ministering in deed and neglecting the Word

Today I spent the day driving around the village of Amakio Jelel with Terry and Kim looking at some of the newly drilled water wells and meeting with the members of that well club. Terry and Kim are here on their annual trip to visit us and see what has happened in the last year. This year is a little different from previous years because Terry will be staying a couple extra weeks to build windmills. It is our hope that we can begin fabricating windmills to put on some of the wells. We were able to spend time with one well club that had just competed their fifth well and were beginning their sixth. Since the beginning of this year, the well clubs have successfully drilled 31 water wells. We are so thankful God is allowing us to be a part of what He is doing here. It is always encouraging to see the fruit of one's labor.  One of the many benefits of being in the water well drilling business is that you get to see tangible results - almost instantly. Missionaries all over the world are doing great work, being obedient to the ministry God has called them to, and yet many times it is difficult to see fruit or to have any type of quantifiable result. It is difficult to measure spiritual transformation in any quantifiable way, but drilling water wells provides instant gratification. Water for All in Uganda is having a great year and God is really blessing the work and the well clubs with numerous successful water wells. The struggle is that it is easy to just fall into the trap of just drilling water wells and not coupling the humanitarian work with the spiritual. It is really easy to just want to drill wells and let the sharing of my faith and discipling take a backseat. However, meeting people's physical needs without addressing their spiritual needs leaves people in just as hopeless a situation as they were in before gaining access to water. So the struggle is to drill water wells but use that work as a platform, an in, or a tool to form relationships. Out of those relationships, you then have the opportunity to share "the reason" behind the humanitarian work. To share why you are doing what you are doing - God's love. Without a relationship I find most folks have no reason to sit down and talk about Jesus's love and why it compels us to love others as He loves us. Please pray we can fight against the temptation to just drill water wells and neglect the relationships and the sharing of faith that comes out of those relationships.