The Hope of the Cross

The Sweet Melody of Hope

Little Marie sat against the dirt wall of the house, shivering from the fever that was burning within her. The large boil on her neck bore witness to the seriousness of her condition. In our world this sick little two-year-old girl would have been scooped up off the street and taken to a hospital. But such love and hope that we are so accustomed to in our world was thousands of miles away from Marie as she sat huddled against the wall in her remote African village...or was it?

Davi had arrived in the village that Friday morning, planning to share the gospel message with a family who had expressed an interest on an earlier visit.

Though the country is predominantly Muslim, there is a spiritual thirst in this region greater than what we can respond to with our limited resources. But Davi was there, excited about this new door of opportunity.

Then she saw Marie. Davi is a nurse by training with a missionary heart that doesn't stop. She approached Marie to take a closer look and realized that she needed medical attention.

More than that, she needed a mother. Marie's had died the previous year, leaving her and a two-month-old brother as orphans. Extended family did not have the means to care for her.

For the rest of the day, Marie followed Davi wherever she went. That night she slept next to Davi, groaning all night in pain. The next day, as Davi prepared to leave the village to return with her husband to the city where they lived, she received permission to take little Marie along. There she was taken to the hospital, where her infection was treated and she was released into the care of Davi and her husband.

Every morning for the past several weeks Marie wakes up early and knocks on their bedroom door, calling "yaayi" - the word for mother. Deeply touched by the plight of this child, our CrossWorld workers have decided to ask permission of Marie's relatives to care for her, praying that this will not only give her a future, but will demonstrate to the village in a tangible way the message of love and hope that they bear.

The gospel is, after all, a message of hope. Yet billions have still never heard the sweet strains of its melody. The apostle Paul refers to those without the gospel as "having no hope and without God in the world" (Ephesians 2:12).

Orphaned from their Creator by the spiritual death caused by their sin, they sit huddled in their hopeless condition, far removed from the only One who can rescue them. Though they may not look so hopeless as little Marie, in a spiritual sense they are, and unless someone like Davi enters the picture, their hopelessness will ultimately become an eternal condition.

CrossWorld is entering into some of the most spiritually destitute places in the world and we need more people like Davi to join our team.

Someone has said: "Hope is hearing the melody of the future. Faith is dancing to it now." But it's hard to dance if you can't hear the music.

So let me invite you to consider coming with us to play the melody of hope so that the Maries of the world might learn the dance of faith that they were created for?

Dale Losch
CrossWorld President