Late-morning our translators made the decision that we’d start making our way back through the community to the church where our bus was parked.
We crossed the tiny stream, walked up the embankment, down the side street, across the Main Street and alllll the way down the street we’d walked the previous days.
Just passed the house of an older man named Julio we met on our first day in the neighborhood and have stopped to say hi to every day since, right before we were going to turn left, two of my teammates saw a blind woman with a few bags of groceries opening the gate to her house. They both looked over their shoulders at me before I hurried up to join them and walked through the gate behind this woman.
She led us around her neighbors house to her own. We small talked for a little bit while M* unlocked her house and took her groceries inside. (*name withheld for privacy)
I sat outside with a teammate on the concrete half-wall that edged her porch.
M then started pulling plastic chairs out onto the porch for my other teammate, our translator, and herself to sit in.
That’s one thing about the Dominican, it seems like everybody has an abundance of plastic chairs and can be ready to host a small crowd for conversation on a mere moments notice.
We talked for a little about how long she had lived in the house. She shared with us about how long she had been blind and when her husband passed away.
We shared about the organization we were with, and that we were Christian missionaries. She told us she loves the Word of God.
At one point, someone asked how she manages navigating alone.
She said, “God helps me to see.”
I asked her how long she had been a Christian.
She said she wasn’t.
My teammates and I were a little caught off guard by that response.
We asked if she knew what the gospel was.
She said, “yes… sort of.”
So my teammate Zachary shared the full gospel with her, and talked about the miracles of Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit alive in us today.
She said, “yes I believe all of that, I believe it in my heart.”
Our translator started to get a little confused now too.
I asked her, if she believes everything about the gospel, and loves the Word of God, and has Jesus in her heart, why does she not call herself a Christian?
“Because I’m Catholic.
And we really don’t know which religion will save us.”
I got to share with her that there is no religion that will save us, but the Bible says that we are saved by grace alone through faith alone, and that Jesus is who saves us.
And then I got to explain to her that “Christian” is a word we’ve put on a set of character traits and religious traditions, when biblically Christian meant “little Christ” or a follower of Christ.
She thought about that for a little bit, smiled and said, “I understand, I guess I am a Christian then.”
We told her how Jesus healed the sick, lame, and blind simply by laying a hand on them.
I held her hand and we prayed fervently for her eyes to be opened.
After a few minutes, we asked if she could see anything better.
She said no and put her glasses back on.
We prayed again, English and Spanish and Creole all being sent up to the God of the Universe on behalf of this sweet woman in front of us.
We asked again if she could see anything better, she smiled and said no again.
We continued to talk with her for a while longer, until the pastor we were in the community with came and found us and told us we needed to go back to the church for lunch.
We wished her well, promised that we’d continue to pray for her provision and protection and said our goodbyes.
For the rest of the day, I kept thinking about her. Wondering about her day-to-day. Wondering why the Lord didn’t open her eyes.
Later, I was telling my friend and squad mate Madison about the day.
I explained the conversation we had with this woman, about sharing the gospel and clarifying that religion doesn’t not save us, and that we had prayed for her eyes to be opened and that we had prayed again.
“But they weren’t,” I said.
Madison stared at me for a little bit, and then said so gently, “yes there were. Her eyes were opened to the truth of what following Jesus really means, and her eyes were opened to the fact that He is the only one that saves us.”
Amen and amen.
Her eyes were indeed opened right in front of us.
What an honor and a privilege and a gift. God is so sweet to us.
Please pray:
- for M. That the Lord would continue to protect and provide for her. That her faith would grow deep and that a community of people would come alongside her to be her friend.
- for our squad leaders. Our alumni squad leaders are currently training our raised up squad leaders to take over and start steering the ship that is N squad. Pray for Madison and Josh, that they would lead with humility and grace, and that the Lord would protect them in every way.
- for Wild + Free. We have been sharing our testimonies over the past few days. Pray that our team would be one that runs hard after the Lord with our hearts both wild for Him and free to be whatever and whoever He calls us to be.
