Today I drove a girl home from the hospital. Her family wanted her to die at home. I drove the green truck very carefully, trying to avoid as many of the bumps as possible. Every so often her family and the staff who had come to help with the stretcher and try to provide comfort had to get out so I could drive across a stick bridge or make it up a steep hill. I did my best, but she still cried out in pain.
Seventeen-year old Asaitu didn't know that by choosing to become intimately involved with her friend would lead to pregnancy. Trying to salvage her reputation and get rid of her "problem," she decided to try to self-abort with a stick. She had no clue about the consequences of these decisions. How could she have predicted that she would get an infection, that her left leg would become gangrenous and have to be cut off at the groin, and that the infection would spread to her other leg, sealing her fate?
Sleeping with her boyfriend and then having an abortion; obviously bad decisions, but still, two mistakes and now she has to die? Why does she have to bear the brunt of her choices, and so many other people don't? I've sinned before, and I'm still alive; why her? These are the thoughts that whirl in my mind as I grip the steering wheel tightly, trying, by sheer determination to keep from jarring the stretcher balanced on the bed of the truck.
Later, at her house, I tried to think of a scripture to read. All I could think of was "Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me." Scott Barlow, the hospital matron, shared about the hope we have in Jesus, and then prayed and annointed her. A few Ormos also gave little sermonettes while the flies gathered and the sweat dripped from our faces.
Most of the people who rode back to Gimbie with us weren't notably sad. In fact, one boy asked me if I was all right. Life is difficult, he said. Yes, I guess so.
So, I keep living, meeting my own challenges, making my own poor choices. I don't often think about the consequences of my decisions. I usually just do whatever seems best to me, given the information I have.
So did she...
Joel