Meet Elaine Brautigam, a family doctor's wife from Upstate New York, USA. She's on a World Medical Missions trip to Kijabe, Kenya. There, her daily job will be to move from bed to bed in the Pediatric Ward of Bethany Kids Hospital. She'll pray for the sick-and sometimes dying-infants and children there, comfort the family and friends keeping vigil by their beds, and trust God to use her somehow in this daunting, heartbreaking place.
God does use her, in ways she'd never have guessed. As Elaine (whose company readers will love) grows in affection for the children and the frightened, grieving folks at their bedsides, she finds a solidarity in suffering with them. That solidarity is the work of the Savior who meets them in the midst of their pain. And of the love for them all that the Holy Spirit pours into Elaine's heart.
By the end of her time in Kijabe, Elaine says, she was "forever changed." Give this deeply felt and beautifully written memoir a prayerful, open-hearted reading, and you will say the same.
Terence Mosher
PhD, University of Michigan
Department of English,
SUNY-Fredonia 1976-2012
