the defense rests

Last week a visiting group listened as I presented about one of our project activities; helping people to repair their own houses.


I love this activity. We give a small amount of money to help some of the poorest & most vulnerable families to repair their house so they have a 'simple, decent place to live'. (To borrow a phrase from Habitat For Humanity.) Our approach is to visit multiple times before, during and after the houses are repaired. We talk with the families about their other felt needs. For example, if their house is falling apart but they tell us, 'Our greatest need is that we don't have anything to eat today', we'll put our agenda for a corrugated iron roof aside and buy them a 50kg sack of rice. 


During the presentation, one of the visitors asked, 'How many of the families so far have become Christians through this activity?' I said, 'None that I know of.'


I was pretty direct in my reply, explaining that one or two of the families we helped were Christians before and they are still Christians. The majority were Buddhists before we built their house and are now Buddhists who live in a single- room house with four walls, a roof and a floor. (Praise God, I reckon!)


The visitor asked again, 'So where is the Christian witness in this program?' I tried to explain our priority to work with churches, NGOs and schools in coorperative partnerships. We are motivated by Christ, we tell people we are a Christian organisation, we talk about our understanding that these resources are gifts of love from God and we leave it up to people to respond. We proclaim our faith and we are happy to serve people of other faiths too. 


The next day at our staff meeting, one of our team mates talked about a family who had recently received financial help to repair their house. She said that the woman was filled with joy and gladly accepted our help. The recipient explained that she had been a member of a church some years ago but had stopped attending. When a Christian NGO noticed her hardship and reached out to her, she responded by going back to church. Now she wants to know God, to understand the bible and for her children to know Jesus too.


Before her room was fixed, her family couldn't sleep properly. Last week the renovations were not yet complete, but it was great to see that one of the kids was enjoying a nap when one of our staff stopped by to chat last week. As it says in Psalm 4, 'At the day's end I'm ready for sound sleep,
For you, God, have put my life back together.'


Maybe the Buddhist can know God. Maybe the poor don't have to be lonely. Perhaps God is at work and I don't hear all the stories of transformation. And maybe I don't have to feel interrogated if people ask whether or not we are a good Christian witness.

(Sleeping kid in the bottom right corner!)