Remember The Poor

In other houses, children with distended stomachs stand barely clothed while adults are gone all day foraging for food [for sensitivity we have not posted photos]. The lack of available food is creating desperation, and people are left to eat anything they can find.  We are already making plans to respond to this crisis. We have sent the first amount of funds specifically to provide food for the starving. We are asking you to join us in this relief effort and the proclamation of the gospel.

The terrible destruction comes from a drought that has caused the already fragile and weak conditions of these people to reach an even more disturbing level of poverty. Dried out fields with dead plants are visible everywhere. The drought has left these people without any food.  But three years ago, White Fields began to support the church planting ministry of Pastor Onesimus in Kotobo Village and the first two church planters, Pastor John Bosco in Kigaga and Pastor Robinson in Katoonya. These men have begun to preach the gospel in their local region of Rukungiri and are now establishing thriving churches with the prayer and financial support of White Fields.

In Rukungiri right now the churches are gathering from among their people supplies to deliver to the needier than them in Kikarara. White Fields has also sent funds to provide a larger food relief of maize and beans which will be distributed among the thousand or more people in the villages.  In this way, the believers in Kotobo, Katoonya, and Kigaga are reaching out to a new mission field a few hours from their home communities.  When they visit to deliver the food and supplies to these people, they will pray with them and share the good news of Jesus Christ.  They become your hands and feet in the delivery of the donations you have made to White Fields.

Kikarara has been on the mind of Pastor Onesimus for several years. Growing up, he would travel through this village seeing the poverty, and for some reason, as he grew older the Lord continued to put a burden on his heart for the people there. He spoke to me about his burden in May. We discussed the conditions of the drought, and we prayed together about the possibility of planting a church among these people.

White Fields Ministry is committed to ministering to the poor and solving poverty through the outreach and establishment of a local church. You become the partners in the movement of the Holy Spirit to put his servants in place to take the gospel to desperate and needy people. They cannot reach these people and solve these needs through their meager resources. But with your prayers and your financial assistance, God will do great things.

Why do we Focus our Solution to Poverty on the Planting of the Local Church?

• The believers of a local church can transform the community not only with poverty relief but do so in the name of Jesus Christ. Real transformation to a community comes when people receive Jesus Christ and begin to live their life according to biblical moral and ethical standards.
• The members of a local church minister to the needs of the poorest in their community according to their own culture and standard of living. As Americans, we may mistake poverty with sloven behavior and give relief to people who merely refuse to work. The local church congregation see their community members every day and can give – appropriate levels – of relief to individuals that will help themselves. (ie. Drunkards will not get out of poverty unless they are willing to get sober).
• Blessings come to the local church members when they begin to share their -even meager – own resources to minister to the poor in their community.
• The leaders of the local church manage the resources and protect the relief to ensure that the benefits are not confiscated by the more powerful in the community. (i.e., Medical relief supplies are the most sought after commodity by drug cartel abusers. They make illegal drugs from the medicine. When the pharmaceuticals are given through the local church provides a source of protection, security).
• Rather than providing lush American-style materialistic relief – sometimes to just a small fraction of the population – the relief managed through a local church along with gospel transformation can transform a whole community. It can provide a community that elevates the needy into the ability to become self-sustaining.
• Rather than taking a few chosen “out of” the local community and leaving the rest in the abject poverty – by planting a local church we seek to bring all in the community to a livable standard so that families can remain intact and begin to care for the others in need in their community.
• The relief provided by a local church gives the direct vision of a body of believers reaching the lost in compassion. “Why are you sharing with us even when you are still poor yourself. It is the difference between giving out of your largess and sharing your little amount. This becomes a powerful testimony to the gospel.

When we received this report today, we immediately agreed with Onesimus to gather leaders from the church and prepare to take supplies to this village. The churches in the Rukungiri area are also coming together and giving out of their poverty to help the people of Kikarara.

This is the power of the national pastor, assessing the needs of the people, gathering the members of the local church, and delivering not only the physical needs but the spiritual ones (the Gospel) as well. White Fields sent money to buy provisions for the people of Kikarara. If you would like to send money to support our overall mission empowering local Pastors to take hope to their people you can donate on our giving page. We will have an updated report for you within a week or two once Onesimus and his team return from serving the people of Kikarara.

[UPDATE July 3,]  Help is on the way!

The funds provided so far have supplied a small pickup loaded with Maize – the staple food for Africans. It is expensive in all of Uganda because of the drought, but there is none in the Kikarara because their crops were consumed by the drought. God’s Embassy Members will deliver the food and proclaim the love of Christ as they share these provisions.  Your financial support will help us fund future trips as well. This delivery should be taking place on July 4th.  The police have noticed the ministry by the church and offered to provide an escort to protect them from robbers, so the church can successfully deliver the food to the families they have registered in the neediest village.

The local church member also participated in donations! 

The best source of clothing for naked people in the poorest communities is right from the members of our local church. They already possess clothes that fit the area, and it becomes a blessing for them to share out of their own meager resources. Whoever is generous to the poor lends to the LORD, and he will repay him for his deed. [Proverbs 19:17, ESV]

We are thankful to have the members of the churches we are supporting in Kotobo Village, Katoonya Village and Kigaga Village ministering as the hands and feet delivering the supplies and proclaiming the love of Jesus. Participate in the ministry to the needy–As Jesus said, ” I was naked and you clothed me, . . . And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? . . . ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’ [Matthew 25:36-40]