Bintu, aged just 12 years old, had been rendered incontinent by rebels in Sierra Leone after enduring 12 months of rape and torture. Then she found a Mercy Ship.
"When she came onboard for specialist surgery to repair the damage, she was very disturbed, very aggressive, very angry," Lord Ian McColl told a dinner at St Clements, Mosman on the weekend.
"Yet Bintu left as a beaming follower of Jesus, transformed by the Christian love and compassion of the nurses who attended her."
A Member of the British House of Lords, Lord Ian McColl is in Sydney to speak on behalf of the work of the global charity Mercy Ships.
The visit coincides with his involvement in a Commonwealth Parliamentary delegation to Fiji and Papua New Guinea.
While in Australia he will also speak at Newcastle, Brisbane and on the Queensland Sunshine and Gold Coasts.
Lord McColl, who at age 72, continues to spend time on the hospital ship Anastasis performing surgery, says countless numbers of lives in Africa were being changed physically, mentally and spiritually as volunteers simply demonstrated God's love.
"If you operate on somebody, save their life or transform it, you have that person at a disadvantage and can easily force your own ideas on them " be those views religious, political or whatever," he says.
"But it doesn't work to present the Christian message that way. What does work is showing God's love and compassion to such people."
Retired Professor of Surgery at Guy's Hospital in London, Lord McColl currently serves as Vice Chairman of the Executive Committee of the International Board of Mercy Ships International.
He is also Chairman of the UK Board of Trustees for Mercy Ships United Kingdom.
Since 1991 he and Lady McColl, also a doctor, have regularly volunteered their surgical expertise serving with Mercy Ships while working among the extreme poor in West Africa.
Most recently the McColl's partnership with Mercy Ships took them to post-war Liberia where they were involved with assisting women rendered incontinent by obstructed childbirth " a condition that has been eradicated in the Western world due to basic obstetric care.
"Some figures suggest that 50,000 to 100,000 African women develop fistulas each year," says Lord McColl.
"As we train more local doctors and work with hospitals and officials to raise basic levels of health care, increasing numbers of women will have some kind of hope, where previously they had none."
This year alone, more than 1500 West African patients will receive a free specialized surgery and more than 7000 dental patients will receive health care onboard a Mercy Ship.
Medical professionals from all over the globe donate their time to perform life-transforming operations from removing tumours to repairing cleft lip and palates, Vesico-vaginal fistulas, cataracts and severe burns.
In West African villages, health care education is offered with skills training and community development projects.
Volunteer cooks, mariners, IT specialists, medical staff and other volunteers pay crew fees to serve the poor.
Founded in 1978 by Don and Deyon Stephens, Mercy Ships is the leader in using hospital ships to deliver free world-class health care services to the poor.
