My heart has hurt for so many people the last few days. A friend back home got a diagnosis of cancer, a teacher here at the school became a single mother when she lost her husband in a motorcycle accident, several friends are dealing with an overload of stress in their lives. And then yesterday Jose came to me with little Jessica. Evidently on Friday (3 days prior) her mom had been boiling potatoes and the pot of water spilled on her arm, burning the forearm area. She said her mom had put some cream on it at the time, but that nothing else had been done to it since then--no cleaning, no more cream, nothing. While at school yesterday she had bumped it on a table and the outer layer of burned skin had split and begun to peel. My heart broke and I hurt so much for the pain she must have been feeling all weekend. This was about 30 minutes before school would end and her mom would arrive to pick her up. Jose wanted me to help him talk to the mom and tell her that she needed to take her daughter to the clinic. So as school ended I went and met with mom. I told her that it is really important to treat burns properly because they are highly susceptible to infection and that the clinic would hopefully have some good medicine that she could use to treat it. Medicine here is socialized so going to the clinic is free and any medicine that they have that you need is also free. It usually involves waiting in a long line and oftentimes, the clinic doesn't have the medicine that is needed and the patients have to purchase it at the pharmacy and many of them are unable to do this. I told her to come back and talk to me if this was the case as I wanted to make sure she got the medicine she needed. Mom and Jessica stopped back by a few hours later to show me that they'd gone to the clinic and the clinic had given her a tube of silvadine cream (what I'd really hoped they'd have!) to treat it. I told her that it was so good she'd taken her to the clinic and that this was really the best medicine she could use on the burn.

The thing is, mom could have taken her daughter to the free clinic for this free medicine anytime in the previous three days. Her daughter hadn't had to suffer in pain for as long as she had. I really don't think mom was trying to be mean or neglectful to her daughter in not taking her. I think she didn't realize how bad the burn was or that it needed treated beyond the initial cream she'd put on it. The medicine that her daughter needed was free and was waiting across town--mom just needed to take her to go get it. And even if it hadn't been available at the clinic, I would have made sure she got the medicine she needed. It was all free for the asking--mom just didn't know she needed to go get it.

Reminds me of Romans 6:23 and the how the "free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." There are so many people who for one reason or another have not yet received the salvation offered by Jesus. It's free and all they have to do is decide to be obedient to him. I'm going to go with Jose later this week to visit a couple of ladies here in La Palma who fall into this category. They have been coming to church here for some time, but they are in a lost state because for some reason they have not yet reached out to accept the free gift of eternal life. I hurt for them and am hopeful that we can share what they need to hear.