Engage Magazine - Issue No. 96 from The Global Church of the Nazarene's Nazarene Mission International of Lenexa, Kansas, United States - www.engagemagazine.com for Wednesday, 27 May 2015
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Testimony of Lucie Nzayisenga By Lucie Nzayisenga
I was born in Rwanda from a churchgoers’ family, but both parents were in different denominations -- my father was in one denomination and my mother was in another. As children we were following our mother, but as we grew up we needed to choose ourselves where to belong. My three brothers decided to go with my father and my two sisters and I remained with my mother.
It was difficult to be together as a family and enjoy celebrations or agree together. The reason was firstly, my parents had different views about their religions; secondly, my father was polygamous, though later he came to divorce the first wife and got married to my mother legally.
The year 1994 was a wicked year for every Rwandese. There was a severe hatred among two ethnic groups in our country where many people lost their lives, including my two uncles and other relatives, within a short period of three months. However, though the war was so intense all over the country, my father did not want us to run away since he loved his cattle. One evening, a large group of people came and attacked our home carrying violent arms: machetes and (pangas) and other traditional arms. They wanted to take away our cattle (we had many cows and other animals). They terrified all of us and we locked ourselves quiet inside the house. They started immediately killing some cows and took away the rest. What surprised us -- especially my mom -- is that most of those people who attacked us were fellow members of my mother's church. And Mom recognized them. From that time, Mom stopped going to church until 1996 when she became a member of the Pentecostal Church.
In 1996, I was selected to go in a girls secondary school at Byimana (in South Province of Rwanda), where I became active in many activities and groups of my mother's former church until I finished my secondary school in 2003. After one year I got a job as secretary-accountant at Health Centre of Rushashi, where my mom comes from in another Province. One pastor from the Pentecostal Church named Nathan, and some of the members of the church, came to know about me. They started coming to visit me and shared with me the Word of God. Even though I was baptized in another church, I was not deeply rooted in the study of the Word.
It was in June 2004 when Pastor Nathan came to my house and shared about personal relationship with Jesus. He asked if I have this relationship with Christ. I said, "Yes, I go to church every Sunday, I love people and help them, I have been Region Mary group leader, I give tithe, etc." Then he said, "Well, but being in Christ is not about what you do. It is only about giving your whole life to Jesus, who is your personal Lord and Savior." After this I was totally confused. I started thinking about the past, how many churchgoers were smokers, drunkards, polygamous and no one had corrected them. And quickly I remembered what happened in 1994, when the group of people who came to attack our home were church attenders but did not have Christ in their lives. From that time I realized that all the time I have believed that by doing good works one can be Christian, and really Christianity is not having collective but personal relationship with Jesus; I felt automatically the need of Jesus in my life. This day I accepted Jesus as my personal Lord and savior and surrendered my whole life to Him, and allowed Him to make me the kind of person He wants me to be. Hallelujah!
Soon after, I met Elysee Bayishime, whom I knew since 2001 and whose kind of character helped me to grow spiritually. In May 2006 we became engaged for marriage, but this engagement caused him to flee from Rwanda to Malawi immediately because of other problems of insecurity which followed our engagement. So he left me only one month after our engagement. This time I could not understand what is happening around me; I could feel a sense of being lost and being in confusion, but it is from this time I started deepening into prayerful life and fasting. God had a purpose for both of us. In the same year 2006, I gave up my job and joined Elysee in Malawi after three months. God used a certain pastor (missionary) from Cameroun Matthew NG`O to support our wedding in December 2006.
It came to pass in 2008, being members of Ufulu Church of the Nazarene, my husband told me how God is calling him to be a pastor. We prayed for it and in 2009 we came to Nazarene Theological College of Central Africa. Our fear was how to learn with our poor English, since we have French education background. However, God is wonderful; we trusted Him and I have come to experience this verse, “I can do everything through Him (Christ) who gives me strength,” Phil. 4:13. We did well at school and became involved in the successful ministry as the Holy Spirit empowers us. I enjoy singing and leading the worship services and mostly spending time with children teaching them and interacting with them. I love sharing the Gospel to the lost women where their homes are broken due to the lack of Christ in their homes. My call is to teach and preach in both French- and English-speaking countries where lost souls can celebrate life again in Christ Jesus. I want to encourage women to live a holy life in order to build homes which will last for their whole life commitment based on a strong foundation our Lord Jesus.
