31 January 2014

when i was thirsty...you gave me a coconut

since moving to haiti, i have learned a lot…a lot.

my views have also changed about a lot….a lot.

one might argue that these go hand-in-hand and i tend to be one of those…”ones.”

…the thing is, ignorance is never an excuse.

over the past two years this passage out of matthew 25 has become more and more foundational, not just to my thinking…but to the very core of who i am….

“i was hungry and you fed me,
i was thirsty and you gave me a drink,
i was homeless and you gave me a room,
i was shivering and you gave me clothes,
i was sick and you stopped to visit,
i was in prison and you came to me.’

….i’m telling the solemn truth: whenever you did one of these things to someone overlooked or ignored, that was me—you did it to me.’ “


i love eugene peterson’s translation in the message for one reason….

there is no real separation between whom jesus is talking to and whom he is talking about…everyone can relate to at least one of the places listed.

all my life i heard this same passage…in various other translations….and they all said, “least of these.”

i don’t believe that the original meaning of the text was at all meant to be what it has turned into…but it essentially has become a term with which christians can express…

judgement.

pity.

self-righteousness.

superiority.

piety.

…and all of those other things that we christians do…to make the rest of the world hate us…and want nothing to do with jesus.

i know…that stings. brush it off…deep down you know it’s true so don’t pretend to be shocked…we all do it and we need to fix it.

when did we, not just as a society, but as the culture of christianity, decide that we have the right or even the ability to determine that one life is more valuable than another…that one life is more useful, or successful, or legitimate?

how many times have each of us been “the least of these?”

i cannot count how many times i have qualified for the title….

but the longer i live in this amazing country…with these amazing people….the more god is teaching me about how he sees humanity…about the value that he puts on each one of us and as a result….

i have a growing longing to see humanity in that same light and put that same value on everyone around me.

a few weeks ago, i found myself in one of the most remote places...in the most remote place of haiti. we had hiked 6 hours up a mountain and had just sat down in a tiny village…

thinking that we would surely find a donkey…..or a pig….or a goat that we could ride out…i had a tiny glimpse of hope that i would not have to channel my inner billy goat any longer for the day.

the glimpse was quickly incinerated when we were told that our only options were 5-6 hour hikes in any direction….

awesome.

meanwhile, we started talking to this village about who we were and what kind of work we were coming to do…they told us that their most urgent need was water.

not clean water…but water.

this village had only 2 options for obtaining this essential life-giving element….they could hike 6 hours over the mountains and carry it back…or they could send children down a cliff to collect it from a small fresh water pool…

they could not even count how many children they had lost.

true to my arrogant human self, i immediately thought, “omg! how am i going to fix this one?!?!”

well…while i was busy trying to figure out how i was going to save these people from the unspeakable horror in which they lived….

…god was getting ready to smack me upside the head and cut me back to size.

this village did not have water….but they did have trees and a lot of those trees bore coconuts.

it took a young boy about 3 seconds to shimmy his way to the top and shake a pile to the ground.

one of the elders then cut the tops off and handed them to us….

“drink this, you will need it for your journey back.”

and then…the entire community prayed for us!

what?

yup…they prayed for our safety, they prayed a blessing over our work and over our organization...that still brings me to tears…

in that moment….when i was thirsty, both spiritually and physically, these people….who by the world’s standards have nothing….they prayed for me…

and they gave me the gift of a coconut.

i continue to learn this…

yes, i have been given gifts and passions and resources that can help different groups of people….

but as i go through life and work with those groups…whether it’s the elderly, or the physically ill, or the mentally ill, or the impoverished….

i am reminded, time and time again, that we are all made of the same stuff….

at the core, we are not any different…

in the eyes of our creator we all have infinite value…

i do not work with the least of these…i am the least of these…we all are.

more than that….we all have infinite value….

and that is a beautiful lesson to learn.


peace, JOY & love,

erika