ripple effect

Got this really cool email from my friend Chrissy in South Africa last week...an example of how one little thing we do (I sent an earlier email to her that prompted this one) can bring about remarkable change. The stress at hand in this email was that she and her husband are moving out of rural South Africa and into a city, leaving behind an unfinished school development project and a nearby school for which they had already raised funds. It's just so cool the way God is bringing justice in places around the world...and how we can all be a part.

Melissa,

GUESS WHAT!!! So I read your email about a half hour before the meeting. I was actually about as bummed out about it as I've gotten. I actually woke up two nights before the meeting and was wide awake for an hour, feeling like I had to just beg God to help, like old testament people who would put on sack cloth and said stuff like "God, we're so totally miserably helpless in this situation without you." Then the next morning I spoke to the person who had sort of offered to coordinate the project after we left, a Brittish couple who live right down the driveway of the school. I was standing right next to the principal as we talked on the phone, and she went into a long spiel about how she was so busy she just couldn't take on another project, and tell her about it later but she couldn't really help with anything. I was so angry I almost cried when I turned and told the principal that we would have to hold the meeting without her.

SO then I went on feeling helpless and hopeless until 30 minutes before the meeting, when I read your email and once again felt this wave of needing to just pray and ask God for help more and more. So I sat down and closed my eyes. And the first thing that came to my head was I needed to call this guy named Kevin. And the next thought that came in my head was "that's the most ridiculous thought ever. He's so busy, he already knows about what you're doing and if he wanted to he would have volunteered already, and he probably won't answer the phone anyway." But the nagging feeling like I had to call him persisted, so I went and called. No answer. Fine, nevermind, I thought. Kevin, I should explain, is the owner of a huge construction company and gives away thousands of dollars toward a orphanage/development project that his family runs. In the last few months their project, ekuJesu, or "the place of Jesus," opened three new preschools in a nearby town, got training for all eleven staff of the preschools, got funding for daily meals for all the kids at the schools, oversaw the building of a church, as well as its day to day running of a small orphan home and it's own primary school that buses in kids from rural areas. They have their own builders, social workers, pastors, and more. Plus Kevin works full time for a construction company building roads. So anyway, I figured they'd be a little busy.

Twenty minutes before the meeting, Kevin called me back from his car. I explained the situation, not really asking for anything, just saying maybe he had some advice on what to do with the $3000 we had raised. And he said flat out he would be happy to manage it. Then he asked if we needed more teachers (yes, another one left this week), and if the teachers were trained (no, a brand new preschool teacher who used to be a housekeeper just became the fourth grade teacher), and if they needed food (that they actually have) and could he and a social worker come and assess the whole school's needs and put together a plan by the end of this week. YES!!

So then basically I went to the school board meeting, flying way higher than my motorcycle was carrying me, and just gushed out how God had set all this up for us. Then we all just sat around being thankful for half an hour. They thanked me, I told them to thank God (and really meant it from the bottom of my heart!), they thanked God, we told the story again of how I had ended up there and how the money came in and how Kevin showed up, and we all thanked each other some more too. When I piece back together the timing of everything, that I called at just a moment when Kevin was ready to take on a project (I had suggested it months ago and he kind of shrugged off the idea), that my Brittish friend turned down a job she was not meant to do (only just today a friend stopped me on the street and went into a long talk about how he had read a story of Jesus turning down work he wasn't supposed to do!)

So that's the story. WHOOPEE!! It was the biggest burst of God-action I've had in a while, and how fun.

Love you, and THANKS THANKS THANKS for your prayers.

Chrissy