I praise God for the call He has laid on my heart. My husband and I are ministering to Nathenje Zone which has two churches (Nathenje and Chimwenje churches of the Nazarene). God is helping us to bring spiritual revival in the lives of many people who had abandoned faith, preaching the Gospel in mostly broken marriages, especially to my fellow women, and teaching children to grow in God`s way through an established nursery school and child development centre. We seek to strengthen these programmes at Nathenje church. We praise God for all He has done for us and what He is about to do, thankful to God for the Church of the Nazarene where we have been ordained as elders in Lilongwe on March 9, 2014.
Friends, fellow women leaders, continue to pray for us as we keep on fulfilling God`s will. Pray for our studies at Africa Nazarene University, and pray for God`s provisional care for us.[Rev Lucie Nzayisenga is a Nazarene pastor in Malawi.]
Talk about it:
- Lucie Nzayisenga believed that simply fulfilling a list of good works, such as going to church, made her a Christian. Why was she wrong?
- Explain why Lucie Nzayisenga's testimony points to the need for strong discipleship and Bible teaching for believers?
- What can you conclude from the fact that members of Lucie's mother's church were among those who attacked their home in Rwanda?
- What do you think it means that Lucie's involvement in ministering to others only followed her personal conversion as a follower of Jesus Christ?
- What does this story say to you about the role of education and discipleship of both pastors and lay people in the church?
"The voice of my father" by Gina Grate Pottenger
Thirteen-year-old Elysee Bayishime decided to disappear for a little while, since he didn’t want to do the chores his father had asked him to do. In 1994 in Rwanda, perhaps that wasn’t the wisest way to rebel. People had been vanishing without a trace for some time.
Having wandered outside his family’s safe compound without telling anyone where he was going, the boy suddenly found himself gripped by a soldier.
The soldier jerked him along for 10 minutes without saying anything. Frightened, Elysee could not pull away.
They arrived at the Kaburi Majengo at Gisenyi graveyard. In the darkness, which obscured his face, the man put a knife to Elysee’s face and began to question him.
After a few minutes, the soldier said that he was going to kill the boy.
“I started praying within my heart, asking God for help. When he raised up his hand, I told him, ‘Wait a minute, can’t you listen to the voice of my father calling me by name?’ I said it repeatedly.”
Distracted and uncertain, the soldier loosened his grip on Elysee. He twisted free and ran for his life back home.
From the time he was a small boy, people in the church where his parents were full-time ministers used to call Elysee the “little pastor.” He couldn’t understand it, since although he was well-behaved at church, back home he was disobedient and argumentative.
From 1994 to 1996, his family became refugees in the Democratic Republic of Congo, driven out of Rwanda by the genocide. War and disease was claiming millions of people’s lives all around them, including Elysee’s youngest sister Cecile, who was struck down by pneumonia and cholera.
In 1996, they returned home to Rwanda, but life did not resume normality.
“Life was so difficult in our family, in terms of starting a new life without shelter,” he recalls. “My father could only manage to provide food for us one meal a day, and we were being chased from school now and then due to lack of fees.”
For five years, teachers, headmasters and fellow students tutored him after class to explain what had been taught during class.
In 2001, just as he was about to complete secondary school, a spiritual revival was organized at the school. The timing was from God.
“I was feeling tired of everything, even of myself. I was thinking how I have been a burden to many people for so long. I was remembering the kind of life our family was living. I deeply thought of myself and my life and I felt empty; this emptiness had troubled me for so long.”
The first speaker preached from Matthew 11:28-29: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.”
Elysee claimed that promise for his own: He knelt at the altar and received Jesus Christ as savior for the first time. That peace he found in knowing Jesus sustained him during the next six years when he struggled with unemployment and had no money to continue to university. He looked to God to provide, and waited on Him. Also, his friends in the Church of the Nazarene at Gisenyi prayed for and encouraged him.
In 2006, he became engaged to Lucie, a longtime friend who attended the Church of the Nazarene in Rwanda. The two relocated to Malawi where they had the wedding ceremony, established a new life and began attending the Ufulu Church of the Nazarene.
