Finding Joy in Jesus

The LORD has appeared of old to me, saying: “Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love;
Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you – Jeremiah 31:3

Imagine you are a South Asian woman.  Every day is a struggle and a challenge to survive.  All you know is oppression from the day you were born until the day you die.   As a girl child, your birth is not celebrated.  You feel unwanted and are constantly reminded that you should have been born a boy.  You are neglected, mistreated, abused or abandoned.  As a young girl, you are abducted and forced into a life of prostitution which increases your risk of dying from AIDS.

If you are a widow, you are blamed for your husband’s death.  His family and your community shun you and you are forced to fend for yourself.  You are forced into an inhumane existence.   You are completely alone, with no one to support or care for you.  Life is too hard.   There is no help.  There is no hope.  Only despair, misery and pain.  What’s the use?  Tens of thousands of widows end their lives just to end the pain.

If your dowry is not enough, your husband can douse you with kerosene and set you on fire.  I have read horror stories of women being set on fire by their husbands or in-laws because of their dowries. A woman’s life is not worth anything.  It’s hard to believe that there are countries where it’s not safe to be a woman.  It can even be fatal.  Women who survive infanticide because of gender are forced to live in a society which denies them rights to equality, respect, education, etc.

Being a woman in South Asia is unimaginable and unbearable for many and it is not surprising that the suicide rate is up to 21 times higher than the world’s average.  Life for these women is a never-ending cycle of misery, hopelessness, degradation and rejection.  These women need to know that there is hope.  They need to know that there is a God who values them.  To Him they are precious.  They were fearfully and wonderfully made in His image.

Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; Before you were born I sanctified you – Jeremiah 1:5

Imagine the joy these women will have when they hear about Jesus for the first time through Gospel for Asia’s ministries.  Help them find hope and joy in a Savior who loved them so much that He gave His life for them so that one day they could spend eternity with Him.  They need to know that they are worth a price far above rubies.  They need to know that although there might have been silence in their homes on the days they were born, there was a joyful noise in heaven.

Women missionaries have been bringing the message of love and hope to the women of Asia.  It is crucial that women minister to women because of the Asian culture.  Women are more comfortable around other women.  Gospel for Asia has trained, dedicated women missionaries who are willing to risk their lives to share the love of Jesus Christ with millions of women who still need to hear the Good News. These heroic women missionaries are willing to risk persecution, beatings and imprisonment because they are passionate about giving hope to women who have lived in despair for so long.  They want to offer hurting women healing and encouragement.  They want to bring the Savior’s light and love into their dark and uncaring world.  Many Asian woman have had their lives transformed but there are still so many who are still waiting.

Weeping may endure for a night, But joy comes in the morning – Psalm 30:5

Help Gospel for Asia send more missionaries to those who are perishing without knowing about Jesus and His love.  Find out how at this link.   Help bring joy to a woman in Asia.

 

Source:  Gospel for Asia

Power of the Meek

Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need – Hebrews 4:16

The power of prayer is remarkable.  We have a God whom we can go to and ask for grace, mercy and help for others or ourselves and He will be more than happy to help us.  Jesus was always encouraging people to pray.  He told the story of the persistent widow who wearied the unjust judge until he granted her request.  Jesus made it clear that if an unjust judge could grant this woman her request, how much  more wouldn’t our loving Father grant ours.

When Santinu, a young boy from a poor village was diagnosed with a brain tumor, it must have seemed hopeless to his family and neighbors.  However, with God nothing is hopeless or impossible.  Through the prayers of Santinu’s friend, Sagan and a group of children from the Bridge of Hope Center, God demonstrated His awesome power.

 

Now, my God, I pray, let Your eyes be open and let Your ears be attentive to the prayer made in this place – 2 Chronicles 6:40

I watched this incredible video and saw how God moves mightily in what might seem like insurmountable situations.

