Christian mission hospitals should be God’s institutions of healing in a world of suffering. They have the potential to ‘close the gap’ in access to healthcare and provide high quality accessible services in the most remote and needy parts of the world to those who need them the most – the poor and marginalized.
In 1993, my wife Ann and me moved to a remote part of Assam in northeast India. We were led by verses in the Bible (Jeremiah 29:11-13 for me and Isaiah 6:8 for Ann) to what God wanted us to do with our lives. Over the following 27 years, God took us by our hands and provided us with all the encouragement, strength and wisdom required to transform a closed-down hospital to a thriving institution bringing healing and transformation to many surrounding communities. (1) We were not alone, God brought many committed staff to join us over the years to make this possible.
I was privileged to be invited to speak at six sessions on “Medical Missions” at the (virtual) South Asian regional conference of the International Christian Medical and Dental Association in November 2020. I am not an expert on medical missions but spoke from our experience in walking with God and witnessing a great transformation take place in our hospital.
In this second session, we will look at areas of medical mission work that are not taught in medical college. How do we take stock of the situation in our hospitals and make wise plans for the future?
At the end of the session, I have answered questions from the group. Unfortunately, the recording does not include the questions (only the answers). The questions are:
- How do we manage burnout in our staff? – sometimes we really are physically exhausted beyond out capacity but often there are other reasons.
- How do we manage differences in opinion with other senior officers of the institution? – we can’t win arguments, but we need to win hearts.
- What can we do if there are irreconcilable differences with our partners? – we can list out our differences and give time for change, sometimes we may need to break the partnership.
- What do you do when workloads become too much to bear? – God will give strength from above – through verses, songs, people…
- Do we need to be serious about our work at all times, can we entertain ourselves too? – it is a tremendous responsibility to treat patients, their lives are in our hands and we cannot afford to be careless.
- When can we stop learning? – Never!
The Sparrow's Nest 