After all these years, the “little pastor” finally recognized that God was truly calling him to full-time ministry. Both Elysee and Lucie followed God’s leading in 2008 to enroll in the Nazarene Theological College of Central Africa (NTCCA) in Lilongwe, to train and prepare themselves for making Christ-like disciples.
They graduated in 2011, then continued their studies with Africa Nazarene University, through its satellite campus in Malawi.
While they are finishing their education, Elysee and Lucie took on the challenge to relaunch Nathenje Church of the Nazarene, which had started in 1983 but closed its doors some years later. The group of 19 adults and 25 children are now worshipping regularly together, and have added a nursery school that has enrolled 22 children; and they have a Nazarene Compassionate Ministries child development center that has registered 30 children. These children receive supplemental education, play activities, and memorize Bible verses.
Last year, Elysee and Lucie were ordained as elders.
“We are so proud to serve God and his people at Nathenje and as ambassadors of the gospel wherever God sends us,” he said.
'No puedo dejar de ir allí' by Gina Grate Pottenger
Entre los 83 mil refugiados de la guerra de Siria que han estado viviendo en un campamento temporal para refugiados, uno de ellos es una viuda anciana. Ella huyó cruzando la frontera junto con sus dos nietos, dejando atrás a su hijo. Recientemente, un pastor nazareno y varios de los miembros de su iglesia la visitaron en su carpa para sentarse junto a ella y escuchar su historia.
“Cuando entramos a su casa, ella comenzó a llorar. Cuando le pregunté por qué, ella me respondió en una manera que jamás podré olvidar”, dijo el pastor Fadi (éste no es su nombre real). “Ella dijo, ‘He estado aquí por 6 o 7 meses. Nadie me ha visitado. Yo solía salir a pedir ayuda y ustedes son las primeras personas que entran a mi casa’ y literalmente se puso a llorar”.
En 2012, Fadi y voluntarios de su iglesia comenzaron a visitar a refugiados; en 2013 la iglesia registró unas 300 familias, y cada semana les llevaron paquetes con alimentos, vestimenta, y otros artículos para el hogar. Este año ellos tienen un total de 600 familias registradas a quienes están ayudando. Ellos visitan el campamento de refugiados dos veces por semana, y se detienen para escuchar acerca de las dificultades de cada uno de ellos.
La vida y las condiciones en el campamento están empeorando en gran manera. En el invierno, las carpas son muy frías, y en el verano son calientes. El crimen se encuentra en alza y los asaltos a mujeres y niños ocurren en forma regular. Los niños no pueden ir a la escuela y se pasan el día merodeando sin propósito. La gente está perdiendo la esperanza. Lo que una vez pensaron que sería una situación temporal, creyendo que la guerra llegaría a su fin, se está convirtiendo en una realidad permanente.
Aunque puede ser un ambiente peligroso para visitantes, el pastor y su congregación se niegan a permanecer fuera.
“No puedo dejar de ir allí”, dijo Fadi. “Incluso si es peligroso, allí hay personas que nos esperan y que realmente quieren escuchar las buenas noticias, así que no puedo quedarme tranquilo en casa sin hacer nada. No me satisfago sólo con predicar los domingos y con tener a mis miembros y mi iglesia local. Existen personas allí afuera que verdaderamente necesitan saber acerca de Jesucristo. Así que continuamos yendo allí”.
Otra pequeña iglesia nazarena a unos pocos kiómetros del campamento continúa llevando a cabo actividades regulares para los niños refugiados, incluyendo una clase de escuela dominical. Ellos reúnen unos 100 niños con quienes comparten historias acerca de Jesús, les enseñan canciones de adoración, juegan juntos y hacen manualidades. Las familias han aprendido a confiar en los miembros de la iglesia y están felices de enviar a sus niños, incluso sin ser cristianos.
Durante la semana, Fadi y el grupo de la iglesia visitan a las familias de los niños con quienes se reúnen para la escuela dominical. El pastor recuerda una ocasión en que visitaron a una familia que había enviado a sus niños a la iglesia. Cuando llegaron, se encontraron con unas 10 o 15 personas reunidas y lamentándose. Las mujeres estaban llorando porque uno de los hijos de la familia, de 30 años, había sido asesinado el día anterior. El padre de familia estaba sentado en silencio y su rostro se veía rígido.
