A few days ago my team and I were hit with this serious question. Every week, as a discipleship tool, we must fill out a journey marker as a team. A journey marker is like a devotional with a specific spiritual topic that asks you some self-reflecting questions at the end. This past week it was all about finding your calling and the first question was the one I referenced above.
When it was my turn to answer, I immediately thought about how in every country we’ve gone to, there has been a lack of physical needs met. Whether it be water, food, clothing or shelter. I knew that many of the places we went to struggled with poverty, but it didn’t really hit me until one day in Malawi. One morning, as we were driving to work with orphans in a small village, the driver decided to take a different route. We ended up driving through what felt like a mile of trash everywhere. Immediately the driver rolled up the windows because the smell was unbearable. The amount of trash or the smell of it wasn’t what got to me, but instead it was the amount of children and adults digging through the trash to find food. I had seen this before, but only on TV, but seeing it outside of a TV screen hit me hard. I began crying uncontrollably, as if someone had just died and I felt so much pain. It was almost as if God had given me a glimpse of what He feels when His children have to go through that. All I wanted to do was run out of the moving car and embrace them. I wanted to tell them that it was going to be okay, that God would provide for them, but are words really enough?
Are words really enough when you’ve been starving for days? Are they enough to buy you a meal? Are words really enough to feed your child whose been crying all day? The answer is no. James 2:15 says, “If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that?” As missionaries, it can be so easy to want to go up to someone and share the Gospel with them, especially since that is what we are called to do. However, what good is it to meet a spiritual need when we are not meeting a physical one first?
God gave me the analogy of two children sitting in a classroom. One of the children hasn’t eaten in days, and can’t think about anything else, but his desire for food, while the other is well fed and is ready to learn. If you were a teacher, which one do you think would be more likely to pay attention to you? The second of course, because his physical need is already met. Remember when Jesus fed the four thousand? He said, “I have compassion on the crowd because they have been with me now three days and have nothing to eat. And I am unwilling to send them away hungry, lest they faint on the way” (Matthew 15:32). This is the same compassion we should have for those we share the Gospel with. Meeting the physical needs of others is just as important as meeting their spiritual needs.
Ever since the day we drove through the dump, God stirred up an idea in me. A non-profit known as Watering Wastelands where I could help meet the physical needs of the people. I may not know when it’ll be established or where, but I’m excited to see it become a reality someday. I want to challenge you today to ask yourself, where do I see pain in the world? Then ask God, how can I align the pain I see with my passions?
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I have to have $12,500 by May 31st (I still need $1,762 to reach this amount) in my support account in order to continue this journey. If you feel led to give, please click on “support me.” If you cannot give, but would still like to be involved, please pray for my fundraising efforts. Your support means the world to me! 
