before you start reading
forgive me for my typos, i tend to have lots. ;) Also, forgive me if i offend you, its just what is on my heart! Happy Reading!
So i have been thinking for a while now, almost two years now about one statistic that bothers me.
Here is the statistic..
"20% of the world lives on 80% of the world's wealth, while 80% of the world lives on 20% of the world's wealth."There of course are many more statistics like this one that deal with poverty and the like out there, but this one has stuck with me for sometime. I used to be the person who thought America is the greatest country in the world, do not get me wrong in many ways it is the greatest country in the world, but when i found out that America makes up a majority of the 20% that lives on 80% of the worlds wealth.I was dumbfounded. I always saw the poverty on television and heard about the
atrocities in other parts of the world, but i guess like most people i brushed it off, was
desensitized to it, or perhaps, i frankly did not care. i think i was a little of all three, but it was never made real to me until the first time i stepped off of a plane into Budapest, Hungary and road in a van to Romania did poverty have a true effect on me. This was my first mission trip and it was only my first few hours there did i see the poverty as we drove past various villages we saw the poor conditions of homes, and dirty children, ran down vehicles, and everything.
BUT the real eyeopener was when we went to the Gypsy village of
Dobresti, Romania for the first time. That was the time did poverty throw me. I was floored, heart broken, and all the emotions that go along with these things. Homes that were about 8 feet by 8 feet, one room where families of 6 or more slept, cooked, ate, lived, and so on... The roof was patchy the walls were dirt and clay brick, the roofs were made of twigs and sticks, and shrubbery. No running water, only a dirty puddle, where water flowed and settled, it was filled with frogs mud and all sorts of other bacteria. I saw children bathing and splashing around in their "drinking water". Oh the things i have taken for granted. I had a
Woe is me moment.
Never more should i gripe and complain, i thought. however, soon i would be complaining that it was way to hot, and i wished there were air conditioning in
Romania! Then with the help of a very Godly and loving women, i realized that i was complaining yet again. i thought
Kalep WHAT THE WORLD... you see all this poverty and yet you leave the village and are still grumbling. Another
Woe is me... moment.
Their is so much to the trip that changed my world view and my life for ever. The Gospel finally came to life for me. The life of Christ was made real to me and i realized that Jesus was with the
"least of these" and he himself was poor, moreover
,as James 1:27 says
"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world"this verse is the core verse to which Belief in Motion and Project 127 was founded upon. And throughout my trip i read this verse that was posted on the wall in the kitchen of the
Bruski's home. Although i had read
James over and over in my lifetime and how i loved this book, this verse never stuck out to me i grazed over it, like i assume most of us have before, or do. I
focused on the
persecution part of this chapter, but i never really took much thought on the latter part of this chapter. Pure Religion that GOD our Father accepts is this.... wow... the bible was more alive to me than ever before... To be the hands and feet of Jesus was real to me.
......
Moreover, throughout the past two years since my first trip to Romania in the Summer of 2007, I have pondered this statistic. I have questioned GOD, asking him why me and not them.? Why am i blessed immeasurable and
undeserving and not them? why am i the one who sleeps on a "
feather top pillow" and feather top bed? in a warm home? WHY... This is not fair, i thought and still think from time to time. Why do i have so many things, pointless things? computers?
ipods? expensive cars? nice cell phone? more clothes than i need? 3+ warm meals a day?... why GOD why am i blessed.? it is a good question to ask God I think...God answered me with this verse in Luke chapter 12 verse 48?...
"
But the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked"....
WOW, how profound, how terrifying, how humbling. I sat and i wondered, as i still do about this command that to whom much is given much is
required", i think how much have i been given.... yea it
definitely surpasses what i have given back and i have
definitely fallen short on the latter part of that verse. much
required?
WOE IS ME, GOD SAVE ME FROM THIS PIT OF MY SIN!!!! I have not done my part, i
have failed miserably... I have been given so much more than i deserve, money, cars, education, things,
opportunities, and yet what have i done in return for the Kingdom of God. How can i continue to pursue the things of this world ....after seeing all the poverty in
Romania and the need to show them the GOD that loves them, and cares about them to children who have nothing and have been abandoned abused and neglected their entire life... how can i? i ask my self every day not to be entangled by things, not to be consumed with materialism, but day after day i struggle with this very concept of wanting, or should i say "needing". i need nothing, i have the neccesities to life as well as so much more...
the other day, i had two friends come over who are from
Mexico and eat with
Ashley and i, and hang out with them at my house. I wanted to get to know them more. they told us that their families are back in Mexico City while they are here working 80+ hours a week in order to provide for their family. they said they miss their families
a lot, and one day they hope to return to their hometowns, and be with their families but right now they must work.... what an
awful life they live. They are
sacrificing so much to make it in this world, and here i am in my beautiful apartment, with so much "junk" that i could live with out, and here they are fighting and sacrificing to
provide just a little for their families. I told them, that it is not fair that one country can be immeasurably rich while next door a country suffers greatly and is impoverished. Here again i ask GOD why me? i find my self wanting to waste my money on entertainment, whether it be watching movies from blockbuster, playing video games, going out to eat a meal that is way to expensive when i compare it to what i can do at home for less instead of using my money for furthering the kingdom of GOD, I am constantly finding my self captivated by materialism, oh i long to be be rid of it, wish i could trade places with an impoverished person so that i would know how it is to do with out because i really can not point back to a time in my lfie where i was in need of anything...
I have been given so much and
exceedingly but here i am wanting more and more and more and more, while i know and have seen that there are people who have that much less that i have...
This is an atrocity that i would lavish myself with pointless things of this world, and let children die of hunger, and i
just want to go to a buffet and eat and gorge myself on food, while one loaf of bread and unclean water is what a family gets maybe for a week.....
AHHHHHH my heat breaks,
humble me GOD, GOD HELP ME, and save me from this idolatry, make me like Christ, i want to rather spend my time with the least of these than with the rich, GOD humble me so that i may be able to do your will. God has not called me to share HIS love grace and mercy to the nations, he has commanded me. Matthew 28:16-20. I am a firm believer that all Christians are commanded to be "great commission christians" (for lack of a better term)....
i will this blog there, i pray that GOD would be Glorified in this, and i pray that you would see the need to share Christ's love with everyone you come in to contact with, and i also pray that you would join me in the great commission, being Jesus' hands and feet in a lost and dying world, i pray that you would see the need of so many people in other parts of the world. I pray GOD would change our hearts to be so giving that no one would go with out need, like in Acts Chapter 4:
32 All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. 33With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and much grace was upon them all. 34There were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales 35and put it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need.
36Joseph, a Levite from Cyprus, whom the apostles called Barnabas (which means Son of Encouragement), 37sold a field he owned and brought the money and put it at the apostles' feet.
This is what the Christian church should look like, no one should be in need of anything and we should be willing to seel everything we have in order to help others.
Thanks for reading this long post. I hope you are encouraged! Ceau!!!!
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