“Pr@ise the L0rd! I will thank the L0rd with all my heart as I meet with His g0dly people. How amazing are the deeds of the L0rd! All who delight in him should ponder them. Everything He does reveals His gl0ry and majesty. His r!ghteousness never fails. He causes us to remember His wonderful works. How gr@cious and merciful is our L0rd!”
Psalm 111: 1-4
Greetings everyone!!
I come to you with a heart full of pr@ise and thankfulness!! I can only declare that our G0d is amazing–full of gl0ry and majesty, grace and mercy! His r!ghteousness never fails!!
I sat with D@n this week to listen to the wonderful works of our G0d in JuduTou! It is always exciting to go into an area where the name of Jss has never been spoken or rarely heard, where the love of G0d and His r!ghteousness has never before been experienced!! This is the case of JuduTou!
Most of us live with some tiny understanding of right and wrong…in a culture where guilt and innocence is a ruling force. Here in this land…right and wrong look very different…if you can even see them at all. The ruling force here is fear and power. Those with power rule over those without it, and those without power fear those who have it. Everyone is looking for power over the fears that they live with daily.
Because of the lack of food in this area, many non-government and government organizations have been distributing grain throughout the year. While the people have been receiving help, the words NEVER BEFORE became a theme in all that D@n shared with me. As he recounted the words and experience our our food distribution among the people of JuduTou, I was struck by those 2 words…”NEVER BEFORE”.
The people said,
“Never before has anyone come to distribute food to our village AND given us the Words of G0d with the food.”
“Never before has anyone come to distribute food to our village AND EVERYONE in the village received food.”
“Never before–since the creation of our village–has anyone come to distribute food to us AND made everyone in the village EQUAL.”
You see, those distributing grain entrust it to those with power in the village. Then those with power give small amounts of grain to those with whom they have good relationships and leaving out those with whom they are at odds. The majority of the grain is then given to the people of power and authority in the village. While to us this seems unfair and wrong, it is the way the world of fear and power works.
For me, I give pr@ise to our ALL POWERFUL G0D, for His unfailing love for EACH ONE of us, for His demonstration of r!ghteousness toward EACH ONE of us, and for His open arms of acceptance for EACH ONE of us when we surrender ourselves to Him. You see for the first time the people of JuduTou not only heard the Words of love and r!ghteousness, but they experienced the reality of them. They EACH received the gift of grain G0d had provided for them as well as experienced what it meant to be EQUAL before G0d.
After sharing with the people a little about Jss– how He came to be among us and traveled from village to village telling people about the Kingdom of G0d–D@n shared with them how G0d loved the world so much that He gave His Son so that whoever believes in His Son would not die but have life forever. He also shared with them how Jss said, “Love one another.”
The food they were receiving that day came from f0ll0wers of Jss who heard about JuduTou and the compassion of Jss moved them to come together to help. D@n told the story of Rachel, a 10 year old, who had a yard sale and raised enough money to buy 38 bags of grain. Then he said the most important thing, “I, D@n, did not give you this food. The people who gave money did not give you this food, but G0d Himself passed through them to give you this food! G0d Himself saw you–the people of JuduTou–and He came to you so that you could see His love for you. There are many villages around you, yet G0d chose you–JuduTou– to come and visit today.” D@n also shared the story of Jss feeding the 5000 with them.
As I listened to his next words, I am still unsure of how this happened. We had prayed for enough funds to provide one bag of grain for each family on the list given to us by the chief. G0d provided that and extra so that we could give extra to the widows and those with special needs. D@n told me that they gave out a bag of grain to each family on the list and the others as we had planned. When that was all completed, there were 38 bags of grain left. NOW, that is a lot of grain and I can tell you I have no idea where it came from. There were people standing around who had not received grain–again people the chief did not put on the list because he was at odds with them. Some were angry so D@n asked to meet with the chief and his council. He was able to say to the chief, “We only came to bring peace to your village.” So they worked together to get EVERY family name in the village. There were 33 families not on the list. D@n went back to the storage and distributed a bag of grain to each of the 33 families. Still we had 5 bags of grain left. We gave a bag of grain to each of the men who helped D@n distribute the grain, a bag to the family of AB@–the man we work with here in the capital, and 2 bags to the chief to use to help those who come to him later in need. Again, I say to you I do not know how we had those 38 bags left over. We bought 268 bags of grain, and there were 290 names on the new list. This one thing I know…our G0d knew what we needed so that EVERYONE in the village would receive His Gift of Grain and HE PROVIDED IT!! He demonstrated His r!ghteousness, His gl0ry, His majesty!! Oh the wonder of His GREAT work!!
still pondering the amazing deeds of our G0d….