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Have you heard the expression “Boots on the Ground?” Well our Live Dead Missionaries are the boots on the Silk Road. Here we’d like to take a moment and allow one of them to share a snapshot of their life with you. Some names and details have been changed, but this is a true story from this colorful, vibrant, and sometimes surprising region.

So many people have spirits like dead, dry bones lying in utter darkness.

The Father sends us – little candles lit with His love and filled with His Life – to them. We go, and we stand in the middle of valleys of dry bones.

We are light in the darkness.

His Spirit in us whispers to the bones, “Awake.” As the breeze of His breath stirs the dust, the whisper echoes into a faint melody. Bones begin to rattle; shackles shake – loosen. The flame over me grows, casting grey light like the dawn around tens, hundreds, thousands of skeletons. “Awake,” the Voice whispers, and the melody becomes song.

I am just a candle and not the only one here.

Some moments, I forget that there are others. I look too long at the death around me and wish I   could go back to my candle shop. But then, I remember the One who bought me the day I first answered, “Here I am. Send me.”  He took me, molded me, and placed me here. Here I will stay until He moves me elsewhere… or maybe I am to stand here for the rest of my life in a valley filled with death. I bow once more and surrender, “I am yours, Lord.” My flame steadies, light grows, the Voice whispers, the song crescendos, and I pray.

For maybe, one day, one of these skeletons will awaken, and a new candle will be birthed.

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