My friends and I started praying together because I believe in Jesus and I believe He can heal – Sagan

I was moved by the persistent prayer of these children.  They went every day to Santinu’s home to pray for him.  Jesus instructed us to, “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you” (Matthew 7:7).  These children didn’t pray once and thought that was enough.  No, they prayed daily until God answered.  Their faith and trust in Him and their persistence impacted not only the sick boy’s life but the lives of others who needed healing too.

As I watched Santinu writhing in pain, I knew that God would intervene because He can’t stand to see anyone suffering.  It was His will to heal Santinu.  When I saw Santinu giving his testimony of how prayer had healed him, I couldn’t believe that it was the same boy.  He looked completely different.  He was no longer in pain.  He was no longer facing death.  God had blessed him with a new life, future and hope.

Now My eyes will be open and My ears attentive to prayer made in this place – 2 Chronicles 7:15

It is God’s will to do so much for us.  All we have to do is ask.  God could have healed Santinu on His own but He chose to involve the children.  The children had seen the power of prayer in the lives of their teachers and as a result they followed their example.  I thought it was great how God decided to show Sagan and his prayer group that He will answer their prayers too in a mighty way.    Like their teachers, they got to see the power of prayer demonstrated in their own lives and in the life of Santinu.  People came to know the God who heals through children.

Have you seen the power of prayer in action?  My husband has!  Just the other day, he prayed to God about the pain in his leg.  The very day he prayed about it, God answered.  He can get in and out of the car without experiencing any pain.  Yesterday morning we spoke about it.  I said that God is just waiting to give us what we need.  All we have to do is ask.

God uses anyone to impact the lives of others.  He used Sagan and a group of children to show His love and mercy to those who didn’t know Him.  He used the meek.  These children acted in faith and humility, trusting in the power of the God they had learned about from their teachers at the Bridge of Hope.

This video showed me that as parents, teachers, we are to be godly examples to our children, training them up in the way they are to go so that when they are older they will not depart but will in turn teach the next generations by their example.

I will share this video with my seven year old son.  I want him to see that no matter how old or how young you are, God can use you to help others and that prayer is a very powerful tool.  Through prayer, God can use you to change lives, work miracles, move mountains and do the impossible.  It is important for children to know that as long as their prayers are from the heart, God will hear them and respond. Encourage them to pray every day.

If you are interested in learning more about the Bridge of Hope, visit this link.

And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive – Matthew 21:22

Source:  Gospel for Asia;

Two Wheels Are Faster

Help Missionaries go farther, faster with bicycles.  Help them to reach more people in one day for Jesus.

As much as I like walking, I don’t relish the thought of walking everywhere–not even for one day.  I have access to buses, trains, streetcars and taxis.  It’s not a problem for me to go to several places in one day to share the Gospel.  However, this is not the case for a South Asian missionary.

Transportation can be a real burden for many Gospel for Asia supported missionaries who spend grueling hours walking from one village to another.  Check out this video to get an idea of what it’s like not to have reliable transportation like a bicycle and consider how having one would be a tremendous blessing not only to the missionary but to those whom he or she would minister to.

Here are the reasons why having a bicycle would greatly benefit a missionary:

• Bicycles offer reliable transportation with little cost. You can donate a bicycle for just $110.
• Missionaries won’t have to waste precious time walking from village to village. By riding a bike, they can minister to more people.
• Bicycles are easy to repair,making travel consistent and reliable. Parts are readily available and the cost of maintenance is low.
• When you donate a bicycle, you help take the Gospel to more unreached villages.

Just put yourself in the missionary’s shoes.  Wouldn’t you prefer to travel to three times as many villages to share the love of Jesus?  Two wheels are faster than two feet!  Consider donating a bicycle.

Source:  Gospel for Asia

 

Gifts Thankfully Received

Thanksgiving has come and gone in Canada and the United States.  Many of us enjoyed delicious turkey dinners with our families and reflected on all that we were thankful for.  We were thankful that we have shelter, jobs, families and friends.  Just recently many people got laid off from their jobs.  Those of us who still have jobs are very thankful especially as the Christmas season is fast approaching.

