Some of us may not return physically to this beautiful jewel in the Caribbean. But we will never really ever say goodbye. Thank you, readers, for letting us share a bit of our wonderful experience there. Thank you for letting us come, Jamaica.

(May 6, 2008) — Back home, it feels like a dream.

Did we really take nearly 300 volunteers from San Diego to Jamaica? Did we really bring to that beautiful western Caribbean island $5 million in healthcare and equipment? Did we really draw 75,000 people to two nights of concerts and gospel? Did we really get home safe and sound? How did we do that? In fact, a tally of what the Miles Ahead teams accomplished may make you tired just thinking about it!

Medical

• The medical team came with the ability to provide more than $5 million in free medical care and equipment to 10,000 people in four free clinics. More than 6,000 patients were treated.
• The 80 professionals included specialists in the areas of dental, optometry, pediatrics, gynecology, orthopedics, internal medicine, pathology and physical therapy. 
• The team brought a portable pathology lab, enabling the pathologist to process some 172 pap smears within 24 hours.
• An estimate $325,000 in pharmaceuticals and drugs were administered free; and $74,500 worth of eye glasses were given out.

Construction

• At least 60 volunteers tackled two primary and junior high school projects, donating thousands of dollars in materials and uncounted hours of labor.
• The construction team focused on the repainting and renovation of one school; and the building of a 400-foot-long wall around the school, plus the renovation of its student lavatories.
• The lavatories were nonfunctioning; the team replumbed the site and replaced the commodes, painted the interiors and installed lighting (there had been none); and hung doors on the stalls.

Assemblies, Sports, Outreach

• Forty volunteers performed at school assemblies throughout Montego Bay to promote education and making good life choices.
• A team of deaf and interpreters held a class in deaf education.
• Three dozen volunteers hosted children’s programs in parks after the school day. 
• About 40 volunteers hit the streets to talk with people and share the love of Jesus Christ.
• Sports clinics were hosted throughout the community by 40 athletes, in addition to a free exhibition soccer game and a free exhibition basketball game.
• Athletes included a former NBA professional basketball player and NFL American football player, along with former Jamaica national football (soccer) stars Warren Barrett, a former national captain, and Paul “Tegat” Davis, a formidable striker.
• A media team created this site, www.MilesAhead.tv, on the fly during the ministry week; shot eight videos; took thousands of photographs, issued two dozen news releases, supported daily presentations, and orchestrated two mights of live-streamed concerts.

Two Days of Festival

• Two free daylong festivals including a family fun zone; a food court; a huge Extreme Sports Park including skateboard and motorcycle stunts; and a Community Care Area, providing information and health screenings.
• Both festivals culminated in a huge concert featuring top Caribbean and American artists headling the festivals, including Papa San, Israel Houghton and New Breed, Carlene Davis, Omari, Prodigal Son, New Generation and TobyMac.
• Evangelist Miles McPherson spoke about the love of God to the crowd, which Jamaica authorities estimated at a total of 75,000. 
• Volunteers registered 3,515 decision cards (individually completed to signal one’s faith in Jesus Christ), and handed out 6,000 copies of 21 Jump-Start devotional books, written by McPherson.

 Of course, statistics don’t tell the stories, thousands of them, of how individual lives were changes.  This blog could go on forever…

The Jamaica trip was amazing. I really feel like I had the opportunity to experience what GOD can do in whole new way. It was great to get a break from the mundane life that I sometimes feel and see hundreds and thousands of lives changed in a week.

The Rock Sports experience was exciting. I had the opportunity to work one on one with hundreds of kids in teaching them how to box. It was great to see the smiles on kids faces when they put on the boxing gloves and position themselves into their boxing stance. The smiles that came after each kid boxed was truly rewarding. Knowing that the boxing gear that we left behind will continue to be used is very encouraging.

God Bless.

Mark

In the fifth chapter of the Gospel of Luke, the author recorded an account of extraordinary sacrifice by the friends of a paralyzed man. This group of men were determined to find help for their friend, even if it required great physical effort. When they couldn’t get near Jesus because of the crowds, they brazenly made a hole in the roof and lowered the ailing man down in front of Jesus. Jesus acknowledged their faith, and then healed the sick man (Luke 5:18-26).

During the week of community ministry prior to the Miles Ahead crusade events May 2 and 3 in Montego Bay, Jamaica, the medical team encountered numerous stories of suffering and sacrifice–and of lives saved. Here’s one example. Dr. John Clifford, an orthopedic specialist and one of the volunteer physicians on duty, takes up the tale.

Someone Finally Understood…

“On the first day of our mobile clinic [Tuesday, April 29] a man comes in with his brother in his arms, carrying him …. [The patient] had a stroke two months ago, and the brother had to carry him everywhere, to the bathroom, to his bed… anywhere he needs to go. He’s completely dependent upon his brother …

“I examined him and realized he had a dense right-side hemiplegia, which means he’s completely paralyzed on his right side, with a complete expressive aphasia. With expressive aphasia, you can understand everything that’s being said to you, but the center of your brain that controls your ability to express yourself is completely obliterated, so you can’t express yourself. You can’t write, you can’t sign and you can’t speak. You’re completely cut off from the world…

“My wife [Nanci Clifford] is a physical therapist, so we brought her over and she began to work with him. And she’s a huge prayer warrior too, so she prayed over him and with the family. She laid hands on him, and she also did therapy on him, so it was a fusion of traditional medicine and spiritual healing. As she was explaining to the family why he couldn’t talk to him, tears started streaming down his face. Someone finally understood…

“She worked over him a while and worked out some of his contractures, and prayed over him, and he was able to stand for the first time since his stroke…”

The improvement was wonderful for the stroke victim. But he still didn’t have any way of getting around. However, God wasn’t finished with the story yet… (To be continued…)

Monday, April 28: Members of the Miles Ahead medical team were at St. John’s Methodist Church in downtown Montego Bay, Jamaica, preparing the location for the launch of the free clinic tomorrow. Behind a door in the warren of rooms off the sanctuary, someone found an old walker. In pieces. They took note of it, and moved on.

