Our Impact Family

When the Lord spoke to me almost 14 years ago about rescuing lives, I had no idea He would use that call to build an incredible, dedicated and loving worldwide family. Throughout today, I have found myself thinking about this family we all share. I really love you all.

As I write this, Chelsey Sisneros is leading a team of nurses up a river in Guatemala. They are on a mission to quite literally rescue the lives of critically ill babies who have no way to get to medical help. Yesterday, the team was distributing the first of 122 water filters into communities made chronically sick because of bad water. That is enough filters to provide safe water for over 2,500 people.

Meanwhile, Andrew Robinson is in southwest Haiti with a team from the US and Canada. They have gone back into the area that was hit the hardest by hurricane Matthew. In October, just days after the hurricane, Dan and Rick from New Mexico went in with water filters for 22,000, preventing deaths from cholera and typhoid. Now Andrew’s team is putting up roofs and walls, providing homes for some of the families that have been living without shelter for almost three months. Along the way, they are watching the Lord heal the sick and injured, and leading people into a living relationship with Jesus.

A couple of hours ago the phone rang; it was Colleen calling from South Africa. Next week she and Rebecca fly to Uganda where they will join David and Cynthia Pearson who are flying in from the U.S. Together, they will teach community health care, research a community transformation project around the Kazinga refugee camp, open the new school in Kalonga, and travel up to the border of South Sudan to determine the need for clean water and the best way to meet that need.

Over the past few days, Christina and I have been talking with Richard in Uganda, DD in Haiti, Randeep in India, Mike in Kenya, Sue in Australia and many more in the U.S. and Canada. All of them are sisters and brothers. That’s not some nice Christian phrase; it is a powerful, steady truth that I, and we, can stand upon.

Yesterday, I read these words from Mark’s gospel:

“Assuredly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands, for My sake and the gospel’s, who shall not receive a hundredfold now in this time—houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions—and in the age to come, eternal life.

For me and for so many of us, when we stepped out to follow Jesus on this Great Adventure, we left some things behind––perhaps plans and dreams, local relationships, material possessions. But we have found brothers, sisters, fathers and mothers around the world; we have found a family formed by the incredible grace of Jesus Himself.

I love my Impact family; and I am so proud and thankful for every one of you.

Steve