MISDEEDS

     Have you ever really tried to do your best for someone and have your efforts misunderstood? It happens to me all the time...; even as I get older it seems, I still make stupid mistakes that cause misunderstandings with people that I really want to impress and what starts out to be an act of kindness becomes a misdeed and peoples feelings get hurt.

     I remember the time in Honduras when a father brought in his sick child to my clinic. The young boy was burning up with a high fever and I realized as soon as I touched his stomach that it was a ruptured appendix. I told the man that he would have to take the boy to the hospital immediately but he sadly shook his head and said that it would be impossible, because he had no money to cover the cost of transportation.

     The nearest hospital was four hours away in Jultigulpa and the fare for the bus was about $3.00. Even as I spoke to the man, as if by an Act of GOD, I heard the brakes of the bus, bringing it to a stop outside the clinic and I shouted to my nurse Christina, to have it wait. I reached in my billfold and pulled out a Twenty-dollar bill and handed it to the man. “Get your son to the hospital.” I said, as I held the door open for him to leave.

     I was content that I had done a great thing..., with GOD’S assistance of course, and was feeling quite good about it until the following day when I heard from my nurse that the man had not taken the boy to the hospital but had instead gotten off of the bus and took him home, where the boy died several hours later. I was very upset that the boy had died but even more furious about the twenty dollars I had lost. I told my nurse it was the last time I would ever try to help anyone again! For that reason, when the man returned a few days later with another one of his children, she was very hesitant about telling me he was outside in the waiting room.
     
     I recognized him immediately as he came through the door, carrying his baby daughter. She appeared to be quite malnourished and I assumed immediately that he was going to attempt to get another $20.00 from me and so, rather than give him that chance to ask; I laid into him with all of my frustrations.

      He sat quietly listening to my ranting and I continued on, until I saw the tears coming down his face. When I finally stopped, he told me that he was very sorry that he had not followed through with what I had told him to do and that he would try to pay back the money I had given him because I was a good man and he did not want me upset with him. Then he explained what had happened. He said he knew the child he had brought in before was very sick and that if he did not go to the hospital he would die..., but when I gave him the money, all he could think about was his five other children, all of whom were just as malnourished as the child he was holding in his arms, and he knew that with the money I had given him, he could buy them some good food and hopefully, by so doing, would not loss any more of his other children.

     I felt like the World’s biggest fool as I sat there and listened to his story and you would think that it would have been enough for me and I would never again open my mouth before thinking or do something for someone without looking at all of the possibilities for misunderstanding. Of course it wasn’t..., and my mistakes could fill a book of bad examples for human behavior.

     There have been some changes at Wat Opot lately. Duch Tel, our Buddhist Monk and Abbot of the Wat, has taken a one year Sabbatical to study and work in the United States at a Buddhist Temple in Los Angeles, California. He will be missed greatly but we are also very happy for him to have this opportunity for increasing his awareness of life outside of Cambodia and I personally am hoping that he will learn enough English so that we will be able to communicate on a deeper level when he returns. In his place are new Monks who will run the Wat during his absence and so the task of building new relationships has begun. It has its difficulties because like Duch Tel none of them speak English and also, because not all Monks are as comfortable as Duch Tel is around Christians.

     There are some young boys that live at the Wat next to us and the Monks are given the responsible for their wellbeing. At times the boys come over and play with our children and for that reason, a few days ago, we decided to give each of the boys a gift of soap and a large bottle of shampoo so they could keep their hair clean and free of lice. As they were leaving they were told that this was a “Gift from JESUS” and they excitedly ran back to the Wat and told the Monks about their good fortune. The following day they returned..., their heads had been shaven with a razor. When I asked them what had happened to cause them to do it, their response implied that their shaven heads were a “Gift from Buddha”, given to them by the Monks.

God Bless!

