February 1, 2007

Your mission dollars at work

Last Sunday morning we gathered for worship at Church of the Torch in Kikuyu, Kenya. It was institutional Sunday, and the pews were filled with about a thousand students eagerly awaiting their opportunity to share the songs and recitations they had rehearsed. The place was packed with children from about 12 Presbyterian schools.

Students from schools like Alliance Girls and Alliance (for boys) were smartly dressed in beautiful school uniforms. In the early 1900s, Presbyterians helped to organize the Alliances, which educated the first president of Kenya and most of the parliament members. These children sang with confidence, skill, and ability. They were impressive, talented students.

While the boys and girls from the Alliances were singing, I noticed a boy sitting in a pew looking somewhat overwhelmed and fidgety. He was about 11 years old but small for his age. His simple school uniform was clean, though tattered and too big for him. He had shoes but no shoelaces. He was from the school for vulnerable and destitute children, affectionately named the “Wee School” by the Irish and American missionaries who, with help from members of Church of the Torch, organized the school.

The children from the Wee School sang with gusto, and as they took their seats the boy I had noticed, Matati, was left standing alone on the platform. I felt sorry for him, this little boy in ragged clothes, obviously aware of the status of those around him, and a wee bit scared.

Then Matati began to recite Longfellow’s poem, "A Psalm of Life":

Lives of great men all remind us, we can make our lives sublime.
And departing leave behind us footprints on the sands of time.

His voice gathered strength; his eyes began to shine.

Footprints that perhaps another sailing o’er life’s solemn main,
a forlorn and shipwrecked brother, seeing shall take heart again.

Matati’s voice was booming, and we could feel the determination in his voice. Every eye was riveted on him.

So let us then be up and doing, with a heart for any fate.
Still achieving, still pursuing, learn to labor and to wait.

Matati humbly sat down to thundering applause, while I kept trying to choke back my tears of joy and inspiration.

That little boy stole our hearts. We knew Matati would achieve, and pursue, and labor, and wait—and the volunteer teachers at the Wee School would be his mentors.

Thank God for mission dollars and for the love of Jesus Christ that gives so much new life to so many people.

Blessings and peace,

Lyle and Terry Dykstra

The 2007 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 332