Who Could Write A Story Like That?
She’s the woman always behind the scenes.
Jennie Thompson, our CCWM Missions Development Director.
“I can do that!” easily flows from her heart right out of her mouth and into some kind of necessary needed action of service.
Jennie is a worker bee, a get the job done kind of person who is always there when you need her.
Maybe that’s why I wasn’t surprised when Jennie (an English only speaker) came to me with a fully developed children’s Gospel tract booklet…in Spanish. She had solved a problem without even being asked and as I looked over her booklet my heart noticed not only the exceptional work, but the steady excitement building in the room about how these little books could be used.
Weeks prior, one of our newest missionaries at CCWM voiced his struggle to Jennie and I over a zoom connect we had scheduled with him. David Karamanis is a podiatrist who has been challenged by the Lord to take his work to the places most don’t want to go. You can follow David here but it’s going to take some commitment to keep up with him. David is traveling week by week to new places. You’ll discover him in wild, overgrown jungles and dangerous areas of the cities overgrown with refugee camps— He’s there, taking care of feet. The lovely feet of those who bring good news (Romans 10:15) are helping the hurting feet of the people on our globe who are, in many aspects, forgotten.
The problem
David is most of the time, a one man mission.
and there are a LOT of people who wait a LONG time to be seen by him when he sets up his makeshift clinics in these harder to reach areas of our world.
David is a podiatrist, called to serve the underserved. Yet he recognized the perfect opportunity to share the Gospel with with them was being missed.
He needed help, but as of yet there isn’t a long line of folks wanting to join David on his somewhat maverick mission.
“I wish I had some kind of children’s book to hand out with the story of God’s love.” David expressed.
“I can do that!”
Jennie had responded in her heart but didn’t say it out loud.
A little background on Jennie
From a very young age, Jennie felt a call to missions. It’s all she ever dreamed of for many years.
But life happened and one thing after another and before she knew it she was still dreaming about it as a Grandma. When Jennie applied to work here at CCWM we saw her missionary heart and leapt at the opportunity to have her join us. And I’m certain it was a God wink for all involved.
Nearing one year later, we are the lucky ones.
The solution
“What do you think of these?” Jennie was holding the little Spanish color books in her hand.
“Nice, where did you get them?” I asked her, thinking of how useful the color book tracks would be to David.
“I made them!” Jennie shared. She told me about her effort to get the Spanish just right, utilizing one of our Nxt Gen Student’s Spanish teacher who jumped in to help with the endeavor.
David was on his way into the Ecuadorian jungle and she wanted to send him the PDF version so he could print them off before he arrived on his off the grid mission.
I marveled at Jennie’s work. And I mean really marveled. Not because it was some kind of state of the art prize winning Gospel tract but rather because Jennie had done it and now they were headed from this little office in midwestern USA to Ecuador. Just like that.
And isn't that quite a story?
The things we can do with our one simple life. If we’re willing to just show up where He tells us to.
“I should have printed more.”
David texted…as he emerged from the jungle.
He told us how the kids loved them and that he felt a missing piece had been placed into his mission.
“Thanks Jennie.” He texted.
And I marveled some more.
Here those little books went from Jennie’s heart all they way to Ecuador, with the help of a traveling podiatrist missionary…from Australia.
Suddenly David had a team. The one man mission had turned into two (four if you count the Next Gen Student and his Spanish teacher)
Who could write of a story like that?
“He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.”
