Larry and Milynn, I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for turning me on to your incredible ministry ‘Eye Doc in a Box’. After participating for many years in worldwide mission trips involving mostly ‘building efforts’, I thought that my days of mixing concrete and building block walls on the mission field were primarily over. Discovering what Dr Curtis had started, and what you guys were so enthusiastically leading, has created a whole new and fulfilling mission opportunity for me and others in our congregation to pursue. Your ministry is addressing one of the most important physical needs that I now realize exists in areas where our church has projects, allowing us to bring the ‘gift of sight’ to the folks there, as well as in surrounding communities. It totally complements the medical and construction teams that we’ve been blessed to deploy. I was simply amazed how, with minimal training (that you guys so graciously provided…) and hardware, that our ‘vision team’ was recently able to enhance the lives of so many people in less than a week. The myriad of smiles and excitement folks displayed having been given a simple pair of glasses that allowed them to see clearly, many for the first time in their lives, was indeed heartwarming…and life changing! Coupled with the opportunity to witness and share the gospel, even leading some folks to Christ, was indeed a great privilege! On behalf of our team, thank you again for creating yet another opportunity for our folks to be HIS hands and feet.
Dr. Curtis, I just wanted to send an email and share a little with you about our mission trip to Niger, Africa. In the eye clinic we saw 1,000 patients in 7 days!! Beth, Kent, and myself refracted the patients and Shelia along with some local missionaries fitted the Nigerians with the glasses. We had a great experience and we saw lots of conjunctivitis and cataracts. We even had a boy come in who was blind in one eye and with the other eye he couldn’t even see food on a plate that was right in front of him. Through prayer and God’s help, we were able to give him a pair of glasses that allowed him to see out of the one eye. I wanted to make sure he could see so I borrowed a coin from a lady and dropped it on the ground. He was able to walk over and pick up the coin from the ground! It brought tears to our eyes and joy in our hearts to know that we had changed his life forever! The Nigerians were so happy that we were able to give them the gift of sight. After we finished with the patients, we sent them to the local pastors so that they may pray with them and get their information that allows them to follow up with them. However, I was blessed enough to have a conversation with the lady pictured below and she accepted Christ right there with us!! So cool!! We are so thankful to you for teaching us the skills to be able to refract these people or give them medication to heal the infections. Your seminar definitely has equipped us and prepared us to be able to give these people their sight back. This was our second year having the eye clinic and it overflows our hearts with joy as we see the looks on the Nigerians faces and the hugs we receive from them are priceless!! God used us in many ways and I just wanted to share a few of those with you. Thank you again for your obedience to Him and your passion to continue to spur us on to go on these trips and give the gift of sight and the gift of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ to people all over the world! May God continue to bless you, your family, and your business abundantly!! For His Glory,
I have made seven short term mission trips to India. In those seven years I have tried various ministries such as: Pastor’s conference, evangelistic crusades, children’s vacation Bible school but by far the most effective evangelistic tool I have found is the Eye care clinics. Dr. David Curtis came to Arizona and trained a group of us to do this ministry. We found that the brief training prepared us for our eye care mission trip. Since then we have taught new mission team members in these concepts. Dr. Curtis has been a great coach and mentor to us. Our church has used the eye care clinic for the past three mission trips and we are convinced that it is by far the most effective tool for reaching people for Jesus that we have found. The eye care clinic is a compassionate servanthood evangelism project that draws all people to receive eye exams and free glasses. We have found it to be far less expensive to do the eye care ministry than the evangelistic crusades. It is more personal in the sense that every patient is talked to about Jesus and is prayed for. The indigenous church planters have testified to the effectiveness of our eye care ministry. They tell us that the eye care ministry has opened doors with the community leaders. It has created a bridge of opportunity for the local pastors to been seen as community helpers.
David, First I want to thank you for the wonderful ministry you've introduced me to. I went to Peru in August where a team of church leaders from Iquitos took us down-river to 7 different villages to work with the people they are discipling. We examined around 300 people, gave out 283 pairs of eyeglasses, and I saw 2 men pray to receive Christ as well as several skeptics deeply moved by the free grace this team offers. I trained one of the local Pastors how to do the exams and others how to interview and dispense the eyeglasses. I left about 800 pair of eyeglasses and both of my sets of paddles. They are working with 9 other villages and that is continually growing, plus they often do evangelistic outreach in Iquitos as well.