Thuit was about three years old when I met her while conducting a relief mission at an orphanage in the heart of the Mekong Delta (Vietnam). A tiny waif whose smile would melt the toughest man, she latched on to me and totally won my heart. We spent the day together, and though she never spoke a word, it was readily apparent that she was deeply hurting for attention and affection. She refused to let any other team member pick her up, but clung tightly to me as I carried her about. Departure at the day’s end was quite traumatic, and although our languages were different, I tried to console her by assuring her that I would return. It was then that one of the staff ladies informed me that Thuit was completely deaf. 

We all live among people who are stone deaf—that is, whose ears are closed to the loving call of Jesus. Many are distrustful and skeptical because of experiences in a society that has few qualms about breaking vows and commitments. Talk is cheap, folks say, but action is a different story altogether. There are multitudes of hurting people all around us, starving for the same recognition, kindness, and love that Thuit craved. 

The Word of God exhorts us, “My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth” (1 John 3:18). Christlike compassion that reaches out to the lonely and hurting around us may well be the only gospel that can penetrate those ears that do not hear. May each of us be sensitive to our Lord’s call, and may we dispense His love as we live and work among the spiritually deaf in our families and communities. 

He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches. Revelation 2:7 

~ Pete Lewis