Thieves
Beam Africa is the ministry where our church is partnered in South Africa. Our family spent a month there this past summer. They run a development centre in a township – perhaps one of the worst townships in Pretoria. Back in August, thieves broke in and stole all of their computers. At the end of September, Louis and Erika Lingenfelder, who run the ministry, came to America for a month. They visited with us here in Colorado as well as others in Michigan and Missouri. While they were in America, they constantly were getting updates of people trying to break in. So they were often trying to coordinate with those back in South Africa in terms of beefing up the security.
Wednesday, Erika and Louis flew back home. On the plane, Erika said she was praying knowing that these thieves were just bent on getting in. When they arrived, they learned that these thieves succeeded. Someone had broken in again and this time took everything. They torn a hole in the roof. They vandalized and broke all the equipment… including the new alarm system. All the computers that BEAM uses to train adults and kids in the community were stolen. They must have had keys to the new safety gates and simply unlocked them. That which they couldn’t unlock, they kicked in, stealing the petty cash and going into every office.
As I write this, I am this, I am reminded of pejorative statements I have heard within the last year that implied students today will gravitate toward ministry of service just because its easy. Implying what they are calling students to do is the real work or a higher calling.
Seeing firsthand the struggles of those who engage daily in trying to help those on the bottom, those thoughts can’t be further from the truth. While everyone wrestles with spiritual poverty no matter if who you minister to, when you throw in the struggles of human poverty and injustice its overwhelming. When I worked as a campus director of a ministry, I never worried about being robbed. (Though our ‘Real Life Cafe’ was broken in once and someone stole our coffee pots and my jacket. But I think they ‘broke in’ because we forgot to lock the door. Not like I had to bar the windows, use electronic fencing and high tech security cameras.) I didn’t really have to change my life much at all. I can count on my hand the times I personally felt threatened or in danger. I hardly ever agonized through the night about those I ministered too. (Maybe I should have more.) Certainly the students I worked with had issues they faced but nothing like seeing children grow up in child-parented homes, or people with no hope of finding employment, or women dying of AIDs, or knowing that many kids you minister to every day go without basic needs and do not live in a safe environment.
Wherever God calls us in terms of building His kingdom is valid. We simply need to be following Him and obeying His call. But I believe working among those suffering from injustice are involved in the hardest ministry there is. Maybe not just giving a dollar to a homeless person. But when someone gives up there life to truly fight for others, to bring the Kingdom of light to those trapped in darkness, its a sacrifice like any other. A couple of days ago I met with a friend who has chosen to follow the Lord and work to bring about awareness and change in the vile injustice of the human trafficking issue. Brad sold his home in Boulder. He left a safe job as a pastor. Not to mention he now works among an issue that won’t let him sleep at night. All because God has called him to this ministry of helping set captives free.
Erika and Louis also stayed up the night they arrived home. They had to work because of this break-in but also spent time crying out to the Lord. At one point they asked if they were really busy doing what they should be doing. Perhaps it wasn’t worth all this. Maybe they should just walk away from it all, throw in the towel, give up. But Erika wrote that it was as if the Holy Spirit came and made her forehead as hard as flint. No. He had called them to this. This battle is worth it. He will make all things new. His Kingdom will come and His will shall be on earth as it is in Heaven.
