Beautiful Feet

Death is often an unwelcome visitor in many mud-hut villages in the Northern Region of Ghana, West Africa. The death of a father leaves the wife and children with no income or way of support. That translates into no food for the family.

Many times I have been asked why the other villagers do not "take in" the widow and her children, now viewed as orphans, and take care of them. The answer is simple. Most of them are unable to feed their own families, much less others.

So what happens to these widows and orphans? Many of them become sick and die way too soon. Some of them eventually die from starvation. Some of them find a way to eek out a meager existence by gleaning in nearby wheat fields. Some of them spend hours and hours in the bush picking up shea nuts, drying them, pounding them and the selling them in the local market for a few pennies. All of the children are put to work hauling water and searching for food, which means they do not attend school. It is a vicious vicious cycle.

THIS.IS.NOT.RIGHT.  THIS. SHOULD. NOT. BE. SO.

Doesn't God's Word say that we are to help take care of them?  Aren't we commanded to do more than just love with words?  Aren't we told to visit them in their distress? Doesn't Jesus tell us that when we are serving them we are serving Him?

Let me say it again.  Doesn't Jesus tell us that when we are serving them we are serving Him?

And when we do, God says:

"How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!"