Author: Dr. Michael Johnson

This is a song by Ray Charles, that takes on even greater meaning in the Biblical context.

Barbara, Kara and Jamie are three very fascinating women.  Barbara Oolman is a family practitioner, serving in East Africa for over 10 years now.  Kara Fisher and Jamie Bearden are fourth year medical students from Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine who have served with us in Kenya for the past six weeks.  They have all been willing to go get stoned while serving in Africa.  They actually served in areas where, churches are being burned and there is genuine open resentment to the Christian faith.

As they relate their stories, it is clear that they were definitely in danger of getting stoned as they visited areas which were hostile to Christians, in hopes of ministering to predominantly Muslim areas of Kenya.  Christians around the world are being stoned, burned to death, shot and persecuted everyday in our present world.  This is very current news if we would be willing to know of it.

Getting stoned is actually a longstanding Christian tradition.  The religious leaders of the day tried to stone Jesus, and of course Stephen, the first martyr for the church got stoned as did Paul, whom they left for dead.  My friend and colleague Phil Renfroe who serves at Tenwek Hospital, made note of how many Christians got stoned during the church’s early history and he said the impact of stoning depended on how big a ‘hit’ was taken to the head.

Suffice it to say, we must be careful in the present day use of words and take the Biblical translations in the context of the times.  We don’t like the old context of suffering, so we deny suffering for our faith to be of any value whatsoever, unless someone else is doing it.

Very few if any of us are willing to be stoned for our faith, nor even suffer the slight of being embarrassed for what we believe.  We deem tithing and sitting through a hour and half church service enough torment and torture.  Giving to missions or even going on missions is beyond our mindset and ‘after all, that was for the old church.’

However, the Bible does tell us we should become filled with the Spirit, as opposed to being drunk with strong drink (Ephesians 5:18).  It is this same Spirit with which Stephen was filled as he looked up into heaven and could take a direct hit to his body, and his head and lay down his life for his faith (Acts 7:55).

Getting stoned may cost you money, reputation, time and in some instances your health and life.  While we may have sacrificed as much to be filled with the things which give pleasures to our bodies, how big a hit are we willing to take to advance the Kingdom of God? Would you listen to the Lord if He told you: “lets go get stoned?”  What would you give for your faith?  What are you willing to really sacrifice so that others may come to know Christ?  How big a hit are you willing to take to your head and heart?

Many Christians today are suffering stoning, burning, hanging and forms of torture and death.

Visit Voices of the Martyrs to learn more.

There are no easy answers here.  I actually told no fewer than 8 people today they would die within a few weeks or months.  They ranged from 14 to 60 years.  It was worst because most of them were dying because they did not have enough money to get care.

The 14 year old girl who has fistula from her body that would easily heal if I had the medication of nutrition I use in the US.

The 30 year old woman who’s husband passed out on my office floor after I informed him of her late stage breast cancer.  It was diagnosed late because she had been to several other ‘hospitals’ who told her not to worry about it.  These hospitals have no real surgeons or pathologists in them.

There was the 27 year old woman who’s husband began to cry as I told them that the tumor on her face could have been curable if they had not waited for 5 years to collect money for treatment.  Now it is nearly invading the base of the skull ready then on to the brain.

There was the…., well, let me leave it at that.  There were no easy answers for the other 5 people either. They will all most likely die within 3-5 months or 3-5 years.

We can’t fix this.  That is obviously not why we are here.  The light at the end of the tunnel in Africa is…., well somebody stole the candle and stole the matches so there is no light.  We can talk about Jesus is the light, but it is hard to share the Bread of Life without helping people to find long term bread for life.

There are no easy answers.

“Dear Lord; please stop my bowels. “The more I think on it the more appropriate a prayer it was.

After all, the place to ‘relieve’ myself was a two minute walk away from where I was laying.  It was in the dark, in the middle of the night and it was raining.  The house had no electricity so the outhouse of course would be difficult to find with the small flashlight I had.  Besides that, the pathway was muddy, slippery and my destination for the pit was just on the edge of the cornfield, obscured by trees and bushes.  So I prayed.  “Dear Lord, please stop my bowels!”  I was praying for constipation to set in.  Well it may seem like a silly prayer to you, as you have a nice, well lit, comfortable warm place to sit and read.  I asked the owner the next morning if there were any snakes in the area and was told only the non-poisonous kind were there.  This was all the more reason to pray harder.  Anyway, God granted my wish and I was able to make it through the night until the next comfortable destination of our trip.

