Reflections of time spent with the Presbyterian Committee on the Self Development of People

by Joseph Johnson

Joseph Johnson shows the children of the Batey Hato Viejo photos on his digital camera. Photo courtesy of SDOP.

Serving on the Self Development of People Committee has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my ministry … and life. It is one of the ministries of the church that looks into the eyes of those it affects. Some ministries write papers, issue opinions or make recommendations; SDOP reaches across tables and joins hands with those who need what we offer. By grace, the members of SDOP are blessed in return. But that’s the way grace is; it moves both ways.

As I think back on my six-plus years serving with the committed people of SDOP, what I recall most are names and faces, not papers (though there was mound of paper!). I think of the 50 or so people, from across the denomination, with whom I served who spent days, the aggregate of which would be months, away from jobs and family in order to improve the lives and futures of impoverished people around the world. I think of the SDOP staff — Cynthia, Clara, Wayne, Mary, Teresa, Pat, Marina, Margaret, Audrey —who are invaluable and quite simply, the best at what they do. I count it a rich and lasting blessing to call them friends.

I think of those people who introduced themselves to us by way of formal applications. I remember farmers in Southwest Georgia, mentally and physically challenged — but not held back — persons in Selma, Alabama, amazing women in Mobile, Alabama, to name a few. Through site visits and phone calls and follow-ups they were more than names on a page, they became fellow travelers in that great cloud of witnesses that bear testimony to God’s grace and the grace of God’s people. I think of Sonia and Elsa and Paula, Alta Gracia and Marlenis and Maria, of furniture makers and craft designers in Santo Domingo, farmers in Azua, block and candy makers in Guerra, cheese makers in San Pedro de los Llanos, well diggers in Monte Plata who along with hundreds of others in the Dominican Republic have declared themselves free and have committed themselves to the hard work of struggling to live better.

Recently dug water well where a water system will be installed in the Batey La Cerca. Photo courtesy of SDOP.

And I think of the thousands of people in pews across the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) who each year on Easter Sunday give valuable resources to make the ministry of SDOP, and others, possible and fruitful. Their gifts are testimony to a rich and abiding resurrection spirit alive and well in our church.

As I remember and as I see the faces and recall the names, I am deeply thankful to have been a small part of the vastness that is the Self Development of People. To God be glory, honor and praise.

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