Sick on Sunday??

Don’t bother! You don’t get out of church, you don’t get privacy, and you don’t even get to stay sick!

I began the wee hours of Sunday morning with a fierce case of TD – traveler’s diarrhea - and an increasingly bad headache. I’m assuming fever since I was under multiple blankets. I stayed in my darkened room (crossing the hall to the bathroom for many trips in several hours), and church came to me. You see, church here is LOUD, with a loudspeaker outside broadcasting the service. Our Pastor told us he has heard testimonies of people passing by and hearing a message and coming to know the Lord Jesus, so it is for good reason! So, I faded in and out of the “praise the Lord” and “the end is at hand” service from the privacy of my room, in much discomfort from a close-to-migraine feeling.

Now, in case you are considering a trip to Hope Academy, let me confirm to you that it was just a bug – not something I ate, since I ate and drank exactly the same thing as the rest of my family, who enjoyed inside-the-church church. Apparently at the change of the seasons, sickness goes around in Nigeria, too! It is the COOL season now – for just under two months before the three hottest months follow.

At 12:30 or so, minutes after church, I had my first visitors. Pastor Reuben’s wife Helen and children came in to the dark and prayed for me while I lay in bed, aching to raise my head. I had heard the children sing and tried to tough it out and compliment them with hospitality of a Nigerian. They left, then Clement’s wife Blessing came in. Then she left and Mr. Chukuma came in. Devin and the boys sat down to lunch. Then Pastor John’s wife Josephine and her kids came in and prayed for me. Trying to put on a good face, I sat up. I broke out into a major sweat just after she prayed for healing. My headache left. Just like that.

I wanted to get up and shower, but Pastor Reuben came, then Pastor John, each telling me that even now, I had received my healing. Strangely, it was true. God is so good!!

Who needs to sleep away a Sunday?? I should have been more specific about my ailment, since the yucky belly tried to hang around throughout the afternoon with limited success. After all, I’m posting the word “diarrhea” on the blog – why not let all the people in my bedroom know? The headache and fever fled at the mention of HIS name! Next time I’ll not shy away. Ahh, the learning curve…