The Ministry of Showing Up--Price Family Update 09 June 2006

The MVNU team has left me much to think about.

I thought about how we entered a village in Togo. This “small” village has over 3,000 inhabitants and has many more Togolais who call this village their hometown.

I remember meeting with the chief. I remember how he repeated three or four times how glad he was that we came to see him. He had heard we were coming. He waited for us in the morning, then at noon. He was relieved when we arrived that afternoon. You see, it would have been embarrassing for him if we did not show up. He would have felt slighted, maybe even lost face among his people. But, instead, we honored him just by being there.

But there’s more to it. Cyrille, the regional missionary working in Togo, had paid a visit a couple of weeks before. Villagers get wary of strangers coming in and talking about planting churches. They are afraid of a wanna-be “big man” coming to town selling spiritual “snake oil” and then leaving town with the money offerings and leaving a trail of broken beginnings of people’s faith in something more to this life. Cyrille had told them that he was part of the Church of the Nazarene International. He did not come alone or only in his name, but in the name of Christ and a church family from around the world.

The village chief told us that day during our visit that Cyrille was true to his word. He believed him to be a man of truth, since we were evidence that the Church of the Nazarene is truly International. I added that when the Church of the Nazarene is finally planted in that village, it will be one of 16,000 churches spread around the globe. Alo-gebo, the name of that village in southern Togo, will be known and prayed for by hundreds even thousands of fellow believers around the globe. The chief smiled and his council applauded. And, you know that when we arrived in that place, we came as ambassadors for Christ, all because we showed up.

A week later, we visited Ouidah, the site of the Temple of Pythons, the sacred center of the voudun traditional religion. We did not pass out tracts or do a gospel puppet show or preach on the street corners shouting quotations of the Roman Road. Instead, we piled out of the bus and walked around the temple square, praying as we walked underneath the ancient tree filled with fruit bats, past the women selling chickens for traditional sacrifices, and among the half-dressed children.

We knelt down to look in the face of children, speak greetings in Fon to the women there, and pray. We saturated that place for a few minutes with the presence of Christ. We simply showed up. We stood together with Africans, not as ones who know more or have more, but as equals. By simply showing up. We stood in solidarity. We stood and shared a taste of the kingdom of God with them. By simply showing up. We arrived in the name of Christ. We went as Christ’s ambassadors. By simply showing up. We know an African pastor and African evangelistic team will be better at presenting the Gospel message and planting a church in Ouidah. We wanted to prepare the soil. By simply showing up.