Update from our recent trip to Slemani, Kurdistan

I’ve taken a long break from this space. My fight for medical truth has affirmed my resolve that the finding of truth must include the finding of the Truth, so I’ve spent more time focused on purely spiritual writing on my other Substack, but thought I’d share this update here.

“Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal among you, which comes upon you for your testing, as though some strange thing were happening to you; but to the degree that you share the sufferings of Christ, keep on rejoicing, so that also at the revelation of His glory you may rejoice with exultation” (1 Peter 4:12-13).

Kirk and I are en route home from Kurdistan as I write. Our veteran medical team was only five this time: Kirk (pediatric cardiologist), me (pediatric anesthesiologist), Allison Cabalka (pediatric interventional cardiologist), Maria Garcia (anesthesiologist), and Jeff Cabalka (loving, humor-filled servant).

Traveling to and from with us were the self-named “Trio of Hope” (Coleen Rishovd, Holly Folsom, and Sarah Oner) from our church, who went to deliver donations to a refugee camp we’ve long served at that recently endured a destructive fire. The recent earthquake in Turkey also provided opportunity for them to visit and deliver supplies to members of Sarah’s family affected by this tragedy.

Stealing their name, we realized we had a “Trio of Hope” in Slemani too, providing support for our long-time pediatric cardiologist friend Dr. Aso as he perseveres in taking care of children with heart disease in his country: our For Hearts and Souls (FHAS) team, the Love Them All (LTA) team of Daniel and Rachel (who live in Kurdistan full-time providing meaningful support), and Amy Howson (a nurse who has volunteered with FHAS and is now living and working with LTA to provide pediatric cardiac nursing education).

We’ve had a relationship with Dr. Aso since 2009. Kirk has been to Kurdistan forty times himself. I wish I could report pediatric cardiac care there has become easier to deliver. I can’t. Dr. Aso finds himself in bewildering battles. And for our team to deliver care there this week, we endured bewildering battles.

I’m a detail person. My style is usually to write long chronologies. I’m abandoning that style this time. I’m hopeful for resolutions and my recounting details will not serve that purpose. Suffice it to say, we had to choose to persevere this week and we did, accomplishing four days of procedures on kids with cardiac disease. Some of our procedures were necessary but not time urgent, some had time urgency, and at least one was likely lifesaving. We praise God for these outcomes.

Exposing my theology, I believe God’s design from the beginning of creation has been to give us the opportunity to believe and follow Him. Our life serves that purpose and all the details of our lives serve that purpose. All the members of the two trios of hope believe in Him. The testing we endure as we choose to take these trips and minister to His children is not only do we believe in Him, but do we also believe His promises and will we follow Him?

Discouragement happened before we even got on the plane. Should we go? Will we be able to accomplish anything? Many trips have taught us that we might think we are going for a particular purpose, but God has a very different purpose. We felt it was important to go, even if we accomplished nothing from a medical perspective. If nothing else, we knew our visit could be a cup of cold water to faithful servants Dr. Aso, Daniel, Rachel, and Amy (Proverbs 25:25).

Our trips are always indispensably undergirded by teams of faithful servants who pray for us as we go, starting even before we go. We call our prayer team the “NEST” and we had over 50 people praying in four teams that each submitted a daily email prayer for us. We know these people are faithful to pray and this was evident as we kept them updated throughout the trip.

We were encouraged on our arrival to find we were going to be able accomplish medical procedures, but were amazed at the battles we had to engage to do so. We exposed corruption and injustice and were faced with deciding the right course given this information. There was a lot of distraction and dissension as we tried to fight this battle while simultaneously caring for the children.

There was not a sense of peace in our team until our daily morning devotional on Wednesday (start of procedure day 3). Prayers were answered for wisdom and direction. We had to let go of any indignation over how we ourselves were being treated, and we determined a creative solution to make things right for our patients and their families, even if we made no progress in our dealings with humans and organizations.

Fourteen years. Forty trips. Frustration in the reversal of progress. Increasing corruption. As faithful servants of a good God, what are we to make of all this? That is the lesson, timely for the world we are living in.

