Samuel

Samuel has AIDS.

He was hospitalized from November of 2009 to January of 2010 with a collapsed lung due to TB. Despite continuous efforts to drain the fluid that fills up his chest, it collects again, the lung will not reinflate and the TB meds don’t seem to be helping.

In addition, he has a connective tissue cancer common to patients with AIDS that has started to cause his face and lips to swell. He is growing large tumors on his tongue and soon swallowing could become quite difficult.

Here in Cameroon, where your family is your health insurance, savings and retirement plan, he spent his entire hospitalization completely alone. Not one single visitor came.

He had a friend or “patron” who paid for his care during his time with us, and a work acquaintance in the village who brought him food occasionally, but otherwise he was on his own.

Despite his protests that he was not yet “healed” we had to send him home. I believe he is still coming to terms with his illness and came in to see me last week for a follow-up visit.

A new doctor who recently started working in Meskine examined Samuel’s mouth and suggested immediately that he go to Yaounde, the capital city in the south. But as we discussed this option the weight of poverty, fatigue and hopelessness settled over Samuel’s countenance and his face simply fell.

Treatment in the capital city is an unrealistic option for many of our patients. The cost of transport alone exceeds their meager means and for a man like Samuel, estranged from his family and already a burden to his patron, there was little hope of travelling south.

In that moment I understood that while treatment for Samuel’s body was important, care of his soul was critical.

So I locked the doors to my office, sat down and asked Samuel if he knew God. He told me yes, obediently reciting what he had probably been taught as a child. When I told him that Jesus came to die for him, because he, Samuel, was loved by God, he began to cry.

We talked briefly about the hope God gives for a future in heaven, the assurance we have of His presence in the midst of our pain, and His forgiveness of our sins. We then prayed together.

My prayer this week is that God, in His faithfulness and mercy would pursue Samuel.

I pray that God would set him free.