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Silver or Gold Have I None... Acts 3: 1-10 October 2012 Early last spring a thin young mother named Nnalongo (“mother of twins”) began attending Ne
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Silver or Gold Have I None...
Acts 3: 1-10
October 2012 |
Early last spring a thin young mother named Nnalongo (“mother of twins”) began attending New Life Centre Church. She was unkempt, smelled badly, and had 3 tiny, dirty children. The twins were her 2 youngest, a boy and a girl, the third child barely older. The girl twin toddled about, but the boy just lay limply, a victim of severe cerebral palsy. Nnalongo’s husband was an old man, rarely home, and her home was a mud hut with a dirt floor in a remote village. |
Nnalongo and her children would ride along with the others from her village, whom the pastor picked up each Sunday in my ancient Land Cruiser. She’d sit through the services, a perpetual frown on her face, doing nothing but tending the crippled baby. And afterwards her interactions with church members and leaders were usually only to ask for things, money, medicine, or whatever she wanted at the time. People kept a distance from her. |
When Nnalongo didn’t get what she hoped for from our church, she decided to return to her previous church, which had always given her everything she wanted. They even gave her food, to the point where she no longer farmed her land. But a rude awakening awaited her. Because she had gone to a different church, when she returned to her first church, she only found rejection. All the gifts given to her out of pity had had a price tag that she was unaware of. Even when her crippled baby died a few months ago, they ignored her, not even attending his burial. At one point some of them even threatened to kill her… |
 Nnalongo and her children standing her her sweet potato hills, her home in the background. |
She returned to New Life Centre Church a humbled woman. Our ladies had stood by her when her baby died. She began to participate in the services, and got prayed for. She cleaned up and a beautiful smile replaced the old frown. Her 2 remaining children were now clean and appeared much happier. Pastor David Kasule has been teaching a midweek Bible study in Nnalongo’s village and she’s been drinking it in. One of his topics has been, “No matter how little you have, you can use it to work with. You need to work.” Nnalongo has taken this word to heart and has risen out of the ashes of her life. In spite of her crippled right arm, she is now planting sweet potatoes on her land (a staple food), and plans to take a piglet from the pastor’s piggery on the condition she returns 2 piglets to him later on. She’s learning how to give back to God. And last Sunday she brought a visitor with her to the church service! |
 Nnalongo's new smile |
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In another village a few miles farther out, there lives a woman and her blind adult son. They also had been rejected by local people, because of their bitterness at life. But when the pastor would see them walking along the village road, he would always give them a ride. Other times, he’d give them change so they could hire a bicycle or motorcycle to take them somewhere. They began to come to our Thursday church workdays with the people from Nnalongo’s village. The blind son would sit in the shade while his mother would hoe weeds with the other ladies, clearing the church compound. |
This continued on for some weeks, and then one evening the pastor and 2 other church leaders were called to their home in a time of crisis. There they began to hear how relatives had killed this woman’s husband in the 1980s in their attempt to steal their family land. Since then it had been an ongoing battle with many pitted against this lonely woman and her blind son. Land titles had been stolen from her, judges have not given her justice. What the church leaders had initially thought was their need to forgive was finally seen as justified anger, rather than just bitterness. The relatives had tried to poison them, had hired a witchdoctor to use witchcraft against them, had killed their pigs. They had become prisoners of their family’s evil intentions and greed. |
 The blind man |
This couple has not come to know Jesus yet, but what they’ve found so far has been Christians willing to listen to them and hear their hearts. Their anger was vindicated that night, and their concerns validated. They were prayed with and had a measure of peace for the first time in years. And the very night of that ministry, the witchdoctor who had caused them so much grief, died… |
Silver and gold we do not have. What we have, we give. What we have is hearing hearts, love, and Jesus. From them we give to the needy. As when Peter and John met the beggar at the Gate Beautiful, the man gave them his attention, expecting to get something from them. But what they gave him was not what he expected. They gave them only what they had, not money, but healing. And people were amazed when they saw the change in him…
Silver and gold we do not have. But we are seeing healing and restoration in desperate lives. This is what the Gospel is all about.
Please pray for these people... |
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Shepherd's Staff Mission Facilitators
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Albuquerque, NM 87153-3640
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Our sister ministry, essentially More is located in northwestern New Mexico. They support our work in Uganda both in practice and in ethic. Have a look! |
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