We visited Pipe Village, so called because the people there live in the pipes. They are, like the quarry workers, indentured servants living in bondage to the company that employs them, and they live in the pipes that are made at the nearby factory.
Notice the baby in the picture below....
He's there...sleeping in a hanging sling. See.
The children sang for us
and we prayed.
We did more art....
Annuma cared for children, cleaning wounds, dispensing vitamins, feeding eggs and milk.
and Grace made friends with Neha
In the midst of poverty, there is beauty.
A small garden
with the fragrance of jasmine flowers...
vibrant colors...
and sari clad women caring for their family.
and sari clad women caring for their family.
In pointing to this beauty, I do not mean to gloss over the hardship, the injustice, the pain of poverty. It is real. Pipe village is a place of abject poverty, of alcoholism and child abuse, of sickness and malnutrition, of oppressive work practices and too early marriages for young girls.
But it is also a place where loving people like Annuma bring the hope of Christ and minister, in His name, in very practical, one-child-at-a-time ways: a dose of vitamins, encouragement to stay in school, a tailoring class, even surgery for the defective heart of a little girl. God's glory is manifest in a flash of brilliant cloth on the line, a flower in bloom, a child playing with sunglasses, praying hands.
Oh, to stay keen to the pain and the hope, the degredation and the glory. To live remembering His children who suffer and never be numb.
But it is also a place where loving people like Annuma bring the hope of Christ and minister, in His name, in very practical, one-child-at-a-time ways: a dose of vitamins, encouragement to stay in school, a tailoring class, even surgery for the defective heart of a little girl. God's glory is manifest in a flash of brilliant cloth on the line, a flower in bloom, a child playing with sunglasses, praying hands.
Oh, to stay keen to the pain and the hope, the degredation and the glory. To live remembering His children who suffer and never be numb.
1 comment:
I am enjoying reading these, Beth. And I'm thankful for people like Annuma who care for them and show them the love of God. I appreciated your last sentence especially.
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