I think on this kind of object lessons more and more.  What if I really did not have an option?  This was literally a pit.  It was a hole cut in the bottom of the floor of a shack, on the side of a mountain.  There was no seat.  That is you don’t sit, but you squat.  This is an uncomfortable position for me as I can barely maintain it to tie my shoes.  That is why I wear slip-on shoes today.

In a recent visit to one of the Internally Displaced People camps ( IDP’s or refugees from the election violence), we were made aware that for the 817 people in the camp there were a total of 2, count them TWO pit latrines.  That is one pit to squat at for each 408 people.  Can you imagine the lines?

Obviously hygiene on this 2 ½ acres is a problem.  (Watch where you step please) The name of the camp is JIKAZE.  That is a Swahili word meaning ‘squeeze yourself’.  This is certainly an appropriate name for the population density and the long lines at the pits.  There are still literally thousands of IDP’s, living in places with similar names.  A few minutes away there is VUMILIA, which means to persevere. 

Needless to say, I did not get in lines but recited my prayer again until we reached home.

“Pit Stop” now has taken on new relevance to me.  Either squeeze yourself, or ask God to stop your bowels.

In a Los Angeles Times article of July 14, 2004, I found a hint of sarcasm aimed at the ‘west’, or to put it another way, western culture.

The article starts with the headline “For Sale, Cheap! Dead White Men’s Clothes”

LAGOS, Nigeria — Tossed off a flatbed truck, a 100-pound bale of used panties and bras, worn socks, DKNY suits and Michael Jordan jerseys lands with a thud amid a jostling swarm of shoppers.  Much of Africa was once draped in fabrics of flamboyant color and pattern, products of local industry and a reflection of cultural pride. But with half of its people surviving on less than a dollar a day, the continent has become the world’s recycling bin. People scramble for 10-cent underpants, 20-cent T-shirts and dollar blue jeans discarded by Westerners.

Insatiable demand from village shops and sprawling urban markets has turned the West’s castoffs into an industry that generates hundreds of millions of dollars annually. Clothing is only the most visible example. Polluting refrigerators and air conditioners, expired medicines and old mattresses also are routinely shipped and resold here. Used vehicles imported from Japan dot African roads. Antiquated secondhand computers power many African governments.

The author noted that people in Africa buy the leftovers from the overflow of our overstuffed closets.  They know the items in question cannot be from a live person, because after all, if a person were alive, why would they throw away such good clothing?  Hence, they must be dead and the markets of Africa are filled with ‘dead white men’s clothes’.  Everything from underwear to outerwear is found in the markets and many well meaning Christians and other people give of their substance with the intent of helping out.

It is in this vein of thought that I would like to address ‘the luxury of lazy religion’.  Let me state from the outset that I am guilty of this myself.  I have on more than one occasion than I will admit to and on several others of which I am unaware, given from a cupboard or closet that was overflowing with stuff and from a heart that was filled with pride.

I have boasted of my giving without sharing.  I have bragged about and showcased my good deeds, and denied my greater greed.  My pity and pride have only been surpassed my self confidence and arrogance.  I have and continue to indulge in the luxury of lazy religion.

As I read in Malachi 1:8, I am impressed that this prophet was bold enough to rebuke the people who brought less than their best.  As I read these words, I am convicted of how often I have and continue to practice a lazy religion of luxury.

Mal 1:8 And if ye offer the blind for sacrifice, is it not evil? and if ye offer the lame and sick, is it not evil? offer it now unto thy governor; will he be pleased with thee, or accept thy person? Saith the LORD of hosts.

As the author of the article noted the people who bought these items found themselves being degraded in several ways.  First, they really did know that these were discarded items.  They only fooled themselves into believing otherwise for it was clear that these items are not in packages and the came in consignments and on large containers.

Secondly, they recognized that the very things they bought spoke of names and people, even places they had read about or seen on TV.  These names began to become more popular than their own names.  The cities emblazoned on the shirts, the ‘hip, jive, slang, covertly and overtly sensuous and outright cavalier profane’ art became common place in their cities, their homes and even in the churches.  These very things they came to treasure, were helping them to worship the giver, the American industry, and to despise their own wealth of customs and traditions.

