When you choose an Adult Literacy Big Gift, you do more than help women like Shyamkala learn to read and write… you give them the skills they need to start a small business!

Imagine that you have a physical disability and live in a remote village in Nepal. You own very little land, so growing enough food to eat can be difficult… And you have four children to feed.

This is what life is like for Shyamkala Dhobi.

In order to support their young children, Shyamkala and her husband have had to make some really hard choices. To find seasonal work, Shyamkala’s husband often had to leave his family and travel to India.

But then Shyamkala learned to read and write – and everything changed!

Like many people in her village, Shyamkala has spent most of her life not knowing how to read or write. So when Baptist World Aid Australia’s Christian field partner invited her to join a literacy class, she was very excited to start learning.

It was hard work. But for Shyamkala, it’s all been worth it.

“I am able to speak confidently; I am able to read, write and do simple calculation.”

After she finished her training, Shyamkala took a loan from the community savings group and bought two goats. Shyamkala has the self-belief and skills she needs to run her own small business. And it’s all because she can read and do basic calculations!

With her determination to create a better life for herself and her family, Shyamkala has since turned her two goats into seven. Better still, Shyamkala’s business is doing so well that her husband doesn’t need to work in India anymore. Her goats are helping to feed her family!

For Shyamkala the Big Gift of Adult Literacy means more than knowing how to read and write… it means having the confidence to buy a goat and start a profitable business… it means feeding her family and having her husband at home. 

For Shyamkala, your Big Gifts are about the bigger picture.

Choose a Big Gift that will help a mum like Shyamkala learn to read. Go to baptistworldaid.org.au/literacy-training

Baptist World Aid provides a vehicle through which Victorian Baptists can impact lives globally. As we direct our collective resources through an effective development organisation like Baptist World aid we are part of transforming lives, advancing the Kingdom of God and demonstrating that we are #bettertogether

One of my favourite nativity characters is Herod. I know the bloke is a Type A Jerk and a devious psychopath. But I appreciate his appearance around the beginning of Jesus’ life. In contrast to heretics who suggest trusting God guarantees peaceful pleasures and solved problems, Herod’s presence in Jesus’ life reminds me Jesus is an ordinary person, surrounded by misunderstanding, frustrating circumstances and downright evil maliciousness. I appreciate the anti-consumerist phrase “Keep Christ in Christmas”. But I also value the anti-super-spiritual reminder to “Keep Herod in Christmas”. Herod shows me that when God was coming close to the world in Christ, it was not without pain and abuse in the background.

Herod’s killing of Bethlehem’s boys is not in the history books but is consistent with what we know of his ruthless, callous leadership. Like Hitler, Pol Pot and other despots, he stopped at nothing to protect his position. Herod murdered his own wife and family. In his will he decreed that leading local men be executed when he died to ensure mourning. He killed a batch of local lads to rid the world of Jesus without a second thought. Like many genocides today it got lost in the news of what else was happening in the world. But it was still a tragic loss for Bethlehem.

I identified with grieving parents a little this week when watching a movie that opened my eyes to an ongoing human rights tragedy. Blood Diamond shows the tragedy of civil war and 400,000 child soldiers in Africa. The plot reveals associated scenes of ripped apart families, power abuse, terrible injustice and the complicity of Western multinational companies. It shows the indifference of Western media which was more interested in one famous politician being “sorry” for what he had done in his office than what most politicians in office should be saying sorry for ignoring. It brought me to tears. My wife tells me I do not cry enough, and she’s right, but these scenes touched me deeply.

When Herod forced Joseph and Mary to take their child to Egypt, they must have asked “What is happening and where is God?” These are questions I ask. Millions are killing each other on religious grounds. 200 million Christians face jail, torture and death for professing faith. 200,000 African children are used as child soldiers. 27 million people are in some form of slavery, including more than a million children trafficked each year for sex or labour. 30,000 children die of starvation daily (a silent Tsunami every week). Over 80% of modern war casualties are civilians. What is going on in this world that Jesus came to rescue?

The post-nativity account of Herod’s murderous jealousy reminds me of the pain and injustice that was part of Jesus’ early life, and part of our world that Jesus came to redeem. Part of our mandate in churches, I am learning, is to give a lead in grappling with the human rights abuses that bring tears to our eyes, and that break the heart of God.

THE WORK OF CHRISTMAS

When the song of angels is stilled.
When the star in the sky is gone,
When the kings and princes are home,
When the shepherds are back with their flock,
The work of Christmas begins:
To find the lost,
To heal the broken,
To feed the hungry,
To release the prisoner,
To rebuild the nations,
To bring the peace among sisters and brothers,
To make music in the heart.
– Howard Thurman

This article was originally published as Darren Cronshaw, “Leadership Column (Human Rights).” Witness: The Voice of Victorian Baptists 91, no. 2 (March 2011): 7.

Our Soup kitchen has now been running for over five years and is open every Friday except for Good Friday and New Year’s Eve week. Numbers are regularly between 25 to just over 40. Every year we put on a special treat for our Christmas dinner, including all the trimming one would expect of a normal family Christmas dinner.  

 The volunteers who prepare the food always pay for it out of their own pocket with the church paying for special nights such pizza and BBQ nights. This last year we were grateful for the support in the form of a grant given by the Christmas Engagement initiative of the BUV. The money provided enabled the staff to put on a great spread of Christmas favourites, including turkey and lamb – the more expensive meats and not usually enjoyed by this crowd.   

With over 50 attending the support was well used and appreciated. Such acts of partnership go a long way to encourage members of the church that they are not alone in their endeavours, so from all the staff of the Christian Community Church Morwell soup kitchen a heartfelt thank you.

By Peter Harvey

BLESS is not a new program, but a framework for being attentive to what God is doing in the world, and joining in with that. As part of our identity as Baptists, and even more importantly as followers of Jesus, we are called to be moving with God in adventurous mission. But how do we do that? Where do we start? How can mission be accessible and achievable for ordinary Christians? How can we encourage one another to bless those around us without adding undue guilt or unrealistic demands? BLESS is a simple model to empower churches to have confidence in living out their faith in authentic ways. It is about being good news and sharing good news with people, and restoring our neighbourhoods back to God’s dream for them. The invitation and the strategy is called BLESS.

In 2017 Baptist Churches around Victoria can offer a series for teaching and exploring the missional practices of BLESS in your church. There are plenty of resources available and its simple to get involved:

1. Set aside 3-6 weeks for teaching and practising BLESS in your worship gatherings and/or small groups and/or Bible study groups.

2. Let the BUV Mission Catalyst team know by email: missioncatalyst@buv.com.au that you are participating so we can connect you with others on this journey and support and resource you.

3. Access the BLESS Bible Study booklet, workshop and sermons, postcard, poster, BLESS stories and videos at https://www.buv.com.au/resources/bless