Forty Families, One Well, and a Question About Prayer

When the well was dug, the village elder asked the team to explain why they had come. The answer opened a three-month conversation.

By a field worker(name withheld for safety)

The question came on the third day, after the drilling equipment had been loaded back onto the truck and the water had been tested and declared clean.

The elder sat with the team leader under a thorn tree at the edge of the village. He was not hostile. He was precise. He wanted to know the actual reason.

"You did not come for the well," he said. It was not a question.

The team leader told him the truth: they had come because of a belief about the world, about people, about what they were made for. The well was real — the water was real — but it was not the reason.

The elder sat with this for a long time. Then he asked about the belief.

What followed was not a conversion. It was a conversation that lasted three months, conducted in the shade of that tree and in the homes of the forty families who drew water from the well. The elder brought his questions. The team brought their answers and their own questions back.

By the end of the third month, seven families had asked to hear more. Two had asked to meet regularly. The elder had not committed to anything, but he had not closed the door.

The team leader describes it this way: "We planted. We do not know what grows."

The well still works. The water is still clean. The conversation is still open.