Dear Friends,

Simon continued his visits to remote health-care centers with the medical director of the Presbyterian Church of the Congo, Dr. Mwala. During the last visit, the Reverend Bope (the church executive responsible for the Kasai Occidental) and Elder Kabibu (personnel manager of IMCK—the Christian Medical Institute of the Kasai) joined us. We left for the 400-mile journey to Kabuabua, Moma, and Mboi in a borrowed car. The visit took us to the south of the province and then west towards Angola and finally circled back to Kananga in five days. As always, we were not carrying money or medical supplies, but went only with good news, as Jesus commanded His disciples to do (Matthew 10:9-15).

We arrived at our first town, Kabuabua, at 6:30 in the evening, nine-and-a-half hours for 130 miles is pretty good. We had sent word of our visit with a traveler who did not arrive until the next day. The church leaders and the nurses (all in the family) were very delighted to see us but also were very concerned about our sleeping and eating arrangement. We assured them that we were well prepared—each of us had a sponge mattress, and we didn’t have to have dinner. They would not hear of it, and finally produced dinner for us at 11:30 in the evening (bidea, manioc leaves, and small eels). Normally eating late at night is not good for a diabetic patient, but Simon ate in faith. The following morning we visited the station buildings. In 1958, when the Belgian tobacco company (Tabac, Congo) withdrew their operations, the village chief offered the facilities to the Presbyterian Church of the Congo, which built a church, a hospital, and a school (primary and secondary) that continue to this day. As you can imagine, a tobacco warehouse does not make an ideal building for a hospital. Nonetheless, the work continues, and like the Lubondayi hospital, all receipts are used for medicines and operations first before the workers are paid. As a health center serving more than 3000 people, on top of their wish list were: a bicycle (they walk 200 kilometers each way for medicine purchase), a stethoscope for each of the two nurses, a functioning blood pressure cuff, and a small fund to stock basic medicines.

At 9:30 we left for a short journey to Moma where a PC(USA) mission hospital once operated. Suffice it to say that it took six-and-a-half hours to go less than 45 miles. Now that the rainy season has been here a while, the effect of rainwater on unpaved roads was in full force. Early in the afternoon, we came across a gully that has been deepened and widened due to water flow and just a few logs across the gully was clearly not enough for the vehicle. A pastor, a doctor, an administrator and a missionary became a bridge repair crew under the supervision of the chauffeur. We often heard the phrase "building a bridge together" to refer to the idea of mission partnership, but this was the first time that Simon literally built a bridge together with fellow Presbyterians!

Simon became very popular, being the first Asian face for many to see in person. The Moma station was constructed in the 1940s, with grand views of the valley and tree-lined streets, stone-constructed water towers and all. Unfortunately, the hospital buildings, built in 1951, were in a very bad state of repairs, with many of the roof tiles missing and large cracks in the walls. Goats and chickens inhabited two of the three hospital buildings while the third was sparsely occupied. On the day of our visit, there were three hospitalized patients.

During the 1950s and 1960s, Moma was the base from which missionary doctors made visits to outlying clinics. Older folks, who used to work with missionaries, grilled Simon as to why the children of the missionaries do not return and carry on the work of their parents. Simon’s question as to why the Congolese youth do not return to their birth villages was dismissed as being irrelevant. It seemed that the common belief was that the hollow halls of the buildings built by missionaries can only be revitalized by other missionaries. Even the cry for help was not expressed in terms of what can be done with some help, but rather how much they suffer.

Simon decided two nights of post 10 p.m. meals were not allowed, and went to bed early. Unfortunately Simon himself provided a banquet to numerous bugs during the night, and he is still sporting the scars after almost a month. Having no material help to offer, we prayed together in the belief that our Lord will provide wisdom, courage, and perseverance for us to serve Him together. We left for Mboi, near the Angolan border, to visit yet another old mission station.

Mboi station was started in 1937 and the last missionary left in 1970. The hospital buildings were also built in 1951, but unlike Moma buildings, they were kept in excellent shape. Even most of the windows were intact. But the cupboards for the medicines and medical supplies were also empty. With hyper-inflation, the receipts from medicines were not enough to replenish the stock and the nearest town is Kananga, 200 kilometers away. The clinic was non-functioning until July of 2000, when the local church members put together seed money and requested a nurse to reopen the clinic. They were seeing an average of 45 patients per month. We were encouraged to see the active participation of local church leaders in the clinic service to the people. Again, we prayed together and assured them we will do our best to help them find a good source of medicine and encouraged them to serve with Christian love and keep the faith that the Lord will use the clinic in His work.

Before departing Mboi, Simon had the honor of meeting the village chief, who has approximately 100 children from 10 wives. On the way back we all shared how different Mboi and Moma were, not in present conditions, but the hope for the future they have and the desire to be a part of the solution. It took another full day to return to Tshikaji. Just this week (three weeks after the visit), we had a visit from the junior nurse at Mboi. He came on a bicycle looking for medicines. He was excited to tell us that after our visit, the number of patients at the clinic doubled, so they scraped all the money available and dispatched him for medicine. Just the fact that the church leaders and IMCK thought them important enough to make a visit earned them credibility in the eyes of the village people. Now seen as an extended member of a greater body of Christ, the clinic became the preferred care provider. We at IMCK were able to sell them the medicines and to make them a gift of stethoscopes, blood pressure cuffs, and thermometers, and send him on his way back to Mboi, a two-day journey by bicycle. Although loaded with a carton of medicine and facing a long, dangerous journey, his feet were light with joy.

God is so good. While we moan the shortage of missionaries, He raised four other Congolese missionaries to bring the good news to the people of Mboi. Simon is so thankful to be in a partnership with other missionaries, for we have a common mission and a common vision, and most important of all, a common master. Perhaps God’s response to Simon’s frustration at the institutionalized partnership was the gift of personal partnership with His servants. Dr. Mwala and Simon will complete the visits to Mbujimai, Bibanga, and Mutoto in January.

Meanwhile, back in Tshikaji, Haejung started to let village children borrow our collection of French books. It became very fashionable for everyone to come and borrow the books whether they have any interest or not. Haejung installed a quality-control mechanism and asked each child to bring back a synopsis of the book they read before borrowing another one. Many of them simply copied a sentence or two, but it still served the purpose of weeding out many "fashion borrowers." A more diligent youth came to our door with a troubled look and confessed that he is having a difficult time writing a synopsis. We did not want to drop the requirement just for him, but we made an exception for him when we learned he had borrowed a world atlas.

So we greet the New Year with joy and thankful hearts. Please pray that our remaining time in Congo will continue to be a time of growth and witness.

With love,

Haejung and Simon Park

The 2001 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 31