GlocalNet

When something like this happens, I feel so helpless. You want to heal it immediately, but you can’t. It’s like going to the hospital bed of someone you love who is sick. You can sit near them and listen, serve them, but not much more than that; but your presence says you love them. Right now, we are praying and adjusting the pillows on the bed because presence matters.

Oscar is starting with the society.  He’s trying to get churches to use their resources to serve others regardless of religion or tribe. I want to help him do that. I don’t know who all my brothers and sisters in Christ are. I do know I am a part of humanity and God expects me, as the Samaritan, to serve them. Byron James is a friend of mine who pastors a church here in the U.S. and his church has adopted Kenya.  if you think God is calling your church to serve there, let me know and I’ll connect you with Shadrack, Oscar, and/or Byron.

I challenge missional writers, bloggers, churches, Christians to lead out—here is Jesus on CNN—follow him. Stop praying, and start acting. You “ain’t prayin’” - you’re rationalizing, procrastinating, hoping something or someone will save you from having to sweat. Out of the hundreds of thousands of churches in America and the millions of Christians, God is calling some of you to engage there.  Do it! Those of you working deep in other parts of the world stay focused.  Don’t leave your lines. God will raise up someone else on this front—they may not be Americans—which is great. Just pray and be open to people you can connect there.

This past week, I’ve felt overwhelmed because there are 3 major countries with 3 major issues taking place where I have close friends that are leading churches in all 3 places in the middle of all that’s going on.  They all need help—not just encouragement. These are literally life and death issues that we never have to deal with here in the U.S. We want to take our plans to reach the world to the world, and have them join our plans; yet, we are so silent when they really need us. And, we say we don’t practice religious colonialism? . .  . Right. We serve the world on its terms in God’s power, not our terms with our resources and power or we’d never do anything.

Many of you outside NorthWood have emailed or called wanting to know how to contribute. For the time being, NorthWood has set up a special account just for Kenya. It will go directly to pastor Oscar’s needs that he outlines in the previous blog—no overhead, or a single cent kept at NorthWood for NorthWood. If you want to give something make your check out to NorthWood Church and on the memo line put “Kenya” and we will send it forward. There may be something else set up later, but, for now, this is what we will do. Today, Pastor Shadrack Ruto who pastors Upendo Baptist Church here in the DFW area and I will meet. He’s from Kenya and his church has all the tribes. We will try to figure out what we can do. So, please pray for us. If you want to volunteer in any way, let us know. You can email me at the church web-site .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). Hopefully, in the next few days we’ll have more clarity as to what can be done.