Missions Conference - Part 1 — Paris Reidhead

Shall we bow in prayer? Our Father in Heaven, we lift our hearts to Thee tonight to thank and praise Thee that Thou has given to us the privilege of being laborers together with Thee. And now we're asking that the sense of Thy presence will become more real than all else beside.

We do rejoice, Father, that Thou art here. Minister to us, grant to us, Father, that it will not just be a meeting when we've met with one another about Thee, but that we've heard from Thee. For what Thou didst do, we'll give Thee all the praise in Jesus' name, Amen.

The Church’s Mission in Acts 1:8

Now I want you to turn to Acts chapter 1 and verse 8. I want you to turn because I'm going to read it and I wouldn't be surprised at what I make an error. And I want to be checked up if I do. Hi, Brother Duggan, how are you?

It's so nice to see you. This is good. Now I want you to listen carefully because there is a possibility there could be an error and I don't want to have it get slipped through. Now you're listening. You're on it.

You're cued up. But ye shall receive power. After that, the Holy Ghost is come upon you, and ye shall be witnesses unto me, either in Jerusalem or in Judea or in Samaria or unto the uttermost part of the earth.

Now I'm wondering if you would agree that that was a correct reading. You don't. You disagree. How strange. That's the way the Church is practicing it. Why don't we change the Scripture to conform to our practice if we're unwilling to change our practice to conform to the Scripture?

I think it's foolish for us to read something and do something else. Now it's an either-or situation with most of God's dear children. I believe the reason is that most of us don't understand the difference between either-or and both-and.

I think we think they are the same. Now that's at a certain age that occurs. Younger, they know. For instance, my little four-year-old son, when he was four years old, that was a long time ago, knew the difference.

I came back from a missionary conference where I'd been out to, well, several conferences. I'd been away for about five weeks. And Jimmy had been asking, when is Daddy coming? When is Daddy coming? And his mother had been telling him a certain day.

And he was there to meet me. Oh, I never had such effusive warmth from my little son. He would come to me. He was a shadow. If I went into the house, he was there. Out, he was there to the car. He just was right with me.

And when I'd gotten all that I had to take out of the car in the house, he said, Daddy, let's go for a walk. Just a bright idea. It just occurred to him for about a week. And so we started to walk. I said, which way, Jim?

Now, we could have gone to the left, which was a pleasant walk, up around a little hill and come back to the front. We were living on a hill, and we could have gone around us. Or we could have gone to the right, or we could have gone down the front steps.

And he looked for a minute, and he said, let's go this way, which was around the house, down the steps to the road. Now we could have turned right and gone up around the other way and come back. Or we could go left.

Which way should we go, Jimmy? Let's go left, this way. Which was about a half a block down to Brainerd Road, which was a busy thoroughfare there in Chattanooga, Tennessee. And there was a stoplight, and we came to it.

He said, should we want to go here? No, let's cross the street, Daddy. But you've got to wait, because you've got to wait until that light. He was already teaching me how to cross the street. And I said, well, you tell me when we should go.

He said, now we can go. So we went across the street. Now we could have gone right, which was up to the tunnel under Missionary Ridge there. Or we could have gone left, which was further down Brainerd Road.

It wasn't much up toward the hill, but there were some stores down the other way. So he said, oh, let's go this way. And so we went down there about a half a block. And all of a sudden, my little four-year-old said, Daddy, there's a drugstore.

Can I have an ice cream cone? Well, I realized I'd been conned by an expert. I mean, this was a set-up job if I'd ever seen one. Whole idea was to get that ice cream cone. So when you've been conned, you better just roll, go with the flow, you know.

So I said, sure, you can have an ice cream cone. I went in. I told the woman behind the fountain. I said, pack it, because he's a roller, you know, flips them like this, and they've got to be pretty well anchored or they're going to roll down the floor.

So she's there trying to screw that ice cream down into the cone so it'll stay. And Jimmy's there, no air conditioning, hot, hot day. And they put some Hershey's, little Hershey's Kisses there in a plastic bag, and he has these, and he's coming to me, and I can just see him squish because it's warm.

And he said, Daddy, can I have these Hershey's? Now, I know why he wanted the chocolate. He didn't particularly like it. But his brother loved it. If his brother had been Esau, it wouldn't have been a mess of pottage.

It would have been a box of chocolate. He loved it. He just wanted it. And Jimmy could trade him out of his ITs with that. So he wanted to take that back and get some of the things that his brother had that he wanted.

