Beautiful Feet - Ethiopia

Touch

Monday

I started a new vocation today.  I became a manicurist. 

We started our week at Compassion Family International, a drop-in center for impoverished children, run by Peter and Elizabeth Abera.  CFI, as we call them, is the main organization that Hope for His Children supports.  Each morning this week, as we have on past trips, we will spend the morning at CFI.  Some of the team will conduct Bible school activities with the kids.  They’ll do Bible story, craft, snack, and recreation.  The kids will all also get a new pair of shoes with new socks. Some of us work with the mothers of the children.   We try to teach them a craft, something perhaps they might be able to do to make money for their families.  We talk and laugh and share time together.

This morning was our first day of Bible school at CFI.  CFI is in a new facility, which is smaller than their last.  So rather than having all the mothers come every day, with a new activity every morning, half the mothers came this morning and half will come tomorrow.  One lucky half will get to come again on Wednesday, and then Family Day will be split between Thursday and Friday.  The new building can’t accommodate all the kids with all their parents/guardians, so half will come on Thursday and half on Friday.

Before we went to CFI, Michelle read to us the story of the leper healed by Jesus.  A leper no one would touch was touched by the Son of God.  He told Jesus, “If you are willing, you can heal me.”  Jesus said, “I am willing,” and He touched the man and healed him.  An appropriate way to start a week where many dirty and diseased children will be begging for our touch.

As the kids arrived at CFI this morning, I picked out familiar, sweet faces, hugging and picking up children, smiling and calling out names.  Four trips in, I’m now able recognize them and call them by name.  As mothers arrived, I recognized some of their faces as well.  Last year was our first year to do activities with the women, so I don’t know them as well as the kids, and I’m horrible with names, so I couldn’t call any of them by name, sadly.  However, some of them recognized me, too, and we were able to kiss cheeks, left, right, left, right, shake hands, and bump shoulders in the traditional Ethiopian greeting that I love. 

Last January, we took one day to do manicures for the women.  There were over 30 of them attending by the end of the week, and we had only three team members working with women, so doing manicures for 30 women took some time.  Because we were working on another project that day as well, we got only a few of them done.  There were many disappointed, although gracious, mothers at the end of last year’s women’s ministry.

We started with manicures this year.  Our first day, with a much smaller team and only two of us working with the women, we started doing nails right away.  While we worked with finger nails, the ladies made beaded bracelets.  For the manicures we start with a simple bowl of cold water and wash the women’s hands.  We then use lotion and give them a quick hand massage.  Finally, we finish with painting their fingernails.  We don’t do cuticles, base coats or top coats, or filing.  In a country where most folks don’t receive basic medical care, common issues like nail fungus and infected cuts are common and untreated, and more serious issues like AIDS/HIV and hepatitis present much greater risks. 

It is utterly humbling and a privilege to be able to minister to these women in this way.  Hands that are calloused and dirty, that care for children and other family members, that work so very hard and are rarely if ever held or caressed or stroked were placed in our bowls of water.  Immediately, every woman began washing her own hands.  Gently, we shake a finger to indicate “no”, and point to ourselves, and say, “Please let me.”  They don’t understand English, but they get the message.  They are utterly dumbfounded by the experience.  Some laugh nervously.  Some sit silently without moving.  Some refuse to meet your eyes.  But none of them refuse the touch.  We gently but firmly rub the lotion into their skin, covering each finger, massaging their palms with our thumbs, and gently stroking the backs of their hands.  Then we point to the row of polish, 6 small bottles of various shades of pink, and indicate that they should choose their color.  With the completely wonderful but strangely uncomfortable experience of handwashing over, they laugh, look at you shyly, and pick. 

I cannot begin to explain to you how blessed I am to be able to serve these women in this way.  We gave everyone name tags today, so I was able to call each woman by name, inquire through an interpreter about her child/children, pray for her silently when the interpreter was called away, and ask them at the end if they liked their new look.  Many of them were posing for each other afterward, laughing and spreading their hands across their scarves or in front of their faces to show off their beautiful new nails. 

Before we had started this morning, I told them the story of Jesus washing His disciples’ feet.  What an honor to be able to say, “I am a follower of Jesus Christ.  Jesus tells us to serve one another.  Jesus was the Son of God.  He came to earth, and while He was here, He washed His disciples’ feet.  He told us to serve each other, like He served.  We are here to serve you today.  You are mothers, daughters, sisters, and daughters of God.  We would like to honor you by washing your hands and painting your fingernails.”  They nodded and smiled. 

How appropriate that story seemed the day after Easter.  How perfectly fitting that activity was following our morning devotion. These women of hard life, dirty hands, and frequent disease were longing, just as the leper who approached Jesus, for a gentle touch.  Like Jesus, we were willing to give it.  Following His example, we laid out a towel, dipped our hands in the bowl, and washed the hands of another, a sister, a precious daughter of God.  

Jesus was right.  The least is the greatest, the servant is the blessed, the privilege truly is in the washing, not in being washed.  

“If you are willing . . .  “  We are willing, Lord.  We will wash more hands, touch more hearts tomorrow.