If a person is blind or visually impaired, we have a way to show Jesus.
Christian Record Services for the Blind, the official Seventh-day Adventist outreach to people who are blind or visually impaired, recently received a note from a woman in the Philippines. She begged for help, saying she could not see, and wanted to know more about Jesus.
Christian Record sent the woman a MegaVoice, a pocket-sized solar-powered audio player preloaded with the Bible and the Conflict of the Ages books by Adventist Church cofounder Ellen G. White. The Bible was among 508 distributed on audio players and in braille and large-print books last year.
Christian Record, founded in 1899, is a worldwide outreach, serving nearly 20,000 people with vision impairments in 76 countries. But this is only part of the story. The organization reaches beyond data and statistics to touch the lives of the people it serves.
At the heart of Christian Record is a desire for every person living with blindness to choose Jesus as his or her Savior and friend and to be among those who see Jesus when He returns in the clouds. “Every eye shall see him,” the apostle John says in Revelation 1:7 (KJV). What a day that will be when the first face that these people see is that of the Master Healer!
While we wait for the Second Coming, MegaVoice players are a key way for blind people to see Jesus. Among the recipients are military veterans who suffer eye trauma from penetrating wounds and traumatic brain injury, the second most common injury among people in active military service.
Christian Record’s inSight4Vets program (inSight4Vets.org) distributes MegaVoice players preloaded with stories about overcoming during the worst possible circumstances, and stories of survival, hope, and transformation. More than 250 MegaVoice players have been distributed to blinded veterans.
Christian Record also organizes annual National Camps for the Blind that give attendees the opportunity to try outdoor sports usually reserved only for those with sight.
Debbie, a first-time camper, first heard about the weeklong camp as a subscriber to Christian Record’s lending library of audiobooks. She was excited to attend a winter camp. “I’ve never been snow skiing or anything like that,” she said when she first arrived at the camp. “Winter camp is a whole new experience for me. My challenge this week will be learning how to downhill ski.”
Since 1967 National Camps for the Blind has served more than 10,000 blind campers through summer and winter camps.
