a true challenge because most of the time the government would not pay us the money from the health insurance (now 70% of the patients have it – a huge blessing for the people!) in time for us to purchase drugs or even pay the old bills. He also spoke in almost every church he was invited to and acted like the clinic’s PR to the village chiefs, church bishops and anyone with a title before the name. In the process we were cheated, lied to, laughed at, and in the end of the days, broken and molded. Now, the last phase of the project is on its way and by God’s grace moving in a surprisingly fast pace: the in-patient building (with maternity ward, men’s, women’s and kids’ wards, operating room and isolation rooms for infectious diseases cases, nurses’ and doctors’ rooms and even a laundry and a ‘prayer garden’). While it is all coming together the clinic is still able to bless patients with bread (and bless the breadseller at the same time), water, prayers and often times, free care and meds for those that cannot afford it. After Nicolas was born in a surreal improvised delivery room, in the midst of cement dust, dirt and rugged curtains, all the deliveries became free, in an attempt to promote reduction of infant-maternal mortality.
I had not realized the impact our presence had had in the community until the day we came back from our furlough, after the worse ride ever (I was very pregnant and the roads were washed away by the rains) in our Patrol and we saw the usual hands in the air waving at us as we drove through village after village. But when we reached Amakom, our village, our car was surrounded by a multitude of screaming children and moms and men singing praises to the Lord. Over a hundred people, Greg. They seemed genuinely happy to see that we made it back safely home – and that we did not gave up on them. It was moving to see how they were full of hope that 1)the clinic would be a functioning and healthy facility and 2)that they were important enough to God for Him to send this family to them – and all that we represent, which is a different story, one of colonialism and fatalism, but that our Father can use for His glory and has done so.
So I finally just retrieved myself into our house and took off the doctor’s hat, praying that no one would come asking for medical help. The community received the news with puzzled eyes and to this minute they do not understand. But they decided to respect it, partly because during it all I was either very pregnant or with a newborn in my arms. By Nicolas’ second week I was ready to work, and still in hopes for this mess to be resolved. We heard so many times that someone in the church knew this or that person that could turn things the right way... Even the Minister of Health that at some point was told to be the savior (even I believed in that one) could not fix it. We finally came to grips (?is that right?) that it is just not going to happen: I am not allowed to be a doctor in this country. I became frustrated and I could not understand how or why my call to serve the people around me had been aborted.
So Andrew and I prayed and fasted (okay, he fasted, since I am functioning as a milk factory these days) and prayed some more and waited while our leaders also prayed. Two of them approached us, after doing so for many weeks and suggested that maybe this could be the Lord hardening Pharao’s heart and that we should be open for Him to show us. Let me be clear here: nobody wanted it to be true, in the natural. But they had a good point and so we did it: we started praying specifically for answers, instead of for my license.
You may think, like I did,that it is just not right to leave now. It is not right to the national church, it is not right to the Mission Society, it is not right to our partners that many times gave sacrificially and expect the same commitment from us. On top of that, all the training that went into learning the language, making relationships that just now are bringing forth fruit and most of all, to me, all the sick people needing proper care. And mostly because we said five years. Not three. As a strong confirmation to us our leadership both in the field and in Atlanta were completely supportive and suggested that we should be relocated under their umbrella, since they just opened a field in Brazil.
We must obey because we heard His voice, and it was very clear. We are NOT being forced out. Our leadership guidance was ultimately the confirmation of what we heard from God...and I believe that this can be a good time for the church to step in and put pressure on the government to hire a national doctor with a call in his heart to live in the bush and serve his people – or simply someone that enjoys life in the country, with a gorgeous view of the lake and a nice house – to take our place. According to the government standards, the clinic is actually about to receive the title of hospital, since now it can offer way more in terms of service than two years ago. As far as administration goes, the clinic accountant had learned so much with Andrew that we think he can take over and do really well from now on.
We love you and still hope one day we can come to Amakom, where our son Nicolas was born, and where we learned tons about our God (and witnessed others around us learn too) to visit with you and see the fruits of the seeds we planted together in this place.
Ju
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Thanks! Greg.
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