“I was sick, and you visited Me”

One of the new ministries God’s added to my schedule recently (I love how life is getting busier and busier as I’m racing toward the last quarter of my time in Ghana) is hospital visitation. I’m one of two Africans and two Americans who are banding together once a week to visit the sick and pray with them.

On our first day, Amos took us first directly to ICU, past sign after sign reading “No Visitors Allowed” and “Silence Please,” right up to the nurses’ station where he announced, “We are Christians come to pray with the sick,” and before anything could be said about visitors and silence, he continued, “Those in ICU are in the most critical condition, so they need our prayers the most. We need to come in and pray with them.” The staff all obliged, and in we went.

Throughout the hospital we saw people in various stages of undress due to the heat; we saw a boy who was skin and bones; we saw a baby who burst out crying at our approach and screamed at the top of his lungs for the duration of our visit; we saw vacant eyes and listless bodies and hopelessness. One man we visited said that he used to go to church, but had ceased for many years, and was sure God no longer cared for him. We assured him that such was not the case, and led him in a prayer to make his peace with God.

May God lead many more in the hospital to make their peace with Him in the days ahead!