Loving Our Community in Practical Ways
Ministry does not always happen behind a pulpit. For us, community outreach is simply another part of Love. Walk. Lead.
We want the people of the Sikute Chiefdom to know that we are not here only for Sunday morning. We want to walk alongside them through everyday life, build genuine relationships, meet needs when we can, and earn opportunities to share the love of Christ. And around here, “everyday life” can include just about anything.
Over the years, God has opened doors for us to serve our communities in ways we never would have put into a missionary job description.
We have helped organize cattle vaccination programs because cattle are not simply livestock here. For many families, they represent food, income, transportation, security, and sometimes most of what a family owns. Helping protect their animals is one very practical way to help protect a family’s livelihood.
During the severe drought, we were also able to participate in feeding programs, helping provide food for families when crops failed and normal food supplies became increasingly difficult to obtain.
Not every outreach event is connected to a crisis, though. Some of our favorite days involve nothing more complicated than getting the community together and having a good time.
We have helped with football (soccer for our American friends), track and field days, and Zambia’s Independence Day celebrations. These events give children, parents, village leaders, teachers, and church members an opportunity to spend time together, build relationships, laugh, compete, and enjoy their community. And yes, football can become very serious business in Zambia. We learned that fairly quickly.
We have also been blessed to provide medicine and medical supplies to Makunka Hospital, helping support the men and women who are caring for people in this rural part of Zambia with the resources available to them. None of these things replace the Gospel. They help us live it in front of people.
We want people to hear that Jesus loves them, but we also want them to see Christians who are willing to show up, serve, work, give, and walk beside them.
A Small Bag for a Very Big Day
Giving birth in a rural Zambian hospital or clinic can look very different from giving birth in America. Expectant mothers are often responsible for bringing many of the supplies that will be needed during and immediately after delivery.
Along with clothing and supplies for the baby, mothers are required to arrive with things such as a large piece of plastic to protect the hospital bed, a bucket for the placenta, gloves and a mask for the medical worker assisting with the delivery, and a baby bathtub.
Those are not “nice extras.” They are part of preparing to have a baby.
For a family already struggling financially, gathering everything needed can become another burden at a time that should be filled with anticipation and joy.
That is what makes these little baby kits so special.
The kits begin thousands of miles away in Waxahachie, Texas, in the hands of our friend Anita Swayne. Anita, along with a few others who help crochet, prepares a little cardigan and hat for each baby. She then puts together a kit with practical items for the new mother and child, including:
A crocheted baby cardigan
A crocheted baby hat
A baby outfit
Socks
A receiving blanket
Latex gloves
A mask
Alcohol wipes
Hand sanitizer
An umbilical cord clip
To someone in the United States, some of those items probably sound pretty ordinary. Here, they can mean a great deal.
Take the umbilical cord clip, for example. It is such a small item that most Americans who have had a baby in a hospital probably never gave it a second thought. It was simply there when it was needed. In rural Zambia, a mother is expected to bring one herself. If she does not have one, another method may have to be used to tie off the cord.
Something that costs very little and fits in the palm of your hand suddenly becomes pretty important.
The same is true of the rest of the kit. A cardigan, a hat, a blanket, some socks, and a few basic medical supplies may not seem like much from the outside. But when you place that bag into the hands of an expectant mother who has very little, it says something.
You are seen.
Your baby matters.
Someone cared enough to prepare this for you.
Most importantly, it gives us another opportunity to remind a mother that she and her child are known and loved by God.
More Than a Project
We never want community outreach to become a collection of projects that allows us to stand back and say, “Look what we did.” That is not the goal. The goal is relationships.
A cattle vaccination can open the door to a conversation. A football match can build a friendship. A bag of food can remind a struggling family that they have not been forgotten. Medicine delivered to a rural hospital can strengthen a partnership. And a tiny crocheted sweater made by someone in Texas can travel halfway around the world and eventually be wrapped around a newborn baby in the Zambian bush.
That is one of the things we love about missions. God has a way of taking what one person is willing to do and connecting it with a need that person may never have seen for themselves.
One person crochets a sweater in Texas. Another person gives toward supplies. Someone packs a bag. Someone carries it across an ocean. Someone drives it down a dusty bush road. Someone translates when we arrive. Someone prays with a mother. And eventually that little bag ends up in the hands of a woman preparing to welcome her baby into the world.
Somewhere in all of that, relationships are being built.
And relationships open doors.
They give us opportunities to sit with people, listen to them, walk through life with them, and eventually share why we came in the first place. Not simply to vaccinate cattle, hand out food, organize a football match, deliver medicine, or give away baby clothes, but to point people toward Jesus Christ.
That is community outreach to us.
Love people. Walk with people. Serve people. And when God gives the opportunity, lead them to the One who loved them first.
