Ahmed's Heart Surgery

James says, "The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much." Thank you for standing with us in prayer for Ahmed. On arrival at Wolfson today, we found our silly, playful boy chattering and laughing and making faces once again. This time he was wanting everybody to look up his nose because it was no longer bleeding. Even as I write this note of thanks to you this evening, I can hear the chatter of all the children upstairs playing with Ahmed's voice happily ringing from the center of them. As I went upstairs to introduce another visitor to the families this evening, I saw Ahmed taking his medicine and he was doing his silly little 'shimmy, shake, shake' to let us know it STILL doesn't taste good. Ahmed's mother is beginning to regain hope. She is finally beginning to ask again, "How many more echos before Iraq?" Since her arrival here on November 17th she has had more quality one-on-one time with Ahmed than most parents get with their child in many years. It has not been an easy path, but the future is much brighter for them now than before they left Kurdistan. While in Kurdistan, the doctors didn't think anything could be done to help Ahmed but the doctors at Wolfson were willing to try. Thank you God for those who have taken the call to heal the brokenhearted as their personal mission in this world.

We were looking forward to celebrating Ahmed's fifth birthday today with the children in the Shevet House, but Ahmed was still recovering at Wolfson from his chest infection. This struggle for his breath and life has left him very weary. He is recovering but he is not yet the same little boy who hasn't known how sick he was. He seems to have quite a real sense that he is "no bash" (which means "not good" in Kurdish). He is lethargic and it is now an effort for him to even smile.

However, the chocolate birthday cake, served outside in the hospital play area, with many smiles and funny faces around him helped. Today was also our co-worker, Simcha's, birthday. So Ahmed had an adult playmate in a funny hat, too. As we tried to get him to eat a little cake, blow out candles and step into the play house, the best laugh of the afternoon came when Mary (the worker with the most birthdays accumulated) stepped into the play house to try to draw him in. That generated the best Ahmed laugh of the day!

Please continue to pray for Ahmed that the joy and enjoyment of life that he came to Israel with will return to him and he will be touched by the master's hand for the rest of his physical needs. We know Our Father has a good plan for this life.

It was a joy for our coworker Lina to find Ahmed today already out of the main ICU, sitting up, awake, even attempting a smile. We thank God that his recovery is coming along well, and pray that God will complete the good work which he has begun in Ahmed's heart and life.