I’ve talked about global atrocities with apathy, both past and present.
I look back at past global and political discussions and stand amazed at my little mind.
The Kathryn five months ago loved talking about hot-button political topics and history. But when it came to discussing this refugee crisis or that oppression under a certain dictatorship, my knowledge matched my compassion level – marginal at best.
I talked in such a way to puff myself in front of the other person. Another way to bolster the inner pride seeping its way through my mind.
I did not truly consider the people involved in the topics I flippantly discussed. Did not consider the pain, the cries, the desperation.
I did all of this with the country of Cambodia…and I had even been here before.
The Khmer Rouge claimed the lives of about two million Cambodians between 1975 and 1979,
The horrific regime wanted everyone back at ground zero. No education. No class or social status. No one who could possibly pose threat or opposition to the new communist state.
Forced into work camps, families died from execution, starvation, disease and exhaustion.
These were things I knew in my head. Things I had even taught in classrooms back in the States.
However, it wasn’t until I watched “First They Killed My Father,” a Netflix movie and true story about a survivor, did my mind shift gears and my being began to rattle.
I’m sad to say that it took a visual representation of the Khmer Rouge to be fully moved to heartbreak, but I’m thankful that God can use something as seemingly simple as a Netflix movie to speak to me.
Now I find myself unable to shake the images from my mind anytime I’m with an older Cambodian…knowing what they’ve seen…knowing what they’ve experienced.
I don’t see them. I see their tragedy. I see their smiles, but then who and what they’ve lost.
Empathy is good, but where I am is not, having to myself that pain is not the person and a person is not their pain.
God sees their pain, but first, sees them as someone to be made whole. Someone to be made completely new by the blood of Jesus.
That’s where I want to be. My prayer is to be simultaneously filled with empathy and hope for the person in front of me. Not seeing them as broken, but as someone to be redeemed and restored by Jesus.
Cambodia has a deep and dark stain in it’s history. But we have Savior who has made things white as snow. A Savior who has purified us and made us a new creation. No marks. No blemishes.
Lord, make this truth evident in all of our lives…especially in the lives of Cambodians.
That is my cry for Cambodia.
