December 13, 2006
Dear Friends,
As the birth date of our Lord approaches, we are hoping for a
perfect Christmas present: our return to Congo! Mike has his six-month
post-treatment CAT scan and evaluation on December 15 and an appointment
with the oncologist on the 19th. He feels good and, God willing,
we hope to return to Congo shortly after that visit. Please pray
for good news!
The presidential elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo
have been concluded, with the incumbent Joseph Kabila as the winner.
Thanks be to God that there was less violent activity and chaos
than was expected throughout this electoral process. Please pray
that this landmark election will be the beginning of long-awaited
good governance and recovery for the people of the DRC.
Dr. Martin Price, ECHO's senior agricultural resource director.
We have just returned from a wonderful conference on nutritional
support for persons living with HIV/AIDS. The conference was held
at ECHO farms in North Fort Myers, Florida. ECHO is a one-of-a-kind
institution that studies and experiments with different varieties
of tropical plants and cultivation techniques. They are a Christian
organization dedicated to helping missionaries who are helping
the poor grow food. We recommend their
Web site. A personal visit is also worthwhile for anyone traveling
in the area of Fort Myers. They are really great people, and you
would marvel at their abundant garden.
We all know the expression “You are what you eat,”
but we typically pay too little mind to it. In Genesis 1:29, God
said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of
the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it.
They will be yours for food.” We were instructed to eat
a variety of plants and God-made abundance, yet we typically choose
only a few and often eat the least nutritious parts of the plants.
We spent a healthy week eating from this garden while we took
part in the workshop in which experts demonstrated how to grow
more nutritious foods with simple techniques based on Scripture
and science. God intended for all to prosper and to eat well,
but as we have become a culture of money, we have lost so much
of the knowledge of how to prosper in His garden. The impact is
particularly hard on the poor, who cannot benefit from the large-scale
cultivation of our factory farms. Where there was abundance and
variety in the land, there is now erosion and destruction of the
soils and limited crop growth in quantity, quality, and variety.
As the lumber in trees became valuable, they were sacrificed,
and their protection of the land was lost. Deforestation and the
loss of knowledge of ancient farming practices have left the earth
barren. Rediscovery and reintroduction of variety in plants and
moving to farming practices that clothe the naked earth in a blanket
of vegetation will allow the earth to heal while increasing food
production.
You may have heard of the movie “Blood Diamonds”
(see Amnesty International's report on Conflict
Diamonds). Some will claim, defensively, that “things
are different now.” But come to Congo and you will see that
we who live in the rich world don’t want to know the truth.
The poor suffer to give the rich their diamonds. Today, children
work the mines like moles, crawling in tunnels that cave in. When
the miners are paid, it is a pittance. The wealth from these diamonds
and other minerals fuels the corruption of politicians and fills
their secret offshore banking accounts. Those minerals are sold
through middlemen who are “legitimate” businessmen.
What gets returned to the land are guns used to control the people
(see IRIN's report, “Guns
Out of Control: the continuing threat of small arms).
There are no large animals in central Congo where we live. They
were killed as a result of continual conflicts between rival militias.
When a militia retreats, they steal what they can from the fields,
then burn them. They kill and rape villagers, burn their houses,
and kill all the animals, domesticated or wild. In this way, their
enemy will have no food. This leaves the people with no possessions
and takes away the abundance that God gave them. This allows the
leaders to be rich by selling those minerals to the wealthy world.
This is the story of Africa from the days of slavery to today.
Whether the people are stolen from their land to work in slavery
in a foreign land or forced to work as economic slaves in their
own lands, the effect is the same. The people suffer and die.
Is this what God wants? Our time in the United States has allowed
us to renew ourselves, just as we have spoken of the soil renewing
itself. We have renewed friendships and made those anew. We are
reminded of the good hearts of so many people in our visits to
your churches. We pray that the next newsletter that you receive
from us will be written in the Congo.
With God, and through all of us, His children, all things are
possible.
Merry Christmas, thanks, and our love,
Mike and Nancy
The 2006 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p.
317
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