Just behind our local market is an entire world that I never
knew existed. During the day when
I’ve driven past, the buildings just look vacant with little to no life. However, once the sun sets these
abandoned buildings become the homes of many beggars and street children. We knew these communities mostly
scavenged and begged for their meals, so we saw this as an opportunity to not
only provide for the felt needs of others, but also show them the love of God
that we talk so much about.
So I spent the bulk of the afternoon cooking with my good
friend Donald and we set out with a volunteer team that is working with us this
week and a handful of youth from the community. I don’t know exactly what I expected, but my heart sank when
we pulled to the back of the market and saw 75 plus people huddled under the
roof of one of the abandoned buildings.
The cardboard mattresses and extra dirty clothes made up their sleeping
arrangements as women, children, and men fought for prime places directly under
the roof.
I found out that this wasn’t just a random group of beggars,
but it was one of the 13 Muslim tribes on the island of Mindinao, the
Bajong. While this isn’t one of
the extremist tribes, it is by far the poorest because they believe the human
race is inherently unclean and can never do anything to change it, so why
try? While many of these people
are able-bodied workers, they will never be more than beggars unless their
entire worldview is changed.
On the island of Mindinao, there are many different dialects
that make it very hard even for Filipinos to communicate with each other. Luckily, Brother Ronny has joined this
tribe and has pretty much become one of them. He lives with them, begs with them, eats with them (when
they have food), and interprets for them.
Through Brother Ronny, we told them why we were there and that we just
wanted to help provide a meal for them, but when we went to serve them, no one
would come up. Brother Ronny
explained to me that they were very ashamed to be in the presence of a
“privileged white man” (if they could only see my bank account…) and that they
didn’t trust what we cooked for them.
While they were very appreciative of our gift, they knew we
were Christian and didn’t want to eat something from the hands of infidels that
would make them even more unclean in the sight of Allah. My immediate reaction was frustration
because I had cooked all day for them and we didn’t have to come visit them,
but we did. It was that moment God
shut my mouth and thoughts and gave me the words to say. I told him that God loved him and his
tribe and that because of that, I wanted to cook something for them they would
eat and have their fill, and come back again.
I don’t think Brother Ronny knew what to do with this, but
he simply smiled and said ok. I
could tell the elders of the tribe didn’t trust me one bit, but as Ronny said
my words to the people, many of the families rushed up to shake my hand when
they were cowering from me before.
Unfortunately, the elders didn’t take to kindly to this, so I gathered
all of our things quickly and loaded up the van. Before we drove off, Ronny came up to my window and thanked
me for coming and asked when I would return. I told him I would be back as soon as I could find something
they would eat.
I’m not totally sure what Brother Ronny’s religious
background was, but either way he’s being exposed to the Gospel. He’s already left his life to live with
these people, for whatever motive, and is learning how to serve a very
difficult people group. These people may never be anything more than beggars
because of their mindset, but does that make them less worthy of being
served? Well my initial response
is yes, but it’s a good thing I don’t make the decisions.
It’s a crazy challenge to serve a group of beggars that may
never be anything different because of choice. But who am I to condemn them to that?
