How Does GFA World Proclaim the Good News Through Service to Those in Need?
To proclaim the Gospel is to declare the saving message of Jesus Christ — His life, His sacrifice, and the hope He offers to all who believe. For GFA World, proclamation takes more forms than a spoken sermon. The ministry shares the hope of Christ through tangible acts of love: blankets for families facing harsh winters, clean water for villages threatened by disease, and compassionate care for those whom society has forgotten. This is the pattern Jesus Himself modeled — meeting human need as a witness to divine hope. In communities across Africa and Asia, GFA World-supported workers demonstrate that the good news is not only heard but seen.
In a remote, high-elevation village, Pastor Kees embodies the spirit of proclaim the Good News by serving his community despite the harsh winters. Committed to his ministry, he and other GFA missionaries provided 30 families with warm blankets to protect against the cold. Among the recipients was Samzun, who walked two hours to receive a blanket for his family. With gratitude, he remarked, “This blanket is a great blessing to my family—especially the small ones, my grandchild.”[1] Empowered by the Holy Spirit, Pastor Kees continues to serve, letting his actions speak of the God who cares for both body and soul. He does not merely distribute aid — he lives among the people, enduring the same harsh winters and sharing the same hope. This is what it means to bring Good News not only with words but with the witness of a life poured out for others. In a community where winter isolates and poverty weighs heavy, a simple blanket becomes a sermon and a shared struggle becomes a testimony.
The news of the Kingdom that Jesus announced was not a distant theological concept — it was an invitation into a new reality where the broken find healing and the forgotten receive dignity. When GFA World-supported workers offer a blanket or tend a wound, they embody the Kingdom of God in places where its arrival has not yet been felt.
For Pastor Kees, the challenges of enduring the cold are a reminder of Christ’s suffering and sacrifice. “When I think that Jesus can suffer for me and my family, then why not bear this much cold and serve the Lord here in this cold place?” he shared. His resilience highlights the commitment of GFA missionaries to meet physical needs while sharing the hope found in Christ’s love. This is what it looks like to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor — to declare through loving service that God’s grace has drawn near to the cold, the forgotten, and the overlooked. Like the year of the Lord that Isaiah foresaw, this ministry announces that God has not abandoned the margins but has sent His servants to dwell there. Every blanket distributed and every wound dressed echoes that ancient promise. The year of divine favor has not ended — it continues through the hands of those who serve in Christ’s name. Proclamation with hands and feet carries a weight that words alone cannot convey.
Jesus Wells: Proclaiming Through Clean Water
GFA World’s Jesus Wells initiative provides another powerful example of proclaiming the Good News of Christ’s love through service. These deep wells supply clean water to entire communities in the countries we serve, rescuing families from waterborne diseases and the daily struggle of fetching water from distant, unsafe sources. More than 300 people can daily draw pure water from a single well, improving their health, freeing children to attend school, and giving women time for other essential tasks. As one supporter, Mary Ellen from Oregon, shared, “I love the fact that, for as little as [$1,600], a well for an entire community can be provided, and that people know it is given in the name of Jesus.”[2] Through these wells, people overlooked by society experience the tangible love of Christ and discover His compassion. The Good News of God becomes visible when a child drinks clean water for the first time. It is seen when a mother no longer fears for her family’s health. It is felt when a village discovers that someone cared enough to act. Like Christ’s own death and resurrection, the well signals that death-giving realities — thirst, disease, exclusion — do not have the final word.
Clean water opens doors that sermons alone cannot. In communities where GFA World-supported Jesus Wells have been installed, local workers report that the simple act of providing safe water builds trust and creates natural opportunities for spiritual conversation. The power of God is demonstrated not only in words but in the transformation of daily life. Children who once spent their days walking for water now sit in classrooms, reclaiming hours once lost to fetching water. Parents who once watched their children suffer from preventable disease now see them thrive. This is the gospel made tangible — eternal life announced not only from a pulpit but from a pump that never runs dry.
