Missions:

Kameel & Rachael Kilada

January 2024 | Edited by Steve Moberg

Middle Eastern Missionary Organization

These reflections come from Rachel Kilada who, along with her husband Kameel, lead the Middle Eastern Missionary Organization – one of the ministries Gashland has supported for many years.

WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO ABOUT IT?

      There has been a great deal of sighing going on in our household lately as we have been watching news updates on current world events.   Bloodied faces of children; families torn with grief as they share about the loss of precious loved ones; gaping holes in the sides of apartment buildings; world leaders grappling with problems too complicated to solve:  these scenes have left us feeling like there must be something we should be doing about this besides sighing as we sit in our comfortable living room chairs, cradling a cup of hot coffee between our hands.  But what?

      Kameel recently returned to the States after spending time ministering to Syrian refugees in Lebanon.  Between four meetings, he had the privilege of sharing with more than five hundred women the wonderful hope that can only be found in the message of the Good News:  It is Jesus, the Bread and Water of life, Who satisfies the deepest longings of the human heart.  Kameel came away from those meetings, his own heart heavy after hearing only a few of their stories, realizing that these heartbreaking scenarios are in fact actually being multiplied out into the millions.   But what could he ever be able to do about it?

      While our ministry, the Middle Eastern Missionary Organization, is preparing to send medical and dental teams into some of the most desperately needy areas, anything our workers might be able to offer in the form of practical and spiritual helps will only be like a grain of sand on an endless stretch of San Diego beach!  Isn’t there anything else a concerned Christian can do to address the overwhelming needs being represented worldwide?  Thanks be to God, there is!

Take Me There

By Rachel Kilada

Here I sit in my little kingdom of peace,

While the world is crying, the world is dying.

How shall I relate—mankind’s burden share?

Lord, on my knees in prayer take me there, take me there.

 

A store is bombed, a neighborhood is shattered.

Nerves and bodies and homes are battered.

Fear is now a burden too heavy to bear.

Lord, on my knees in prayer take me there, take me there.

 

Tensions build around a boundary line.

Tanks line up; airplane engines whine.

Soon the peaceful countryside is scarred and bare.

Lord, on my knees in prayer take me there, take me there.

 

The rain refuses to fall on a field.

The farmer’s harvest is a paltry yield.

His children will go hungry; there is nothing to spare.

Lord, on my knees in prayer take me there, take me there.

 

Somewhere believers refuse to bow the knee.

Because they follow Jesus they will suffer painfully.

Torture, humiliation, and prison they must bear.

Lord, on my knees in prayer take me there, take me there.

 

A missionary doctor works late into the night,

Desperate to save one native in her plight.

He wonders if his friends back home the burden share.

Lord, on my knees in prayer take me there, take me there.

 

Disease and suffering stalk this poor old earth,

Freely taking victims as part of sin’s cruel curse.

Loved ones snatched, families broken everywhere.

Lord, on my knees in prayer take me there, take me there.

 

Sin, like a tyrant, rules this world of man,

Murder, injustice, and fear on every hand.

Under its bondage men die in their despair.

Lord, on my knees in prayer take me there, take me there.

 

Here I sit in my little kingdom of peace,

While the world is crying, the world is dying.

I must relate—mankind’s burden share.

I go to my knees in prayer, and I am there!  I am there!