One of the young men at our church, Mike Evans, is serving as an intern this summer at Central Baptist Church in Harare, Zimbabwe and is chronicling his experience at a blog, “Entrusted With the Gospel.” I am finding his reflections encouraging and challenging so I wanted to pass it along. The following is from a recent report about his labors in pastoral work:

Day by day, the Lord provides me with the graces I need to go on, but I will be honest that I am tired. As I write this, my eyes are filled with tears by the things that I have seen and the pain that I am surrounded by. HIV/AIDS is rampant, and the needs are great, even among our church family here. My eyes are being opened to what it means to oversee the flock, to meet one another’s needs (even as I have sat here, a family has come in to give me some money as a gift), to care for widows and orphans and the fatherless, to see each of these to maturity in Christ, to teach and admonish one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs, to read the Bible together and to eagerly long for the return of Christ. More and more, my heart is being turned toward the needs of God’s people as they cry out for relief, and they gather as a church body to lean on one another, hoping that they will have the faith to persevere tomorrow.