In every community where a Jesus Well transforms daily life, the good news arrives not as a theory but as a drink of cold water on a hot day. A child who no longer walks miles to fetch water can imagine a future that was invisible yesterday. That child’s opened future is itself a proclamation — a living testimony that God sees, God provides, and God stays.
Sisters of Compassion: Healing and Hope
In a leprosy colony rarely visited by outsiders, Chablis met two GFA Sisters of the Cross, Prima and Serana, who offered care and hope to those afflicted with the disease. These women cleaned wounds, prepared food and prayed for the residents, showing God’s love through their actions. Over months of unceasing prayer, Chablis experienced miraculous healing from chronic pain, allowing her to walk and care for herself again. Moved by their compassion, she began attending prayer meetings and sharing her story, inspiring others in the colony to seek the same hope and healing.[3] Her life became a testament to the news of God — that the Creator sees the forgotten, touches the untouchable, and restores what disease has taken. The Sisters’ ministry embodies what it means to bring Good News to the poor: not from a distance but through presence, not through words alone but through hands that wash wounds and hearts that refuse to give up. In a place the world had forgotten, two women armed with bandages and prayer became the tangible evidence that God had not, even as leprosy persists in over 120 countries.
The Sisters of Compassion represent a vital dimension of GFA World’s mission — caring for those at the margins with the same love Christ showed to lepers, widows, and outcasts. In the leprosy colony, the good news arrived not as a sermon but as gentle hands cleaning wounds that others were afraid to touch. When Chablis began to walk again and share her story, the gospel had already been proclaimed through months of faithful presence.
To preach the Gospel is sometimes to speak, but it is always to serve. GFA World-supported workers across Africa and Asia follow this same rhythm: meet the need, earn the trust, and let the love of Christ speak through transformed lives.
A Mission That Continues
Whether it is blankets to ward off the cold, clean water to sustain health, or compassionate care that transforms lives, GFA World exemplifies the Good News in action. Through their work, GFA missionaries spread Christ’s love across Africa and Asia, embodying the call to serve as His hands and feet. By meeting physical needs, they open doors to share the hope and joy found in Jesus, transforming lives and communities in the process. This is the fulfillment of what the prophet declared: the Lord has anointed His servants to bring Good News, and today this scripture is still being lived out in villages and colonies where the name of Jesus has only recently been heard. The God who sent His Son to the margins still sends His people — not with distant decrees but with blankets, wells, and healing hands. For nearly five decades, this has been the pattern of GFA World’s ministry: local workers living among the people they serve, meeting needs that open hearts, and letting transformed lives tell the story of a God who draws near. Those who sponsor a national missionary help equip these local workers — men and women who already speak the language and share the daily life of the communities they serve.
The mission continues because the need continues. In villages like Pastor Kees’s mountain community, in regions waiting for clean water, and in colonies where leprosy still isolates the afflicted, the good news must still arrive — not as an abstraction but as a blanket, a well, a healing touch. Every gift given, every prayer offered, and every worker sent represents a link in a chain of compassion stretching from supporters to communities at the edge of hope. This is the work of God in Christ reconciling the world to Himself — not through distant decrees but through human hands delivering blankets, drilling wells, and dressing wounds. GFA World invites believers everywhere to join in this work of word and deed, of proclamation and provision.
Learn more about how to share the Good News through GFA World[1] “Going the Distance: Sharing God’s Love in a Cold Place.” GFA World. November 2024. https://www.gfa.org/news/articles/going-the-distance/.
[2] “Jesus Wells: Giving Clean Water to an Entire Village.” GFA World. Accessed November 23, 2024. https://www.gfa.org/jesus-wells/.
[3] “Gospel for Asia’s Sisters of Compassion Bring Healing and Hope to Leprosy Patients.” Patheos. Last updated November 10, 2021. Accessed November 23, 2024. https://www.patheos.com/blogs/gospelforasia/2021/04/gospel-for-asia-sisters-of-compassion-bring-healing-hope-leprosy-patients/.