As Christmas draws near, we think about the gifts we will get for our loved ones and friends and plan our menus.  It’s a fun and a stressful time. We decorate our homes and set aside one evening just to wrap presents to put under the Christmas tree.  We are thankful for the most wonderful time of the year.  We are thankful for God’s greatest Gift to us–His beloved Son, Jesus.

Sadly, it’s during this time of the year when we are reminded that not everyone is as blessed as we are or has much to be thankful for.  Imagine that it’s Christmas time but you are not in the holiday spirit because you are overworked and it’s a constant struggle every day to provide meals for your family. You’re working hard but have nothing to really show for it.  You can’t give your children education or clothes.  This is how life is for many people in South Asia.  Each day is a struggle for them. They don’t live–they just exist.

Imagine how thankful you would be if you were to receive a simple gift that would help you and your family.  Gospel for Asia offers lots of wonderful gifts in their Christmas Gift Catalog.  Gifts like chickens, sewing machines, rickshaws and Bibles are not only a great source of income for people who are living in poverty but they are a means by which the love of Christ can be demonstrated in tangible ways.  Since 2007, the gifts from GFA’s Christmas Gift Catalog have helped over 736,000 impoverished families in South Asia.

I thought of which gift I would be thankful to receive and came up with two.  The pull cart and a bicycle.

With a pull cart I can sell fruits, vegetables, clothing or handcrafted items so that I can provide for my family.  This is a legitimate way for a poor person to make a living.  I would be able to give my child an education and give faithfully to the church.  I can even share the Good News about Jesus with people as they buy the goods  I am selling.  I don’t have to worry about renting a cart.  Having my own cart saves me time and I can take home all of what I earn.  Having my own cart will be a testimony to my neighbors and relatives that God takes care of those who put their faith and trust in Him.

I love to ride.  In Guyana I used to ride a lot.  It was a fun way to get around.  Good exercise too.  If I were living in South Asia, I would love to own a bicycle.  If I received one as a Christmas gift, I would use it to reach more villages and tell them about Jesus.  The Bible talks about how “beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things!” (Romans 10:15).  Imagine how much faster I can share the gospel of peace and bring glad tidings of good things if I had a bicycle!

This Christmas think of the many lives in South Asia that will be changed through the Christmas Gift Catalog.  Think of how thankful you would be to receive one of these gifts.  Take a look at the Catalog here and prayerfully consider each gift.

So let each one give as he purposes in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity; for God loves a cheerful giver – 2 Corinthians 9:7

Sources:  Gospel for Asia; Dhal Ni Pol Blog

Literacy Saved Her Paycheck

Literacy brings an incredible freedom to women in South Asia; helping them to take care of their families, not be cheated at the marketplace, and be able to read the Bible for themselves – Gospel for Asia

As an avid reader, I can’t imagine not being able to read.  It is one of my favorite things to do.  I loved reading since I was a child.  It led to my other favorite thing–writing.  Being able to read and write can really make a difference.  You can read books, study the Bible, write letters, read recipes, directions, the labels on products in the grocery store and write checks.   These are things that most of us can do but in South Asia, more than 30% of the women are unable to because of illiteracy.

Imagine that you are illiterate and have no opportunity for an education. Imagine the struggles you face as you try to make ends meet while your husband spends your earnings on alcohol.  This was Dayita’s reality.  She came from a village where few girls received an education.  Being illiterate left her with very few options.  She began sewing clothing to ease her family’s financial situation.  Her husband Kaamil deposited her earnings in the bank but she was horrified when she found out that he was withdrawing her money so that he could buy alcohol.  Desperate, Dayita found someone to help her to open her own bank account but managing it proved to be very difficult because she couldn’t read or write.  She was unable to fill out the deposit and withdrawal forms.  She had to rely on others to help her.