“Nos sentamos junto a ellos, oramos con ellos en el nombre de Jesús. Durante mi oración abrí mis ojos y miré al hombre mayor, y él comenzó a llorar. Él estaba sollozando. Yo lo abracé y le dije, ‘Confíe en el Señor’. A veces no podemos decir nada, simplemente oramos por ellos y nos sentamos junto a ellos”.
Un niño de 6 años de edad tenía problemas médicos tanto del corazón como de uno de sus ojos. Luego de pedir permiso, el pastor Fadi puso sus manos sobre el niño y oró por él en el nombre de Jesús. Tres días después su madre llamó para avisar que cuando fueron al doctor para una revisión, el doctor se sorprendió al encontrar que el corazón del niño latía perfectamente; él lo declaró como sano.
“¿Qué tipo de oración hizo usted?” preguntó la mujer. Luego de ser invitado por ella, el pastor regresó para explicarle acerca de quién es Jesús, y como resultado ella lo aceptó como su Señor.
El pastor Fadi dijo que varios de los refugiados están comenzando a cuestionar su sistema de fe, ya que hoy en día lo relacionan con la violencia, la guerra, y el odio.
“Cuando ellos ven que los cristianos les demuestran amor y cuidado, algunos comienzan a hacer preguntas y empiezan a pensar acerca de esto”.
El año pasado la iglesia bautizó a 14 de los refugiados como nuevos creyentes en Cristo. Uno de ellos solía ser miembro de una milicia.
“Él dijo, ‘Ahora sé la verdad, ahora sé porqué Dios nos trajo aquí’”.
Este antiguo miembro de milicia se ha convertido en un firme creyente en Jesús, y anima abiertamente a muchas otras personas a que sigan a Jesús. Él ha traído a 40 personas a Cristo, incluyendo a su familia entera.
Otras iglesias y organizaciones de ayuda se encuentran trabajando con los refugiados, pero la mayoría de ellos no visitan a las personas en manera directa dentro del campamento; por el contrario, realizan eventos fuera del campamento y los invitan a concurrir. El pastor Fadi cree que los nazarenos son los únicos que se encuentran ingresando al campamento y pasando tiempo junto con las personas, quienes los aceptan abiertamente a pesar de que los nazarenos son directos en cuanto a su condición de cristianos.
La iglesia está sobrecargada con las necesidades de los refugiados en el campamento. Ellos están orando para que Dios provea los recursos para comprar un vehículo lo suficientemente grande para que puedan transportar un gran número de niños al club de niños de los días sábado; ellos también necesitan dinero para comprar pañales y leche para los bebés de los refugiados, medicina para los enfermos, y otros artículos necesarios para suplir las necesidades físicas.
El pastor también le pide a la iglesia global que oren por él y por su equipo mientras que visitan a los refugiados.
“Nos encontramos en la línea de frente. Oren por protección y dirección, por una nueva unción, y por el ánimo para seguir yendo allí. A veces sentimos la presión para que no vayamos”.[Traducido por Ed Brussa]
'I can't stop going there' by Gina Grate Pottenger
Among the 83,000 refugees from the Syrian war who have been living in one temporary refugee camp outside the country is one elderly widow. She fled across the border with her two grandchildren, leaving her son behind. Recently, a Nazarene pastor and several of his church members visited her tent to sit with her and listen to her story.
“When we entered her house, she started crying. When I asked her [why], I will never forget this woman,” Pastor Fadi (not his real name) recalled. “She said, ‘I’m staying here 6 or 7 months. No one visited me. I used to go around and ask for help and you are the first one to enter my house,’ and really she started crying.”
In 2012, Fadi and volunteers from his church began visiting refugees; in 2013 the church had registered 300 families and every week they brought them food packages, clothes and other needed household items. This year they have a total of 600 registered families whom they are helping. And they visit the refugee camp twice a week, listening to their heartache.
Life and conditions in the camp are getting much worse. In winter the tents are very cold and in summer they are very hot. Crime is growing and assaults on women and children occur regularly. The children cannot go to school and spend their days wandering without purpose. The people are losing hope. What they thought would be a temporary situation, thinking the war would end, is turning into a permanent one.
