I wrote this blog while on a flight from Nairobi, Kenya, to
Accra, Ghana. But before reading, here is a quick update: I am in Ghana, serving with Campus Crusade at Cape Coast University with teams New Song and Team 180 and loving it. It’s hot, but Ghana already has a sweet spot in my heart and I’ve only been here five days.
The in-flight movie, The
Blind Side, featuring Sandra Bullock,
just ended. I can be quite critical of
“feel good” movies, but while this is still idealized, it is legit. The Kenya Airways movie pamphlet describes
the movies as: “The remarkable, true
story of Michael Oher, a homeless African-American youngster with a tragic past
who is adopted by the Touhys, a well-off white family in the American
South. With their help, the out-sized
Oher begins to excel in school and discovers the extraordinary athlete
slumbering within.”
While it is moving for the masses, this story hit especially
home for me. As I mentioned before, I
had the opportunity to teach in a St. Louis inner-city school before going on
the World Race. While I do feel like I
have more of an understanding because of my relationships with my students, I
still have no idea what it’s like to live in the ghetto, wear through my
wardrobe in a week, have a crackhead for a mother, or hardly know a distant
father. Throughout the entire movie I
kept thinking of one particular student I had.
He reminded me so much of the main character in the movie. A soft-spoken, gentle giant whose ticket out
could easily have been football. The end
of the movie-I’m not spoiling anything, I promise-features newspaper clippings
showing boys that had been murdered from the place where the main character had
grown up. Many of the articles ended
with the clause that the deceased boy had been a good athlete. In this movie, Michael Oher was the
exception.
There’s the popular tale about an incident in which
thousands of starfish washed up onto the beach.
A little girl slowly walked along the sand tossing them back one by
one. A wise, worldly adult went up to
the girl and in a frustrated tone stated, “There’s thousands of them. You’ll never be able to throw them all back! What you’re doing doesn’t matter.” While picking up and tossing yet another
starfish into the water she said, “It matters to that one.”
It matters. We hear
all the time that we’re blessed, but how much of that are we willing to
sacrifice? I do not think it would be
wise for every person to adopt an orphan, but I do know that we are called to
do unto others as you would have them do unto you. What does that look like in application? That could be buying a little more cookie
dough than you’d like to help fund your neighbor’s trip or volunteer to teach
at an after-school program. Maybe it’s
inviting a young couple out to lunch after church or donating blood. Maybe it’s finding out who in your church has
a need and meeting it or meeting your neighbor for lunch. Be an organ
donor, leave a big tip the next time a waiter is clearly having a bad day, write
a letter to someone who’s now distant, or go to a random Little League game and
compliment the players after the game.
Whatever.
Do I do all of this?
Heck no. But something we are
striving for as a squad is to be the church.
It’s easy to say, “The church should be doing this and that,” until we hear
our own voice echoing with the reminder that, “You are the church.”
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PS: If you have a few
more minutes, here is a video called “Miniature Earth” that is fascinating,
challenged my understanding of the world, and enlightened me to what is
reality. Enjoy.
