Yesterday was our first day at a monastery in Myanmar. This place is awe-inspiring. What started with just a few people has exploded. On the property there are about 400 monks and nuns as well as about 4,000 others living in the care of the facility. There are two buildings where the sick are cared for, as well as dental, eye, and physical therapy clinics. As volunteers we will change bandages and diapers, we will taxi disabled people to clinics, we will assist with physical therapy, we will help keep the facility looking good, and we will help teach English. The sick patients, volunteers, and monks pay for nothing. Everthing is provided for by donation – including food, water, electricity, housing, medical care (I could go to the dentist for free!). Even the people who live on the property for refuge (that’s about 3,600 people, to keep count!) are given water and electricity for free. All this is done by donation in one of the poorest countries in Southeast Asia. And the facility has expanded exponentially to other Asian countries as well as Germany, Italy, and even the US where they have programs for orphans and drug rehab.
Did I mention this is a Buddhist monastery?
I’m upset, guys. I’m so incredibly heartbroken. 4,000 people cared for by the vision of one man, and all by donation, with the simple mantra of stay mindful and do good things.
What are we doing? What the hell are we doing, church?
This is funded by volunteers going through the streets of Yangon – silently – for two hours every day with a bowl to collect money and bags to take food donations. I’m not saying something like this could work exactly the same way in the States. I’m not delusional, ya’ll. But why couldn’t we do so much more? We are so affluent.
I hear your brain already saying you’re not. Please trust me on this. You are. Why are we so hesitant to give? Why are we so timid to speak truth? Why do we hold on to such fear when ultimate freedom is available to us?
Who are we loving???
As I’ve understood, Buddhism is centered around the thought of detachement. Pain and decay are inevitable, so detachement from these physical things release us from the suffering of life. How incredibly close to the gospel! What does scripture say? Set your mind on things above not things of the Earth. They pass away. Heaven is eternal!
My heart is pounding inside!
I’ve heard so many volunteers today decry the Western mind as weak. Why? Because it is focused on what perishes. Church. Brothers and sisters! WE are focused on things that will perish. For the love of God and all that He is, why are we focusing on this transient crap? Why are we not giving outrageously? Why are we not sharing all we have? Why are we afriad of giving our energy to the Lord’s work? Will He not give us all energy we need? Will he not provide all we need to live?
Listen, I was processing this before and coming to this monastery has solidified it in my mind. In the West we are seeking a good life. We say that the Lord wants good for us – and what are we talking about? We’re talking about an American ideal. A house with two cars, two kids to match, food, plenty of money to be completely comfortable. NO. Stop it. Just stop it!
The good life God calls us to is to first love Him and then to love others out of that overflow. Your health is not guaranteed in there. Maybe you’ll get cancer. Is God still not good?? Your monetary stability is not included in there. You might lose our job. Is God still not good?
I’m not saying we can’t or wont have those comfortable things, of course! We live in a blessed society where the poorest of the poor still have better resources and chance at life than entire NATIONS elsewhere.
But defining the good life by things here on Earth is a slap in the face to the brothers and sisters I’ve met around the world. I have met Christians living in bamboo homes, who gather only enough food for a single day, who have no access to medical care. Is God still not good? Is He withholding from them? Is their life not good because they lack these things??
Of COURSE we want to provide for them! Of course we want to help them live longer and become educated and have safe dwellings. All of that is beneficial and helpful and I get that. BUT, that is not the good life God has promised us.
The good life is the eternal, indomitable, imperishable life promised in Him! The good life is freedom in Christ from the lies of the enemy. The good life is Holy Spirit indwelling – God with me every single breath! The good life is joy that springs up within me from a place I don’t even understand. The good life is assurance that WHATEVER happens to me here on Earth, I have a home in Heaven. Why? Because the good life is being a spiritual daughter of God! I have inherited EVERYTHING in Christ. I have security and power and authority because of whose I am, not because of all the extra things He gives me.
The GOOD life is in a good GOD!
I love you all so much. I can’t make this ring true for you. I know this is an experience I share with so few, but I pray Holy Spirit impresses it on your heart. Go after the good life. Everything else will fall away. I pray everything else in my life falls away.