Although it can be dangerous for visitors from the outside, the pastor and his congregation refuse to stay away.
“I can’t stop going there,” Fadi said. “Even if it’s dangerous, there are people waiting for us and they really want to hear the good news, so I can’t be relaxing at home and doing nothing. [I’m not satisfied] to preach on Sunday and have my members and my local church. There are people outside, they really need to know about Jesus Christ. We continue going there.”
Another small Nazarene church a few kilometers from the camp is continuing to host regular activities for the refugee children, including Sunday School. They gather 100 kids and share with them stories of Jesus, teach them worship songs, play together and make crafts. The families have learned to trust the church people and are happy to send their children there, even though they are not Christians.
During the week, Fadi and the church team visits families of the children they meet at the Sunday school. The pastor recalls a time when he decided to visit a family who had sent their children to the church. When they arrived, they found 10 to 15 people gathered in mourning. The women were crying because a 30-year-old son of the family had just been murdered the day before. The father of the house sat in silence, his face set sternly.
“We sat with them, we prayed with them in Jesus’ name. During my prayer I opened my eyes and I looked at the old man and he started crying. He was sobbing. I hugged him, I said to him, ‘Trust the Lord.’ Sometimes we cannot say anything, we just pray for them and sit beside them.”
One 6-year-old boy had medical problems with both his heart and his eye. With permission, Pastor Fadi laid hands on the boy and prayed for him in Jesus’ name. Three days later his mother called to report that when they went to the doctor for a check up, the doctor was astonished to find the boy’s heart beating perfectly; he declared him to be healed.
“What kind of prayer did you pray?” the woman wanted to know. Upon her invitation the pastor returned to explain who Jesus is, and as a result she accepted Him as Lord.
Pastor Fadi said that many of the refugees are beginning to question their faith system because now they connect it to violence, war and hatred.
“When they see that as Christians we show them love and care, some of them start asking [questions] and they start thinking.”
Last year the church baptized 14 of the refugees as new believers. One was a former militia member.
“He said, ‘Now I know the truth, now I know why God [brought] us here.’”
This former militia member has become a strong believer in Jesus and openly encourages many other people to follow Jesus. He has brought 40 people to Christ, including his entire family.
Other churches and relief organizations are working with the refugees but most of them will not visit the people directly in the camp; instead they host events outside the camp and ask them to come. Pastor Fadi believes the Nazarenes are the only ones who are entering the camp and spending time with the people, who accept them readily even though the Nazarenes are upfront about being Christians.
The church is overwhelmed with the needs of the refugees in the camp. They are praying for God to provide the resources to purchase a large van that they can use to transport larger numbers of the children to the Saturday kids’ club; they also need money to buy diapers and milk for refugee babies, medicines for the sick, and other material items to meet physical needs.
The pastor also asks the global church prayer for him and his team as they visit the refugees.
“We are there on the front lines. Pray for protection and wisdom, a new anointing and a new encouragement to go there. Sometimes we feel some pressure not to go there.”
A family restored in Nepal by Gina Grate Pottenger
Sajita* and other members of her 12-person family had done everything they could think of to find help for her father and her younger brother, who was now 16 years old. The two were out of their minds with a kind of madness for years that had placed great tensions and burdens on the whole family.
Sajita (left) had sought out medical doctors as well as witch doctors for healing for their mental state, but no one knew what to do.
Her brother, Akash* now 18, remembers what it was like when he was sick for four years, since the age of 12. It was like he was unconscious, and words came out of his mouth but he didn’t know what they meant. For four years he was unable to continue going to school, and hadn’t learned how to read or write. He was also aggressive, sometimes attacking people. Their father was the same.
Then some Christians came to their area of Kathmandu, Nepal, to show a gospel drama. For Sajita, the gospel message presented a hope for her family that she had not found anywhere else. She believed in Jesus and began to follow Him.
She was the first Christian in her community, and the people didn’t accept her new faith. They mistreated and rejected her. But she held fast. Sajita began attending a Nazarene church that was about 15 minutes away by foot.
The pastors and leaders in the church embraced her and they began visiting her community to support her and reach out to others. They met with a cold reception, however.
