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| Dr. Michael Christensen, Rev. Clarissa Holland and Pastor Dennis Singini |
Dennis, a circuit-riding pastor in Malawi, is
program coordinator for CitiHope Malawi, in charge of food[1]
and medical distributions and HIV/AIDS training for churches[2].
Dennis also works for WorldHope Corps in Malawi on its
Well-rig crew, drilling deep-water wells for villages without a clean water
supply (see previous posts).
And Dennis also serves as a Regional Shalom Trainer
in Malawi for Communities of Shalom International, based at Drew
University. He was in NJ this week as
part of Drew’s certification program for regional Shalom Trainers meeting at
the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association for their annual 36-hour Training of
Trainers event.
He shared today with the Green Village congregation about
“What God is doing in Malawi” in relation to 2 Cor. 8:7-15 and Gal 3:28.
The 2 Corinthians passage refers to the “Manna
Provision” in Exodus, about how “those
who gathered much did not gather too much, and those who gathered little did not
gather too little, so that all had what they needed.” (Exo 16:18)
In Northern Malawi, Dennis explained, “there are
families who went to church this morning without having anything to eat today.
There are villages without a clean water source, where a shallow well or a
stream [with contaminated water] is the only place to go. A dog will drink from this stream, a cow will
drink from this stream, and children will drink from this same stream.”[3] In his role as overseeing pastor of 11 small,
poor congregations in remote villages, Dennis sees first hand “how farmers don’t
even harvest enough for their own families.”
Galatians 3:28, Dennis reminded us today, “says that
there is no Jew or Gentile, there is no Male or Female, there is no Slave of
Free, but we are one in Christ Jesus.
Therefore we should care about each other and love each other equally in
Christ. I’m sure none of you have had to
sleep with farm animals; none of you have had to eat grain with chickens, just
because you were HIV positive. But I
tell you; this is what is happening in Malawi.
And we who are Christians should love each other, and accept each other,
even if we have HIV.”
Rev. Clarissa Holland, Pastor of the UMC in Green
Village, emphasized the desperate conditions in Malawi, and how the orphan care and feeding center she visited a few years on a WorldHope Corps mission trip recently closed because they ran out of food
and funds. She urged members and
friends to literally ‘share their food with the hungry.’
You can literally save lives by helping Dennis with his ministry
to families affected by HIV/AIDS, to children without enough food to eat, and to villagers without clean water. You can contribute online to www.WorldHopeCorps.org
or by sending a charitable gift to the following address:
WorldHope Corps, Inc.
P.O. Box 295
Madison, NJ 07940
973-714-0023
[1] CitiHope’s Food for Peace, funded by USAID, is a nutritional Dehydrated Vegetable
Soup supplement distributed to HIV orphans and other vulnerable children and
families in northern Malawi.
[2] Pastoral and Congregational
Training Care Training (PACCT) recently received a $10,00 grant from the United
Methodist Global AIDS Fund for their outstanding, church-based, HIV/AIDS
training in rural villages.
[3]
According to WHO, one out of five children die from water-borne diseases in
villages where there is no clean water supply.
WorldHope Corps recently procured its own well rig to continue its
village well program begun in 2008.
WorldHope Corps has drilled 18 deep-water wells so far, and seeks
sponsors for its 2012 village well program.