Urgent Needs
Picture this…you are relaxing in your recliner at home, peacefully unwinding from the busy day when numerous friends drop by unexpected. Let me tell you about some friends who dropped by in one week’s time.
On the first day, there were 368 people, followed the next day by 2,000 people. On the succeeding days, there were 1,264, 2,406, 3,432, 2,500, 2,033, and 1,644 people. A total of 15,647 friends dropped by Rivers of the World’s work area in the village of Nakuru, a beautiful lakeside town in Kenya. The people who have been arriving are refugees who have fled from Nairobi to Nakuru in desperate need of help.
Since the Dec. 27, 2007 national election, widespread violence has occurred in parts of Kenya, to include areas of Nairobi. Until Friday, Jan. 25, 2008, Nakuru had escaped the weeks of violence that has seen as many as 1,000 people killed in the east African country and around 250,000 people forced from their homes.
I never do this, but I am urgently asking folks to join with ROW in meeting the needs of these displaced people. These 15,000 people need food, blankets, mattresses, cooking pots, clothing and fuel to move them on to their final destination.
Imagine the plight of the family of Samuel K., who is one of our micro business loan members. He and his wife Grace, their three-year-old daughter Jane and her grandmother, live together in a shack in Mathare Valley, which is one of the five large slums in Nairobi. Their home was looted and everything was taken, even their clothes. Samuel’s business selling chickens was wrecked and all his stock stolen. They have nothing but the clothes on their backs.
As Christians, now is our chance to actively demonstrate the love of God by helping these folks in need. If the neighboring town where you live were suddenly destroyed by a flood, would it prompt you to help? It should matter not that these folks live in another country and another continent—needs exist and we must rally together to meet those needs.
Paul instructs Titus that he should remind the people of the importance of good deeds in the life of the Christian. We read in Titus 3:14 (NKJV):
“And let our people also learn to maintain good works, to meet urgent needs, that they may not be unfruitful.”
There is no time for us to be idle. We must work hard each day and to live our lives in such a way that we are prepared spiritually, physically and financially to meet the needs of others in times of crisis.
