The Lord told me on our first day in Cambodia that this was going to be a hard month and one that made me realize how much I have to depend on Him. At the time I thought it had everything to do with the house we are living in. 14 people in a 2 bedroom house, its dark and gloomy inside and we live with 2 big lizards (which we have affectionately named Fred and Sally) and a host of other small critters crawling about. After one week of ministry I have realized that while the living conditions are definitely part of the lesson, the people that we encounter are what is going to teach me the most.
5 days ago we visited 2 villages. One of those villages was in front of a garbage dump. The people living there, in their makeshift tarp huts, dig through trash all day to find things to take to recycling. That’s their sole income, $1.50 a day. Because of that every member of the family has to help once their old enough. I watched a young boy, probably about 10 years old dig through a nasty trash bag the whole time we were there meticulously sorting out the metal and plastic he found.
picture by Toni Groff
2 days later we went to another village that had been forced to leave their homes by the government and were relocated to a muddy, hot piece of land. The organization we are working with has built houses for many of them but there are still several families living under tarps until the houses are finished. Again, poverty and desperation were in my face. My teammate Ally and I spotted a “coffee shop” under one of the tarps. So we took one of our translators over and ordered a coffee. We talked to the lady working there and she shared with us that her and her 2 year old daughter lived there by themselves. Her husband had gone to find work in Malaysia 4 years ago, but she has not heard from him in the last 2 years and she thinks he found a new wife and is not coming back, but she looks for him everyday. To make a living she sells coffee and food under this tarp during the day and then cleans off the table that she prepares the food on so that her and her daughter have a bed to sleep on at night. I also met another woman in this village. She is 19 and has a 2 year old daughter and is 5 months pregnant. Her husband has also left her. She has no way to work and make money because she has to take care of her daughter. I cannot imagine this being my life. I left the village feeling confused, and helpless.
This brings me to the present. Yesterday, upon returning from church where I gave a message on giving up all things to know Christ more our team is bombarded by a group of street kids, half dressed in dirty worn clothes. 2 of our teammates, Sam and Courtney, had met these kids the day before when they shared their cokes with them. We now have 7 instant friends, all under the age of 10. The kids run up and jump on us like we are jungle gyms. We laugh and play with them and just enjoy their presence.
While all of this is going on I notice a young boy, probably about the age of 7 with a piece of cloth tied around his neck. Then I realize that there is a tiny baby nestled inside. I assume it is his brother. I stretch my hands out towards the baby and the little boy takes the cloth from around his neck and hands me this sweet little infant. I wonder why a 7 year old is caring for this baby. While I stand there holding that precious little life I notice a young woman standing on the other side of the street nervously watching me and holding a baby about the same size as the one I have in my arms. “No, surely not…”, I think as I give the baby back to his brother and we walk across the street. She stands there with a big beautiful smile on her face and I learn that sure enough, just as I suspected, she is the mother of these children and the baby she is holding is the twin brother to the one I had just given back to his brother.
picture by Toni Groff
Through our translator I learn that she has 6 kids, her husband is injured and can’t work but the government has built them a house and until recently, when they went back to the states, there were some American missionaries here that had been giving them rice. I ask her what she needs and she points to the half empty can of infant formula. So, me and Andrew walk to a nearby store and buy some formula for them. We come back and give her the formula. Again, that big beautiful smile is on her face. As I’m talking to her I notice the twin that she is holding is considerably smaller than the one I had been holding. I ask the mom if I can hold her son. She, without hesitation, hands him to me. I immediately notice he is retracting (retracting is when the skin pulls in around the rib cage because he is having trouble breathing) I tell the mom that he NEEDS to go to the doctor. She explains that she took him but they wouldn’t see him because they only see adults. Our translator doesn’t speak great English and trying to explain what I needed to explain was hopeless. So what should have been my first response suddenly becomes my only response. I grab 2 of my teammates and we ask the Lord to heal this sweet, precious little life. I am a nurse, but standing on the street corner in a third world country I have nothing to offer. I hate feeling helpless. But what I know is that God is good and He is our healer and our provider. He is trustworthy. Although I frequently convince myself otherwise, I don’t have anything to give them without the Lord anyway. So I hand this mom her son back and trust that the Lord will heal Him just like we asked. I think, as I look at him one more time, that his retracting seems to be subsiding. Thank you Jesus.
I thought as I walked away from that mom and her precious children what it would be like to know that you can't provide for your kids. It must break her heart. I just simply can't imagine. Then I thought about the child sponsorship programs we have in the states for situations just like this. Until today, they have just been stories. Not real life. Today those stories have flesh and blood and they are hungry. I realized that we can provide for those needs in a tangible way by sponsoring them. I realized that just a few dollars a month really does mean life for these precious little children. I realized that there is nothing so important in my life that I couldn't give it up so that one of these kids has a chance.
So if you want to consider sponsoring a child through Food for the Hungry there is a link on the left hand side of my blog site, but there are also several other organizations that you can sponsor through as well.
