News Report – Edward Williams sat quietly in the busy waiting room of the Deen-Gross Eye Center in Merrillville. Large black sunglasses shielded his sensitive eyes from the light.
One day earlier, the 67-year-old father of eight underwent cataract removal surgery in his left eye at the St. Mary Medical Center outpatient surgery center in Hobart. A week before that, he underwent a similar surgery for his right eye.
It’s just another cataract surgery in Northwest Indiana? Not quite.
Williams doesn’t live in this area or in this country. He’s from the Republic of Liberia, a small country on the West African coast where the Ebola virus outbreak took place a couple years ago.
There, a civil war once destroyed nearly of its healthcare facilities, life expectancy is only 57, and there’s only one doctor for every 70,000 people, according to the World Health Organization.
“It is very hard to get good health care there,” Williams told me while waiting his turn in the eye center’s hallway.
In Liberia, Williams serves his people, and his God, by creating sustainability projects, mentoring young men and building new churches to help provide for the many needs there.
Most likely, if you’ve heard anything about Liberia in the news, it focused on something negative. Williams understands this international stereotype. He doesn’t, however, see only the negative in his homeland. He also sees its good people, its centuries-old traditions, and its natural beauty.
“We are a proud country,” said Williams, taking off his glasses to reveal his freshly healing eyes.
Two years ago, Williams began noticing his vision getting blurry. First, it was in one eye and then, in the other eye. He was slowly losing his sight, he realized. Last year, he started going blind. He didn’t need a doctor to tell him. The process was gradual, like a slowly setting sun after a brightly lit day.
“I could not see what I wanted to see,” he told me in English punctuated by a thick accent. “I could not see what I needed to see.”
Williams prayed for renewed vision, or merciful death.
“If it’s not the will of the Lord, then let me die,” he prayed. “I do not want to go blind.”
In Liberia, he may as well as be dead, he reasoned. Life is hard enough there. To continue without vision – physically as much as spiritually – is no life at all, he told himself.
His 67-year-old eyes have seen so much already in his country. Daily hardship. A devastating civil war. Lack of running water and dependable electricity. High rates of infant mortality, unemployment and illiteracy. Sparse health care of any quality.
He’s seen it all, literally and emotionally.
His eyes, though, have also seen the glory of the Lord, he believes. Genuine miracles, he believes. God’s blessings, he believes. Williams was raised a Christian but he formally became a servant for Jesus Christ in 1980, he said.
“When you care for God, God cares for you,” he told me with the same matter-of-fact surety that water is wet.
Williams, who lives in the nation’s capital, Monrovia, has been working with ministry-minded church members from this country, including from Suncrest Christian Church in St. John. Together, they build churches, friendships and new converts in his area.
“We work with some wonderful leaders in Liberia,” said Suncrest lead pastor, Greg Lee. “Edward has become one of the people I respect more than anyone on the planet.”
In January, when two Suncrest leaders took another trip to that area, they discovered Williams’ serious vision problems.
“But no procedure was available there to (help) him that had decent chances of success,” Lee said.
Lee’s church arranged for Williams to fly here for the needed surgical procedures, free of charge. He arrived here late last month, staying with various church members in Northwest Indiana.
“You can imagine how he is soaking in the experience after knowing third world poverty for a lifetime,” Lee said.
Soaking it in, indeed. Everything leaves him in awe. From our daily hustle and bustle to the mechanized mass-milking of cows at Fair Oaks Farms.
“He keeps talking about it,” said David Vineyard, Suncrest’s global director of compassion and missions.
Vineyard escorted Williams to the surgical procedures and follow-up doctor visits. He also opened his home to Williams, a home of daily conveniences we take for granted.
“Everything is magical here,” Williams said, trying to explain the wonderment he has felt.
Williams asked me how our grocery stores stay in business during power outages, a common problem in Liberia. I told him such outages are rare here and many stores have backup generators.
“Ahhhhhh, I see,” he replied with the fascination of a child.
Suncrest leaders searched for a local eye surgeon to operate on Williams’ cataracts.
“Dr. David Gross rose to the challenge, at no cost,” Lee said. “Interestingly, the doctor’s practice had a fund established for charity work that came from a memorial set up when a fellow doctor in his practice died very young.”
Gross told church leaders, “Thanks for giving me the opportunity to help out.”
Williams’ second cataract surgery took place July 11. I met with him the next day.
“I can see everything clearly,” he told me.
He pointed to a sign in the distance and proudly read it word for word.
“I give all glory to God for giving me my vision back,” he said.
He knows how many other Liberians with cataract problems will likely go blind without such medical intervention. Divine intervention, he believes.
He returns to Liberia later this month but he’s already anxious to return home to serve his people, once again in the name of God.
“I have more work to do,” he said emphatically. “More work with my new eyes.”