Imagine the scene with me: We’re in an African village, surrounded on every side by kids of various ages, most of them being loud and trying to get the attention of the “azungos” (that’s Malawian for “white person”) that were around. But the face of one of these kids captured my attention so utterly clearly that I couldn’t keep my eyes off of her, even from a long way off.
She’s about 8 years old, chest wrapped with a piece of fabric that holds her sister to her back who is just a year old. She isn’t loud like much of the other kids, and she isn’t clamoring for the attention of anyone. She sits at the base of the tree, being mom to a child that clearly couldn’t be hers. She worries that her sister is okay; it doesn’t concern her that she’s missing out on the attention of the new friends that came today. Her eyes capture your attention in a way that is almost shocking: the stark difference in colors between her white eyes and dark skin makes it impossible to miss. Her eyes tell a story that is filled with pain, poverty, and desperation for something that is different without her uttering a word.
She shouldn’t have to be a mother at 8. I’ll find out later that she also is in charge of taking care of another sibling because the parents aren’t around. She’s charged with the responsibilities that twenty-year-old Americans struggle with. She’s followed each and every day by two kids who need her attention.
Most of the other kids run inside to the dance party that the Americans started to entertain the children and we both see the opportunity here. We sit down and talk about the basics of the conversation that we’re capable of: her name, her age, her sister’s name and age, and mostly just smiles that captured the heart of this American.
Her name is Diana and in a simple conversation, I had a revelation from the Lord.
I glance down to see a tatter in the white silk dress that adorns her little body.
I never noticed before our conversation, but the dress is clearly flawed. There is a part near her knee that has a hole that won’t be able to be fixed with just a few stiches but requires a patch, or better yet, a new dress.
And sitting against that tree I heard the Lord say to me: “Kristy, I don’t see your tatters when I look at you either. I see your heart, your passion, and your impact in the kingdom. You focus on the tatter in the dress—the fatal flaw. You forget that I am making all things new.”
I thought that I would cry but staring at those two girls made it impossible for me to do so. I never saw the tatter on the dress until the moments when I stopped long enough to look for it. I never focused on the tear, and this little girl didn’t either.
I pray that I am becoming the kind of person who realizes that Jesus doesn’t want me because he sees my flaws and wants to fix them, but the kind of person who sees my good and knows He can use it, despite all of those flaws.