Raju* a member of the church, said that for five or six years the ministry team visited Sajita to pray with and encourage her, and also tried visiting other homes in the neighborhood. Then they began bringing some of the neighborhood children to the church’s child development center, which offers supplemental education, warm meals and activities, singing and Bible stories. The teachers care for the children and their families.
Gradually, the community softened to the Christians in their midst. As Sajita persisted in visiting families and sharing Jesus with them, people recognized her authentic love for them. Now everyone in the community loves Sajita and the church members who visit them, Raju says.
As a result, there is a house fellowship of 20 new believers in the neighborhood that meets weekly for worship and discipleship. Sajita leads the group.
She became aware that God was calling her to full-time ministry, so several years ago she enrolled in South Asia Nazarene Bible College to complete the Church of the Nazarene denomination’s course of study, a three-year full-time program which leads to ordination as an elder in the church. Sajita completed the program and was ordained in 2014.
Today she is the assistant pastor of the church, and is responsible for the group of believers in her neighborhood.
Also, the church’s support led to the total healing of her father and brother.
Sajita and another relative who had found Christ took Akash to the church one day. His mental state was so clouded that he barely understood where he was or what was happening. But by the last song of the worship, he became aware that he was in a church. Repeatedly he was brought to the church and the people would pray over him.
Raju recalls that the church leaders were visiting Akash’s neighborhood one day when Akash, out of his mind, tried to attack them. Six of the team subdued him, held him to the ground and began praying fervently for God to release him from the mental illness that had held him in such bondage. The group prayed over Akash all night. By dawn, he was free and in his right mind.
“I felt a white, invisible thing was touching me. And they prayed for me and I feel very better. The illness is gone completely,” he says.
Now he sings in the choir and plays guitar for the church services.
“I want to do something for Christ, something for the church and I want to be a good Christian.”
Sajita and Akash (photo left) say that there is peace in their household. Their father, who is free from his mental illness, has not yet accepted Christ, but he gladly attends the church.
“I’m feeling very glad, my family also they’re glad and at that time I could not read and write, I could not go to school but nowadays I am studying very smoothly. And my family also, we are happy.”
Sajita has big dreams for her community.
“I’m praying for this area, I want to raise the gospel house to house in this area and I want to bring them to Christ,” she said.[* Names changed for protection and privacy.]
Under the Southern Cross by Dorli Gschwandtner
It's a perfect night for the dawn of new hope.
A calm and quiet evening in a remote location in Sri Lanka, far away from the cities' noise and light pollution. A tiny settlement, with a cleared space beside the huts and rugs spread out upon the tidily swept ground. An open fire crackling merrily off to one side, and beyond it: darkness. A white screen strung between two trees, and a couple dozen children and adults in colourful clothes, sitting on the rugs or on plastic chairs, attentively watching the story unfold on the screen.
Above us, a spectacular night sky is displaying a breathtaking pattern of a million stars. I pick out the Pleiades, Cassiopeia, Orion – strangely dislocated from his accustomed position in a European winter sky. In vain I try to discover the constellation I most desire to see: the Southern Cross, a reminder of college trips and visiting family and friends in the Southern hemisphere, a promise of new adventure. But it hides from my view.
It's a perfect night for the most perfect story ever told – the story of another cross. More people have joined the viewing by now. Silently they stare at the screen, mesmerized by the tale of this man who heals the blind, who calms the storm, who loves the poor, who shows compassion to sinners. From where I sit, the viewers are a mass of black silhouettes and in vain I try to discover two shapes amongst them – the two people I most desire to see. As I watch Jesus taking hold of a dead girl's hand and raising her to a new life, to new hope, my thoughts travel back to this afternoon.
We had come early to the area, travelled from the main highway along a dusty, bumpy path and parked our vehicle under a tree by the side of the road. Then we walked along a grassy trail, past a few small huts, each one shabbier than the one before. At the final one, an elderly-looking couple greeted us politely. Their youngest daughter, a twelve-year-old girl, tiny for her age and frail, came out of the hut with a shy, uncertain smile on her lips. We talked for a few minutes, and then the older daughter appeared as well, leading a toddler by the hand. The mother pointed at her grandson as he cowered against the wall of their humble abode. "No father," she said.
