I was working for a summer camp as a Water Safety Instructor (WSI) pool lifeguard one summer when I was given Broken Bear. I do not know his real name and only know very little about him so I have given him the name Broken Bear.
Broken Bear was a Native American about eight years old when I met him. He had Cerebral Palsy, and his parents took him to the hospital and left him there when he was an infant. They never came to visit him, so he became a ward of the state.
He was in a wheelchair and had never walked. His hands, fingers, arms, legs, and feet were shriveled up; his hands held in a tight fist. We had never seen his fingernails. His legs were drawn up so that he sat in a fetal position in his wheelchair. His mouth and lower face were a mess. He drooled because of some soft palate problem. His mouth was deformed and teeth were growing out of the side of his gums. He could not do anything for himself so feeding and dressing him was our job. I began to pray for Broken Bear.
When he came to the pool I put a lifejacket on him and got him in the water. He was so emaciated that he was not heavy for me.
I worked with an occupational and physical therapist in the pool. First, we worked on his wrist, hands and fingers, trying to relax them in the soothing water. This worked so we would move on to arms and legs and feet. My prayer time increased for him since I would pray for him as I worked with him each day.
As the summer moved on Broken Bear was able to be in a standing position in the pool. Then the OT told me to hold him up with his back to me and to kick his feet in the water to simulate walking. In the water his body weight was very low due to the buoyancy of the water. I was building walking brain pathways as he simulated walking. I realized even though his body didn't work, his mind did. He could understand a lot of things so I talked to him about Jesus every day.
As more of the summer wore on he walked holding on to the side of the pool under his own power. Then the OT gave him a walker so he could walk where he wanted in the lower side of the pool. He walked across the pool and all around his area.
He wanted to play ball with the other boys. The OT asked us to have him use the walker on land especially when we had to take him to the bathroom and change him. He was not toilet-trained but became so that summer.
He learned to walk on the land with his walker. He now prayed with me each pool visit. He was growing in understanding of God. He asked me how to know Jesus. He did pray to become a follower of Jesus.
Broken Bear began to walk all over the camp on his own with the walker. Finally he began to run with the walker. He got so fast the OT said to take the walker away. Then he walked and ran on his own power.
Broken Bear could walk!
Creator God is so good! Broken Bear wanted to be accepted by the other boys, but his mouth and lower face was such a mess that it made him look ugly. We prayed about his need for friends.
We teachers felt he needed surgery on his mouth, gums and palate so we petitioned the state for funds. Finally, after several attempts, the request went through, and he was scheduled for surgery for that fall.
Before the summer ended I decided he needed to be baptized. The problem was we had no way to do this since he was in a state hospital, and we didn't have the authority to take him out.
Finally, as camp was nearly over, I decided to go ahead and baptize him myself. I taught him about baptism and he agreed. Then in the pool on the next to last day when almost everyone had left the pool area it was just Broken Bear, me and God and I baptized him.
God cared so much that Broken Bear went that summer from a wheelchair to walking and in the fall from a messed up mouth to a working mouth. I knew he could learn so I prayed for him to get to school and be helped until he was on a normal level.
Thanks to God Broken Bear was no longer a broken boy but now had a hope and a future. He was healed. He was no longer Broken Bear but now Awesome Bear!
Ruth Kathleen Smith (Laughing Water) was born on the Onandaga reservation near Syracuse, New York. She came to Christ as an adult.
