Light in the Darkness
COVID has changed the world as we know it.
Our jobs, social lives, educational lives, church lives, and economic situations have been challenged – just to name a few. Navigating this crisis is challenging to say the least.
But, COVID gets worse than this.
When COVID meets extreme poverty, the challenges exponentially grow. For those living in extreme poverty, job loss becomes no food on the table, and no food leads to starvation. When you work a daily wage job each day to be able to afford one meal that evening, the loss of a job is devastating.
This is the current state in South Asia. An area of extreme poverty, where 26 million children already roam homeless on the street. When COVID hits extreme poverty, starvation becomes just as threatening as the disease, if not more threatening.
South Asia is also an area where over 500 million have never heard the name of Jesus.
Any situation without Jesus lacks hope. Even in our first world, materialistic and shallow fillers of life only last so long. And when situations of extreme poverty lack Jesus, this same truth remains- no hope.
When Jesus meets extreme poverty, there is light in the darkness. When Jesus meets COVID, there is light in the darkness. When those who bring Jesus to the extremely physical and spiritually poor, hope is made available in the darkest of places.
The Bible instructs us to tell others about Jesus. It instructs us to be like Jesus and care for our neighbors. We know this is truth, we have experienced this. So, when we have the opportunity to support leaders in these impoverished and lost areas to share the gospel and meet the needs of their community, we take it. Supporting church planters is one of the most effective ways to do this.
The truth is that no church planters means no spread of the gospel. This means no hope in any economic situation, including rich or poor. This means no hope in COVID no matter where you live. The big picture is that no Jesus means no hope on earth now and no hope after death. No Jesus and no hope means earthly and eternal misery.
This is why we support church planters. Jesus is working through His leaders all over the world. We have been called to share Jesus’ hope with the world – both in the U.S. and globally. We know Jesus’ hope and how it changes everything. The need for hope flattens the playing field across the board, it humanizes us all. We need all need hope and Jesus is our hope.
Today is Giving Tuesday – May 5th. Consider giving generously so that church planters across the globe can bring the hope of Jesus to their communities. Join us in bringing light to the darkness by giving a financial gift today.
Passionate about the church and the people she’s been called to serve, Andrea has spent the entirety of her professional career in ministry. As a director at Mosaic Christian Church, she built the missions program into a sustainable, focused endeavor and developed the Kids Ministry into a thriving environment for children to encounter Jesus. From leading trips across the world to leading pre-k volunteers, Andrea has seen the very real impact of the local church on a given community, and it has only stoked her passion to see God’s lost children come home. In addition the her role at Stadia, she helps lead Gail’s Girls and is intentional about building others up to be all that God designed them to be. If she’s not at hip coffee shop working, you can find her at a spin studio, exploring Baltimore’s freshest restaurants with girlfriends, or in Pennsylvania spending the day with her family.