We can believe in God because we see evidence of His creation. Romans 1 tells us that creation makes it so evident that He exists that we are without excuse. There’s a difference, however, in believing in Him and believing Him. The Bible tells us demons believe, and shudder (James 2:19). We can believe in Him and have no peace with Him, or we can believe Him and what He tells us and be at peace with Him. God asks us to be holy, righteous, and perfect, and, in His infinite patience, proved over millennia that we humans cannot do it without Him. He promised to provide a means for our redemption and He did so in His Son Jesus Christ, who died for our sins and proved His divinity by rising again. At Jesus’ baptism and at Jesus’ transfiguration, God spoke audibly from heaven regarding His Son, the second time saying, “This is My beloved Son, with whom I am well-pleased; listen to Him!” (Matthew 17:5). God has provided His Word, the Bible, so that we can, indeed, “listen to Him,” come to know Him, and follow Him. We can have peace that we will be with Him for eternity, and we can have peace while we live in a bewildering world waiting for eternity.

I am absolutely convinced that the world becomes fundamentally less bewildering if we have an intimate knowledge of the Word of God. Jesus told us, “In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). That is why Peter could tell us not to be surprised by trials, because Jesus has already warned us about them.

Without a knowledge of the Word, we make up our own ideas about how God should act and how the world should be, and we find ourselves painfully disappointed, and at risk of shaking our fist at God. We may believe, for instance, that children shouldn’t be born in poor countries without adequate cardiac care or, if they are, that we can somehow by our efforts fix a broken system. How do we balance the truth that Jesus told us we would always have the poor with us (Matthew 26:11, hint: we’re not going to fix it) with the responsibility to love and serve anyway? We’ve served in pediatric cardiac care for nearing 25 years in a lot of countries, and we haven’t fixed any of them. We have had a lot of victories, but we’ve also had a lot of defeats.

This week I was tempted to believe that our efforts in Kurdistan were ending in defeat. I’ve been called to not just read but to outline my daily Bible readings this year, so, in God’s timing, I was continuing to go over Leviticus in detail simultaneous to our trip. I’ve never undertaken to understand the details of the sacrificial offerings of animals as my eyes have glazed over through these portions of Scripture. I’ve simply been glad not to have to know the details since Jesus was the ultimate and complete sacrifice, making these rituals no longer necessary. Before His ultimate offering, there were burnt offerings, sin offerings, guilt offerings, peace offerings, and ordination offerings. Burnt offerings are just that, burnt. Entirely. An offering by fire, a soothing aroma to Him.

I’ve concluded that burnt offerings were an extravagant obedience. God, in His wisdom, provided that the other offerings could feed the priests or the people. They served a practical purpose, in addition to honoring and obeying Him. Burnt offerings seemed to serve no practical purpose. They could be considered a waste, an extravagance that served only to please Him. What if all our efforts to serve in pediatric cardiac care in Kurdistan were a burnt offering? He would be pleased.

But then I found this little nugget: the priest is allowed to keep the skin of the burnt offering (Leviticus 7:8). I assume that means the hide, which could provide warmth and covering. In our obedience to Him, even in burnt offerings, He provides for the care of His people.

The Old Testament gives us the Law and the prophets. It tells us what God expects and it tells us what God is going to do given what He expects (send Jesus). And then Jesus, in the New Testament, tells us the Law and the prophets are summed up in loving God and loving others (Matthew 22:40). Even if our offering of serving God’s children in Kurdistan is entirely burned, we honored Him because we believed in His promises and followed His calling, and it did provide something practical to each of the families we served.

The realization that a burnt offering provides a soothing aroma brought to mind these verses: “But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every place. For we are a fragrance of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing; to the one an aroma from death to death, to the other an aroma from life to life” (2 Corinthians 2:14-16a).

I believe He helped us resolve to be a sweet aroma, regardless of circumstance, on Wednesday morning. God led me the verse that opened this update, in 1 Peter, about not being surprised by trials. No surprise 1 Peter also contains these verses relevant to our experience this week: “To sum up, all of you be harmonious, sympathetic, brotherly, kindhearted, and humble in spirit; not returning evil for evil or insult for insult, but giving a blessing instead; for you were called for the very purpose that you might inherit a blessing. For, [quoting the Old Testament], ‘the one who desires life, to love and see good days, must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit. He must turn away from evil and do good; he must seek peace and pursue it. For the eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous, and His ears attend to their prayer, but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.’ Who is there to harm you if you prove zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for the sake of righteousness, you are blessed. And [quoting from the Old Testament again] ‘do not fear their intimidation, and do not be troubled,’ but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence; and keep a good conscience so that in the thing in which you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ will be put to shame. For it is better, if God should will it so, that you suffer for doing what is right rather than for doing what is wrong. For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God” (1 Peter 4:8-18a).

We offer our service so that we might bring others to Him. We pray we were a pleasing aroma to Him and others this week.