Jesus said to her, “Daughter, you took a risk of faith, and now you’re healed and whole. Live well, live blessed! Be healed by your plague”. (Mark 5: 34)
Daniel and his sister have been blind since birth, the consequence of a genetic disease. They were born in a rural area of Ghana, where resources are scarce and disease runs rampant. Before Daniel reached his teen years, his father died, and his mother struggled to keep herself and her four children alive. Finally out of desperation, she led her blind 11-year-old son and 10-year-old daughter to a small hut in a remote area and left them to die. After hours of anguished cries begging their mother not to leave them, the children got busy living. They foraged for food on their hands and knees and subsisted mainly on roots for three months until they were rescued by a local orphanage.
They were immediately given food, shelter, medical treatment, and counselling. The children couldn’t bring themselves to talk much about their mother, but they did talk about their faith, which they said saved them.
Doctors felt that Daniel would benefit from a corneal transplant. So through the help of several charities, he was flown to the United States for his surgery. In the end his eyes, like his sister’s, proved to be beyond repair. Daniel cried a little and admitted he felt embarrassed to be going home without his sight. But amazingly he never expressed any ager for his heartrending fate.
His faith continues to save him.