Devotional of the Week

……we are his house if we hold firm the confidence and the pride that belong to hope. – Hebrews 3:6b

Big Daddy’ was the nickname my husband earned when he and our two sons helped provide leadership to a group of twenty teenagers on a service trip to northern Thailand.  They went to the city of Lampang to build a Habitat for Humanity house. Khum Suy-Supin, an aluminum factory laborer, was the husband and father of the family whose house was being constructed. Khum’s optimism and joy about his new home prompted him to joke with the crew helping him build his house. He gave each co-worker a nickname. My husband was Big Daddy, our oldest son was Hot Shot and our youngest simply, Brother.

        The house was a basic square structure made of mortar and concrete blocks. It had a cement floor and a tile roof. Yet compared to other homes in Lampang it was almost palatial. Most people lived in makeshift structures cobbled together with canvas, cardboard, rusted metal, wooden planks, leaves and wire mesh.

       It took five days to finish the Habitat House. Its completion was marked by a dedication ceremony that included songs of praise and prayers of thanksgiving.

      The house my husband and sons helped build was the 75^th  home the Habitat for Humanity organization has constructed in Thailand.

      Hebrews 3:6 talks about Christians acting as true representatives of God’s house when they are bearers of the confidence and pride that come with hope. Habitat for Humanity workers have the opportunity to be such representatives because they help build homes that give families the pride and confidence they need to face the future with hope.

God help me to represent your house well today. Thank you for the hope you have given me. Help me to share it confidently and proudly with others.

The Lord God has given me the tongue of a teacher, that I may know how to sustain the weary with a word. – Isaiah 50: 4a

There were sixty to ninety children in each class! I visited a school on the island of Boracay in the Philippines. The principal gave me a tour of a series of dilapidated, cement buildings without lights or air conditioning. She kept warning me not to trip on broken stairs and crumbling asphalt. Four children shared each battered desk and as many as eight passed one piece of paper and pencil between them as they practiced their lessons. The weedy overgrown playground boasted a rusty slide and a few swings. A pump with mud puddles all around it was where a thousand children washed their hands and drank water. The washrooms were three wooden stalls with splintered doors. The principal’s office also served as the library and medical room.

Yet the students were smiling and polite. They sang and laughed and played energetically. The teachers were friendly and kind, even though they worked in difficult conditions and made less money in a month than a North American teacher makes in a day.  The principal told me children hang around the school till they close the gates at 6:00 pm and are waiting at 7:00 am when they open them. “Their homes are crowded and full of worries”, the principal said to me. “School is a happier place for them.”

As I read Isaiah 50:4 I thought about those teachers on Boracay Island who sustain and uplift weary children with their kind words. Despite primitive facilities and meager supplies they have made their school a place of happiness for their students.

God I want to have the kind of speech that sustains and uplifts the weary. Fill my mouth with words of kindness and affirmation as I speak with others.

Put away from you all bitterness and wrath and anger. Ephesians 4: 31a

A young man named Khom was our war museum tour guide in Siem Reap, Cambodia. Khom was a toddler when the ox cart he was riding in with his parents drove over one of the 12 million land mines left in Cambodian soil after the bloody reign of Pol Phot ended. Khom’s parents were killed. He lost his right arm. Raised by Buddhist monks who took in the homeless orphan, Khom has a remarkably Christ –like attitude about forgiving his enemies.
“How do you feel about the Americans?” I asked Khom after he explained that the United States bombing of Cambodia was the main cause of Pol Phot’s disastrous rise to power. “I don’t hate Americans” he said. “Many have come to Cambodia since the war and risked their lives to help us get rid of the land mines.”
“How do you feel about your fellow countrymen who joined Pol Phot in carrying out his holocaust? “ I asked Khom when he described the massacre of more than three million people by the Khmer Rouge. “I don’t hate my Cambodian brothers” he said. “Many joined Pol Phot at gunpoint or because it was their only alternative to starving to death. What good would it do to hate them for that?”
Rather than wallow in bitterness Khom has dreams for the future. He wants to open a school for Cambodian orphans. He hopes to write a book about the war in the Khmer language so young people will truly understand what happened in their country. I pray Khom’s dreams come true.
God grant me a merciful spirit. May I be tenderhearted and forgiving towards those who have hurt me. I want to leave behind my bitterness and look to the future with hope.

On that day………..I will break the yoke from off his neck, and I will burst his bonds, and strangers shall no more make a servant of him. Jeremiah 30:8

The ‘stick stick’ men I saw in the Chinese city of Chongqing came immediately to mind when I read Jeremiah 30:8.  Like many cities along the Yangtze River, Chongqing is very hilly with winding steep stairs cut into the rocky cliffs which lead from one location to another. The ‘stick stick’ men make up an army of thousands of porters who walk around with their bamboo poles. These poles or sticks can form a yoke over their shoulders which they use to carry produce, baggage, textiles, appliances and even construction materials for strangers who hire them. I marveled at the amazing strength of these men who climb up steep hills with heavy burdens. They work long hours for just a few dollars a day. Many are farmers who have been displaced because the government has flooded their land to build a huge hydro electric dam on the Yangtze. I spoke through an interpreter to some of the men. They are working to earn money to provide food for their families and an education for their children.  They are at the bottom of the Chinese social ladder but they want better prospects for their sons and daughters. Hope for a good future for the next generation inspires Chongqing’s ‘stick stick’ men.

God gives hope for a good future to the children of Israel in Jeremiah 30:8. Someday they will no longer have a yoke around their necks, nor will they be required to serve strangers. 

God you grant us hope for a good future. Help me to bear the yoke of today’s burdens with courage and determination knowing I have your hopeful promises to look forward to.