God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble – Psalm 46:1

God saw that Dayita needed help and He intervened.  He sent Ashna and Neha, believers from the local Women’s Fellowship to start a literacy class in Dayita’s area.  Dayita began attending the sessions because she was determined to keep her hard-earned money safe.  To her surprise, Kaamil supported her.  Ashna taught two hour classes on reading and writing from a Bible based curriculum.  Within two months, Dayita could read and write enough to fill out her bank forms.  She is able to deposit and withdraw money on her own now.  She is able to get around because she can read the names of buses and bus stations.  Thanks to the ministry of Ashna and Neha, Dayita is learning about Jesus and starting to believe in Him.

Thanks be to God, who sees all and knows all and is every ready to help those who are in need, Dayita can enjoy the freedom that literacy brings.  Knowing how to read and write, she doesn’t have to depend on others for help.  She can go to the bank and do a transaction any time she wants.  She can travel without worrying about getting lost.  She can also enjoy the freedom that knowing Jesus brings.

If you are interested in helping other women like Dayita, find out how at this link.  Help to free the women of South Asia from the yoke of illiteracy.

 

Source:  Gospel for Asia

Family Finds Hope and Joy

And a little child shall lead them – Isaiah 11:6b

This photo is of a smiling family.  They have a very good reason for the expressions of joy on their faces. The children belong to Bridge of Hope, Gospel for Asia’s children’s ministry.  At Bridge of Hope, the children receive more than an education.  They receive daily meals, medical care and the love of Jesus.

At Bridge of Hope as children learn about God’s love in practical ways, they share the message with their families.  Can you imagine what it is like for a family living in poverty to find hope and joy in the love of Jesus?  They learn that there is a Savior whose desire is for them to know Him and to have a relationship with Him.

How wonderful it is when a whole family accepts Christ as their Savior.  You can help to make this possible by supporting Bridge of Hope.  To find out how, click here

Together we can bring hope to children and their families and transform communities.

 

Source:  Gospel for Asia

Oppressed Because She is a Woman

Then I returned and considered all the oppression that is done under the sun: And look! The tears of the oppressed, But they have no comforter—
On the side of their oppressors there is power, But they have no comforter – Ecclesiastes 4:1

It saddens me that in some countries, it is dangerous or even deadly to be a woman.  Sex trafficking, bride burnings, infanticide, gender related crimes, poverty and oppression are the realities that girls and women face in Asia.

Women should be able to live in a society where their rights are protected  and are not oppressed because of their gender.  Gender discrimination is something that all women may encounter at some point in her life but in Asia, women are perpetual victims of violence, abuse and oppression.

Imagine that you are a mother and one Sunday evening you find your daughter lying naked on the front step of the house she shares with her husband and children.  There is no one there to help her and no one wants to come to her so you are the only one she can call for help although you live quite a distance away.   Imagine how you would feel when you see your daughter with burns on more than 80 percent of her body, crying in agony. She survives for three days, long enough to tell the police that she was doused in kerosene by her mother-in-law and set on fire by her husband–the father of her children.  Then she dies…

This is what happened to Laxmi, a woman in Bangladore.  She was a victim of bride burning which is a crime that accounts for the death of at least one woman every hour in India.  More than 8000 women die in this horrendous way.  This type of crime is also called, “dowry death”.

A dowry death is the death of a young woman in South Asian countries, primarily India, who is murdered or driven to suicide by her husband. This results from the husband continually attempting to extract more dowry from the bride or her family. Bride burning is just one form of dowry death. Others include acid throwing and Eve teasing.  Because dowry typically depends on class or socioeconomic status, women are often subjected to the dowry pressures of their future husband or his relatives.

Laxmi was only 28 years old when she died.  Hers was not an arranged marriage.  It was a love marriage and she came from higher caste than her husband, Majunath.  He became increasingly drunk and was unable to find regular work because most of the money Laxmi earned was spent on liquor.  Pressured by her in-laws to provide, Laxmi turned to her mother for financial support.  Laxmi was harassed and accused of adultery by her in-laws and beaten by her husband.  It turned out that it was her mother-in-law who compelled her son to set his wife on fire.  Majunath ended up dying because he suffered from burns when Laxmi hugged him in a desperate attempt to put the flames out.  So, their two children became orphans.   An arrest warrant was issued for Laxmi’s mother-in-law but she has disappeared.

