10th August, 2007

AMOS BENNETT

“I pray that I will never be the same again,” says Sarah Creighton, an Illawong nurse who worships with St Paul’s Anglican Church, at Menai in southwest Sydney, returning from 12 months service as a volunteer nurse with the international charity Mercy Ships in West Africa.

“You cannot see what I have been privileged to witness during the past year and not be touched. You cannot sit with patients who haven’t even been touched for years and have them thank you for that touch without yourself being broken. Or sit with a woman whom no one will go near, because she has been incontinent since childbirth, and see her respond to the healing touch of doctors and nurses.”

Ms Creighton ’s calling by God to become a nurse in Africa came when she was 17. Two years ago she heard the challenge to full time mission work and knew it was time to go.

“I was finding my heart moved with compassion for the suffering people of Africa, and I could no longer remain where I was. I discovered Mercy Ships by accident while searching on the internet, and started receiving the charity’s newsletters. I read them and was moved to tears, telling God I would go if He was sending me.

"Those around me reacted differently. Some thought I was crazy going to Africa, having to pay my own way there and back and paying crew fees while onboard the hospital ship. Others put me in the 'martyr' category. But mostly, reactions were positive.

“It really annoys me when people think of what I have been doing simply as humanitarian. I went because Jesus died on the cross to give us eternal life, and that means hope - hope and healing of body, mind and spirit. My amazing God saved me and chose me to help provide through Mercy Ships hope and healing to the hurt and suffering.”

Ms Creighton worked as an ICU nurse at Sydney’s Liverpool Hospital for more than five years, and before setting out for Africa spent three months at the Westmead Children’s Hospital to learn more about pediatrics. That work experience prepared her for her role as a ward nurse caring for both children and adults. She served onboard during the latest field assignment to Ghana, then sailing with the Anastasis to Liberia to be with the medical crew at the commencement of an assignment to that nation.

She describes Liberia as a ‘mess’ three years after the end of more than 20 years of civil war.

“It’s a country with 85 per cent unemployment. Three-quarters of the people live below the poverty line on less than $1.50 a day. There are no services - electricity, mains water or sewerage. No one can afford health care services. A whole generation has missed out on education. Former child soldiers have no skills. Gangs are beginning to form. The country has a Godly leader who is doing her best but has a huge task ahead of her.

“God is calling us to help the poor - the poor in body, mind and spirit. He is not interested in the way we perform religious piety and acts that on the surface have an appearance of godliness. He is interested in our hearts and the way we are prepared to spend ourselves on behalf of the poor. May I never become hard to injustice on this earth. I pray that my heart would break for the people of Liberia. I don’t know the answer to all the problems but I do know that I am called to love those I come in contact with and reflect Christ to them."

Mercy Ships is an international Christian charity that has operated hospital ships in developing nations since 1978. For more information, visit www.mercyships.org.au. Amos Bennett is the organisation's media officer.

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