Another View for Jan. 6, 2005
By Erich Bridges
For days, maybe even weeks, many Christians will focus on the staggering human suffering in southern Asia.
You're probably one of them. You've been moved by the heartrending stories of death and survival. You've shed some tears. Perhaps you've already contributed to relief efforts or plan to do so. You've prayed for the families who have lost loved ones.
But soon you'll grow weary of the avalanche of stories of sadness and loss. Your daily life will crowd back in with its many demands. The new year will bring new crises. The news inevitably will return to Iraq, the economy and other matters-and your attention will shift away from the people of southern Asia.
Please, don't let that happen this time.
Throughout their annual Christmas season of giving to international missions, many Southern Baptists focused specifically on South Asia. They prayed for the hundreds of millions of people in the region. They gave to the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering that the people of South Asia in particular might hear the gospel of Jesus Christ.
That-and the timing of this monumental tragedy-cannot be a coincidence.
Many of the places hit the hardest are difficult to reach physically, cut off by rebel insurgencies, wracked by ethnic conflict. Sri Lanka, for example, has been plagued by a long-running battle between the government and the Tamil Tiger guerrilla movement.
The devastated Andaman Islands of India are very difficult for outsiders to reach without government approval. The Maldive Islands-home to up to 400,000 inhabitants-are solidly Muslim and resist ministry by any Christian agency.
In the wake of the tsunamis, the countries hit are the least capable financially to address the overwhelming needs. Yet, with a minimum wage of less than $5 per day, one little Thai Baptist church promised $500 to aid others. Another group of 20 church members gathered $3,000 to buy rice to send to the affected areas.
“The need is more than just containers of supplies,” said Paul Hattaway, an expert on Asia's unreached tribes and peoples. “It is more than throwing mineral bottle water from moving trucks-and feeling like they have done their part. It is about sitting down with a mother who has lost her husband and children, and praying with her, and helping her to put the bottle of water on her lips and nourish her.
“Only the church can do that.”
Baptist Press
Erich Bridges is a senior writer for the Southern Baptist Convention's International Mission Board.