Trafficking of minor girls – the second-most prevalent trafficking crime – surged 14 times over the last decade and increased 65% in 2014, according to new data released by the National Crime Records Bureau.

Girls and women are the main targets of immoral trafficking in India, making up 76% of human trafficking cases nationwide over a decade, reveal NCRB data.

Other cases registered under human trafficking over the last decade include selling girls for prostitution, importing girls from a foreign country and buying girls for prostitution.

Sexual exploitation of women and children for commercial purposes takes place in various forms including brothel-based prostitution, sex-tourism, and pornography.

As many as 8,099 people were reported to be trafficked across India in 2014.

In the article, Silent Slaves:  Stories of Human Trafficking in India, I read about a 15 year old girl who was in a New Delhi hospital.  She was frail, her face and head were bandaged.  A bruised black and blue eye and swollen lips were visible.  She had burn marks and scabs on her neck and down her whole body and one of her ears was disfigured.  She had a wound on her skull which was rotting and filled with maggots.  This caused a stench. She was in this horrific condition because of her employer who beat her everyday with a broom and a stool.  Many times the woman would put a hot pan on the girl’s body and burn her skin.  The skin on her skull started to peel because she was repeatedly burned in that same spot.

How could one human being treat another like this?  Sadly, this teen’s case is not an isolated one.  Thousands of girls like her are trafficked every year from remote villages to large cities and sold as domestic workers. Many of them are abused or sexually exploited.

Extreme poverty, lack of education and employment, and poor implementation of the government’s minimum wage system in rural India make girls more vulnerable to being trafficked. The 2013 Global Slavery Index, published by the Australia-based Walk Free Foundation, an organization that works to end modern slavery, found that almost half of the 30 million “modern slaves” in the world are from India.

The article describes how domestic worker placement agencies operate and how they are flourishing at the expense of minor and illiterate girls. Read more.

Due to the fact that girls are seen as an economic burden and boys a source of income, girl babies have been aborted and murdered – female infanticide or Gendercide – in their millions in India. The Lancet estimates that 500,000 female fetuses are aborted in India every year. As a result according to the BBC, “an estimated 25-50 million women in India are ‘missing’, if you compare the proportion of women in the population with other countries.” Staggeringly, Unicef believes 10 million girls, were killed by their parents in the last thirty years.

Killing babies because they are girls really hits close to home.  As a woman, I can’t imagine my parents ending my life because I was born a girl instead of a boy.  I always remember my mother telling me that she had a dream of how I would look before I was born.  My father used to take me kite flying. My parents loved my two sisters and me.  I know fathers who have only daughters and no sons but they are ecstatic.  They adore their girls.  This is not the case for the girls in India, however.  Some are aborted or killed after they are born, others are neglected or abandoned.

In India a girl is an expensive burden because when she marries, her family is expected to pay a sum of money to the groom’s family regardless of whether or not they can afford it.  It’s an expense they don’t want to deal with.  So, when a girl is born, there is no joy.  There is no celebration, only disappointment and anxiety.  In some cases, there is rage–rage of the husband toward the wife and the baby girl.  The wife is blamed for the gender of the baby and the girl, if she survives, is constantly reminded that she is a mistake–she should have been a boy.

Bride burnings, sex trafficking and girl infanticide are just some of the hardships that women and girls face in Asia.  The documentary film, “Veil of Tears” takes you on a harrowing journey into their lives.  Their stories may make us squirm but instead of shutting them out, we ought to raise awareness and do what we can to help.  Let us be the voice of hope for the oppressed.

Find out more information at this link:  http://veiloftearsmovie.com/take-action/ 

And the LORD shall help them, and deliver them: he shall deliver them from the wicked, and save them, because they trust in him – Psalm 37:40

Sources:  Gospel for Asia; The Sidney Morning Herald; Wikipedia; Scroll In; Women’s Media Center; Counterpunch