Go Beyond

Amman, Jordan

I am currently in Beirut, Lebanon where my friend Jamal Hashweh, Director of Global Hope Network, and I spent the day visiting Syrian refugee families in the Bekaa Valley. We will fly back to Amman in the morning to join our Kingsland team. I asked Kelly Boldt, one of our adult sponsors, to report on today’s events in Amman. Thanks, Kelly, for taking the time to write this post. Jamal and I had a 16-hour day and just made it to our hotel room but I will post a report on our time in Lebanon before I go to bed.

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By Kelly Boldt

One of the things we all struggle with when we go abroad to serve others is that we usually don’t have a tangible measure of our success. We will probably never know what happened to many of the families we have visited during our time here. Today I felt like God told our group to power forward.

The first family that my group visited this morning is an extended family of 11 people living in one very small flat. They have been in Jordan from Syria for almost 2 years, which is longer than most of the families we’ve talked to. A certain number of families each year are moved to different countries to start a new life. When I say “family” that means immediate family only.

The particular family we visited is struggling with the decision to leave. Should they leave the rest of their family? Should they go to Sweden or Germany or France? They are very afraid that they won’t be accepted in another country because they are different. Then the father told us that he was trying to listen to what God is telling them to do. As soon as he said that, I knew that he was something special — humble. It doesn’t matter whether you’re in Amman, Jordan or Katy, Texas, it takes a special heart to demonstrate humility.

Then we talked to this man’s sister, her children, and their elderly mother. They were all so gracious and hospitable. During our time with them, they served us Turkish coffee (I have to admit I whispered to Kyle Doe that I’d give him $10 if he’d reach over and discreetly drink mine!), tea, and water.

We could tell they are very warm, loving people just from the smiles on their faces. When we talked about God’s love, they nodded their heads in agreement and looked us straight in the eye. We could tell they trusted us. They told us about their beautiful home in Syria before the war and all their neighbors they loved. Their neighbors were several different religions, including Christian, and they all got along fine because they loved each other.

They told us about a man who owned a pharmacy in their community. He was Christian and he would help anyone — Muslim, Christian, anyone. He would tend to their medical needs on the side and everyone depended on him. Then one day he was gone and never came back. They think this kind and compassionate man may have been kidnapped, but nobody knew for sure. They just knew he was a good man and their impression was that Christians will love you, no matter who you were.

So thank you, Mr. Christian pharmacist, whether you’re still on this earth or experiencing His glory in Heaven. Because of you, we were able to put another link in the chain today that will hopefully lead to the salvation of this family.