Iraq: 'The Lord is doing something'

Mike Creswell works for the Southern Baptist News Service. In November he visited Iraq and looked at some of the projects the Southern Baptists are involved with.

Approaching Baghdad, the twin-prop, 19-seat plane does not circle. It does not descend slowly. Instead, the plane does a hard right turn, goes just about sideways and sort of falls out of the air, levelling off at the last minute to land some seconds ahead of your stomach. Fortunately the pilot tells you before it happens that it's going to happen, but still . . .

The landing method is to reduce the chances of getting fired on, of course. It seems people always want to know what kind of reception we Americans had from average Iraqi people during a week in Baghdad. And the answer is: kind, warm, polite for the most part. If there were threats, dirty looks or bad intentions, we were not aware of them. And believe me, I was looking around all the time!

Visiting a poor community on the city's outskirts was about as close as to feeling like a rock star or VIP as I'll ever get: kids and grownups alike surged around, happy just to shake hands or smile. 'Hey, Mistah', the kids would say over and over as they wanted their photos taken, even with no photo to give them in return.

Damage?

After seeing news coverage of the war it was surprising how little damage is evident around Baghdad. Yes, some large government buildings downtown are little more than burned out shells that will need to be torn down some day. No, we did not see the whole city - that is quite large and home for some six million people. But in travelling in and out and all around the city, most buildings seemed intact.

Things look safe enough, but you notice the taxi driver speeds up so as not to tarry too long beside a passing American military convoy, because they are, after all, frequent targets.

We were close enough to hear the booms of the attacks on the Rashid Hotel early one Monday morning. Automatic weapons fire heard in the distance did not seem to faze Iraqis. 'What was that about?' I asked. 'Oh, it could be a wedding. Iraqis always fire their guns during weddings.' Oh.

But amid all the signs of outright war, we also saw the more silent conflict that's seldom mentioned on the six o'clock news - the spiritual battle being waged here. Whatever journalists or politicians or soldiers tell you, it's the outcome of this battle that will decide Iraq's future.

House churches

Dozens of house churches have sprung up here in recent months and Christian workers say the Iraqi people are the most open of any in the Middle East. They're saying right now there's an open door for outreach and ministry. The Iraqi people are tired of an Islam that only talks of justice at best and more often just plain old revenge.

It's hard for western Christians to even imagine how sweet and how compelling and radically different, powerful and life-changing the plain ole Good News of Jesus can be to people in such a spiritual desert. Show the people love, one worker told us, and they will come out of the woodwork to be a part of it.

Food distribution

Iraqis cheered as a volunteer team moved through their neighbourhood to give out cartons of food sent by Southern Baptist churches across America.

Children ran up to the five Southern Baptist men from North Carolina like they were long-lost uncles, giggling and jostling to get close. Mothers handed over their babies to be held and the few men around extended greetings.

Any anti-American feelings were well-hidden in this impoverished Shiite Muslim village where some families have had relatives killed or tortured by Saddam Hussein.

The ten-day effort by the team from Calvary Baptist Church in Salem, North Carolina, was just a small part of a massive, months-long Southern Baptist effort to help the Iraqi people.

During late October the last of 69 truckload-sized cargo containers carrying a total of some 45,000 boxes of food arrived by truck in Baghdad and were off-loaded in a warehouse for distribution to needy people across Iraq.

Saddam's legacy

In the northern Baghdad neighbourhood, hundreds of food boxes were delivered to a school building and distributed from there. It is a poor area far from downtown, where people have built modest homes of mud bricks on land taken by squatter's rights. Raw sewage runs through the dirt streets and livestock wanders unimpeded. Even here, though, village council members had determined the most needy families to receive food boxes. Volunteer team members went with the government leaders who carried lists of eligible families.

Calvary member Larry Ledford told of visiting a home where a man had been tortured by Saddam Hussein's henchmen. Terror filled the adult man's eyes and he stayed behind his mother while he trembled violently. 'I was able to put a hand on his shoulder and we prayed for him before we left', Hal Newell said.

They saw one man who had lost a leg to torture, one who had an eye gouged out and another man whose hands had been smashed by a hammer during torture. A red flag flew over one house where a family member had been killed by Saddam's crew.
Although few spoke English, they understood it was Christians from America bringing them food. 'One man said it was the Christians from America bringing us food. Where are the Muslims?' the man asked.

'The Lord's doing something'

Iraq's latest revolution does not involve guns. Small and quiet as yet, this new revolution has more to do with the hearts and souls of the people: Iraqis are turning to Christ. Many new churches have been started in the last eight months and Christian workers in Iraq say they expect that number to continue growing because of the unprecedented openness to the gospel they're seeing among the Iraqi people.

'The Lord's really doing something', said one worker in Baghdad. 'We're seeing phenomenal response', he added.

'I've worked in the Middle East for over 20 years and I've never seen any people in the Middle East more open than the people of Iraq. This is the most exciting thing', said Steve Hardy, a former trustee of Southern Baptists' International Mission Board. A staff member at Calvary Baptist Church, Hardy has visited Iraq twice.

Missiologists have long known that people caught up in traumatic events like war ask more spiritual questions and are more receptive to the gospel. But in Iraq many people are also questioning the Islamic faith they've grown up with.

'More and more, people have seen the ugly side of Islam. People are tired of violence. They're tired of the anger, the hatred. They're saying, "We don't want this any more",' one worker explained.

He said they had given out more than 5,000 Arabic-language New Testaments in the last month - and that every one had been asked for by Iraqis. Interestingly, some Islamic leaders have given permission for Bibles to be distributed among their people. This is highly unusual for the Middle East, where Muslims are often forbidden to own a Bible.