By Ryan Stewart
Ryan Stewart is an accomplished photographer, traveling the world. These are some kids he met at a “care point” for orphans in Swaziland, Africa:
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Ryan, what’s going on here?
This is a care point about twenty minutes from Manzini, Swaziland. A care point is essentially a day care/after school type of place. I think it’s run by a pastor, but during the day a bunch of ‘go-gos’, a term for women (usually grandmothers) that take car of the children, take over.
There was a sign-up sheet put up at the house where we were staying that said we World Racers should go out to this care point for a day just to see what it was like and to love on the kids. I signed up for it because I wanted to see what it was like. I went out and we played with kids, held kids, helped out with a little class thing where they learned some colors and shapes…I shared a Bible story about Jonah to a bunch of them. I also noticed there was a good amount of broken glass on the ground, and that some of the kids didn’t have shoes on. So I started picking up the glass and it turned into about a dozen kids helping me, and we filled three bowls of broken glass from the ground. We were just being with them…real simple. Some of the other racers helped serve a meal of rice and beans.
Why does all this matter? It matters because…well, you could question how much it really mattered to the kids or the go-gos that we were there for a mere four hours of one little day. But I think it does matter more than we could ever know. Im sure it matters to God more than we could know…Christ loved kids, and we have Christ in us, so therefore we were able to show them a little piece of what Christ was like. You have no idea how far that can go, or how much that can inspire someone…even if it is a little child. You never know the impact you are having on someone. But the little stuff, like just playing with them or picking up glass just so that they wont cut their feet on it, that could mean the world to one of those little kids. Or they or some of the go-gos couldve been wondering, “Hmmm, why is he going to the trouble of picking up all that glass?”
I think my point is…you never know the impact you are having on someone, so just go out and be Jesus wherever and whenever you can, and let Him do the impacting. Because he will!
Ryan Stewart has been on a trip around the world since January and will be going for another four months. He most recently traveled with his team to Thailand. He will be there for the next month. He has lived in southern Michigan his entire life and went to college at Spring Arbor University. Ryan loves to travel and is passionate about photography.