Sherry

Early yesterday morning I was all prepared to write about what I heard the night before -- Randy Harris' great message at Highland. He talked about how to see people differently. Because of the cross and since we have died with Christ, we no longer see people from a worldly point of view (2 Cor. 5:16). "What a great topic to blog about," I said to myself.

However, a few minutes after I opened up the Service Center and before I could get to my computer, I heard a loud banging on our front door. I went to the waiting room, opened the door and there was "Sherry." The left side of her face was scraped from a fall the day before. She was wearing dirty pajama bottoms and a raggedy shirt and sweatjacket. Sherry was jumping up and down, moaning in pain because of a terrible toothache. I could have seen her as a nuisance, an interruption to my writing. But I believe the Lord brought her here so that we could display His love to her.

In the meantime, our office manager arrived and we both tried to settle Sherry down -- giving her a warm cloth to press on her aching cheek. Getting her to rub ice on her hand, which I read helps with a toothache. Sadly, these treatments didn't seem to work. I offered to take her to the emergency room, but she started to scream and jump up and down, yelling, "I've already been to the emergency room last week. They just made me wait for four hours. I need this tooth pulled."

We called a dentist that helps our clients with emergency situations like this. And then I called my friend, Scott, who runs the Medical Care Mission. Within 45 minutes, one of his nurses called us and asked to bring Sherry in right away. Thank the Lord, He provided Sherilyn, our new intern who is a social Work major at ACU. She went with me to take Sherry to the dentist.

After looking at Sherry's tooth for a couple minutes, the dentist came out to inform us that her tooth was so infected that she'd need to be on antibiotics for a week before they could pull the tooth. I learned something new. They called in a prescription to Wal-Mart, and so off we went to the pharmacy department to wait for the prescription. In the meantime, Sherry kept moaning and crying about the pain she was in. At one point we found out she had been smoking crack recently and so we were a bit concerned about getting her pain medication. But the pharmacist assured us she'd be okay with it. Sherry said that she once had a scholarship to the Air Force but threw it all away when she got on crack.

After a trip to McDonald's to buy Sherry a milkshake so she could eat non-chewable food and start taking her antibiotics, Sherilyn and I took her to her house -- a ramshackle dwelling where she lives with her grandfather.

Seeing others no longer from a worldly point of view, but through the eyes of Jesus. We're going to contact Sherry some more -- taking her to the dentist next week since she has no transportation. I want to sit down with her and ask her the question that Jesus asked the man at the pool of Siloam: "Do you want to get well?" She needs the Lord desperately -- to let Him fill her heart and not drugs. I want to lovingly share the gospel with her. And to tell her that if she'll work with us, we could get her with some Christian folks who will help her get on a healthy path -- counselors, mentors, drug rehab people, and so on.

Would you please pray for Sherry today? After being with her much of the morning yesterday, it's pretty clear that she is a sheep without the Shepherd. Jesus sees her as a precious woman whom He created and for whom He died and was raised. I want to see her and everyone else with the same eyes.

Jim