-by Michael Allen
It was the summer of 2019, my first trip to the Amazon Basin. This was the second village that we had the opportunity to minister in that week. We set out that morning in small teams to visit homes and invite people to the medical clinic and vacation Bible school that had been set up at the home of the village chief. As our small boat pulled up to this particular home, the man in the window invited us in for a visit. When we began to converse with him it was discovered that he was blind. Jane McEwen, a veteran of many missions to Brazil, explained that we were there to share about God. The man was very receptive and asked to hear about God. At that point Jane turned to me and said, “Ok Mike, you're up”, meaning go ahead and share with him. For a split second I froze, not knowing how to begin. This was not my first mission trip. In fact, I had been on many trips to remote places in the world doing just what we were doing in Brazil. From the outside view, there was no hesitation from Jane’s command and my speaking, but internally there was a struggle going on in my mind. As I started to speak I went back to where it all began, “In the beginning…” I did not use the exact phrasing of Genesis 1:1, it was more of a Star Wars intro: “Long, long, ago,…” I began to share with him the story of the Bible from Creation to Christ. As Jesus said in Acts 1:8, the power of the Holy Spirit will come and then you will be my witness. That surely was the case here, the Bible was coming alive right here in this man’s home! Not only did he respond to the Holy Spirit and accept Christ as savior, his granddaughter, who was listening the whole time in the adjacent room, walked out and accepted Christ as well! The man said that his parents were Christians but that he had never heard the story of God and always wanted to. God knew the man’s heart and desire, and after many decades, sent us deep in the Amazon River to bring the hope of Christ to this house. What an awesome God we serve! “Though I was blind, now I see.”