Well, you've got to stop somewhere, don't you? So I said, now, Jimmy, you can have either the chocolate, which was now in my hand, or the ice cream, which was also in my hand. So my little four-year-old looks at the ice cream, which he'd wanted so badly, and he looked at the chocolate, which he realized he could trade with his brother.

And he looked back at the ice cream, and then he looked at the chocolate, and just a big blood drop of ice cream hit the back of my hand. Well, you better understand when you're licked, you know. And I bought them both, regardless of what happened.

So I became magnanimous. So I said, Jimmy, just this once, you can have both. His face lightened up. His eyes brightened. His little hands reached out, and he took the chocolate in one hand and the ice cream in the other.

That started ice. But he knew the difference between either-or or both-and. But how sad that the Church of Christ doesn't know the difference. We think the Lord said, either in Jerusalem or unto the uttermost part of the earth.

And he never said that. He said, after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you. You shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem and unto the uttermost part of the earth. And he didn't use the words carelessly.

He intended it to be just the way he said. Now there's a biblical, historical, scriptural reason for it. I want you to turn over to Romans, the fourth chapter. You must understand why the Lord Jesus said both-and, not either-or.

Abraham’s Promise and the Worldwide Ministry of the Church

I think it will be sufficient if I begin reading with verse 13. Romans 4, 13, and we'll conclude with 17 and comment on the way. For the promise that he, Abraham, should be heir of the world, was not to Abraham or to his seed through the law, but through the righteousness of faith.

For if they which are of the law be heirs, faith is made void, and the promise made of none effect. Because the law worketh wrath, for where no law is, there's no transgression. Therefore, it is of faith that it might be by grace.

To the end, the promise might be sure to all the seed. Not to that only which is of the law or the natural generation, the natural heirs or successors of Abraham, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all.

As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations before him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead and calleth those things which be not as though they were. Now what was the promise made to Abraham?

Indeed, and in thy seed shall all nations of the earth be blessed. And that promise is not just to Abraham's literal physical seed, the Jews, those of Israel, but we're told here, those who like father Abraham believed God and their faith was counted to them for righteousness.

We too, therefore, are the children of Abraham through faith and heirs of the promise. And thus it was consistent for the Lord Jesus Christ to say, after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you, you shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the uttermost part of the earth, because every one of Abraham has an heir to the promise.

Indeed, and in thy seed shall all nations of the earth be blessed. We all, therefore, that are in Christ, are expected to have a worldwide ministry for Christ. Now that's the word of God. That's not something Paris Reid had invented.

That's something that God has made clear in his word. I was at Monterey, Massachusetts, New England, Keswick, when Robert McQuilkin, the founder of Columbia Bible College, came to visit his sister, who was Mrs. Thomas Lambe.

Tom Lambe was a great missionary doctor from Ethiopia. And Tom Lambe had a cottage right near Monterey, the New England, Keswick. And Robert McQuilkin was there, and the director of the New England, Keswick, asked Dr. McQuilkin to speak to the Sudan Interior Mission candidates that were there for their month of in-house examination.

We were there being tested as to whether or not we would be accepted as missionaries. And I'll not ever forget, long as I have memory, I'll remember the afternoon when Dr. McQuilkin stood before us with his open Bible and unfolded to us the promise that was made to Abraham, coming to us as the heirs of salvation.

That every one of us were heirs of that promise and had the privilege of a worldwide ministry for Christ. And he took us to that Acts 1 -8 and said, Here are the spiritual resources with which this is to be accomplished.

After that, the Holy Ghost is come upon you. You shall be witnesses in all the world, both hands. Now, how does it work? What are some of the ways by which this is to be accomplished? Some of the methods that God uses to accomplish it.

A Scottish Woman’s Local Ministry to Bobby

One of the early records of missionary ministry was an event that occurred in Scotland many, many decades back, nearly going on 200 years ago, not quite. But there in Scotland were some people that had an awakened missionary vision because of what God had done through the Moravians and through John Wesley and through the revivals that had taken place.

There was a growing missionary interest. In Scotland was a church that had a missionary-minded, missionary-hearted pastor. And in that church was a woman, an unmarried woman, caring for her parents who was burdened about a country just beginning to come to the attention of the world, China.

And she wanted to be a missionary to China. And she prayed every day for China. Her heart was breaking for China. But of course, being a woman with family responsibility, she couldn't go to China. But she said, Lord, somehow use me to bless China.

