Dispatch from Yopugon, Côte d'Ivoire
by Melissa Yoon
We went to the city of Yopugon for our last work day in the missions field. 
I was sad that we didn't get many chances to go into the villages for evangelism (EV) this year. I expected the schedule in Yopugon to follow our previous days and consist of mostly VBS. But praise God - we wrapped up our last day with three hours of EV!
The way we EV in Côte d'Ivoire may not appear to be the most effective method in terms of building lasting relationships or maintaining accountability, since we most likely will not see these people again. But I believe that God used our team to encourage the people we met and to fill them with a renewed sense of hope in Christ.
Of the people that my EV group encountered, one group in particular really affirmed the purpose of our mission. As our group was walking down a street, we saw some young men sitting outside near an empty lot. They invited us to sit with them and obtained seats for everyone, and 
more young men joined us. They told us that someone had notified them in the morning that a missions team would be visiting the area, so they were expecting us. There were about ten men, most of whom seemed to be in their late teens or early-to-mid twenties. All were Christian, except for one. We shared a verbal account of the bridge illustration with the non-Christian man, and afterwards, we asked him what he thought of our story. The man answered that he believed in God, that God sent Jesus Christ to die on the cross for our sins, and that he believed that Jesus is the only way to heaven. He said that he had no problem believing in the Gospel; rather, he struggled with finding the courage to attend church every Sunday. When asked why, the man and his friends shared that they didn't feel comfortable going to church without an offering. All of them were unemployed, and work was hard to find. Their immediate needs used up the money earned from any work; there was nothing left for Sunday offering. One of the men, who seemed to be the spokesperson for the group, told us that they all believed in Jesus, but the harsh living conditions in Côte d'Ivoire sometimes made them wonder if God forgot about them.
Our conversation with the men reminded me of a discussion that our team had after our very first day in the field. A few of our team members, shocked and broken by the extent of poverty 
in Côte d'Ivoire, expressed feelings of hopelessness and despair over the people's living conditions - not unlike the sentiments of the young men. To encourage our team, Joseph June told us something that a member of the Korean church in Abidjan had shared with him: 
in 1953, postwar Korea was a third-world country - it was no different from Africa. If one compares pictures of Korea from 50 years ago to pictures of Ivorian villages today, he would find that they looked exactly the same. People lived in shacks. There was no sewage system. As a third-world country, Korea seemed hopeless. But God sent American missionaries to open the peoples' hearts to the Gospel, to make His name known. Now, approximately 50 years later, Korea has achieved economic success and no longer has third-world country status; it is currently one of the leading senders of Christian missionaries worldwide.
The story of Korea's transformation was a tremendous source of encouragement to our team and strengthened our faith in God's mission in Côte d'Ivoire. After hearing that story, I didn't doubt that God has great plans for Africa as well. Our EV group shared this story with our Yopugon brothers, to encourage them to also have hope and big dreams for the future. I could see the change in the men after we finished speaking, at the prospect of a better life in Christ. Current conditions may have appeared to be bleak, but the future was full of hope.
"Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful."
-Hebrews 10:23
