A letter from Les Morgan serving in Bangladesh
December 30, 2015 - Begotten, Not Made
For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God (Romans 8:19a).
I remember the morning we found a baby girl abandoned on the front steps of Christian Mission Hospital in Rajshahi, Bangladesh. Her mother, I imagined, had pressed her lips and cheeks wet with tears against her daughter’s face before whispering goodbye and turning away forever into the dark. Such, I could believe, was the suffering through which this child began her life in the arms of the Church; and as I held her, I loved her.
-1_medium250.jpeg)
Louis Hembrom, a student at St. Andrew’s Theological College in Dhaka, is learning how to minister to the sick and disabled
I thought of adopting the child, but instead entrusted her to the local church and prayed that God would choose a family and help them care for her. Yet the church was poor, and I struggled with the notion that instead of the child growing up with proper clothing, enough food, necessary health care, and a good education, she would suffer from the lack of all these, as so many in Bangladesh do. Indeed, a woman from among the impoverished and oppressed Santal tribal people adopted the child; the woman had never married but wanted to be a mother and so took the abandoned girl into her home. She named her Treesha, and she loved her and provided her all she could; but whenever I visited, my heart ached for the child, just as it aches for all who live in want.
When Treesha was old enough to start school the Church of Bangladesh, upon the mother’s request, placed her in one of the church’s hostels for children of very poor families. There she received clothing, food, health care and education in a secure and disciplined environment. Many of the girls at the hostel are from Santal families, and since it is located in Rajshahi, where I frequently visit, I was able to see Treesha often—and she knows how I held her in her infancy.
For 22 years now I have been visiting Santal villages in the Rajshahi area. Most Santals do not own their own land but instead work as daily laborers in the surrounding rice fields. Earning about $1.50 a day, they live in mud-walled homes with dirt floors and tin roofs and cook on mud stoves molded over small pits in the ground. Many Santals cannot afford basic health care, so when I go to their villages I either run a small clinic or visit the sick in their homes. Most recently I have been helping the Church of Bangladesh set up a program to advocate for health care access for the Santal people and to accompany them through the difficult-to-navigate government clinics and hospitals. The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) supports this outreach and helps Santals receive care at Christian Mission Hospital as well, through contributions to a medical assistance fund.
-2_medium250.jpeg)
Treesha, now 18 years old, actively participates in her church in Rajshahi
During one of my visits to the rural Santal village of Astapukur about 15 years ago I treated a young boy named Louis Hembrom. I met him again a few months ago, this time as his teacher at St. Andrew’s Theological College in Dhaka, the capital. Although his family is poor, he was able to pursue his education with assistance from the Church of Bangladesh; then in high school he felt God’s call to serve as a minister in the church. Now at St. Andrew’s he is in my class entitled “The Healing Ministry of the Church,” which aims to equip future church leaders with the skill and confidence needed to minister to the sick in their communities.
For practical experience my students go to nearby slums in Dhaka to visit people with serious illnesses. Recently I accompanied Louis to the home of a severely disabled Bengali Muslim girl. As I watched him hold and pray for this child, I saw in him deep compassion and an emerging capacity to lead his church in ministry to the sick in the name of Christ.
Treesha’s and Louis’s stories illustrate how the Church of Bangladesh, in partnership with the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), reaches out through health care, education, and evangelism to minister in the name of Jesus Christ to the sick, the impoverished and the lost. Through this work God has called many into the family of faith; in the past 10 years the Church of Bangladesh has baptized and confirmed hundreds of new Santal believers and established 10 new congregations in the Rajshahi area.
Yet Treesha and Louis are examples also of the mystery of the fruits of the Church’s mission. For the raising up of people of faith is not something we can anticipate as we would a return on a carefully planned investment of our resources. God’s children are not outcomes of calculated human efforts but rather the offspring of free, divine love. They are a begotten fruit—begotten, not made. The Holy Spirit knits together the chosen ones in the womb of Christ’s beloved Church, and we wait with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God.
To bear fruit in mission the Church must invite and receive into her arms those who suffer from disease, want or oppression and care for them in the name of Jesus Christ. For without this outreach, the Church’s marriage to Christ will never be consummated, and our life together as communities of faith will remain barren.
Last month I worshiped with a Santal congregation in Rajshahi, and during the service Treesha, now 18 years old, stood in front of the congregation and read from the concluding chapter of Romans in which Paul sends his greetings to the believers in Rome and all the saints who are with them. In my relationships with Treesha, Louis and many others in Bangladesh, God has shown me what every missionary longs to see—the revealing of God’s children, born of his love.
Your fellow servant,
Les
The 2015 Presbyterian Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 232
Read more about Les and Cindy Morgan's ministry
Write to Les Morgan
Write to Cindy Morgan
Individuals: Give online to E200389 for Les and Cindy Morgan's sending and support
Congregations: Give to D506770 for Les and Cindy Morgan's sending and support
Churches are asked to send donations through your congregation’s normal receiving site (this is usually your presbytery).
