Casino Night!

Have you ever donated money to a relief or disaster agency? If so, did you wonder how much of your money actually went to helping those in need? Sometimes I worry that my contributions are going to some to fat executive’s salary or to flashy marketing campaigns.

I’m involved with an organization that serves the poor and orphaned in Mozambique, Africa. Life for Mozambique (LFM), a Christian ministry birthed by Life Covenant Church in Torrance, has two orphanages that provide housing, food, medical care, and education for 25 Mozambican children. These orphanages also serve as community centers to help the neighboring men, women, and children survive in one of the world’s most economically challenged countries. Each orphanage also houses a Life Covenant Church of its own that strives to meet the spiritual needs of the nearby people.

LFM’s goal is that the orphanages will one day become self-sufficient. We have a couple of business projects that aim to generate income by delivering valuable services for the local people. These projects are very promising, but are also still in their infancy. So, LFM is annually tasked with raising each orphanage’s monthly operating expenses. We try to hold two or three annual fundraising events, and this year we’re trying something new – a Casino Night on April 30. I wanted to call the night “Gambling for Orphans,” but I was overruled.

Unlike the mega-sized disaster/relief agencies mentioned above, when you donate to LFM, you can be quite certain that 99.9 percent of your money goes to the feeding and caring of Mozambican children. I can’t say 100 percent, because sometimes we have to, you know, print a banner for our next 5K or order stationary to write thank you notes to our donors.

I was able to go to Mozambique two years ago and spending time at the orphanages was an amazing experience. Below are the stories of two children that have recently found new lives at our orphanages.

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Eva Jorge is a true heroine and her story reads like a script from a tragic movie. She is living at our first orphanage, the Melanie Center. For starters like so many children in Mozambique, Eva lost her parents to HIV/AIDS when she was young. Luckily, an uncle took her and her five brothers into his home. But conditions there were pretty rough and poverty was at an extreme level. So her uncle forced her to work on farms and in the local markets. The conditions were so bad, that Eva, at 12 years of age, gathered up her brothers and moved away, on her own. They lived together in a hut on the beach; selling fish to earn money for food. But her uncle tracked her down and gave her away in marriage in exchange for money. Not only was Eva separated from her brothers, but also her new “husband” sexually abused her. 

The local Ministry of Women and Social Services found Eva and extracted her from her abusive “husband”. Her brothers were taken in by a local Catholic center and Eva was brought to the Melanie Center. Eva is being restored mentally, physically, and spiritually. Her life has changed completely and God only knows where she’d be if he hadn’t rescued her and delivered her to the Melanie Center. Thankfully, Eva is thriving. She is developing new skills. She is studying and learning. She dreams of one day being able to teach other girls to sew.

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Sometimes children at our orphanages have a living parent, but times are so tough that we house the child to easy the burden for the mother or the father. Such is the case of Lucas Manuel, a resident of our second orphanage that opened in 2014, the Melanie Center II. He is 14 years old and was raised in the mountainous farming region of central Mozambique. His father had three wives and was a leader in Zionism, which is a hybrid religion of Christianity and many various African tribal sects. When Lucas was six, his father died, leaving he and his mother to fend for themselves by working in the fields of neighboring families. Lucas saw his dreams of becoming somebody important slowly evaporate in the heat of the African sun. Lucas was brought to the Melanie Center II where he embarked on a course of study to become a civilian construction engineer. Thanks to the MCII, Lucas has been given a new life and a chance to succeed in school and achieve his dreams of building a good home for his mother. What was once without hope, Lucas’ life is now on a trajectory of success, health, and promise.

So, if you donate to LFM and are wondering where your money ends up … all you have to do is close your eyes. Hopefully your mind’s eye will see a young child like Lucas or Eva. A child that is healthy clothed, educated, and smiling. And with that picture in your mind, you’ll never have to wonder where your donations are going.

Please click here if you’d like to attend the Casino Night!

Saturday Sorrows

A woman, dressed in black, rises at dawn. She sneaks quietly out of her home and looks for a place to be alone, away from the sounds of weeping. Her name is Mary. She is from Magdala.

It was so dark up on that hill yesterday. I think that’s what I’ll remember the most.

Not his screams, that ear-splitting cry of his …

or when he told us not to weep for him …

or his final words, when he voiced his feelings of forsakenness.

Why, oh Lord, have you forsaken us?

It’s the darkness that scared me the most. The clouds were so full and black, completely blotting out the sun. As if the flames from a thousand candles were suddenly snuffed out.

I’ve known darkness like that before. Not the darkness when you find yourself suddenly awake and afraid in the middle of the night. That’s temporary. Everybody knows the sun will eventually rise.

The darkness I’m talking about is kind that keeps you captive in broad daylight. It’s the kind that fills you with paranoia and evil thoughts. It makes you feel like you’re a crazy person, even when all is calm, when there’s a moment of peace.

It can make you foam at the mouth and give you the strength of seven men. It makes you want to hurt yourself, or worse, try to kill yourself. People tell me that more than once I tried to jump off of a cliff. There were times I needed to be tied down so that I wouldn’t harm myself, or others.

