Challenged by doing...

I think what I am enjoying most about being here is how it is challenging me. The need is so great, just like anywhere in the world frankly, the need is there... but in America it is easier to ignore. Here, it isn't so easy. You're the only white people around and it doesn't take much to realize how much more we have. Therefore, often the need comes straight to us. It's humbling, and encouraging and challenging. I really love it. Wednesday night I was telling The Lord how I felt like I wasn't "doing" enough... going back to my old awful habit of trying to complete everything with works... and then Thursday came. 

Last Thursday I was able to go to Maaru, one of the local village churches that Kenneth helped to start with a man named Wari. Wari is our translator and if Kenneth was Paul, Wari would be Timothy. He is an amazing servant who's hunger for The Lord and thirst for the Word is evident in just a short conversation. The three of us traveled out to the church. There was only one man sitting under the tree waiting for us. He had asked us if we could go and look at the church garden, where precious seeds had been donated and sowed for the following harvest season so that the widows and orphans of the church would be taken care of. Now I am no farmer, and I'll be the first to tell you my agricultural knowledge despite being raised in Eastern Oregon is pretty limited...however I could have informed you that those crops, those fields are not in good shape. At all. We had church service and I just sat and held a sweet little babe that came up and greeted me and then proceeded to plop down into my lap. After the service the church took their offering, and one by one I saw children and parents come forward and pour the first fruits of their harvest. Cup after cup of sorghum. One man even put in money - which is unheard of. 

Now all this long intro to tell you that after the service the church sat and had a meeting and had to decide that they were going to begin to store the tithe and offerings to prepare for the dry season. When their harvest ran out, and there was nothing to feed their families, they would use this stored amount to feed the needy families. Essentially they were preparing to help ease the struggle when food is little to none. And then, choosing among them who out of the widows and orphans would be fed. 

Humbling. 

 After we were asked to go and pray for a new mother and her baby. The mom had delivered the child and was unable to deliver the placenta, she then went in for surgery to have the rest removed, and now she was suffereing from complications. It is hard saying whether she was having complication from an infection from the surgery, or if it was from the delivery. Either way, she wasn't doing well. I layed my hands on her and we prayed, and the poor gal was all bones, she had ben unable to keep anything down, especially harsher foods like posho and sorghum. Next week we're going to take her some rice, and we'll continue to pray for her healing. Just that mornign The Lord took me to Luke 13 and the story of the woman who had been crippled for 18 years - and although The Lord healed her, what stuck out to me above all else was that He saw her. I was blessed to be able to tell that sweet new mom that the God of the universe sees her. 

Later that afternoon as soon as we got back I went out again with Wari and Camille to do Jesus Club. We walked to another neighbroing village and  shared the gospel with the children. Camille and I did wound care, and one by one, just like always they came to get their wounds here. There is a type of malnutruition here that causes the skin to grow thinner and thinner until the areas that are close to the bone break open. So the wounds generally look the same - big gouches on their shins and feet. One little girl came up and hers was so deep, I think it had to have been nearly to the bone. 

The need here is great. But my God is greater. I am thankful to be able to be here and serve, thankful that I can be just one little part in this big redemption story. And thankful that this life isn't what we were ever meant for. 

By Thursday night I wasn't asking The Lord what I was doing anymore... He just showed me how He is graciously allowing me to be apart of what He has been doing.