Poverty

When the kids were little, we rented a farmhouse on a nice little acreage where we could keep our horses and accumulate critters. While it was nearly a hundred years old, it was actually in pretty good shape. I loved the French doors between the dining room and the living room, its wide woodwork, the open staircase, and the built-ins. This had been quite a home in its day, and it still had a sense of elegance and grandeur. But it also had some cracks in the plaster, several generations of paint speckled on the crown molding, and some of the flooring may still have been from the seventies.

My son was little, but apparently this had not escaped him. My sister was in the process of building a beautiful, brand-new home, and, innocently enough, my son asked me when we would get to move into a "nice" house. I don’t remember exactly what I said, but I think it went something like this: “You should be grateful! There are people living in cardboard boxes!” I may not have handled it perfectly, but I resolved that one day I would take these kids on a mission trip to a place where they would experience what real poverty looked like.

Going Therefore . . .

So, something like 10 years later, we were on our way to Jamaica. I served as the youth leader at our little country church and this was my chance. These kids would get to see what the world looked like outside our little bubble. Of course, that wasn’t my only motive, we were “going therefore”! We would take the gospel to these people who had so little. At least they would have Jesus! Nearly thirty people from our little church (with an average attendance of about 100) went along—high school kids and many of the parents, as well. We had fluorescent green shirts made up with a paraphrase of 1 John 3:18, “Not Just Words . . . Action!”

And we jumped into action. Miss Paula, as the little Jamaican orphans called her, built her mission model around that of creation week: work hard for six days and rest on the seventh. We replaced peeling wallpaper in the orphanage, the men put in a new water tank to collect rainwater, we visited people with disabilities, and we went to a home for juvenile delinquents. I must add a couple of qualifiers to the last part of that. "Home" was an abandoned sugar refinery with gaping holes in the roof (which would explain why the beds were scattered haphazardly throughout the rooms), and "juvenile delinquents" often meant boys from the streets. Boys who simply had nowhere else to go.

We helped them with schoolwork and played with little toy cars they had made from milk cartons with pop bottle lids for wheels. And our kids learned to play cricket! A stick served as a substitute for the bat and the only ball they had kept getting lost in the jungle that encroached upon their playing field. But, in that moment, kids were just kids. Light-skinned, dark-skinned . . . rich or poor . . . they were just kids playing ball. These "delinquents" that, if I am honest, I was a little afraid to bring our children around, were just kids in need of love. Just like any other kid.

With the exception of a little cricket and some dancing in the downpours that would happen every day around five o’clock, we did indeed work hard for six days. And surprisingly enough, when the day of rest came, no one wanted to rest! Even as we climbed Dunn River Falls and swam in the Glistening Waters—major tourist attractions in Jamaica—I would hear kids commenting on how they wished they could have gone back to finish the wallpaper or hold the babies one more time. It was then and there that I deemed the trip a success. These kids—well, all of us—had found joy in service—what we were designed to do. They were learning, as I had been, that so many of our "troubles" get so much smaller when we see the challenges so many others face.

Lacking What Is Needed

But perhaps the greater eye-opener for me was that most of these people already had Jesus. Indeed, they seemed to know him far better than us! You see, these people needed Jesus. He was all they had! They lived in shacks made of corrugated tin. Their fences were made of rocks, piled up, and topped with shards of broken glass embedded in cement. Their children lived in orphanages and on the streets and in abandoned sugar refineries—not because they didn’t want them . . . because they couldn’t afford to feed them. One of the neighboring towns had the highest murder rate per capita—in the world. But they had Jesus. I saw smiles and laughter and joy under circumstances I am not sure I could even bear. More joy than many of the privileged and wealthy that had everything their heart could desire over in the United States. Maybe . . . more joy than me?

For the first time, I truly realized the difference between happiness and joy. Happiness depends on our circumstances. Joy comes from Jesus. They may have been poor and hungry—in need of food for their bellies. But without realizing it, I had been poor and hungry, too—in need of food for my soul. I went intent on giving . . . I ended up receiving. I had intended to show my little, now nearly grown son what real poverty looked like. And I guess I did. But I feel the table was somehow turned. After all, what is "poverty"?

“Therefore go and make disciples of all

nations, baptizing them in the name

of the Father and of the Son and of

the Holy Spirit, and teaching them

to obey everything I have commanded

you. And surely I am with you always,

to the very end of the age.”

Matthew 28:19–20 NIV

“Dear children, let us not love

with words or speech

but with actions and in truth.”

1 John 3:18 NIV

“Blessed are the poor in spirit,

for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

Matthew 5:3 NIV