It is my honour to officially welcome you to the shores of Jamaica, and specifically to its capital city Kingston. I commend you for the remarkable achievement of acquiring and commissioning this new vessel to full time ministry. In its first year of operation, thousands of Jamaicans will benefit from this visit as they did from its familiar predecessor, Logos II, through the years.
Ladies and gentlemen, Jamaica, and Kingston in particular is pleased to host the MV Logos Hope for the first time.
During its anchorage thousands of Jamaicans will benefit from this the world’s largest Floating Book Fair, and also communities that are scheduled for special relief projects. At a fraction of the retail costs, visitors will be able to purchase educational, family and Christian literature. In these challenging economic times where knowledge is expensive, help is inadequate, and hope is being tested, I believe I can say, on behalf of all Jamaica, “our ship has come in!”
But more exclusively, it is the ship of Captain Colenbrander and the four hundred volunteers on board representing forty five nationalities, who have made it their home. With such rich and diverse national and cultural representation, you should feel at home in Jamaica, where our national motto is: “Out of many one people.”
The MV Logos Hope is a stark reminder of the expression that ‘while there’s life there’s hope’. Enshrined within the very name of this visionary vessel is a mission, rooted as it is in “the logos,” the Word. It was Jesus himself who said, “The words I speak to you are spirit, and they are life.”
The voyage of the MV Logos Hope is indeed a life-bringing one as it infuses light and life in people around the world through its literature distribution project, as well as the testimonies of personal transformation shared by its crew. For 40 years the Logos Institution has been doing this, by conducting a ministry in bringing knowledge, help and hope to the world through Literature.
Never has the need been more urgent, in Jamaica, and the world, to be reminded that regardless of the challenges we face as individuals, nations, and a global community, our eyes must be firmly fixed on the future with an unswerving gaze of hope. We cannot afford to forget that while there is life, there is hope, and that with God all things are possible.
Very late in the life of the Russian dramatist and novelist Maxim Gorky, and after much hardship and adversity, he wrote:
“I came to realize what good books really were and realized how much I needed them and they gradually gave me a stoical confidence in myself: I was not alone in this world and I would not perish.”
This is what I believe your visit to Jamaica will do for the thousands who have and will walk up the gangway of the ship during the coming days.
Thank you for reminding us that we are not alone in the world, and that we will not perish.
Thank you for bringing the priceless words of hope – at a price we can afford.
I hope that as you visit us in the years ahead a mutual understanding and relationship would have developed and a level of anticipation will erupt, on your berthing, in the chorus saying, Finally our ship has come in!
I thank you.