Heartbreak

This song has spoken to me over and over as I have asked my Lord again and again to break my heart for the things that break His. One of the times that He answered that prayer, though, took me by surprise.

My team had been invited by our pastor to visit his home and meet his family. As we were sitting in his living room waiting for the meal to be prepared he turned the TV on to an American Christian station. Now, I have a personal aversion to televangelists for a few reasons, but this time I was appalled as we sat there having conversation while for an hour the televangelist begged people to give money to buy olive trees on the Mount of Beatitudes near the Sea of Galilee in Israel. I’ve been to Israel. It’s beautiful there and I can see why people would want to buy a tree that they could go visit, and it’s heart-warming to think that in a few years those trees will help boost the economy because workers will be needed to harvest the olives. However, as I was sitting with a very poor pastor in his home that God has blessed him with for free and seeing the seemingly wasteful of money the pastor on TV was asking people to spend on trees when that amount is probably close to what most Africans make in a year, it broke my heart. My team had a long discussion about what the perception of Americans and American Christians is in Africa and it’s not a pretty picture.

African children learn at an early age that “mzungus” (white people) are rich and so when they see us they always beg for money. The vendors never believe us when we tell them that we don’t have much money and try to talk the price down. One even said, when we told him that we are missionaries, that the missionaries he knows live in big houses and drive big cars so we must have money like they do. The problem is, perception is reality no matter how hard we try to deny it, and the perception isn’t far from the truth. No matter what we say, what the people with whom we come in contact see is what they’ll believe and it will last for generations.

There is a fairly new book out called The Hole in Our Gospel by Richard Stearns, the President of World Vision. It has been traveling around our squad and this past month my team has had it. It’s really eye-opening anyway, but to be reading it in Africa opened my eyes in a whole new way. There are so many things in that book about people living in poverty and the fact that thousands die each day of malaria and AIDS. It’s horrifying to read about, but when you’re living it it goes a lot deeper.

The girls on my team meet every day to pray and discuss different things, and the other day Brittany wanted us to pray for the governments of these countries who need aid and won’t ask for it or accept it, or who use it in corrupt ways. We also prayed for the Christians in America and around the world to wake up!

This trip I’m on is not just a “feel good I went on a mission trip” type of experience. I am seeing firsthand how AIDS and malaria and poverty affect lives. I have become friends with people who cannot afford to send their children to school because even public school costs money. Some even have to choose whether they will eat or buy their medicine. I have played with children who have been orphaned for various reasons. I know a teenager who died of AIDS because his family abandoned him. I know a little girl who was born HIV+ and there’s nothing she can do about it except take medicine so she hopefully won’t get AIDS. Nearly every African in the countries we have been to has malaria and, as long as they can afford the testing and medicine every time they get sick, it’s no big deal; but what about the ones who can’t afford it?

When I return home from this mission trip I want to be truly changed. I want this fire to stay in my bones no matter if people listen or not because I know what I have seen and I know what a difference I can make, and I want to continue to make that difference. Even if I can only impact one life, that’s one life changed for the glory of God. Will you join me in living a life of obedience to Christ no matter the cost? Will you hold me accountable to living that life when I feel like giving up? Let’s band together in the name of Jesus and bring His life to this dying world.