UPDATE ON BABU

Thank you all for your prayers, kind words, and financial support. We are very happy to say that Babu’s rickshaw fund has been fulfilled and surpassed which will help fill in some gaps for the days he was unable to work. If you still wish to provide additional support, please reach out.

We had Babu over for dinner for the first time to give him the money collected. He was amazed to see me (Jahred) in the kitchen as I quickly roasted the cauliflower that he brought.

After the lovely meal, we had the chance to speak with Babu’s sister and wife via video call. They both knew that he would be coming to our place tonight and they wanted to talk to us. They expressed their sincere gratitude for us supporting Babu and helping him solve his problems, and shared that they gave thanks and prayers to God for us.

During our time together, Babu expressed some beautiful sentiments. We usually avoid using a translator to speak so that we can practice our Bangla and him his English, but what he wanted to say went beyond either of our language abilities. First he expressed what a great time he had over dinner sharing, “I never expected to have such a good time.” But second and more profound what Babu shared was his feeling that God was working in his life.

While he is so very thankful for your support and our friendship, this evening he regularly used the word madhom meaning ‘medium,’ as in “The artist used painting as his medium of expression”. Babu felt we were the medium with which God was working in his life. Below are a few screenshots of the things Babu shared. Thank you again for your support.

For it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose. – Philippians 2:13

Originally posted January 8, 2026

First a special request:

If you have been following along with our posts, you will know that we’ve made good friends with our rickshaw driver named Babu. Over the past months we have come to learn more about his life and have developed a trusting relationship with him. He has treated us as his brother and sister and not just his foreign customers; he checks in on us whenever something happens in the city (like an earthquake or political demonstration), and calls us to ask how we are doing when we haven’t seen him for a while. We have shared jokes, introduced him to bubble tea (he loves it) and have offered a shoulder to cry on when he’s faced difficulties or misses his late mother.

On Thursday evening, Babu came to us distressed. That afternoon, completely blindsided, his customer had stolen his autorickshaw. Some of his friends helped him rent a motorcycle to drive around the city centre in search of the rickshaw, but after many hours they were unable to find it. He was devastated. He is the sole breadwinner of his family, supporting his wife, sick father, and younger brother and sister. Rickshaw driving is his only form of income. He needs to replace the rickshaw that he was renting, worth approx. 50,000 BDT, which is a significant financial burden as someone who barely has any savings at the end of the month, after paying the rental fee and sending money to his family in the village. With this unexpected catastrophe, he said to us, “I feel like my life is over. I don’t know what I will do”.

Would you consider supporting our dear friend Babu by contributing to his rickshaw fund? 

We ask that you keep Babu in your prayers: that he would not lose hope but believe that God is a good and loving Father who is with him through the trials in his life. And please pray for us as we continue to build this relationship and share the gospel message with Babu.

We all have Christmas traditions and they often centre around family, biological or otherwise. Over our 3 Christmases together in Canada, Jessica and I had developed our own Christmas rhythms – with our corps we’d participate in regular kettle shifts, carols by the fire, Bloorstock (the annual Christmas talent show), and the Christmas day meal; along with our familial traditions like attending Jessica’s parent’s Christmas Eve service, and meals and present exchanges with both of our families. 

I have always found Christmas a time of great reverence. Each year through song and sermon I find myself in awe of the action of God coming down to be with us in human form. In the west this reverence is often practiced through introspection. We sit personally with an advent reading or message. We give a little smile when a lyric hits right during a carol. Christmas is a time of peace which we like to take in the form of inner peace. As someone who is more reserved and pensive, I enjoy this aspect of Christmas.

Unsurprisingly Christmas looked a little different for Jessica and I this year. Being both of our first Christmases away from our immediate families and Toronto church community we were wary of how it would feel and be. How different would Christmas feel without our regular traditions? What moments would I have for reverence?

In Bangla, Christmas is translated as boro deen literally “big day,” and so there are many ways Bengali christians gear up for their “big day.” Similar to life back in Canada our Christmas was filled with many parties, this time with various offices and groups around the territory. But parties here look a bit different. Since Bangladesh is a predominantly muslim country there is little in the way of traditional Victorian inspired Christmas decoration (think Christmas trees with lights, garlands, stockings, wreaths, etc.). Instead, parties are decorated with balloons and general party store decor, making the celebration feel very much like a grand birthday party (which it is). This is accompanied by a large Christmas cake and singing Happy Birthday to Jesus while the kids blow out the candles and are hand-fed first bites.

There is an overwhelming feeling of outward grandiose joy in the Bangladeshi celebration that I do not always gather at Canadian celebrations. In Bangladesh it is not a Christmas carol unless it moves you to break it down on the dance floor. There is an outward embodied joy with the announcement of Christ’s birth that I hadn’t felt until an elderly lady from our corps pulled me by the wrists to dance with her in the dance circle. In the west we sing Joy to the world but this year I really asked myself “do we embody it?” How many of us sing carols with our hands in our pockets or with a focus on musical excellence as opposed to embracing an ecstatic exultation.

One may think being a majority muslim country would make Christmas dull. But for over a century Christians in the west have been writing and complaining about the over commercialization of Christmas. Here, Christmas is what you make it. What people know about Christmas is what the church celebrates and does around it. To have a Christmas completely centred around Christ can never be dull. Christmas is the celebratory carols you can hear one village over. Each Christian institution makes the advent season known by raising an illuminated star on a long pole for the whole city or village to see. Proclaiming and declaring this boro deen “Emmanuel is born. God is here with us!”

On another hand for most Bangladeshi’s December 25th is just that, December 25th and nothing more. We felt this absence of communal recognition the most when we had to leave our Christmas day service early to ensure we made it home before potential political unrest began as an exiled political leader returned to the country. We prayed for safety as we drove through crowds of people. And yet we were  reminded that Christ came down especially for these moments of brokenness. A reminder of the contrast between putting our hope in a political leader and surrendering it to the King of Kings. That the Christmas story has no meaning in a perfect world, but the joy of Emmanuel is that He is here in all seasons, through introspective reverence, outward embodied joy, and the chaotic unrest that surrounds us. He is here.