March 2007
Dear Friends,
Gilette caught your attention as soon as she came through the
orthopedic clinic door. A lithe, smiling young lady who seemed
to float on her feet, she was dressed in a matching track runner’s
outfit, including bill cap. We listened to her history and examined
her foot and ankle, then prescribed treatment for her chronic
low-grade ankle sprain. I noticed the logo on the T-shirt beneath
the flaring zip-up jacket as she prepared to exit the exam room,
“Run Like Hell.” In a tactful note I suggested, “Why
not ‘Run Like…’” She quickly smiled and
filled in the blank, “Heaven.” She then quickly assured
us that she was a “born-again Christian” and had another
T-shirt she had proudly bared to the world as she won the world-class
10-kilometer race in Japan last year. In bold letters, that shirt
proclaimed, “Jesus Christ is Lord.”
Stan and Mia Topple are just finishing a six-week stretch at
MyungSung Christian Hospital in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, before
going on to serve in Kenya. What a nice twist to serve under a
staff of 30 or so Korean missionaries after having been missionaries
to Korea ourselves in much earlier days. This three-story, multimillion-dollar
hospital with state of the art equipment is offering services
unique to Ethiopia. The first stage of the plant was completed
on a 30-acre site given by the Ethiopian government two years
ago and has a $300,000 annual budget supported by a single 60,000-member
Presbyterian Church in Seoul, Korea.
Among the hundred or so skin patients that Mia saw today in MyungSung’s
rural outreach clinic there were many examples of the downtrodden
segment of this country’s population.
“One ten-year-old girl,” writes Mia, “with
the hands of an old woman—wrinkled and thickened—openly
wept as I examined her and I felt she did not weep from fear but
in response to someone who cared. The Presbyterian pastor who
was my translator found out that her parents had died and that
she lived with relatives who used her as maid. She did all the
washing of clothes, dishes, etc. of a large household. I thought
of Morgan Landis, one of our grandchildren, exactly her age—what
a difference! Abuse of children takes many forms. Hard to get
the picture of those big tears running down that little face out
of my mind!”
Little Mohammed is a 9-month-old refugee who was brought to us
three weeks ago by his teenage mother. He had a small birthmark
on his wrist that had been treated by local “healers,”
resulting in a viscous, deep infection encircling his entire forearm,
threatening loss of the limb. With debridement of the dead tissue
and successful skin grafting, Mohammed was discharged yesterday
to return with his mother to their home country of Somalia. We
have been encouraged to renew our prayers for the secret Christian
believers in that ravaged, strife-ridden country.
Abdul's hip was destroyed by TB.
A few weeks ago, MyungSung Hospital received a $5,000 grant for
crippled children from the Wilson Rehabilitation Hospital, our
place of labor for 22 years in Korea. The first recipient was
Abdul, a bright-eyed 12-year-old with a hip destroyed by tuberculosis.
Abdul and his mother were found in the orthopedic clinic of the
Black Lion Hospital as we were visiting there on the other side
of the city. Because of the impossible backlog of cases in that
government institution it was reported that it would be a minimum
of six months and perhaps years before the boy could come to surgery.
Within the week, Abdul went smiling into the operating room here.
The third day after his operation we helped him out of bed to
stand in his body-hip cast with crutches. Abdul laughed and said,
“Let me go, I can do it!” A can-do lad, he will go
far and do well, I feel sure.
Abdul three days after surgery.
And so we find opportunities at every hand to interact with young
and old, wealthy and poor, Moslems, Orthodox (and unorthodox!)
Christians. We pray that the flag of Christ is raised in many
hearts as well as bodies healed and spirits comforted.
Thank you for your partnership in prayers and encouragement.
Mia and Stan Topple
The 2007 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p.
332
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