The Mosquito's Story: a Malaria tale prompted by Compassion Int'l

You are about to read a story about a mosquito.

Why on earth am I writing about a mosquito? What does a mosquito have to do with God? Oh, plenty, my friend.

As Compassion writes,

Malaria kills 655,000 children per year. And April 25 is a day to raise awareness and spur on action for a disease that should not even be killing one child.

Compassion International issued a call to bloggers to write about World Malaria Day - which is tomorrow, April 25th - and write on a specific prompt: from the perspective of a malaria-infecting mosquito. I laughed at how silly it felt and how I could not possibly do this. But then my fingers took to typing and what happened next I can only say came from the prompting of the Spirit.

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So without further ado, here is... The Mosquito's Story:
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You think I’m just a teeny insect, don’t you. But I’m a huge killer. I kill children - the population that so many of you tear up over and cry over and want to help more than ever. Millions of commercials air every day asking to save the children.

But I’m the antithesis to that.

I make sure what you do fails. I make sure your efforts go in vain. And I’m so tiny that some people think I’m harmless.

I find that hilarious; how people think that the big killers are big things - like weather disasters gigantic as the earth, itself. And big lurking men who wait to blow up buildings and big cities.

But one of the greatest killers is the tiniest among you. Do I dare tell you that? Do I dare tell you that you can fight me so easily? I will not tell you how. I must not.

Because then you will win and the children will live and the tears will stop and families will be saved.

And I just can’t have that. No, I can’t have that at all.

I want fevers. I want babies crying from dusk until dawn. I want parents weeping over still bodies. I want people scrambling around for help only to realize they don’t have the right pill or the nets or the doctors available. And people without resources is like a mosquito without a stinger:  Useless.

So go ahead and focus on the big guns. Focus on the news stories that air every night on TV educating you on all you must fear in this big, bad world. What you won’t find is a picture of me. I’m not on a wanted poster. The children I kill aren’t on milk cartons because you don’t even know they are lost. I’m done with them so fast that no one even knows about them.

Us mosquitoes are mighty so you better be aware.

But don’t be too aware. We like you ignorant and looking the other way.

picture from http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Anopheles_albimanus_mosquito.jpg public domain

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Don’t look the other way. Don’t be ignorant and think the “other person” will help these children who die every day.

My 9 year old stepdaughter has a passion for those stricken with malaria -- all because of one church service where a chime rang every minute to symbolize how often a child dies of malaria. She is saving her money, nickel by quarter, to raise money in order to donate to malaria campaigns around the world. She has chosen to open her eyes even though it’s hard and painful.

Open your eyes? Click here to find out how you can help. Click here and here.

Compassion International has a special Malaria Intervention Initiative. An engaging video accompanies it and you can see what, specifically, Compassion does with your donations. See it all here.

We don’t have to bow to such a thing as malaria. Malaria is not our master - God is. 

We can fight it.

The mosquito does not have to win.  

Please take action now.

Praying for the Light Unto Their Path

A busy day of trying to get things done yet trying to relax and breathe as well.

But I pause in my busy relaxing to ask you to please pray for a dear sister in Christ who is journeying tomorrow to Guatemala on behalf of World Help and Operation Baby Rescue. You can read all about it here.

Her name is Michele-Lyn and she blogs at A Life Surrendered. which is my new favorite blog. I am constantly more and more astounded by this beautiful woman - her testimony is not for the faint of heart and she writes and lives in such grace and honesty that it makes me want to summon myself and my other friends and have us all unite in following God's ways more obediently.

Michele-Lyn will be blogging as part of the team going to Guatemala for World Help and I hope you follow her stories there.

She leaves tomorrow and, as you can read on her latest blog entry, she is feeling all the normal heart-flurries one feels before they embark on a life-altering journey. I remember feeling very similar things before my trip to Honduras and, to be honest, she is going far deeper into the trenches of poor and sickness and fear and death than I ever tip-toed in.

So I ask you to lift Michele-Lyn and all the people journeying to Guatemala this week up in prayer:

Dear Heavenly Father, so good and so loving,
We ask You to bless the efforts of the World Help volunteers, missionaries, and bloggers as they leave the safety of what they know to go and serve what we would call the very least of us: babies that need rescuing, adults and children that need comforting and the Good News that only You can bring.  I pray that You direct their footsteps according to Your Word (Ps 119:133) and uphold them in Your protection and righteousness. Though their hearts may break and grow weary from the sin and sadness in this world, make Your presence known to them so that they may feel hope and rely on Your provisions. You have us all in your mighty hand.  For You are a mighty savior and take delight in us with gladness. You calm our fears and rejoice over us with joyful songs (Zephaniah 3:17 NLT). We thank You and praise You for the work that will be done by these precious Christ-followers as You send them out. We pray this all in Jesus' holy and unfailing name. 
Amen.

Thank you, friends, for taking part in this prayer with me. My heart beats strongly for this mission. I'm not sure why. I don't question the passion I feel, though, I obey it. And though I want to drop everything I am doing here at home and join them, I know God wants me here, serving my family in this very specific way. So I must be content to pray fervently and unceasingly.

I encourage you to get to know Michele-Lyn over at her blog, A Life Surrendered as well as checking up on their experiences in Guatemala. 

Blessings as I leave you with this beautiful picture, taken from this website.