Little is much…When God is in it. (Remembering Lorrie Klem)

It has been an interesting few weeks.  Its week 4 of second semester, I still have no clue how time goes so fast here.  The days are often long, but the weeks seem so short!    

My Obstetric Complication class is going pretty well (based on the first test I'm just about finished grading.)  I've struggled a little more with it that I have the Normal Obstetric class I taught last semester.  Mainly, the struggle has been figuring out what the students actually need to know and what can we actually do about it here. 

We got some new text books from Northwest Nazarene University (thanks sooo much, they really are a great help!!)  A few of them are relevant to my class and the students are using them for their major assignment.  But then the really interesting questions come! For instance, our PNG text book, written in 2002, briefly discusses, in two paragraphs, placenta previa (condition where the placenta is attached to the uterus close to or covering the cervix) and what needs to be done here.  The US text book has pages on the condition and its treatment!  One of the pages states that the condition can resolve in many cases.  There is nothing about it resolving in the PNG text book, only treatment when the woman comes in bleeding.  First question from a student, "How can placenta previa resolve while the patient is bleeding?"  Answer from me, "Well, it can't, the book is talking about placenta previa resolving when it is diagnosed early on in pregnancy by looking at an ultrasound, and then as the uterus expands the placenta ends up not covering the cervix…" Next comes some blank stares from a few students and more explanation is given by me. 

Ultrasound is not something that is done routinely in prenatal care in PNG.  Overall, in the country, it's rarely done.  Very few places have a machine, and only a few of the patients would be deemed medically necessary to have a scan done.  So, very, very few placenta previas are getting diagnosed on ultrasound and "resolving" in PNG.  Where do you go from there?  Why can't every woman get an ultrasound in pregnancy here? Why do babies (and mothers) most likely die every day from this condition in this country and very, very few probably die yearly from it in the US?  Why do I have to teach that there is basically no treatment for hydrocephalus, when I know there is one, and the US textbook explains the treatment in detail?  Why is most of what I need to teach basically the same few steps for treatment, for such complicated conditions?  Why are there only so many steps that can be done here?  Why can't the care plan at the end of that US textbook also be in our PNG textbook?    

One of our Doctors here, Mark Crouch, shared recently about his similar feelings on the OB ward.  I totally understood his frustrations and it hit home with what I had been experiencing these last 4 weeks trying to teach all of this.  (see my Facebook page for the link to his blog)

Tonight in Fellowship, the first year students sang the song "Little is much when God is in it."  And I was holding back tears the whole time.  My frustrations with what to teach had set in again as I finished the second test this afternoon and gave it to the ladies in the printing room to print for me.  Also, a wonderful lady at my church in Illinois, a friend of mine, has just passed away after a valiant fight against cancer.  Lorrie embodied this song.  She could throw a party for a whole community with $50 or less it seemed!  She always saw a harvest field in front of her.  One of my best friends (and many other people) is a Christian today, because Lorrie witnessed to her at work, and invited her to church and showed her what being a Christian is all about.  Lorrie did much with little all the time.  So I sat there tonight, hearing the students sing the following lines, thinking about what little we have here, and what little Lorrie worked with much of the time as well. 

In the harvest field now ripened
There’s a work for all to do;
Hark! the voice of God is calling
To the harvest calling you.

Refrain

Little is much when God is in it!
Labor not for wealth or fame.
There’s a crown—and you can win it,
If you go in Jesus’ Name.

Does the place you’re called to labor
Seem too small and little known?
It is great if God is in it,
And He’ll not forget His own.

Refrain

Are you laid aside from service,
Body worn from toil and care?
You can still be in the battle,
In the sacred place of prayer.

Refrain

When the conflict here is ended
And our race on earth is run,
He will say, if we are faithful,
“Welcome home, My child—well done!”

Little is much when God is in it!
Labor not for wealth or fame.
There’s a crown—and you can win it,
If you go in Jesus’ Name.                                (Kittie L. Suffield, 1924)

If that wasn't enough to get me straightened out, Pastor Joseph then shared from 1 Samuel 16 about the time when David was chosen over his seven brothers to be King.  "The Lord does not look at the things people look at.  People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."  (verse 7b)  Another wonderful message, but I wrap up with the prayer that is now on my heart. 

Oh help me Lord to see what you see, to look at what you look at when you see all that is this place Papua New Guinea and its beautiful people, and not see this place you have called me to labor as "too small and little known."  It is great because you, God, are in it, and I know you will not forget your own.

And may a little(or much) of Lorrie Klem live on in each of us, as we make the best of what little we have, with you, Papa God, always in it.