There are old men who prophecy about Light spreading out from a mountain-top village with spotty electricity and no plumbing.
They are weathered but not weary. The Light is in their eyes and in their foreign voices you can hear hope, audible hope. These are men made wiser by time, men who've seen and felt destruction and tribal tension, men who've witnessed their own brand of ethnic cleansing at the hands of those who feel superior.
And when we enter their village, the first white people to set shaky feet there, they look at us like we are light and hope.
Or at least carriers.
They tell us of the prophecy and how the church and our coming, how it all must fit. We've come with one of their own, a dear brother of ours and a son of their village, a spearhead and pioneer in this Light-bearing.
They have long endurance. Hope sustains old souls who wait for Light.
The ends of the earth can be the most beautiful and filthy and hungry and full.
Full of that blessed assurance that we in the west work so hard for. Hungry for the spiritual things we stuff ourselves with and for the extras that we toss aside.
Beautiful for the people and not the stuff. Filthy with the sweat and soil of agrarian work and with sin that needed no western introduction.
When the first missionary came bringing Light to the valley below them, he and his wife were unwelcomed. But they were persistent with their gift and some listened, some became disciples and spread Good News. It reached the top of the mountain, it changed their way of life, it turned them from head-hunters to soul-hunters and they took their lanterns and hunted over the border.
From the highest point in the village you can see Burma. Jungles, miles of trails, uncounted thousands living in darkness and wholly forgotten by most.
But the coming of Light brings heat and burning hearts and feet beautiful with the Good News. So it spreads. The hope of old men and the Light of their eyes burns darkened jungles.
If you extend your soul to the hungry And satisfy the afflicted soul, Then your light shall dawn in the darkness, And your darkness shall be as the noonday. - {Isa 58:10 NKJV}
Linking up with Emily at Imperfect Prose, Tell Your Story, and Crystal at Thriving Thursdays