I recall a few years ago when a friend and I were having a discussion about the
simple word “change,” and how it affects our lives. I was at quite an
immature state in life, and stubbornly believed that “change” was a bad thing. In my nature, I just enjoyed things the way
they were; “change” was risky, it was difficult, it took work, and the outcome
was never certain. Why take a gamble when you had a sure thing in your
pocket? My wise friend replied with this analogy which has stuck with me
since. He said, “Imagine a small pond that has been cut off from any
supply of fresh water. The pond just sits there over time, the water
never moving, refreshing itself. The pond will gradually become dirtier
and dirtier as it fills with bacteria left from the environment surrounding
it. Eventually the water will become undrinkable and useless. If a
person became lost in the woods and dying of thirst stumbled upon this pond,
drinking it would only cause him bodily harm because of the bacteria the water
carried.” “Now,” he said, “imagine a new pond, only this time with a
river flowing through it. The water is continuously flowing through the
pond, displacing older water with newer water. Thus when you look on it,
the water appears fresh and clean. Fish
and other wildlife could either live in it or use it to sustain life. If
a person was dying of thirst this river would save his life.” All I could
do upon hearing those words was to simply bow my head in defeat and admit to
myself the truth; “change” is not only good, it is essential to life. One
could say a rather big “change” in my life was 14 months ago when my wife Jess
and I moved to La Ceiba. It’s been astonishing to just witness the “changes”
not only in Signs of Love but in the lives of the people we see consistently.
I’m a huge believer in growing the youth in the church. I think it is
absolutely essential in growing the church because of that same principal of
change. A passionate youth brings new life into a church, new
ideas, enthusiasm, and so much more. There is a reason that Jesus told us
that we need to have faith like a child, because of what a child brings to the
table. In my opinion, one of the main reasons is a child or young person
is eager to learn. Not only are they eager to learn, they are also eager
to share what they have learned. You can just hear the voices of
countless children coming home from school just saying, “Mommy guess what I
learned today?”
Over the past few months it has been great to see that “youth movement” occur
in our Deaf Church. We now regularly have 6-8 kids who are a part of our
Deaf class coming to The Deaf Church on a regular basis. It’s also
exciting that some of these kids are more advanced in their language than a
high majority of our existing church base. That opens up the door to the
things they have the ability to learn about the Bible. I’m at the point
when I can simply look on them and see the potential, see the future of The
Deaf Church, the future of Signs of Love. They have been that refreshing
water in the church.
I pray constantly that God will raise up leaders from these youth to take the
reigns and launch this ministry into great new heights. I can see it when
they are grasping biblical concepts quickly, memorizing scripture, and setting
a fresh example that even most of the adults could learn from. I saw it
when we were able to take every older kid from our Deaf class out to our
village programs in February. How most of them loved having the chance to
interact with other Deaf kids without the ability to take advantage of daily
schooling. How they would create their own activities without prompting
and implement those activities with ease. How they would desire to teach
their language to those who struggled to grasp it. Every day after those
village programs I was so excited that I felt like I could punch through a
brick wall. I truly felt like God was giving us a glimpse of what Signs
of Love was going to be in the future.
I don’t expect this change to happen
overnight, and it is going to take a lot of work and training, but I can see
that fresh water coming to replenish and sustain a key part of Signs of Love…
and boy does it look good. - Daniel Fox