The woman slowly approached me after the meeting, with a folded notebook page torn from a spiral in hand. “I don’t have reliable internet where I live,” she communicated with great concern, “and I didn’t want the people in my community to be forgotten.” 

With great care, she hands me the list – front to back, there were 59 Dominican names. Not numbers. Not pins on a map. Names. People she knew were hungry.

And included on the back was a second list. 13 more names. With deep care, she said: “These are the Haitian families that need food.”

Across the island of Hispaniola, over 6 million people are experiencing high levels of food insecurity. In Haiti over half the population doesn’t know where it’s next meal will come from and thousands have entered into famine levels of food insecurity. That’s the data, and it matters. We need the numbers to locate the need.

But we don’t feed data. We feed people.

This is exactly why we believe that the Church is God’s response mechanism. And that has nothing to do with its scale, rather, it has everything to do with its relationships. Because when it comes to hunger, it’s not just about counting the names, it’s about knowing them.

One thing that we can learn from Scripture is that Jesus didn’t ignore hunger, he leaned in. In John 6, we see Jesus recognize that the crowds were hungry. And he doesn’t just continue on. Jesus pauses. And while his disciples scramble to financially calculate what to them would be an impossible task, a boy sits there with his lunch. 

5 loaves and 2 fish. 

Jesus takes what little the boy had, in comparison to this great need, and multiplies it. He fed the crowd with that boy’s “yes”. But as we keep reading, we see that Jesus eventually gives them what they really needed: Himself. 

Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe.

All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day.

For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.”

John 6:35-40 (ESV)

This is what Team Hope is built on, a response that is scripturally grounded, relationally driven, and Church-led. Today, Mission of Hope partners with over 800 churches, schools, orphanages, and organizations across the island to distribute meals, share the Gospel, and walk with families experiencing crisis and suffering.

Back to that day near the border.

The woman who handed me that list was a local church leader, probably in her seventies. She had attended a gathering that we had hosted in a church two blocks from the Haitian border, where we invited pastors and leaders to help us identify those most in need.

We had explained that we would be sending out a digital form to help us collect data. But as you now know, that would prove to be a challenge for her with the spotty service and lack of internet access in her area. So she sits down with her notebook and writes each individual name. 

One by one. Because they weren’t just a statistic, rather a relationship. She knew exactly who was hungry.

“For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit.

For the body does not consist of one member but of many…

But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, yet one body.

If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together. Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.”

1 Corinthians 12 : 12-14, 18-20, 26-27 (ESV)

Paul reminds us that we are one Body with many parts. We all have a role in responding to this crisis. 

Some give, some go, some connect the dots.

The woman near the border didn’t wait for an ideal solution. She didn’t have access to adequate resources or technology. But what she did have, she gave. Her relationships. Her time. A priceless piece of notebook paper with 72 names – remembered and written. 

She said yes to what God asked her to do.

And that’s the question I want to leave you with:
“What’s your lunch?”

Like the boy who gave his small meal to Jesus and watched it multiply to feed thousands, what is the simple thing in your hands today that God might want to use? To meet physical and tangible needs in a way that not only leans in to the temporary, but ushers in hope for eternity, through Jesus Christ. 

Maybe it’s your voice. Your network. Your time. Your resources. Your encouragement.

Whatever it is, God’s not asking for abundance. He’s asking for obedience.

As you’ve read this, maybe God has been stirring your heart. The “yes” He’s inviting you into may not look exactly like ours. It could be meeting a need in your neighborhood, reconciling a relationship, or stepping into a ministry opportunity you’ve been hesitant about. Whatever it is, the invitation is the same: listen, trust, and obey.

If you sense God is leading you to connect with what He is doing here on the island of Hispaniola, here are two ways to get involved:

Join Team Hope – Become a monthly partner at $10 to provide a daily meal for someone who needs hope now more than ever.
Join Team Hope -> https://missionofhope.com/join-team-hope

Support our family in ministry – Partner with us as we serve and lead in the Dominican Republic, empowering and equipping the local Body to see life transformation for every man, woman, and child, through Jesus Christ. 
Partner With Us -> https://missionofhope.com/missionary/austin-paige

Every number has a name.
Every name has a story.
Every story matters to God.
May we be a people who stop for the one, while we pray for the millions.