Wilder View - August 2010

Don’t you love the sounds of summer… children laughing as they splash in a swimming pool, the ice cream truck driving down your street, and conversation at backyard BBQs? Yet, there is one summer sound that I would venture to say, we all hate to hear – the sort of hum/buzz that sweeps around our head, the sensation of a tiny soft landing which prompts us to slap the mosquito that is threatening the calmness of the moment. I have yet to find someone that likes mosquitoes. Yet, for the majority of us in St. Louis, mosquitoes are just pests. For our brothers and sisters in Catembe, Mozambique, mosquitoes are deadly.

Many of you might remember last summer that I had this God experience at 3:15 in the morning. I was in a dead sleep when a dialogue of questions and answers went through my mind;

“Does the pastor of Catembe have mosquito nets for her family? To which I replied, “I don’t know.
“Well shouldn’t they?”
“Well, yes.”
“How are they going to get them?”
“Well I should get them.”
“What about the United Methodist Women at Catembe? Do they have nets?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well…“
“Ok, we will take care of them as well.”
“What about the men’s group?"
"Yes, of course”
“And what about the whole church of Catembe?”
“What if the people of Catembe could have some way to tangibly show the love of God to their whole community?”
“Ok, ok, I get it… we should get mosquito nets for all of Catembe.”

Then I was back to sleep. The next morning, my sermon changed half way through and I shared this dialogue with you all and some of you probably thought, “There she is, going crazy again.” Others of you thought “Wow, what a God moment!” In a very short time we were able to raise enough money to purchase a mosquito net (220 nets) for every family of Catembe United Methodist Church in Mozambique.

We found out as we began to send in our money in that there wasn’t a structure in place to get our nets directly to Catembe, so we slowed down in our efforts to get nets to cover the entire peninsula of Catembe, Mozambique.

Recently we found out that the United Nations Foundation has been conducting pilot programs of mass deployment of mosquito nets in an area to greatly reduce malaria in that area. They have received a success rate of 82% in the reduction of malaria in those pilot locations. Carol Kreamer our Missouri Mozambique Coordinator, along with many other people in Misri, and Mozambique are meeting weekly through Skype to discuss the mass distribution project for six areas of Mozambique. Catembe will be one of the areas!

For this to happen, they will need to find community groups that will go and survey the needs of the community so that they identify what each family will need. Then they will distribute the nets, and help install them. They will have to stop by several times during the next year to determine the effectiveness of the project. What a great mission project for the Catembe church to save the lives of many people in their community and tangibly show the love of God! The goal for this new distribution will be to get an 85% reduction of malaria in an area.

The nets that will be deployed are not just repellent nets. A mosquito will die within 10 minutes of landing on the net. The nets will help protect young children, elderly family members, and reduce the devastating reoccurring illness of malaria. On average, $10 provides for the net. If the Spirit nudges you to sponsor a net, or two, or more just note it on the memo line of your check or put it on the offering envelop.

Although God hasn’t nudged me at 3:15 am again, I think the original question remains, “Shouldn’t we help if we can?” I think the original answer remains as well, “Yes, of course.”

Shalom,
~Pastor Kathleen