The other day I was at the soccer pitch watching our team practice. I had just gotten back with Lila from taking a couple of people to Mbabane, the capital city of Swaziland, to register and pay for classes for college. As I was sitting on the sideline of the field next to Pastor Gift, our host, his kids and another little boy named Majazi came up and started playing around us. I started playing catch the Pastor Gift’s youngest daughter, until she got bored, and then his son and Majazi started climbing on my back. After a while of playing with them, they found something else to play with, so I started watching the guys practice again. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Majazi starting to walk away, like he was going home. For some reason I kept watching him. I noticed that his shirt was almost completely torn, and was only attached by the collar. His shorts were torn all the way down both legs as well. But, those things weren’t what kept me watching him as he walked away. As I looked down at his feet I saw that his shoes were giving him some trouble. As he walked the sole of his right shoe completely came out from under it. It was hanging by the stitches on the side of the shoe. He stopped leaned down and tried to fix it. He put the sole back under his foot, and tried to shift it to where it would stay. He took a couple steps and it started flopping again. This time he didn’t stop, he just dragged that foot along with his head down.
Watching Majazi walk away like that made me feel like crying and throwing up! Tears came to my eyes as I walked far enough to where I couldn’t see him anymore. The feeling of throwing up came back later as I was thinking about it.
Every day we see kids run around barefoot with torn clothes, and that doesn’t really get to me. But, to see a kid look down at his shoe that just broke and be bummed cause he can’t fix it breaks me! The kid always smiles and laughs; all of them do. We either get so used to living amongst it all that we forget what it means to be broken, or we’re so broken that our minds and hearts go on overload and we just become numb to it. We often forget that we live in a world full of injustice while we sit on our couch, watching our plasma screen television, eating popcorn. We go to the mall and buy a couple new t-shirts to add to the 10 or 15 we’ve already got, and meanwhile there are kids that have two shirts that are ripped to the collar. It’s true that every good thing, as well as bad thing that God turns into good, is a gift from God, but the prosperity message that the Church preaches has got to stop. Why is it that every time Jesus talks about money and possessions, he talks about giving it away? The story of the rich young ruler always comes to mind when thinking about these things (Mark 10:17-31). This blog kind of reminds me of one of the first blogs I wrote in Mexico about the cost of following Christ.
I’m not judging anyone for what they have. It’s only by God’s grace that we have what we do. It’s only by His grace that we live in the country that we do. It’s also only by His grace that I have the opportunity to be in Africa being broken by these things. Maybe I can’t change Swaziland, or Africa, or the World, but people are what count, and if we don’t stand against the injustice that takes place all around us, then who will? To answer that question will cost us everything, but most importantly, it will cost us our lives in service.
“Is this not the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter-when you see the naked, to clothe him, and not to turn away your own flesh and blood? Then your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will quickly appear; then your righteousness will go before you, and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard. Then you will call, and the Lord will answer; you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.” Isaiah 58:6-9
Jon
