Today I took the assembly at King Road Traditional School in Abbotsford. It was lots of fun -- I basically did a slide show that I narrated as I went. I made comments about the pictures and tried to help the kids understand life for children their age in Uganda.
I wonder what kids think when the see someone their age going to school with no shoes on and a bloated stomach -- or fetching water in big jerry-cans?? Or what do they think when you tell them that there are no taps - or that you have to kill snakes so that they don't kill you??. I think it is hard to register. I suppose that a lot of this never hits home for many people until they are adults and they witness a third world country in person where poverty, death, disease and malnutrition stare at you every day as you roam the dirt roads of any given village in such a place as Uganda.
In Abbotsford, we too have malnourished people, some with very bad shoes, many with no home or only a cardboard box to shelter them from the elements. They also don't have their own tap to turn on and take a hot bath.
The suffering world around us are victims of sin -- their own sin and others sin all wrapped up into one complicated mess.We too, except for God's providence in our lives could be out on a street, down on our luck, or left to starve in a sun-scorched, war-torn land.
Our goal is not to alleviate all suffering nor to fill every need -- our goal is to show people and tell people about Christ. He can remove our guilty stains, fill our spiritual hunger and quench our eternal thirst. The physical needs are the pathway to the human need for forgiveness and atonement; the need to be in a good relationship with God. We can tolerate much physical suffering when we know our soul is secure. And, interestingly enough, secure souls tend to make more decisions that lead to less physical suffering.
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