Wayne

PEACE

     As we age, people’s beliefs often undergo many changes and refinements, becoming more expansive and inclusive, or more closed and dogmatic.  I have met my former self a couple of times in the past few months and it has made me realize just how the passage of time has polarized my way of thinking.  It got me to wondering if who I have become is really a result of growth and understanding, or have I, in the weariness of age, grown tired of battling for my GOD and perhaps even crossed over the line, as some have made claim, and become a persecutor of Christians.

     I can see how a few who have read my writings and know me only superficially could label me a Heretic... but now to say that I am actually persecuting Christians who are trying to bring GOD’S message of Salvation to others is disturbing to me.

     I know exactly how these people feel because in the beginning of my journey I too felt persecuted for Christ’s sake. Just JESUS and me against the whole World and if people didn’t like me, it was because they didn’t like HIM. I could be antagonistic and even rude towards people and Peoples who didn’t share the same views that I held because the GOD of the Universe was on my side and WE owned the World. I suppose I got much of this from growing up in a Christian Reformed environment; we were after all, the people GOD chose after the Jews killed Jesus and not only was I baptized as a child but carried the mark of circumcision as well, which practically guaranteed me a seat in the Inner Sanctum when the Pearly Gates were opened, or so was my thinking when I was young, energetic, and willing to do anything for Jesus..., well anything that is except follow the Second Commandment that Jesus gave us. “Love your neighbor as yourself."

I didn’t have a problem with the First and Greatest commandment that said we should Love God with all our heart but when I left Grand Rapids, Michigan, in June of 1966 to enter Navy boot camp at The Great Lakes Naval Training Center in Chicago, Illinois, my neighbors became people of different races, religions, and colors. Many, I would soon learn as we were marched to the showers, were not even circumcised! Talk about religious persecution! I was sure feeling it those first few nights away from home. Language was another problem. The closest I had ever come to swearing was to try and think of the word that Johnny Carson was being “beeped” for on the Tonight Show. I didn’t realize that there were so many beepable words in the English language.  Surely God did not mean that I should Love all of these as my neighbors! I had never known a “heathen person” before, at least not on a personal level, but there was no doubt in my mind when I first entered boot camp that I had just been cast into a whole company of the fallen.  

     I didn’t realize it at the time but just a little less  then two years later, while serving as a medic with the Seventh Marines somewhere in the countryside around Da Nang, it would be men like these who would give away their position so that a medivac chopper could lift me out of a combat zone and into safety, knowing full well that by doing so they would seal their own fate and earn the right to have their names written down on some memorial Wall in years to come and perhaps even on The Page White and Clear.

     I have met a lot of people since that time who are nothing like me at all. Many live and hold beliefs that seem so strange and even Heathen at first, but as I live and work among them I can sense that GOD is just as much interested in them as HE is in me, molding and shaping them to be what He wants them to be. HE wishes for no one to feel unworthy of HIS Love and Compassion, and as I see it, helping people to experience GOD’S love can be our only ministry.  

     It is true that I have chastised “Christians” for disobeying my request that they not proselytize when coming to our Project for AIDS patients. It is also true that I have told people I did not want them to come back if the only thing they want to do is preach about Christianity but don’t want to physically share GOD’S love with our patients, by hugging a child or by comforting a sick patient with a touch. It is also true that I have told people not to teach classes from the BIBLE while on the Buddhist Grounds or play Christian music at full volume when the Buddhist Monks are present. These things can easily be seen as persecution by some but that is not the way I see it. My reason for criticizing or rebuking, as some may see it, is not because  I have anything against the GOD they say they serve, but because the individual, in my mind, is not following the Two Commandments GOD has given. We are to Love the person we see before us and do nothing more. There is no Third Commandment given to us by JESUS. Whatever changing that needs to take place will be done by the Holy Spirit in HIS Time.

  MT 22:37 Jesus replied: " `Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: `Love your neighbor as yourself.' 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

Perhaps if those people, Peoples, or even Nations, who feel that they are being persecuted because of their religious beliefs, were to reconsider the TWO GREAT COMMANDMENTS and than start applying them to the way they live their daily lives, we would start to see a change in the way the World is presently heading. I did... and I believe I made the right choice.
          
