A Journey To Iraq

The Border between Kuwait and Iraq andthen a one mile walk...

"There’s no way you can go in alone without security; they’re killing civilians. I just had 6 of my guys killed 2 weeks ago. Three security guards at the border were shot at 2 days ago: you can’t go in!" the Iraqi security guard had called to say.

The night before our entrance into Iraq, Dr. Lynn Cawley (clinical psychotherapist) and I (Communications Director) received that call. For nearly eleven months I had longed to enter Al Basrah, the southern region of Iraq, thirty minutes north of Kuwait. Was the promise I had been given from Isaiah 54:14-17, "you will have nothing to fear. Terror will be far removed; it will not come near you," null and void? I was challenged that night concerning fear: where would I put my trust?

We were able to bring pictures to this Iraqi family from relatives in Kuwait who thwy had not been able to communicate with for years.

The next day we parked near the border on the Kuwait side. My hope for a quick trek across the border was not to be. After 8 stops to examine passports and a mile walk, we made it to Edgar, our Iraqi friend who would drive us the rest of the way. Our mission was to bring a 40-foot container of aid to a Children's Hospital, orphanage and the Arab-Marsh tribes who had been greatly persecuted. Soccer teammates from Orange County Lutheran High School had spent hours packing education supplies and personal care items into bags. I was eager to see this delivered.

To plan for future health projects, we also wanted to evaluate the Children's Hospital. Talking to us for more than an hour, the hospital director shared his desperation while nervously fingering his prayer beads: surgeries are being postponed due to lack of sutures, their only centrifuge machine for blood is broken, and they are unable to continue routine medical care when the sewage breaks in the intensive care unit. They lack bed linens and a means to wash bedding. He calls those who incite demonstrations and killings "barbarians from foreign lands hired to protect the hated Saddam and his animosity towards the west." He expressed appreciation for the United States.

Afterward, we toured the hospital. Free to visit all the rooms; emotionally we could handle only three. Families gathered around us, hoping that we had something for their dying children. Before I left America, an army colonel emailed me, "children that go to the hospital are more apt to die than be healed - they just don’t have the supplies." Gazing at children holding onto life while flies buzzed around their limp bodies, I saw firsthand the reality of his words.

As Co-Founder and Communications Director for GO&D/Giving Children Hope, I am grateful for our official recognition as an international relief and development organization to Iraq, registered in Kuwait with the United Nations, the Humanitarian Office Center, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Rebuilding a nation requires a long-term commitment. We do not want to be a non-governmental organization (NGO) that visits, takes pictures and does not return. Our purpose is to do whatever it takes to build trust in a country torn by war and fear. Our vision is to restore hope to the people of Iraq, helping them transform their personal futures and the future of their nation. Please keep us in your prayers as we believe God for the impossible.