Sunday night, I drowsed on and off all night, as I rode a bus down out of the Andes mountains of Quito to the Pacific coast town where Damaris, the child I sponsor through Compassion, lives. At 7:30 am, the bus finally pulled to a stop at the Panamerican bus station. The lady next to me asked where I was staying, and, fortunately for me, she knew where it was and, even better, it was just down the street. After finding the price for the cheapest room available ($8) I walked up 3 flights of stairs to room 310, and decided I’d pretty much gotten my money’s worth. The fan worked, the room was small, and the shared bathrooms and showers down the hall were on the sketchy side. After a whole night on the bus, I decided I needed a shower, however sketchy they might be, so I showered and changed. It was only 8:45, and I was supposed to meet my sponsored child at 9:30. I decided something with caffeine would probably be a helpful way to get me through the day, so I headed downstairs to see if there was somewhere I could get some black tea.
I paused at the bottom of the stairs. There were a lot of people in the lobby, and I wondered if my sponsored child had showed up early. I scanned the faces. There was a girl, sitting on the couch. She looked familiar, and my mind went back to the most recent picture I’d gotten of Damaris, holding a pair of shoes she’d bought with the birthday money I sent. Was it her? She looked at me, and the same question was obviously reflected on her face. We both decided the answer was yes, and headed towards each other with big smiles. She came right to me and gave me the biggest hug. She didn’t want to let go. I was so happy in that moment I had come, because I knew that I didn’t just want to see her, she wanted to see me too.
Her mother was there with her, and the 3 of us headed to a local park. We talked as we walked around the park, taking pictures and playing on the playground equipment. She asked about my siblings and my favorite colors. I learned her favorite color (pink) and that she likes almost any food but vegetables. While we were waiting for a taxi to take us from the park to the harbor, her Mom shared how Damaris had been praying that I would be able to come to visit. It was so special for me to hear that.
After our trip to the harbor, I went with them to their house. I met Damaris’s sisters, her father, a cousin, a nephew and a niece. While I was there Damaris showed me her photo album. It was in a box, and in the box were most of the letters I’ve sent her over the past 4 years. She read some of them out loud to me then showed me her photo album. Mixed in with photos of parties and trips were photos I had sent of myself and of our family. I was amazed the way my simple letters and photos had become such a big part of her life.
The other day a friend posted a link to a really powerful post about the plight of children around the world. In it, she shared that there are 169 million children in need around the world. That number seems a bit overwhelming, until you look at the number of Christians in the world. There are 2.1 billion Christians in the world, according to her post. God’s people can care for each of these children. If only 8% of us would look out for one child, meet the needs that no one else in their life can or is meeting, pray for them faithfully, and love them with the love God has given us, there would be no more children in need in the world.
Will you be one of the 8% who will make a difference? Sponsor a child through Compassion. Send a child orphaned by Aids in Zimbabwe or Zambia to school through Forgotten Voices. Pay for a life changing surgery through Cure. Mentor an at-risk kid in your neighborhood. Adopt. Foster a child.
If you’re already doing that, thank you for being Christ’s hands in a hurting world. Pray with me that God will move more of his people to take up their responsibility, and be encouraged that each of us is only part of Christ’s body, no individual has the responsibility to care for all the needs and brokenness in the world. But, if you’re thinking that maybe you’ll let someone else take the responsibility; after all, it only takes 8 in 100, and money and time are tight, let me share something with you. The day I left Damaris’ hometown and headed back to Quito, two of her sisters were on the same bus as I was. Her oldest sister sat down to talk with me. She told me, how when she was young, her family lived in a house of cane. To pay her school fees, in the afternoons she would go out with a 2 liter bottle of soda and sell individual cups of soda to people on the street. Now, her family has moved ahead. Damaris doesn’t need to sell things on the street. They have a house made of cement block, and even have electricity to run their refrigerator. Even so, her mother is only making $75 a month, her father about the same. Imagine trying to raise a family on $150 a month. When she told me that, it suddenly put my own affluence in perspective. I could afford a plane ticket to come and visit them. If Damaris’s sister saved every penny she made for an entire year on the $25 a week that she earns, she would earn just about $100 more than my 3 destination plane ticket cost me.
America is an affluent nation, and without even realizing it, we have come to see as needs what are really luxuries. I expect internet access and hot water. I don’t want to eat the same thing at every meal. A 40 hour work week and a 2 day weekend seems like a given to me. Ezekiel 16:49 says, "Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy.” I’m afraid that those words are true for far too many in the United States as well. For most of us living in the United States, giving is a lifestyle choice we can make. Maybe we won’t buy as many new clothes, or go out to eat as often, or rent as many movies, or choose the unlimited texting option for our cell phones. But, while there are still children who don’t go to school because no one can afford to buy them a uniform, children dying of preventable diseases because they have no access to medicine, children dying of starvation because their parents have no food to feed them, I think it is our responsibility, as Christ followers, to make those lifestyle choices. The next verse in Ezekiel says, “They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen.” Let’s not become a nation like Sodom. Lets “learn to do right! Seek justice, encourage the oppressed, defend the cause of the fatherless, plead the case of the widow” (Isaiah 1:17).