But we knew the story, and this is why we had come.
The boy had no father because his mother made a living by selling herself to men. We didn't know how long she had done this nor why she had begun. But we did know that a few weeks earlier, she had asked her little sister to accompany her to a friend. That "friend" turned out to be the school principal, and he had sexually abused the defenceless child.
This had happened not only once, but repeatedly. Finally, a neighbour had approached the local Nazarene worker, and he was in the process of determining a way to remove the child from this situation of risk.
This is why we knew the story, and this is why we had come: to simply spend time with this young girl, talk with her, laugh with her, play with her – give her two hours of innocent childhood. To let her know how precious she is.
Before we had come, I had felt indignant towards the parents, who were encouraging these acts, furious with the older girl, who had done this terrible thing to her little sister. But when we were there, I could not find it in me to condemn them.
The parents, tiny people themselves, stood in front of their broken home. The mother, aged before her time, looked as if the last time she'd had a reason to laugh was beyond memory. The father, bare-chested, showed us his scars: large discoloured blotches over his heart and on his back – shell wounds that had got infected, he explained to us. He had been injured when the refugee camp, to which his family had fled during the civil war, was attacked. Only a couple of years ago they had returned to their home, trying to rebuild their lives out of ruins, as so many thousands of others around them.
And the sister, the person whom I had expected to loathe. She appeared just as small and delicate as the little girl. She looked at me, smiling timidly, almost eagerly, as if she was hoping, longing to see someone smile at her in return. What sort of misery had induced her to enter this shameful profession? What dreams had she buried because there was nothing left to keep them alive? What pain had it caused her to conclude that life had nothing else to offer her sister, too?
I did not know, but I knew that I could not judge her. So I smiled at her in return and bent down to play with the little boy who was blissfully unaware of any barriers to the making of friends.
When it started getting dark, we invited the family to the JESUS Film showing that was taking place about a mile away. Then we took our leave.
As my thoughts dwell on the events of the afternoon, the story continues on the screen. I watch as Jesus gazes with kindness and mercy upon the woman brought before him, caught in the act of adultery. He does not condemn her, does not throw a stone as the law requires. Silently, he bends down and starts writing in the sand. Let the person among you who is without sin be the first to cast a stone.
The tale carries on, and I watch, praying that among the viewers there are two young girls who need to hear about compassion, about mercy and forgiveness. And the people watch, while the fire keeps dancing off to one side, young children stir restlessly, dogs slink among the huts and the jungle whispers beyond the rim of light.
The Triumphant Entry. The Last Supper. Judas leaves, with bitterness in his heart. Jesus raises the cup. They leave the Upper Room. Gethsemane. Jesus prays. The hour has come. Judas betrays his master with a kiss. The trial. The way to the cross. And Jesus dies.
The people watch, spell-bound. It has become quiet in the little village; nobody is stirring; a reverential hush has settled on the crowd. The night is darker than before. Even the stars seem to hold their breath.
But we know the story.
The third day dawns. The grave is empty. Jesus is alive!
How many times have I seen the film, read the chapters in the gospels? The message never fails to hit home.
A few more minutes after the resurrection, and then the film ends. As the music continues playing, the JESUS Film team members walk to the front, speak a few words, invite the people to come forward and accept Christ's gift of life. While we silently pray, about half the people sitting on the rugs get to their feet and join the pastors in the front. In the light that is falling off the screen, I recognize the older sister from this afternoon. Warm gratitude floods my heart as I watch her speak to the pastor, as I witness her receiving new life, new hope in Christ.
The JESUS Film showing is over. The rest of the people are getting up, starting to walk home through the night. As the girl walks past me, holding her son in her arms and leading her younger sister firmly, gently, I step forward and press my flashlight into her hand, hoping it will guide her safely home, hoping it will remind her of the light of life which she has seen tonight.
A few minutes later we, too, are on our way home, bumping along in our vehicle over the rough track that will lead us back to the highway. I turn to gaze up at the night sky, wanting to catch a last glimpse of the marvellous splendour above. And there, hanging proudly and majestically well above the horizon, I see it: the Southern Cross, a reminder of the best gift ever given, a promise of new life, new hope. A promise fulfilled.
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