Well, that was before the Lord was her burden. One Saturday afternoon, she had gone downtown shopping to get the things that the family needed for the Lord's Day, which was a very important day in Scottish Christian families.

She was walking down one of those cobble-paved streets past a little narrow alley that led off into some Rabbit Warren-type housing for the poor. And a little boy burst out of the alley, running, sobbing, crying, and bumped into her leg and fell down on the cobbles and lay there sobbing.

And she reached down, took a handkerchief from her pocket, wiped his face, wiped his runny nose, raised him up, looked at him, smiled. First kind word he'd heard for a long time, I suppose. And she said, well, what's the matter, laddie?

What's the matter? Oh, he says, my father's drunk again. And he's been beating me. And he's chasing me. And he hasn't found me. He isn't here. No, he's not. No one's chasing you, Bob. He got away from you.

I said, what's your name, lad? He said, well, my name is Bobby, Mom. And she talked to him a little while. She said, they walked down the street. They passed a church. She said, Bobby, do you ever go to church?

What? Me? These are all the clothes I have to my name, Mom. Look at me. I've got rags and dirt. Only the swells go into the church. Sometimes I hold the horses for the people that are there. But I couldn't go in there.

They wouldn't have the likes of me. And so she said, Bobby, would you like to go? Yes. I hear the words. And I like the music. I'd like to go. And so she said, well, I'll get you some clothes. So she detoured, went into a store, bought him clothes all the way up.

Underwear, socks, shoes, little pants, shirt. Gave him the bundles and said, now take it home. Take a bath. Put them on. And meet me right where we bumped into each other, there by the alley tomorrow, and go to church with me.

So for several weeks, that's what happened. Then one Sunday when she came, he wasn't there. And she looked for him. He wasn't there the next Sunday. He wasn't there the following Sunday. And then she spied him, and she called him, and he came.

Said, what's the matter, Bobby? Oh, he said, you know, I hid the bundle with my clothes. When I get home from church, I take them off and wrap them up, and I put them under my bed. But my father was looking for something to pawn so he could get a drink.

And he saw the little bundle, and he took it down to the pawn shop and sold it for enough to get drunk again. And I was ashamed to tell you. She said, Bobby, that's all right. Come, we'll go to the store.

So she took him back, but she said, this time, we'll do it differently. This time, I'll keep them at my house. And you come to my house, and you can take a bath and put the clothes on, and then we'll go to church.

So for months and months and years, Bobby would come. He would use their home, put on the clothes, go to church. She helped him go to school, helped him. She tutored him so he could go to school. And then he went on and on, and one day he came to her and said, you know, I've asked Jesus to come into my heart, and he has.

That's what she'd been praying for. And later on, he said, I feel the Lord Jesus wants me to serve him, but I'll have to be trained. She said, I'll help you, Bobby. And so she helped him get the preparation so he could go and get the training.

Stayed with him, helped him all through the years. Well, the scene changes. Many, many years later, this dear woman has gone to be with the Lord. It's out in China, late at night, a bare table, a candlestick, and a large pile of paper.

Kneeling on the floor with his hands against the side of the table is a man whose face is lined, whose hair is prematurely gray. And he's got his hands on that paper, and he's dedicating it to the Lord.

Who is it? It's Robert Morrison, first missionary to China, the first translation of the Bible, or part of it, into the Chinese language. Who is Robert Morrison? He's the Wee Bobby of Edinburgh. You shall be witnesses both in Edinburgh and under the uttermost part of the earth.

Witnessing Locally and Globally

She understood. She realized that she was an heir to the promise made to Abraham, and thee, and thy seed shall all nations of the earth be blessed. You're to be a witness for Christ where you are. You can't by escape from the responsibility to witness because you give to mission.

It's not a license to disobey. It's not indulgence that permits you to lose concern with the people that live next door to you because you give to somebody in some distant land. As we've heard said, the light that shines the farthest must shine the brightest at its base.

And he who's got a heart for the uttermost part of the world must have the burden for the people that he knows and sees. It's a lot easier to give money to someone whose face you've never seen than it is to talk with someone whose lawnmower goes where yours go, right side by side.

But the Lord Jesus has said you're to be witnesses both in your Jerusalem, and Judea, and Samaria, and on the uttermost part of the earth. Well, we understand how we're to be witnesses here. We know what we're to do for the lost neighbors.

