The Well That Changed a Valley

In 2ثة014, a small church in rural Kentucky pooled their resources to drill a well for a village in northern Uganda. The congregation of sixty-three members — mostly retired coal miners and schoolteachers — raised eleven thousand dollars over eighteen months of bake sales and envelope offerings. They expected to provide clean water for one village.

What they didn't anticipate was what happened next. The village of Patongo, once bypassed by travelers because there was no reliable water source, became a stopping point for merchants and families moving between towns. A small market grew up around the well. Mothers from three neighboring villages began walking to Patongo, and while they waited to fill their jugs, a Ugandan pastor named Joseph Okello started holding an open-air Bible study. Within two years, a church of over two hundred had formed — not because anyone planned it, but because blessing has a way of flowing outward.

This is the heartbeat of Psalm 67. When the psalmist prays, "May God be gracious to us and bless us and make His face shine on us," the next breath reveals why: "so that your ways may be known on earth, your salvation among all nations." The blessing was never meant to pool and stagnate. God pours His goodness into our lives the way water fills a well — not so we can cap it off and guard it, but so that it spills over, drawing thirsty people from every direction toward the living God who provides.