Peace to you,
May you find Joy as you journey,
Toward life’s Eternal Fulfillment,
And may you see GOD'S Presence,
In All that He has Created.

VFJ Wayne Dale Matthysse    

Porn Nak

PORN NAK
Spokesperson for Children Having AIDS
PARTNERS in COMPASSION / CAMBODIA

     My name is Porn Nak and I am nine years old. My father died in 2003 and my mother died one year later. Both of them had HIV /AIDS. They did not know they had it until I was born and got sick. When the Doctor told them I had HIV they were surprised, because he told them that I got it from them. I am the youngest of five children but my brothers and sister do not have the virus.

After my parents died, we went to live with my grandparents. They were good to us but sometimes children in the community made fun of me because I was skinny and they said I had AIDS. Than the Doctors told us there was a new medicine I could take that would keep me from getting sick but I would have to be watched very carefully for several months. My grandparents said they were to busy to keep taking me to the hospital all the time and so the Doctors said they could not give me the medicine, but than they said I could live at a Wat that took care of children and they would take me to the hospital.

At first I did not like the idea and I cried when they told me I would have to stay, so they said my brother Nahan could stay with me. Now we have lived at the Wat Opot Family Center for nearly one year and both my brother and I like it very much. I take my medicines everyday and every morning I go to Khmer school and in the afternoon to the Wat Opot School. On Holidays we visit with our family and have a good time. Life is pretty good for me right now but sometimes I think about my parents and wonder how things might have been if they didn’t get AIDS.    

The History of Partners in Compassion Cambodia

In 1996 the Catholic Office for Emergency Relief and Refugees (COERR), in Phnom Penh, Cambodia began an AIDS awareness program in the Province of Takeo. Mr. Vandin San met with target groups, informing them of the dangers of AIDS and steps they could take to prevent contacting it. While there was some concern at that time, no one could foresee how large the epidemic would become.

In the years that followed, San continued to work with COERR, dealing primarily with the training and education of Buddhist Monks. He arranged and led several conferences in each of the nine Districts of the Takeo province in which 344 monks participated. At least one representative, from each of the 226 Buddhist Wats of Takeo attended. While no one can measure what effect this has had on the spread of AIDS in that area, one thing is certain. The people and especially the Buddhist Monks of Takeo are far more aware of and open to dealing with the situation now facing Cambodia, than are other Provinces, where this form of education was not available.

As a result of the close working relationship COERR had developed with the Buddhist Wats of Takeo, it was decided in 1999, at the close of a seminar, that it was time to do something that would directly impact the growing AIDS problem.

In February of 2000, COERR began construction of one of the first AIDS family health centers in Cambodia. It was unique, in that it was built on the property of a Buddhist Wat and would be used not only as a treatment center but also as a training center for Monks and family members.

In the beginning of 2000, Wayne Matthysse, a medic who also worked with COERR,  assisted San with some home visits to 3 families with AIDS, living in close proximity to the project. Within a few months that number had increased to 10 families. By the beginning of 2001 that number had risen to 40 families.

In 2001 Vandin San and Wayne Matthysse formed the local non-governmental-organization called PARTNERS in COMPASSION CAMBODIA (PC CAM) and they took over the management of the Wat Opot Project from COERR. What had started off as a health clinic soon developed into a twenty-four hour Family Health and Care Center.

In August of 2003 a new relationship with MEDICINS SANS FRONTIERS BELGIUM completely changed the direction of the PC CAM program when they offered to put all of its members on Anti-Retro-Viral Therapy. From care of dying members they were suddenly challenged to look at them in a whole different way. Now those members needed to have help in rebuilding their lives and their children needed education. For that reason, PC CAM devoted itself to finding new and creative programs that would provide challenging alternatives for their members to choose from as they began to restructure their lives.  

Today nearly 1000 families who have been affected by HIV/AIDS receive Home Care, counseling, and assistance from PC CAM teams and what started off to be a hospice has developed into a residential community and work center for homeless and vulnerable men, women and children.