Do Something

On Wednesday we took our team to visit the "trash village".  Here lives a community of people who work everyday in the massive trash dump behind their house, rummaging through garbage for hours in order to make an average of $1 per day.  

They pay $7 per month to live on this plot of land.  For every kilogram of plastic bottles they make $0.20 and for every kilogram of metal zippers they make $0.50.  On a good day they will be able to make $1.50

The reality is that those who live here make up a tiny fraction of the 1.3 billion people who live on less than $1.25 per day.

My heart is broken for these people and for the reality of extreme poverty, however I am so thankful that I saw with my own eyes and heard with my own ears their stories.  

It is moments like these where I wish I could gather everyone I know and bring them to this place, so that they too may feel the heart break and be pushed into action.  

We can't turn a blind eye to the reality of injustice in the world today, we were not called to be the generation to sit back and live our own lives.  We need to figure out a way to be catalysts of change, raising awareness and fighting for each individual life.  

These people are people just like us, they were created by God in His image and they are loved as much as we are loved.  They matter just as much as you matter.  

We can not let fear of the uncertain or the risky keep us from reaching out to the poor and the vulnerable.  It is easy to ask ourselves "What can we do?"  But I think what we need to be asking is "What can we not do with the God of the impossible by our side?"

It is not about figuring out exactly how we can change the whole world, but looking to the individual.  What we can do is ask God what is our part to play in this, and He will tell you.  Maybe it is to raise awareness, to commit to prayer, or maybe it is to pack up your belongings and move to Cambodia.  We need people in all areas.  We just need to be open.  

As many hard questions as situations like this raises for me as a Christian, I know that I can have peace and hope in knowing that poverty like this was never on the Fathers heart.  Gods heart is breaking more than we could ever imagine.  When He created this world His intent was for a place that man and God could walk together, but because of sin it is the way it is and we as Christians must do what we got to do.

It will be hard, there will be challenges and you will fail more than once, but God. But God never gives up on us, His Children, His love towards us never fails.  He has equipped us to be His hands and His feet to those like we met in this village.

During my times abroad God is always reminding me of the passage in Matthew 25:35,

"For I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink; I was a stranger and you invited Me in; naked and you clothed Me; I was sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me; Then the righteous will answer Him, 'Lord, when did we see You hungry, and feed You, or thirsty and give you something to drink?  And when did we see you a stranger, and invite You in, or naked, and clothe you?  When did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?  The King will answer and say to them, 'Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.'

Could it be any clearer?  Guys, we have to find a way to engage our hearts in the issues that are on our Saviors heart.  Jesus did not bear the burden of the cross only for you and me,  He died on the cross so that all may have eternal life in Christ Jesus.  He came to bring hope to the hopeless, to be a light in the darkness, to give peace to the restless, and He wants to use us to do that!  He is calling us on a journey together with Him, all we have to do is say yes and obey.  Are we willing?  Are we ready to do what He asks us to do?  Are going to keep the gospel to ourselves, go to church, pray before meals and pretend that everything is just fine?  Or are we going to do something?

"You may choose to look the other way, but you can never say again that you did not know" 

-William Wilberforce

For more information about how you can get involved go to www.grimerud.no