"We should stop giving money to organizations. We should stop going. We should stop going and taking pictures with small African children. We should stop changing our Facebook profile pictures." Those are not exact quotes but they are main ideas. Should we stop bringing awareness to the things we witness?
You know what it makes me want to stop doing?
((That's right, polite, sweet, kind and compassionate Melissa has a fire under her again. {Excuse the southern drawl at this point!} She's baaaaaaccccccckkkk at it. Ranting and raving. Kicking and screaming. You're so welcome in advance and if you should be so easily offended, stop reading this now. I am quite serious. STOP. ))
If you've passed the test of drama, please continue reading below.
Do you know, or have any idea, what it makes me want to stop doing, as in right this very second? I want to stop being angry about it and I want to tell you exactly what's on my mind. So OBVIOUSLY, that's what I plan to do. There are two major things I have a problem with in all of this.
1. One of the articles I read talks about "voluntourism." It's this basic idea and principle that a white man or woman becomes a philanthropist/journalist/tourist and it becomes offensive to groups of people on the field because they never stay. I actually completely agree with this idea. I have a major problem with a church or organization that chooses the tour stops and does not create a sustainable relationship between the partner and the field. I have problems with people who don't stay.
2. The second thing I have a problem with is what is now being called "The White-Savior Industrial Complex." The basic idea is that the white man or woman comes in and rescues the 'victims' and leaves them rescued with nothing to sustain them. I do have a problem with that. The article I read about this talks about Americans creating this cycle of colonialism. I agree with this to a point. This idea of the power hungry taking over the poor and weary and destroying what liveliness they have left in them. This is quite possible in missions, humanitarian work, and, of course, government and militant processes.
BUT (you knew this was coming), I cannot stop going. I cannot stay in the states and pretend I don't know what's going on with the education of small children in villages along Lake Tanganyika. I cannot sit idly by and pretend that entire families are not war torn in the Middle East and northern Africa. I cannot stand the thought of young women and children being trafficked in southeastern Asia. And I cannot bear the idea of children who have lost their families to natural disasters, poverty, sickness and the drug cartel in Latin America.
I can't tell you how many days I've wondered about Mapalo. Is she in school? Did she grab the hand of someone else as she was walking through the village? Did she wear her broken zippered dress for the rest of that year? Is she healthy? Does she love Jesus?
Mapalo was a little girl I met in the village of Nzovwe in 2009. Boy, did this sweet little thing leave an imprint on my beating heart. She looked at me like I was crazy for the first few days but as the days went on... she moved a little closer. She wasn't staring at me from a distance or looking away pretending she didn't know I saw her. She moved in and eventually, this feisty little toothy girl was sitting in my lap. One day, my team and I were walking in the village, going from door to door, when I felt the hand of a little one grab mine. And yet, it was Mapalo, her toothy grin and broken zippered dress standing next to me and holding on tight, ensuring that I did not walk off without her.
When I close my eyes and think of Africa, I see her. I see a beautiful, educated young woman fostering and developing leaders in her village. I see her courting and marrying and loving children of her own. I see her washing dishes along the shore of the Lake and carrying water from the closest spring. And I pray. I pray that she develops the women under her. And you know what else I pray? That the change in her life had NOTHING to do with me-- that it was everything to do with Jesus.
Did you cringe when you read that? Did you feel different? Did you feel a small inkling in your soul that something is not right in the world? That you are to be a repairer or plower for some group of people, who don't need just you alone, but who need an advocate? Are you a little uncomfortable? It makes me a little uncomfortable-- that's for sure. This idea that I know someone but don't know where they are. It gets at me a little at night when I'm dreaming/waking and making up ambitions and plans for my future. I see her.... walking next to me in the village and I see a vivid picture of her hand in mine, although I have no physical picture of her hand.
When I first went to Zambia in my summer of 2008, I was sick over it. I saw high flying kites made of plastic grocery bags in small shack villages and I saw the deepest, sweetest brown eyes I had ever laid my eyes on begging to be loved. To be seen. In one of the following two summers (I'm almost positive it was 2010), I was at an AIDS orphanage in Kabwe. I sat on the ground while the girls played with my hair and touched my skin and the boys played drums and laughed and danced. They didn't speak English. We didn't know most of their names. But I cannot forget their faces. I cannot forget the little girl who crawled all over me for a couple of hours. I cannot forget the kiss on my cheek from a little boy named Chola, which always made me think and pray for the kids, especially in gangs, I had at Mack.
So each year, I traveled back to the United States and I told their stories. The stories of kids who had lost their parents to HIV and AIDS. The stories of missionaries on foreign fields who were being persecuted. The story of Innocent, a little village boy who would have nothing to do with me on the first day of our kid's conference and who would not leave my side by the end of that 4 days. A little boy who returned to hug me when we found him the following year and let me rub my hand across his sweet bald head while he just stared and smiled and stayed at my leg for a while. The story of Mapalo and the village of Nzovwe. Their stories raised awareness and made others get involved.
Their stories changed me and not in a narcissistic way that totally focuses on me. I didn't go to be changed. I actually went to do something that I thought was productive and American and efficient and would change them.... but in the process, I was changed by brown eyes and little hands. Cheek kisses and hair tied in knots. Skipping rocks and water bottles on heads. Chalk on the ground and shower caps. And those images, those roaring photographs in the crevices of my mind, changed the people around me because I could share their stories.
The beauty of my "GO" is found in pictures, yes, maybe a few Instagram pictures and Facebook photos. The beauty of my "GO" is found in working with an organization who is trained well, who meets needs, and who loves people on the field. The beauty of my "GO" is found in the confidence that God created me to be about Him, which means I'm about the business of others, and not just myself. To take the wretched, broken, yet healed and mended pieces to place them in the hands of those on the other sides of the world who can learn and grow with me, while creating relationships in their language, culture, and circle of influence. The beauty of my "GO" is found in a compassionate, loving Jesus who pursues justice, rights wrongs, loves orphans and windows, and feeds the hungry, who returns wronged money from the tax collectors, and makes the lame walk. The beauty of my "GO" is found in Jesus who forgives freely, frees me to love Him, and then urges me to walk in Him by sharing my gifts, passions, and abilities with His loves across the globe.
I cannot say no. How can you say no to a "GO" that is that incredibly beautiful?
I dare you to go. Don't give in to the idea of humanitarianism being self-centered and arrogant and don't think that you alone can change the world but remember the God to whom you serve and how deeply His love is for peoples of the ends of the Earth and how passionate His plea for us to go and love and serve Him?
I go because Jesus has done a great work in me and I want to share that. He has placed a great call in me and I want to do that. He has gifted me so succinctly for his plan and I want to fall into place where He desires me.
Praying your "GO" would be more beautiful than ever before.
And also praying you will stay.
Love you, from the bottom of my heart-- Melissa
"You answer us with awesome and righteous deeds,
God our Savior,
the hope of all the ends of the earth
and of the farthest seas..." Psalm 65: 4
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