The strangers all stared as we passed. Hollow, wanting, desperate eyes. They follow me. They haunt me. Its something they don’t tell you when you join the race. They don’t tell you that you will be watched wherever you go. That for 9 months you won’t be free from the saddened eyes of the desperate people of the world. I have been on the race for 4.5 months and I am still unnerved by the amount of people who look at me with awe in their eyes. In Swaziland the children will grab at your hair desperate to know what liquid gold hair feels like. In India strangers will stop you on the street just to look at you and will take pictures to remember the one time they were “lucky”enough to see white skin and blue eyes. Maybe it’s because I am halfway done with the race but those eyes, which used to be so easily ignored, now haunt me as if I carry the weight of the envious glances everywhere I go.
In all this, I am reminded of a woman I met in Nepal who left her home in China. She left to help build a church in a closed country, not speaking her own language, she bravely spoke to several believers every Sunday above a small Chinese restaurant. After the service she approached me asking to see my natural blond hair, to touch my naturally rosy cheeks, and immediately she began to tear up proclaiming “You are beautiful… I am not.” I was astonished! No matter how hard I tried to tell her that what she was saying wasn’t true she simply would not accept that I believed her equally beautiful. Here was a woman who was giving her life for the lord and who had shown such immense courage… yet she could not accept that she was beautifully and wonderfully made. It breaks my heart. God why make me blonde and blue eyed when it’s only cause is to be a constant reminder to those around me that they believe themselves unworthy?
In taking this concept a step further, this Christmas I was camping in small jungle village in Nepal. During my time there my team met and prayed for a young man. However he was in chains, beaten and bruised because he was demon possessed. This particular story is something I struggle with telling because what I experienced that week in Nepal was incredibly difficult. It brought me to a place of brokenness. I won’t go into much detail but we came to find out that this young man was not the only one afflicted with such evil spirits. The entire village for generations had been sacrificing to a demonic spirit. They lived in fear that if they did not praise and sacrifice to this spirit then it would torment them. And for 1 week I held and loved on children who would be raised in a world where they were taught to fear a demon rather than the one and only holy God. So yet again I was brought to the humble realization…. Why me? Why have been so incredibly blessed? And why were some of us born into a world of such unending suffering. I don’t have a clear answer. I know that the lord is good and merciful. He remembers his people and he will remember that generation of children growing up in that village. He will remember the man chained from demon possession. “Listen, my dear brothers and sisters: has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him?” James 2:5. The Lord is faithful and he remembers the poor and their suffering. He remembers his people.
Now I just ask…… Why me? Why you? How have we been given so much while others suffer? And what are you going to do about it? Whose going to feed and lead his lost sheep? Why not me? Why not you? To be honest I don’t understand why I am blonde hair and blue eyed and why I grew up in such a protected and loving enviorment while others are born into a demon possessed village. And if you have wisdom I want to hear it! Leave a comment below or text me personally I want Godly wisdom and I want prayer and understanding. But one thing I do know….. God has called us for so much more. God has called us to make disciples of all nations. To love the widows. To hold the orphans. To lead the slaves to freedom. To love his people. And when the lord comes back. I don’t want to be caught sleeping. I want to be out leading his sheep to freedom.
