B4T STORY: HUMBLED BY HELP

This is a guest post by a B4Ter’s wife in East Asia.

It was a cold, dusty day as my husband sat in the change room of his factory with a handful of his workers. It had been about two years since the opening of our factory, and in that time, my husband had built deep relationships with many of his workers. Setting up the business had taken hours and hours of hard work, long days, jumping through seemingly impossible hoops, and seeing miracles happen. It had taken all the blood, sweat and tears we had.

Working Well

My husband loved working with “his boys”—the workers in his factory—as he taught them how to bag feed, work machinery, load trucks, sell feed, deal with customers, collect money, and more. He loved every minute of it! He shared his life and worked shoulder to shoulder with them, and they respected him for it.

The reputation of the business was growing, and so were sales. Things were looking good.

A Bad Circumstance

Then we were dealt a huge blow. In summer of 2016, we found out that one of our children was seriously depressed, self-harming, and suicidal. We were devastated and panicking. We got some emergency help in a nearby country and began a year of traveling back and forth between our country of service, and this other country in order to get help.

And so, that cold November day, my husband sat in the factory’s change room, head down, shoulders slumped as he shared this with his men that he would be gone for six weeks in order to get help for our daughter.

He didn’t know how they would react to this news. Even though the business was doing well, it was still in a precarious place. It was still relatively new and needed lots of work, and my husband felt the weight of responsibility to keep it running so that his workers would continue to have jobs and an income. Would it be able to survive if we left for an extended period of time?

Unexpected Comfort

When he looked up from telling them the news, he saw tears streaming down many of their cheeks. And then, one by one, they got up and hugged him, and reassured him. “Don’t worry about anything. We will take good care of the factory while you are gone. You go and help your daughter. We understand.” One worker slipped a small amount of money into my husband’s hand. “For your trip,” he murmured kindly.

My husband stood there, humbled, as the men loved on him in his time of need. These men had so little, they were not believers, and yet they gave him so much. We were there to serve them, and yet, they were serving us. It was a moment of deep humbling, in the most beautiful of ways.

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OPEN USA Note: The B4Ters in this story have been unable to return to the country because of the political/security situation there. Please pray with us that, even though the B4Ters can no longer be there, transformation would continue. Pray that many would become disciples, growing from the seeds planted in obedience and faith.

OPEN USA supports workers in the 10/40 Window, who are doing Business for Transformation. This author’s identifying information has been withheld due to security reasons. To learn more about OPEN USA or to get involved in B4T, visit Find Yourself in B4T

To learn more about B4T, read Business for Transformation by Patrick Lai.