But, thankfully, those days are gone. I’m not that woman anymore. I’ve been changed.

Cleansed.

Transformed into a whole new creation.

I was having one of my episodes when he passed through my town. It took three men to drag me and throw me at his mercy. It’s not like I remember any of this, but from what I was told, seven evil spirits came out of me that day.

I was delivered from darkness and brought into the light, by the Light. He himself said so. He said he was the Light of the World. I’ve been with him ever since. Because he also said that whoever followed him would never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life. I promised to stay as close to him as possible, because I don’t want to take one single step in darkness ever again.

But now the light of life is dead. He asked us to follow him, to walk with him, to abide in him. How? He’s gone.

He deserted us.

He left me. Abandoned us all.

It’s all so confusing. I really don’t understand. Why Lord did you let this happen? Couldn’t you have escaped? Fled? Gone another way or taken a different rout? Instead you walked right into capture.

This despair is overwhelming. But, it’s not like it was before I met him. Somehow it’s different. I know that because he changed me … this grief will someday disappear. He healed me once and now I must trust that the Father will do it again. We had so little time together, but it was enough to alter my life forever. He taught us about what the Father is really like. About love. About faith. About peace and forgiveness. He may be gone, but I now have a love for the Father that had always been missing.

I hope he knew how much we all loved him. I stayed with him as long as possible. He asked me to follow him and I wouldn’t stop until I couldn’t go any farther. I went up the hill and back down to the garden tomb. I saw the place where they laid his body. I’d have gone into the grave with him if they had let me.

I’m going back there tomorrow, as soon as the sun breaks through the dark of night. I want to anoint his body. I have to get the spices ready. I think Joanna and James’ mother will join me.

Those soldiers rolled that stone and enclosed him in blackness.

The light of world was extinguished.

Alone.

In a tomb of darkness.

Friday's Eyewitness

 “What do you want me to do for you?”

I’ll never forget those words, even though I thought it was kind of obvious – I’m sitting there begging, yelling at the top of my lungs for him to have mercy on me.

And he asks me, “What do I want?”

I’ve been asking for things all of my life. Money. Food. A cool cup of water. But this one was simple. I said, “Rabbi, I want to see.”

He tells me that my faith has healed me. And just like that, my eyes were opened.

I’ve always dreamed about what it would feel like to have my eyesight restored. Would it hurt? Would it sting? Would it be a gradual recovery like a wave slowly reaching the shore? But it wasn’t like that at all. It happened painlessly, instantly, in the blink of an … eye. How wonderful it was, to see, to have his face be the first thing I saw. His smiling face.

And now he’s gone.

I followed him all week, you know. What else could I do? I’m a beggar. So I went with him. I listened and I watched. I viewed him with my own eyes. I took part in his entry into Jerusalem. We sang and cheered. Palm branches covered the road. What a sight to behold! Our messiah was resuming to his rightful throne. The Son of David returning to the holy city!

And then today’s events unfolded. Word spread like fire through the city. Arrested? Really? For what? The man was as gentle as a lamb.

I ran to the Praetorium as quickly as I could. Everybody else was scattering. They were saying, “Bartimeus, leave, get far away from here, it’s too dangerous!” But as a new follower, I knew I’d be safe. I could blend in. After a lifetime of tripping over rocks and roots, I chose to run toward him.

I got there as Pilate handed him over to death. I watched the soldiers flog him. He was tied up like an animal. Beaten like a criminal. And he took it, each brutal, flesh-ripping lash. I begged him to cry out for mercy, like I had done on the side of the road. I watched every second as my eyes filled with tears. There are some things I wish I hadn’t seen. The amount of blood was overwhelming. Those hideous stripes across his back. I’ll never be able to erase that from my mind.

The agony in his face was too much to see. That face, once filled with so much love, now gripped in torment. I watched the soldiers punch him and fit his head with a crown of thorns. I listened as they mocked him and I followed as they led him through the streets and up the hill.

Oh the things I’ve seen this week: the sky, trees; bread, birds, and babies. How wonderful it’s been just to see my own toes. You have no idea what it’s like to not have to use my hands to feel my way around. But is it all worth it, if I can’t see him? If the giver of the most precious gift of all time is gone, is it worth it?

I didn’t make it up that hill. I couldn’t go any farther. So I stayed behind. I wasn’t afraid. But there are some things my eyes don’t need to see. When you’re blind, your hearing becomes extremely acute. I used to live by sound. Chirping birds announced the daylight. I can recognize every one of my friends by the shuffle of their sandals in the dust.

Some sounds are too much to bear. I heard the hammer pounding the nails and the wood grinding against rock as it dropped into the earth.

I heard his mother crying.

His screams echoed against the blackened sky.

I’d seen enough blood for one day. So I couldn’t make it up that hill. He was the light to my darkened world. He gave me back my life – I didn’t want to see his death.

What do I do now? I have nowhere to go. My blindness is gone, but now I’m back to stumbling in the dark.