One of Many Gospel Bridges to the Unreached
One of the things Nurul most disliked about the home for widows in Indonesia was the joy an elderly Christian woman there exuded.
Nurul disliked most things about her life – the physical and emotional ravages of 68 years, the recent death of her husband and her adult children not making room for her in their homes, among other things – and she could not stand that another widow, Amelia, could sing and smile so much in the home for widows and orphans.
Besides having no money, Amelia had no children or other relatives to care for her, Nurul thought; was she demented? Nurul seethed. She liked to joke that she had been left to a home for abandoned children and abandoned grandmas.
To be widowed for many elderly women in Indonesia was to be doomed to poverty, and at last Nural had to ask Amelia: “Why are you so happy and not afraid of dying alone, with no one to bury you?”
Besides having no money, Amelia had no children or other relatives to care for her, Nurul thought; was she demented?
“I am very happy because Someone cares for me, even though I have no kids to take care of me,” Amelia replied. “I am happy because I don’t care about the body, I just care that my soul will be saved.”
Though a living witness to Christ, Amelia felt she needed help to explain the wondrous person of Jesus. She called the director of the native ministry that runs the home and asked him to visit so she could introduce him to Nurul.
“When we were talking and mentioning Jesus, Nurul asked, ‘Who is Jesus?’” the director said. “After telling her about Him and discussing her life, how she suffered and caused suffering, Nurul decided to follow Jesus.”
Then one of Nurul’s children found a way to take her in, and she was reunited with family members – until she told her Hindu relatives about her faith in Jesus. They let her stay for only three months.
“Because she became a Christian, no one cared for her and she had to go out from the community,” the director said. “So, she stays with us in the house for old people.’
Abandoned again, but this time wedded to Christ, Nurul has found the same kind of joy that Amelia and many other Indonesians have found as a result of the work of hundreds of native missionaries.
Many have also left family members for fellowship with God and Christian communities, thanks to the faith and witness of native missionaries throughout Indonesia. The home for widows and orphans is just one of many means by which native missionaries proclaim Christ in the country. Please consider a gift today to help spread the saving knowledge of God’s Son to people marooned on islands of sin.