"If I return home, where will all these orphans go?" That was the dilemma faced by Christopher Biak Lang, missionary from India and director of Love Children's Home in Myanmar. The church that sent Christopher and his family to Myanmar had just informed him that the church mission fund had dried up; thus he, his wife and their four children should return to India. Christopher, however, had 18 local orphans who were living with him.
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It was early Sunday morning, the day after Christmas. Rasool and Maryam Abdolahi and their two children were sleeping peacefully. That all changed, however, in an instant. Without warning, plainclothes policemen broke through the front door of their Tehran apartment and stormed inside. As some of the police rummaged through their personal belongings searching for evidence of their faith, Rasool and Maryam were handcuffed and taken away—as their two children watched in horror.
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She was just 17 years old, and with each passing day her fears increased. I'll be suspended from school if they find out, she worried to herself. An education was a precious opportunity for someone like her, and she would do anything to keep from losing it. So she did all she could to keep her shameful secret hidden.
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Wearing a simple dress and an innocent smile, twelve-year-old Saraswati Etlapuram seems like any other carefree little girl who lives in Hyderabad, India. Below the surface, however, she ponders questions about injustices that she doesn't understand: "Why do people shun me? Why am I not permitted to attend school like other children? Is it true that I will never be married?" Although she is perfectly healthy, Saraswati is treated like a leper—because her parents have leprosy.
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Today our team drove into the mountains of Burundi to visit some Heaven's Family-sponsored national missionaries, distribute food to some very poor believers, place a chlorine-generating water purifier in a village where the water is making almost everyone sick, meet some micro-loan beneficiaries, and interview church planters who need bicycles to take the gospel further. We also met a pastor whom I inadvertently caused to lose his job. His name is Gregoire Bizimana. Let me tell you the story.
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Many Westerners know something about the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, when 800,000 people were slaughtered during three months of ethnic cleansing. Very few, however, know that the Rwandan genocide fueled two major wars in the neighboring nation of the Democratic Republic of Congo. The second war, which began in 1998, involved seven foreign armies, and it directly and indirectly resulted in the deaths of 5.5 million people. That made it the world’s deadliest conflict since World War II, yet it has been largely ignored by the rest of the world, a hidden holocaust that is not over yet.
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Today was a long one, as we worked to make the most of our only full day in Kigali, Rwanda's capital. In the morning, Chuck, Teryl and I ministered at a conference for 200 Rwandan pastors who were interested in learning about house churches. In the afternoon, we distributed $1,000 worth of corn flour, potatoes and beans, courtesy of our Food Fund, to 53 very needy Christian families who had been selected by their pastors. By late afternoon, everyone on our team was tired, but we had one more stop, a very poor village on the outskirts of Kigali named Ruliba. It would prove to be worth our drive.
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Today was our sixth day in Kenya. Yesterday, half of us flew north to the town of Lodwar, which sits in the heart of an area populated by Turkana tribespeople. Their region is generally arid, but it hasn't rained here in eight months, so living conditions are even more challenging than normal. The Turkana survive as small-scale goat and camel herders, and their livestock is dying. Water has become so scarce that women are walking ten or more miles to a polluted river to carry back a dirty drink for their families.
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Two men fled into the night—in opposite directions. One was the dead man's killer. The other was the dead man's best friend. It started with an argument that ended with a fatal gunshot. The body of Marcos' best friend, Daniel, lay dead on the street. Fearing the murderer would shoot him as well, Marcos ran for his life into the darkness. To the local police, his flight made him a suspect. They nabbed him and then locked him up. The real murderer was never apprehended.
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"Your baby girl's skull is fractured, blood is seeping into her brain, and she is in a coma. Her chances for survival are slim." The doctor's words drained what little hope remained in the hearts of Daniel and Sung, parents of ten-month-old Sarah, who had fallen one story and landed on a concrete floor.
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