Every Time I Bind a Book

Matt Peirce, one of our interns, wrote something on his blog recently that really resonated with my heart. You need to read this. It’s that good.

This morning I started binding thousands of curriculum with 5 other interns. At first glance, this is obvious behind-the-scenes work for the ministry. I see no people, I talk to nobody except the other interns, and I’m in the office close to 8 hours a day sitting in a chair. But I refuse to accept that the work I’m doing for the next three weeks is behind-the-scenes. Here’s why.

The books we are binding are Leadership Summit curriculum, specifically the Save Sex book. This curriculum teaches young people in Qwa Qwa how to save sex for marriage. It is full-color, interactive, and effective in changing the lives of youth. Teen pregnancy rates have dropped drastically in many of the schools where Leadership Summit has been taught for the past few years.

Every time I bind a book I’m giving a high school student a chance to learn how to make choices that will change their life. Every time I bind a book I’m helping a young person avoid AIDS. Every time I bind a book I am not behind-the-scenes, I am on the front lines of the battle to help change the continent for the better. God has privileged me with this work. Far be it from me to say that God was wrong in putting this task before me.

Here’s to an Africa that is not just a stereotype, but an Africa where people are strong, healthy, Godly, and completely sold out to Jesus Christ.

Interns, thank you for your dedicated hard work and positive attitudes. It’s all Kingdom business, and you are changing the continent of Africa. I am so proud of you!

4 Responses - Add yours below

1. Mike DeLong says:

   Matt - praise God for your heart and your vision…to see what God sees…to do what God loves…and to honor Him through it all! May the Lord give you such joy that your seams burst with His Pleasure! And just think…He has promised that “He who began a good work in you will carry it out to completion” - now THAT’S a PROMISE with ETERNAL Rewards!

2. Sam says:

   I know where Matt is coming from. I’m in the Marine Corps and for me finding something in my everyday life that makes a difference is not hard but what’s does get foggy is the where do I find God at in my everyday duties. I have to break my work down as well into something more then just the work at hand but what is does down the line. I accept the fact that if I’m at least helping in some way to make some ones life a bit better then it was before even if it wasn’t all me but if i laid a hand in it then i can feel a since of “good deed”. When i was in Iraq i would spend countless hours like Matt in the OCO making candy bags for the kids we would give out on missions. Most days i would be asked by a fellow Marine ‘Why” all I could say was because I want to. It’s not as Godly as what Matt was doing, but it helped build a relationship between the kids Iraq and the Marines. With relationships comes trust and being comfortable, and if their comfortable they can gain knowledge. With that knowledge come’s the power to unite us and stop the fighting perhaps. Its bit out their but it got me though the days.

3. danielle says:

   I LOVED this. It is so true.

   When I worked for a missionary who ministered in Sudan I would pray over the support letters that I would be folding and sending out (all day, day after day!)

   Thrive seems to have a great group of interns (and a great group of leaders!)

4. Kristie Chiles says:

   It is so refreshing to see God at work with what seems to be so mundane to us, but is so important multiplied in God’s Hands!

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