You know that there are certain things that you must do if people are to come to Christ. You've got to live before them as a sample of God's grace. We saw that Sunday night. You must intercede for them, legally represent them before the throne of God because God gave man the power to choose to go to hell and he doesn't take that power away from them until either the sinner or the sinner's legal representative asks him to.

And we have been made to be kings and priests unto God. He didn't ask us if we wanted to be. He said, unto him who loved us, who washed us in his blood, and made us to be kings and priests. Made us. And consequently then for these people next to us, we must not only live Christ before them, realizing that to some we're the very best Christian they've ever seen or will ever know.

We not only must do that. We must also intercede for them. And to intercede is to legally represent the sinner in this fashion. Oh God, this man, this woman, these people, these children are no worse than I.

They don't deserve hell any more than I did. They are just as bad as I was and I worse than them. And Father, you were merciful to me. I ask you in Jesus' name to be merciful to them. Awaken them to their need and convict them of their sin.

That's the responsibility we have as being their kinsmen and having been made priests. To go into the presence of God on behalf of the sinner and plead with God as though we were the sinner. To pray what the sinner must pray for himself, but in his behalf.

Confess his sin, acknowledge his guilt, and plead for mercy. This we must do. And then the third thing we do for the lost is to witness to them. We're not only to be intercessors in behalf of sinners, but we're to go from the presence of God into the presence of the sinner and plead with the sinner as though we were God.

To plead with them to be reconciled to God. Now that's our task. That's what he meant when he said, you shall be witnesses unto me. Live Christ before them, intercede for them, and then plead with them to be reconciled to Christ.

What's a witness? A witness is someone who tells what he's seen and heard and experienced. Have you seen the holiness of God? Have you seen the sinfulness of your own heart? Have you been convicted of the lostness that if God didn't have a hell and you were to die, you'd have to make one?

Because if you went to heaven as you were, you'd ruin it for everybody else. You were lost? Have you ever seen your lostness? I asked a company of people, about 100 people, I said, how many of you have ever been lost?

Four hands went up. I said, how many are saved? Every hand went up. I said, this is a miracle. I don't understand it. The scripture says he came to seek and to save that which was lost. Only four of you have ever been lost.

All of you claim to be saved. Either he's wrong or you're wrong. I don't know which. But he only saves lost people. And the biggest task we have in our witness is to let people know how lost they are.

And the only way we can do that is to let them discover how lost we were. You can witness and tell them what you saw, found out about yourself. And the witness can not only tell what he's seen but what he's heard.

Have you heard God speak in invitation to your heart, come unto me and rest all ye that labor and are heavy laden? Have you come? Have you received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, your found rest to your soul?

Well, then you heard something. So that's a witness' privilege to tell what he's seen, tell what he's heard, tell what he's experienced. Have you experienced the witness of the Spirit? Has God's Spirit borne witness with your spirit whereby you can cry, Abba, Father?

Well, that you can witness to. You see, you're the world's greatest expert on you. Nobody in the world knows anything about you. Nobody can say you know. If you say this is what I heard, this is what I saw, this is what I experienced, there isn't a philosopher anywhere in the world that can argue with you because you're the world's greatest expert on you.

And the Lord Jesus didn't say you're to be philosophers for me and metaphysicians for me and great arguers for me and debaters for me. He said you'll be witnesses unto me. You'll tell what you've seen and you've heard and you've experienced.

And that's the whole of it. When you go beyond that, it's hearsay and it's inadmissible. But don't worry about having words to say. If you know yourself and you know what you've seen and heard and experienced, that's all God wants you to say.

He'll do the work from there on. Now, you shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem and in Judea and in Samaria and unto the uttermost part of the earth. Well, how are you going to do it? We got this thing on Jerusalem fixed up, haven't we?

We understand what we're to do here. What about this Judea and Samaria and the uttermost part of the earth? How are we going to handle that? Well, God's got a plan. God's got a plan. Of course, you can go there by prayer.

Instantaneous travel to any part of the globe, any place in the universe. Instantaneously by prayer, by the gifts of the Spirit, the word of knowledge. If God pleases and you're concerned, you can know what's going on around the world.

Have you ever tuned in on somebody around the world and asked God to show you what's happening to them? That woman that you were talking about woke up. She saw something. She felt something. She knew something.

God was communicating from way down there in South America to a woman somewhere and telling her, pray for your friend. We've got instantaneous communication around the globe. Most of us have never learned to use it.

