Maureen Wise
Light shines into the darkness
A few days ago we made one of our regular visits to one of the closed institutions where we work. It was a drab, cold, grey day with a bitter wind blowing. High walls appeared out of the mist as we approached.
This place like others of its kind is found in the middle of nowhere – we had driven along mud tracks through fields for several miles to get there. It is ‘home’ to over 500 adults with physical and learning disabilities whose life takes place within those high walls.
Conditions are appalling. Entering one of the blocks the stench greets you. The corridors are dark and people are poorly clad and many clearly distressed. In room after room, men and women sit sometimes all day on wooden benches without activity, rocking or sleeping, faces often bruised or cut. Food is delivered to their dormitories in steel buckets. People live and die in these places.
Unless the gospel is taken to them where they are, they will never ever hear of a Saviour who visited this poor world to seek and save that which was lost.
It is our testimony that we have seen his power – to save, to provide and to bless – and we count ourselves most privileged to be involved in such a ministry.
We would usually begin with a service in one of the corridors. Singing always attracts a number of people and there would be a message calling them to the only Redeemer of sinners. It is always a motley gathering. Concentration times can be short, there are often interruptions from shouting or sometimes fights break out. But there are also those who listen with all their hearts and over the years have believed and know this Saviour for themselves.
We love to go to this place and others like it and have many friends amongst those who live there. There is also often opposition from the staff. But God has been at work and no man can stay his hand. It is our testimony that we have seen his power – to save, to provide and to bless – and we count ourselves most privileged to be involved in such a ministry.
3 houses, changed lives
Many of you will know that in the most wonderful ways the Lord has provided us with 3 houses in villages in Moldova which are now home to a total of 17 people who were formerly living in such closed institutions. Lives have been changed not just outwardly, but also from the inside out, by the powerful work of the Holy Spirit.
Casa Bucuriei was the first house for 6 women in 2006; Casa Matei home to 5 men in 2008; Casa Alex home to 5 women and 1 man in 2011 and at the end of 2013 the foundations were laid for a fourth house for 6 women in the most beautiful village of Capriana.
None of the work has been without its challenges, not least the last house Casa Alex. People come to us not only having suffered years of deprivation, cruelty and neglect but also often steeped in wickedness and corruption. They have been living literally in darkness and the shadow of death. We find ourselves not infrequently working ‘within a yard of hell’.
Only God himself has the power “ruined nature to restore” and we have seen him doing this time and time again. We do not have words sufficient to praise him for what he has done in these lives but we worship him for such amazing grace.