On Tuesday night, team members were eating dinner together, sharing the day’s experiences. Someone brought up the story of the stroke victim, carried to the clinic by his brother. That’s when one of the doctors at St. John’s said they had found a walker. Maybe it could be fixed and given to the man, if he could be found again.

Each of the four medical clinic teams had assigned to them a MacGyver — a fix-anything guy. On Wednesday, April 30, Jeff Scranton refurbished the old walker, cobbling together spare screws and metal parts until it was sturdy enough to donate to a needy patient.

‘Stand Up! Stand Up!’

On Thursday, Sean Burgess, the director of the Miles Ahead medical outreach operations, dug through the clinic’s records and found the paralytic man’s name and address. He lived in a neighborhood known as Grandville, which had a reputation for being dangerous. Sean, with a local volunteer named Otis and the team’s local bus driver, found the address. The man and his brother lived in a shack behind what looked like a garage. Sean takes up the tale:

“We take the walker into the room, and start to explain to them how to use it. We also explain how it’s going to take time for the man to be able to walk again… The crippled man puts his hand on the walker, and the brother starts giving him instructions. …He kept saying ‘Stand up! Stand up!’ And [the man] stands up on his own power.

“And then the brother says, ‘Come to me! Come to me!’ And he gets behind the man and moves one leg forward and says ‘Come to me! Come to me!’ … You could hear the love of the brother in his voice; it wasn’t like he was demanding or angry. And then the man moves his leg, and then again, until he walks across the small room!

“And I said, ‘This usually takes three months, so be patient with him.’ And the brother said, ‘He can do it!’ He turned him around and had him walk back to the bed…”

Sean said he, Otis and the bus driver joined the brothers in prayer, and then left, amazed at what they had witnessed.

“That’s why we were doing what we did in Jamaica,” said Sean. “Miles Ahead Medical exists to bring the gospel and its message of the saving grace of Jesus Christ to a population that otherwise is lost, forgotten, and left to die.”

Postscript: John Clifford said his wife, Nanci, the physical therapist, thinks the man will regain some ability to walk on his own, and eventually he may learn to communicate in some fashion. Pray for him!

In the air somewhere over Southern California, 7:29 p.m. PDT, Sunday, May 4, 2008: We’re riding into the sunset. The western horizon glows a burnt orange. We’re on Jamaica Air flight 75 on our way from Montego Bay, Jamaica, to LAX, where we’ll catch a bus to San Diego. Most of the nearly 300 Miles Ahead volunteers are heading home too, or will be very soon. After months of planning for the Jamaica Crusade, they spent 10 jammed-packed days in MoBay working their tails off — and making a difference in people’s lives.

While it will be wonderful to be home again, I can’t get the images of Jamaica out of my mind…If you could view memories like a gallery of photographs you might see…

* The 30,000 Montego Bay residents on Friday, and then 45,000 on Saturday, dancing to the gospel reggae-rap music of Israel Houghton and Papa San and others during the crusade concerts… I can see one boy, I would guess about 10, swaying with tears running down his cheeks…

* A downtown church transformed into a Miles Ahead medical clinic, and about 200 of the 6,000 residents who took advantage of the four sites offering free medical care…I can see a toddler pulling herself up on the wheels of an old wheelchair; in it sits a smiling old man without legs waiting for his free prescription…

* Volunteers dripping with sweat as they sweep out a dank school lavatory whose broken toilets have no water…I can see the 900 students who now have a brightly lit, restroom painted cream, now with working commodes and stalls with doors…

* A troupe of junior high boys and girls, dancing in bright red plaid traditional costumes, celebrating their newly repainted school… I can see the warm and quiet principal handing Pastor Miles a plaque honoring Miles Ahead for the work done there.

* A thin, dignified older pastor leading a passionate worship service in an unfinished sanctuary… I can see peace on his face, even though it is scarred where robbers beat him, and I can watch him literally jump with joy on badly damaged legs…

 There are so many more snapshot memories… It’s worth your time to flip through the wonderful (real) photographs taken by skillful volunteer Miles Ahead photographers at http://www.flickr.com/photos/milesaheadpics/sets/. (They have their own blog at http://www.therockphotographers.com/) And scroll through the iDo stories at http://www.milesahead.tv/category/jamaicaido/.

With such wonderful experiences it’s no wonder we’re leaving our hearts in Jamaica.

The devil has been doing nothing to me this week but tearing away at my heart. The only thoughts going through my head are ones of discouragement. The devil is telling me over and over there is no reason for me to be here and I have nothing to offer. I did nothing last night but pray for opportunities to serve God today. My day started with frustration, but it ended with joy.

I’m with the school assemblies team and today we had an opportunity to speak at an all girls school. When we got there is when I was feeling my worst inside. We spoke to the girls in a large group, and then had the opportunity to spend some one on one time with them for about 10 minutes afterward. I was very close to stepping outside and waiting for things to end because of the way things were going in my mind. I was able to ignore those thoughts from the devil, and I’m now praising God that I stayed. I grouped together with two girls and before I knew it 10 minutes was up, and I was just getting started. Somehow another 30 was added to the time and God filled my heart more every minute.I was able to help one of these two girls come to accept Christ for the first time, and the other, who already had, was encouraged to live for him. The devil’s plan was for me to run, but with God’s help not only did I stay, but I was able to help another beautiful girl come to know Jesus. The devil always thinks that he has the best plan to mess things up, but since I’m as close with God as I am it never works!