We should. We should learn to use it. We're not just praying about things. We're praying for participants and we gather in prayer. That's a good way to do it. But then there's something else. Ye shall be witnesses unto me.

Money as Time, Talent, Training, and Energy

We come to another matter of money. I'm going to talk about it for a minute because I used to have some very negative ideas about money. My one, I think, is some of the things I said to churches when I was a young preacher.

I'm ashamed of myself. I had packed in more nonsense about money because I'd been through it. You know what I'd been taught? Nobody said it, but that was what we had. To be wealthy is carnal. To be poor is spiritual.

Now, I grew up in that atmosphere. I grew up in Minnesota, so I must be here. I wasn't the only one. And then the other thing was to be successful was carnal. To be a failure was spiritual. So if you could be poor and a failure, you were going to be one of the most spiritual people in the community.

But if you were wealthy and successful, then you really had problems because money was very dangerous. Well, it was dangerous to me. I didn't have any. I was hoping I'd get a little of the danger they talked about.

But back in the Depression when I was going to Bible school, a dime was the biggest piece of money I'd see from one week to the next. Now, I learned some things along the way. God, that's great. You know, I'm still learning.

I'm still learning. I'm a student. I'm a disciple. A disciple is a learner, and you never outgrow your learning process. And God's teaching me every day. Now, what about money? What is money? Well, it's a filthy looker.

No, it isn't. It can be, but that's not what it is. What is money? Well, let me put it this way. You go, everybody works for somebody. I don't care whether you run your own business or you're employed.

You work for somebody. Everybody works for somebody. And at the end of a certain period, weekly, biweekly, monthly, however you get what you work for, it's put in your hand. And what is it? Well, it's money.

What's money? Well, money is education. Money is time. Money is talent. Money is energy. And you trade a certain amount of time and a certain amount of talent and a certain amount of training and a certain amount of energy, and somebody puts in your hand what they think your time, your talent, your training, and your energy is worth.

But what's money? Money is fluid life. Money is crystallized training. Money is liquid time. Money is what you are. You have traded it. This equals that. This equals one week, two weeks, one month of that.

And what's this? This is money. And what's that? That's your training, your talent, your time, your energy, and you've traded it for this. And now it has become liquid life, fluid life. And the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ and the work of God floats around the world on fluid life.

We've got to take a whole new view of money. Now, it represents time, I said. Here are missionaries from Mexico, our dear friends. And here are missionaries who are walking around the world. Here's somebody that's going for the first time to some distant tribe.

They're to sit down with them, learn their language, and give them the Bible. And they stand before you and they say, I'm going, and I need your support. I can't go unless you help me, unless you pray for me, unless you support me and give, because I will have needs.

I must have money. Now, let's make a hypothesis. I want to illustrate. Let's suppose that you work for $1 an hour. Now, that's pretty good, because when I worked, the last time I got paid by the hour was when I was a student in college and I got up to $0 .37 an hour and I was one of the highest paid guys in ARP where I was in that factory.

I started in at $0 .19, went up to $0 .24. You say, oh, that was an awful long time ago. I don't think so. It went awful fast. But I know that there are some folks that get $1 an hour. It's illegal if they're still paying you that.

You've got to get $3 .35 an hour or $0 .65, whatever it is, or else they're going to be in the poking. But the fact is, let's use $1 an hour, shall we? So what happens? You go to this missionary and you say, I'm going to support you, and every week I'm going to give $1.

I'll give $4 a month for your support. So she goes, she lives there, she witnesses, you're here. You get paid $40 a week and you give $1 to send her. Now what's happening? What's that? You say, well, one hour a week.

Oh, that's not very much. But there's 168 hours in a week, and that means there's four times. We'll drop the eight hours because that's goof off time. We won't even count that. Let's just say 160 hours.

So that's four. So you work one hour and you live three hours so that you can work one. And therefore, what you're really doing is giving four hours of a week to keep that missionary there. One hour of your working life.

All right? Now over next to you is somebody that makes a munificent amount of money, $10 an hour. And they say to their missionary, well, I'm going to give you $1 a week. Now both of them gave the same dollar, buy the same amount of food, same amount of whatever, whatever the missionary is.

But what about the person that's here? One hour, but in 40 hours they make $400. The other one made $40, and they each gave the same dollar. Well, how much is a dollar when it's an hour? $10 an hour. That bought how much?

