Dear friends,
“His name is Graveyard,” said the young woman in Mozambique, indicating a school age boy. “That’s an unusual name! Is it a family name?” was the best attempt at not saying something even more awkward. “No. My first five children all died before they reached their third birthday. When he was born, I figured he was just headed for the graveyard, too. So that’s what I named him.”
Malnutrition, AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis and “normal” childhood diseases still wreak havoc in the lives of so many people. I was recently in Mozambique. Measles broke out among village children not long ago, and many died of measles.
“Remember the guy down by the river that several years ago prayed for the first time in his own language? How is he doing?” “Dead,” replied my colleague. “How about the chief that was so interested to know more about Jesus that we visited that afternoon?” “Dead,” came the reply. “How about the guy that went with us, that was so excited to be able to tell others about Jesus?” “Dead, too,” was the heavy hearted reply.
It is extremely difficult to develop a long-term plan for training and leadership development in such extreme conditions. These are some of the issues that I talk with people about as I visit, in this case in southern Africa. These are also examples of why the Good News that we bring must impact all aspects of a person’s life. This we call holistic ministry, because we believe that God is concerned with the whole person, their whole life, and that the whole world is God’s.
One development worker recently asked someone on their team what someone coming from the riches of the West really had to say to someone struggling with such poverty. Their local colleague thought quietly for some time, and then said, “When someone like you that has everything still needs God, that shakes us up. That really means something.”
I suppose we all have our dreams about what heaven will be like, as we try to imagine the unimaginable. Another colleague asked a local friend of his, “What do you think heaven will be like?” Contemplating the thought of heaven awhile, he finally answered, “Heaven? I’ll be able to eat an egg every day.”
When we pray, “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” we are committing ourselves to bring as much of heaven to earth as possible. Or, to say it another way, we are committing ourselves to transform the world into what God intended it to be before sin messed it up.
Thank you for your partnership in this wonderful task.
Blessings, Walt White
“His name is Graveyard,” said the young woman in Mozambique, indicating a school age boy. “That’s an unusual name! Is it a family name?” was the best attempt at not saying something even more awkward. “No. My first five children all died before they reached their third birthday. When he was born, I figured he was just headed for the graveyard, too. So that’s what I named him.”
Malnutrition, AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis and “normal” childhood diseases still wreak havoc in the lives of so many people. I was recently in Mozambique. Measles broke out among village children not long ago, and many died of measles.
“Remember the guy down by the river that several years ago prayed for the first time in his own language? How is he doing?” “Dead,” replied my colleague. “How about the chief that was so interested to know more about Jesus that we visited that afternoon?” “Dead,” came the reply. “How about the guy that went with us, that was so excited to be able to tell others about Jesus?” “Dead, too,” was the heavy hearted reply.
It is extremely difficult to develop a long-term plan for training and leadership development in such extreme conditions. These are some of the issues that I talk with people about as I visit, in this case in southern Africa. These are also examples of why the Good News that we bring must impact all aspects of a person’s life. This we call holistic ministry, because we believe that God is concerned with the whole person, their whole life, and that the whole world is God’s.
One development worker recently asked someone on their team what someone coming from the riches of the West really had to say to someone struggling with such poverty. Their local colleague thought quietly for some time, and then said, “When someone like you that has everything still needs God, that shakes us up. That really means something.”
I suppose we all have our dreams about what heaven will be like, as we try to imagine the unimaginable. Another colleague asked a local friend of his, “What do you think heaven will be like?” Contemplating the thought of heaven awhile, he finally answered, “Heaven? I’ll be able to eat an egg every day.”
When we pray, “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” we are committing ourselves to bring as much of heaven to earth as possible. Or, to say it another way, we are committing ourselves to transform the world into what God intended it to be before sin messed it up.
Thank you for your partnership in this wonderful task.
Blessings, Walt White