1998
Before we even went to Malawi for the new eyeglass clinic ministry, we met Ian and Danetta Shelburne, missionaries on home leave from Uganda, and told them about our proposed new ministry. Ian immediately invited us to consider them for a future mission. The Holy Spirit at work!
We arrived in Malawi with about 3,000 pairs of glasses from the Lions Club. They were in 5 huge boxes, and that plus our luggage attracted the attention of the head Customs officer at the Lilongwe airport, who came up to us and asked what we had in those boxes. We said “Eyeglasses for free distribution”. He said “Glasses? Like mine?” and took a pair of readers out of his pocket. When we said yes, we had our first eyeglasses clinic right there in Customs, with several satisfied Customs officials sporting new glasses. [Don't try this in the U.S.! ] No more doubt about whether there was a need for glasses! People want to see clearly.
We had hoped that we could do both WBS and eyeglass clinics, so people could read their Bibles. In the picture above, we tried that - you can see boxes of glasses under the communion table (yellow arrow) - but it turned out we had to do one or the other, not both. Glasses were just too labor-intensive to mix them, and the local church leaders really preferred WBS only, and we wanted to help people with the physical blessing of glasses, so we finished our round of clinics, went home and emailed Ian!