Beans and Rice Evangelism

Several weeks ago I was back in the States sitting in church thinking about ways that I could intentionally look more like Jesus. Everywhere Jesus went, He drew people to Himself. Everywhere He went, He served and healed.

I want to live in such a way that not only do people see Jesus in me but they see Jesus manifested in the things that I do. I am certainly not perfect, I fall down and sometimes my life looks messy. But because of the blood of Jesus Christ that is not how He sees me. I can come before Him riddled with sin and brokenness, and as I ask for forgiveness, He washes me in His blood. I am no longer a stained believer. I am a daughter that is pure, clean, and completely forgiven. He does not see me for my sins but sees me through the veil of His blood. As a disciple of Jesus, I am seen as His daughter, His bride, His warrior, and His servant.

That is one of the things I love about my job at LiveBeyond, not only do I get to serve the Haitians, but I first and foremost get to serve Jesus. Every day I teach a class to our Haitian staff about how we can be bold, be warriors, and be confident in sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Part of my job includes going out into the villages and sharing the gospel with the people I meet and seeking out voodoo priests to tell them about the victory that happened on the cross and the redemption found in the blood of Jesus.

As I was sitting in church thinking, I realized that as Jesus taught, He provided a service whether that was food or healing. This is something that I decided I want to emulate. I am certainly no doctor, but I know I can clean cuts and put on band-aids and tell about the King of Kings who can raise the dead to life. So from this, the idea for beans and rice evangelism was born. I got back to Haiti and talked to our Haitian cook about making a pot of beans and rice so that I could carry it to the neighboring village and as people ate Pastor Sargesse and I could share the gospel.

Per usual, I had so many ideas of what was going to happen and naturally, most of them were completely wrong. But praise the Lord because He has moved each time and every day I am so humbled to be a part of His gospel being shared in Thomazeau. On the first day, we went to Cai Soda to the center of the village where they have a water pump. I sat in the dirt and immediately children half dressed, barefoot, and dirty came running up to get some food. Even though adults were standing around, I was floored that they wanted the children to eat first before they themselves got a plate. As Pastor Sargesse preached to the adults, I got to do something that I have never done before and quite frankly something I have never wanted to do before; preach to children. I have never been the type to want to babysit, teach Sunday school, or naturally gravitate towards children but I couldn’t help but smile as kids with their cheeks filled with beans excitedly told me they knew the name of Jesus.

Over the last few weeks, I have seen a very small glimpse of why Jesus called the children to Himself. They are eager, excited, and filled with more love than they can share. I very quickly learned that the pot that Mauna had cooked for us was not big enough for the growing crowds we have had every time we have gone into different villages. The idea that people are coming because they are physically hungry and are leaving not only with full bellies, but also with full spirits fills me with hope that this region of Haiti will turn from the kingdom of darkness towards the Kingdom of Light.

There have been days that I have thought that to be successful in sharing the gospel you have to have big stages, large crowds, and loud speakers and all of those things are absolutely great but I am so humbled that one pot of beans and rice has been used to multiply the believers in villages in Thomazeau!

Sometimes being the hands and feet of Jesus looks like a pot of beans and rice. But it always looks like plundering hell and populating Heaven.

#LiveBeyond #livebeyond #evangelism #missionary