I was blind but now I see!

This Cross was taken down in KAF last week. It is from the side of a dumpster.

I did not see the things of this world as I drove at sixty miles and hour down 787. I did not stop in the projects and look at the poverty that some people have as I was going to some resteraunt downtown. When I go into my house I can forget those that have no house. I only need to reflect on the poverty of this world when it served a purpose. I only had to be shocked by the cruelness of others when it was in the news or the purpose for a charity event.

Now I am in the middle of what for most is only something they read about in the news paper. I see the segregation. I see how one race of people will be so disrespectful to another. We all live here together, the Americans, Phillippinos, the Napaleese, Kenyans, Indians, Masodonians, Bosnians, and any others you care to throw in. We all take the same risks, eat the same food, live in the same nieghborhoods and work in the same buildings, yet there still exists the seperations. There still exists the segregations. There still exists the classes, the prejudice, the abuse and rudeness and the lack of basic care that we have anywhere else in this world.

I have seen men, to such a drastic way look at someone who could not speak English and over enunciate "CAN YOU UNDERSTAND ME"? I have seen an African American question an Indian man being in the same bathroom as an ExPat. I see signs showing how the way other cultures use the toilets is wrong, with a big X through the picture and a check mark next to the way we do it in the United States. I see how the tents are divided by Third Country Nationals and ExPats. How the tent that you have makes all the difference to who you are. What does this sound like to any of us.

David in his comment to me on yesterdays post pointed out the juxtaposition between the last two days posts. On one hand I speak of deeping of prayer and on the next how wrong that men here are treated so poorly and there lack of being paid does not matter to anybody. David makes a wonderful point, Is Christianity only about the prayer and the Spiritual things that make us feel good? It is about being like Jesus. Walking and talking to those that need him most. It is about healing, not just physically but emotionally, the pains of others. It is about getting your feet dirty, having noplace to rest your head, and getting off our comfy couches after we are done with prayer and touching people physically.

Our Lord asked us to make Disciples of the world, we are Disciples of Christ Jesus. He taught us to pray and he taught us to walk with those who need us most. We can go deep, as I suggested on Saturday. We can seek His fellowship in prayer and quiet times as He saught those times with the Father, but what will we do when He gets up from prayer and walks down to the projects? Will you follow Him then?

I was blind now I see! Not just the happy things of our Spirituality but also the apauling things of this world. Jesus asks us to do both. He asks us to go to the ones in need and heal them. To Show the Gospel to them regardless of who or where they are. As David points out, true Christianity is manifested in our Love and concern for others.

Thank you David.

Father I pray that our Spirtual life begins to expand past our prayers and inner thoughts. I pray that we can establish our Faith and manifest it into true compassion for those around us, regardless of the needs. That we may be like Jesus Christ in prayer and in action. That when He rises that we follow.