Six minutes times four is 24 minutes. So the one person is getting four hours of witness time on the field, the other is getting 24 minutes. You see, to whom much is given, from them much is required.

As you are prospered, as you are enabled, means that you're giving time. Now obviously you can do as much with one dollar as you can for the other, but it doesn't do as much for the donor. The donor has to give a lot more, has to give $10 to equal that one dollar the other one gave.

Now you say, well, I don't understand that. I don't know where you get the scripture for that. It's a lot of your own personal nonsense. Well, maybe, maybe it is, but I'm not stupid enough to come here unless I've got something figured out to answer that question.

So I want you to go to Luke chapter 16 and verse 9. Luke 16 and verse 9, and I want you to hold onto your hat. Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness, that when you fail, finish, die, go to be with the Lord, they may receive you into everlasting habitation.

Who are they? The friends you've made with money. So you die, and you're there in heaven. Somebody comes to meet you and says, brother or sister, I've come here. The Lord told me he was bringing you home, and I was to be here to meet you and receive you, and I want to thank you for leading me to Christ.

And you say, well, look, I recognize a lot of family, a lot of friends. I recognize everybody I knew that's here that I've seen so far, but I don't think I ever saw you all through my life, and how in the world did I ever lead you to Christ?

That's true. You never saw me. I was where Marianne went down there in the interior of Brazil, and she came, and she lived among us, and she learned our language, and she gave us the scripture, and she talked to us in God, broke my heart and brought me to Christ, and I was born again.

But you see, she couldn't have come without you, and God, who's kept the books on that great computer in the sky, he just put me down to your account as one of the friends that you've made, and I want to receive you and thank you for leading me to Christ.

You say, well, I don't think that's what that scripture means. Well, here's the difference. I'm here, and you're there, and I think it does, and you've got to prove I'm wrong. And until you prove I'm wrong, I'm going to say that's what it means.

That's what it means. Make to yourself friends with the mammon of unrighteousness, that when you fail, they will receive you in everlasting habitations. I close with this. My wife and I were in the Sudan along the Ethiopian border, and we came to the Yaboos River.

Salia and the Gospel in the Sudan

We were there. I had met a boy over at the Doro Medicals compound who wanted a ride back to the Yaboos. I came in, and he came up. The director said, will you take this man and his wife maybe back to the Yaboos in your truck?

I said, I will. And he came up. He said, this is Salia. I did something. His people, as most of the tribes in the area, didn't shake hands. They snapped fingers. That was how the greeting was. And he held his fingers out for me to snap them, and I reached over, and I took his hand.

As he had seen us do with the English and with others. And I held it, and I prayed for him. I said, oh, God bless this boy and his wife and his family, while holding his hand. Something happened. Later on, when another missionary came, he said, my heart was bound to that man because he shook my hand.

I didn't realize that just that, doing it my way, not his, would make such an impression on me. Well, we got back to the Yaboos. And I told Salia that I wanted him to help me translate the Bible. I had to get a sample of his language, and he was to be my informant.

So he would come day after day. He walked six miles to get there by six in the morning. And he would stay there until just time enough to get home before dark. And he would sit there, and I'd go over it again.

And I chose John 3 .16. Third day came. We got up. They were quiet. Nobody disturbed. We awakened. There was two women with two babies. My wife said, oh, honey, it's going to be a hard day. We looked out, and these little bodies were totally covered with what we knew to be syphilitic sores plus yawns.

You couldn't have put a silver dollar anywhere on the baby's body. It wouldn't have hit an oath. We didn't have any of the medicine needed. We weren't trained in medicine. All we had was a tube of uncontaminated cotton and tweezers.

My wife went out, and she cleaned the sores, put on the tunas. That's all we could do, just let them know we loved them. Pray. And I'm sitting there with Celia while she's there, tears streaming down her cheeks, trying to help these women.

And I'm getting it, for God wanted me, so loved the world. Trying to get this into life. Oh, it was poorly done. Poorly done. And I was looking for a word, love. I've gotten most of the words, love. And then Celia used a word about one of the babies that had come, had died.

And he used a word that says, as a mother cries for her baby when it dies. That was the only word I could use for God loved the world. God so cries for the world as a mother cries when her baby dies. That he gave his all, he died.

And Celia looked at me, eyes wide. That's how God loved us. And he said, I want to talk to him right now. So we bowed, and for the first time God had ever, to my knowledge, heard anyone in that language utter the name of Christ and ask God to forgive and pardon and give them eternal life.