I am guilty.
Why am I blessed to get an endless supply of water back at home when people here have to walk miles to fill up a large yellow container that won’t even last an hour? Why do I get to drive an automobile to the doctor’s office on clean, paved roads when I “get a cold” while people here who have serious and life-threatening health problems have to walk miles to even make it to the nearby clinic? Why are there kids starving in the streets, hoping beyond all hopes to find a simple loaf of bread when I have a pantry full of food back at home, and worse, take it for granted?
Who was I to complain about university and college food when a day’s worth of leftovers can feed hungry street children for a week? Who the hell was I to complain about a freezing cold room one day and an over-heated room the next when there are orphans, widows, and prisoners who have to rely completely on the sun or shade of a tree for their protection, warmth, and safety?
Did you know that $40 serves a family in need for an entire month? That’s $10 a week. That’s two less Starbucks drinks a week or giving up an addiction of medium sized drinks at Dunkin Donuts for a year to save a family. $40 a month is $480 in a year. Four hundred and eighty dollars. When you do the math, giving up ten dollars a week looks like nothing to the average American, but what seems like nothing to me is literally everything to a family in need in Ethiopia. Realizing this makes me want to shed everything I’ve ever taken for granted and give it away to someone who really needs it.
It makes me want to do something.
We need to become friends with people who have experienced the injustice of this world personally in order for it to leave an impact on us. This month, I have had the opportunity to become friends with Gadisa Birhanu, who has been working with HOPEthiopia for four years. Through HOPEthiopia and our host, Ralph, Gadisa was able to find empowerment and love, something he didn’t have before.
Gadisa’s is a story of redemption and the result of what one person can do for the life of another through one simple thing, loving by laying down one’s life for his friends. Gadisa always had dreams of helping people and becoming a social worker. But between the ages of 13 and 17, he slept on the streets in an over-sized sweatshirt. He struggled with bouts of extremely severe malaria and nearly died. In order to eat he had to steal his food by dining and dashing. He asked his brother for help but was turned down. It wasn’t until a friend, Melese, gave him a very small sum of money to encourage him out of the blue. Melese told him something simple: That he was going somewhere.
By working at HOPEthiopia, Gadisa has met Jesus, giving a new sense of purpose to the work he is doing in his life to empower others. He was lead by three people to the verse of Jeremiah 29:11. This scripture says “‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future.’” It wasn’t until a woman gave him a bible with that verse tucked inside the cover that he began to really seek the Lord and His face and ask “What are the plans you have for me?” It’s been history ever since.
Gadisa now sponsors six children. He sees their potential because he knows where they come from. He spends his birthdays hanging out with homeless elders on the streets, women who are in prison, and giving them encouragement that there is hope. Gadisa has every right to be proud of his life now, but he is constantly humbling himself to give more and be where Jesus would spend His time. Gadisa left me with a question that’s imprinted on my heart and will be with me for the remainder of my Race: “If Jesus came today, where do you think He would go?”
I can tell you right now that He would go straight to the street kid himself and give him a loaf of bread. He would sit in the dirt with orphans covered in flies, feces, and soot. He would sit next to the homeless and even go as far as invite them inside His home for a Thanksgiving meal. He would give them shelter, water, warmth, and a place to rest their head. No questions asked, nothing in it for Him. Just true, humble love. When Jesus comes back, I want to be where He is.
So, yes, I am guilty of turning my back in the past. I am guilty of embracing the ignorance of poverty. But I am no longer going to stand for empty excuses to brush off the reality of what is happening in our world. It’s personal now. It’s in these moments when the distant truth becomes personal knowledge and when a story on the news becomes a close friend that I am forced to look myself in the eye and truly do something about it.
This year is great, and I am experiencing a lot that is bringing me closer to Jesus. Walking in his shoes is making his power, his truth, and his friendship not just theory, but reality. But the harsher reality I’ve come to know is that poverty is real life, it’s happening now, and it’s something that shouldn’t be ignored. It’s the only life that some people know. But Jesus shows us that it doesn’t have to be the only life people know, as long as we are willing to rise up out of our guilt and give our lives away through the smallest acts of kindness and encouragement.
