The nurses brought cake. I went home at peace.

But the next morning, I awoke in confusion. What had I just done? I had been a part of family medicine for 45 years. I loved my patients. Hundreds knew me as Dr. Sherry. With one signature, I had lost my identity, my profession, and the patients that I loved. Was there life after medicine? I really wasn’t sure.

Fortunately, the year before, a friend had invited me to a seminar by Joy Kauffman, founder and director of FARM STEW International. FARM STEW is an acronym for Farming, Attitude, Rest, Meals, Sanitation, Temperance, Enterprise, and Water. The aim was to help subsistence farmers help themselves feed their children, practice better sanitation, and live the abundant life that they could, by following Biblical principles for health, rest, work, and farming. I liked the fact that the program used local trainers and did not give “handouts,” but taught people how to improve their own lives.

In the program, Joy mentioned needing someone to help write grant applications. I told her, “I don’t know anything about grants, but I can write.” As I wrote and worked with FARM STEW, I wondered if the story I was telling was true. After all, I had never been anywhere that FARM STEW was working. Finally, I told Joy, “I have to see the program in action for myself.” She responded with an invitation to visit Uganda and South Sudan with her.

I soon found myself deep in African communities. We looked at the new vegetable gardens program participants had started. We admired Tippy Taps, a low-cost hand-free washing device for clean water, and I found myself deeply interested in the intricacies of building a proper latrine. We drove over roads with ruts so deep that the car practically disappeared as it traversed the rut. We taste-tested what our participants had been learning to cook. There were rainbow salads (more colors equal more nutritious varieties of food), soy milk, and mandazi (soybean curd). I loved it all, and it made no difference that I went home with three kinds of E. coli!

The best part was inaugurating a new well. The women sang and danced and yodeled in a way only they knew how to do. Amidst the celebration, I caught myself looking deeply into a woman’s eyes. She and I couldn’t talk to each other due to language differences, but I knew what she was feeling. She was no different than me. She wanted the same things as I wanted—healthy children, food for our families, and to earn money for our children’s educational and medical needs. I was hooked! I had found a new way to serve. I could no longer work 24/7 in the “mission field,” but I could help this woman change her life.

I volunteer for FARM STEW by being on the board, writing as needed, and running booths at camp meetings and ASI meetings. I know that every time I talk to someone about FARM STEW, I have given someone else the opportunity to make a difference in a life in need.

Life after medicine for me is service that will change someone’s life for the better. God can lead us to find our niche after medicine just as much as He guided our minds and hands while we practiced medicine.