Mere survival has a long-term cost: The continent is losing the capacity to produce its own clothing. Although labor is cheap, Africans cannot make a shirt that costs as little as a used one. Every textile mill in Zambia has closed. Fewer than 40 of Nigeria’s 200 mills remain. The vast majority of textile factories in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania and Malawi are shuttered as well. Thousands of workers have lost their jobs.

“We are digging our own graves,” says Chris Kirubi, a Kenyan industrialist who blamed secondhand clothing for the demise of his textile mill. “When you make your own clothes, you employ farmers to grow cotton, people to work in textile mills and more people to work in clothes factories. When you import secondhand clothes, you become a dumping ground.”

Giving second best does several things.

1. Robs God of the best, because we are giving to ‘the least of these’ of whom Christ is the chief!  We give our old linens as though we are giving our new lives.
2. Shows people that they deserve less than God’s best.  This implies they are second class and we are first class.
3. Since I am first class, I must deserve it for some reason and I become more prideful
4. Robs God of glory that would be His if we gave people the best.  We get the glory.
5. Hinders God from doing greater things in their lives.
6. Shows God as stingy and greedy (man does not live by bread alone, he needs some meat and potatoes to go with that, but you my poor friend can eat gruel).
7. We rob God of our talents, out tithes and our time.

1. We have talents (singing, reading, knowledge) which we consume on ourselves.
2. We have tithes (Luke 21:2 the widow’s mite versus the rich man’s gift) of which we give grudgingly and for recognition
3. We have time which we use for self (no time to read the Bible to draw close to God, but plenty of time to watch TV and draw closer to the world).

When we take communion, we are reminded in 1 Corinthians 11:23-29 that we are to take it in remembrance that God gave His best.  We are told that we are to examine our hearts as we take this.

God gave His best, yet we approach the Lord’s Table with stinginess, defiling the altar as though our dumping our leftovers to the poor was as good as any other gift on the altar.

We need to examine ourselves.  Are we lazy about our religion?

1. Are we more devoted to doctrine, denominations and divisions?  Do we have more invested in our personal assessment of the truth or in our personal evangelism about the truth (i.e. Jesus)?
2. Are we eating the gravy of Bible study to the exclusion of witnessing and winning the world to Christ, i.e. Biblical living?
3. Are we more involved with who is in charge, than fulfilling the charge that is before us?
4. Are we giving without thinking or trusting?

1. Our gift reflects our trust.  No one gives an investment broker whom they trust, only half the money if they believe they will get a good return.  They give all.  We say we trust God and we want to invest our lives in His plan, yet we hold back.

We are rewarded commensurate with our giving.  We lack peace, because we give only a piece of what God has given us.  He wants it all.  Give your best, just as God in Christ gave His all at the altar, on the cross.

Abraham laid His only son on the table.  We lay a remnant of our sums of things we have collected.  We are rewarded commensurate with our giving.

Le 22:24 Ye shall not offer unto the LORD that which is bruised, or crushed, or broken, or cut; neither shall ye make any offering thereof in your land.

The luxury of lazy religion would let us give less than our best, let us focus on denomination and division and deny God the glory He alone deserves and deny others the chance of experiencing that glory.

“I wish they had killed me.”  The camera focused on the veil of shadowed light and not on her face in order to keep her identity secret.  The veil of darkness did little to hide the emotions of her plea for death.

She watched as the soldiers entered into her home and slaughtered each family member with machetes, slicing them as one would cut through the clearing of heavy grass or bush.  Except this slashing brought forth screams and human blood instead of plant sap and falling underbrush.  The woman went on to describe how the soldiers kicked each body as they fell lifeless, just to make sure that indeed they were lifeless.

She lay under one of those bodies pretending to be dead, all the while watching as these same men gang raped a three year old girl.  When they had left the house and the 20 or so dead bodies, she saw her chance to escape.  She groped and crawled from under this gruesome pile and used what strength she had to run from the house to the nearest bushes.  Who knows, they had burned the other houses on the compound and they could just as well set fire to this one to make sure there was indeed no one alive.

She ran, but not quickly enough.  Some soldiers saw her.  They caught her.  At least 20 of them gang raped her.  They left her.  She was found later by relief workers and of course the camera crew that did the interview.  “I wish they had killed me.”

This is the Democratic Republic of Congo today.  Pray for the victims of the war that is brought about by the thirst for revenge, greed of resources and the lust for blood and power.