I hope you wouldn’t be sad for me.
In the scheme of things, the moment someone’s life leaves their body is just that, it is a moment. A moment in the midst of all the things that add up to their life, the achievements they attained, the impact they imbued, the words they whispered, the actions they actualized, the foods they fancied, the people they appreciated, the inspirations they entertained, the interactions they incited, the passions they preferred - all of these things collectively define a person’s life. When that life ends, those things still define them. The moment that our Earthly life ends does not override everything that person meant through their daily actions summed up. I think to focus on the end is a shame. To recognize the end and celebrate everything else that happened in between the beginning and the end is frame of mind that we should have. Everything I do, I attempt to do with meaning, purpose, impact. I see myself as a risk taker, but I calculate everything I do based on the sustainable affect it can have. I seek what is good, what can be made good even if it isn’t yet “good”. I think like this because I can’t afford to think any other way after what I saw in Kenya. I feel, how could I live a life focused on me and what I can see, when I know and have experienced relationship with people who had nothing and yet still chose to live for other people? Though I cannot see them around me anymore, they are still there in Kenya as they are. I cannot see with my eyes, but I can see with my heart. If I died today, I hope you wouldn’t be sad for me. I live not for myself. I live to bring more of Jesus, more of justice, more of restoration to the brokenness and blindness that we (including me) live in. When it comes to this I don’t have 20/20 vision, but I yearn to see more clearly. To see with my heart, not with my eyes. Our eyes are always deceiving us, and we hardly bother to look past the first layer. If I died today, the work of my hands on Earth would come to a stop. But you shouldn’t see it as things left miserably unfinished. Our work on Earth will always be unfinished. Our work is only finished when we enter into another realm, where all sadness and sin evaporates, where the fullness of grace and things as they should be rain down in torrents. I look forward longingly to that place. Until then, I will live my life for so much more than just me. And when my life ends on this side of eternity, I hope you won’t be sad for me.
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on a website whisk the readers through the thick of daydreams of late nights when wishes keep the writer wide awake when writers remember a lost realm and imagine an immaculate world where flaws lead to freedom grace is given to the grieving death decrees that debtors receive jubilee redemption restores and refreshes and then those things that the readers thought and taunted and trivialized thoroughly those things that the writer revealed and reveled in and revisited often those things they became present processes through People Small hands reach over to give me a simple Kenyan saltine cracker. She doesn’t have to speak a word, and somehow this message is the most powerful one I’ve ever encountered. In ten seconds, ten-year old Baraka teaches me what it means to give. She is young, skinny, and has no opportunity for education. Yet, she is hungry for opportunity, education, and for food. When our team brings simple snacks for the children, Baraka brings her share and splits it with me. She needs the sustenance so much more than me, but her first inclination is to forget herself and provide for another.
It’s no coincidence that “Baraka” means blessing or fortune in Swahili. That young girl is a blessing and fortune in the truest sense of the word. Although she didn’t have physical blessings and fortune in her life, she embodied blessing and fortune. I believe that fortune is tied to wealth, wealth is tied to abundance, and all of the above tied to attitude. If we base our personal fortune on physical things, we will never be satisfied and will always desire for more, to meet a new standard of enough. However, when individual wealth is tied to an attitude of abundance, then it’s possible to be content in the face of any circumstance. True giving comes from a heart of being content. This attitude should not be based on or swayed by standards of society. Figures like Baraka, Jesus Christ, and Mother Teresa motivate me to give. It does not matter if it is a child, a religious leader, or an elderly person, it is the giving attitude inside the person and the subsequent action that inspires me. When I travelled through Kenya in 2012, I saw poverty in front of my eyes, which I had prior only heard of and or seen in still photos. What I also saw was joy – manifested through giving – during my interactions with Kenyans. They gave their presence by saying hello and welcoming us into their country, even if to them we were strangers at the street corner. They gave their food by cooking plentiful meals and hosting us with great hospitality, despite having meager supplies and humble abodes. The Kenyans understood that need should be met by giving whatever you could; this could be helping a blind person navigate the streets, pulling over on the roadside to help push a car out of a pothole, or teaching a foreigner some basic Swahili. After I returned from Kenya to finish my last year of high school, I realized that Kenyans embraced giving by demonstrating that it starts now. In America I am often taught to plan and experiment, then implement when I know it will result in impact. While I always keep that in mind, I know that giving must start now and be done smartly. Someone who is constantly researching and keeping up with a social issue is more likely to care about it, give to it, and engage in solving it. As a student, I can only give so much of the limited amount of money I have, time that I also allocate towards studying, and energy that I also spend on getting involved with school activities. However, I know that if I am faithful in giving when I have just a little, I will also be faithful in giving when I have more. To remember what I learned about giving in Kenya, I fast on a normal basis. On the twentieth of each month, I spend 24 hours choosing not to eat food and instead read my journal to be reminded of my experiences, give the money I would have spent on food towards the charity I worked with, and research the latest news on the areas I was in. Instilling a habit of remembrance, gratitude, and giving allows this experience which happened 3 years to keep changing me to this day. The more that I build up this practice, the more I can make a greater impact in the future and inspire others to do the same. I give because Baraka gave me a lesson I’ll never forget. |
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July 2016
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