Where Is the Outcry?

I was riding through the slum one day, just looking out the window at the people passing by, when I noticed a little girl. She looked to be about five years old, with her hair shaved close to her head and carrying a small tattered backpack over her tiny shoulders. She wore the characteristic uniform of a school girl and I instantly knew she would be walking home from a day in class.
Now looking back I can't imagine what it was that made her stand out. But I'm sure I'll never forget it now.
She walked with her head bent low, as if trying not to draw any attention to herself, but as she passed by this man (who looked to be about 25 years old) he stepped partly into her way and stroked her cheek in a sexual gesture.
No one said anything, no one noticed, and in a moment he had moved on and she was on her way again.
It took me months to realize why that had disturbed me so much. I had heard stories of young girls who had lost their lives because they had bled to death after being attacked on the way home from school. I talked with girls who slept in the same bed as their mom's "guests".
If a man could make a gesture such as that in public to a girl who looked to be about five times younger than he was and get away with it, then I could only imagine the horrible things that went on in secret, in the dark when no one else was watching.
And since then I have wondered often to myself, where was the outcry? Did it become so much a part of their culture that they saw nothing of it? That though some might acknowledge it as wrong, nothing could be done about it?

Just in this one year alone there have been 17 suicides in our valley, all under the age of twenty-five. Afew days ago there was yet another one, a young boy from East Wenatchee.

I was talking with someone from our church about it and she said something that really hit me hard. She said, "What I find hard about all of this is, where is the outcry?" Instantly my mind went back to the image of that girl in the slum so far away. I again felt the injustice and the great sadness I had felt when I saw that a culture could become so twisted in its views and its ways that its very own children suffered for it. And that those who survive suffering would become twisted themselves. They would become a mere product of their culture that would ultimately help to shape their culture even further.

And then I saw it.

We are the same.

Our children are suffering too.

And in an instant my heart broke for our culture. Where is the outcry for the child who felt it was okay to take his own life? What is being done? What can we do?
When did it become okay to take God out of our schools? I know many don't believe in God but let me word it this way. When did it become okay in our culture to take positive influence of any kind out of our schools? When did it become okay to take out any BIT of good for our children, knowing that there is so much bad taking place? Why are we not equipping them better?

How many of our children are going to suffer before we start to cry out for them? To cry out against the culture of suicide?
I have mourned for the culture of Kibera (the slum I did ministry in). I have mourned for the children there. But I have not mourned for my own, or the children here. And I am sorry for my part in the silence I have helped to make.

It takes more to speak out against a culture of depression and suicide then just to say that it is wrong. It takes doing something about it.

They say that being a parent can open one's eyes to how God can love us unconditionally.

I'm not a parent (surprising, I know) but there's something about these kids that's been teaching me a similar lesson. I didn't realize it until just a few minutes ago when I was telling a friend about them and couldn't help feeling a bit surprised at the things I said.

Here's what I realized:

I love them.

They're selfish. At first glance they see me only for what I can give them. They don't understand who I am. There's a good chance they never will.
They beat eachother up and laugh when one of them gets hurt. They're dirty, used and abused. They're neglected and starved. They're poor and forgotten.

They're innocent. They're children. They need me. They love it when I smile at them. They love it when I make them laugh. They need my encouragement. They need my presence.

Their laughter makes me smile as soon as I hear it. Their hugs touch me in ways I can't explain. When they sing there's nothing I'd rather do than just listen.

My heart comes alive at just the thought of them. I cherish their names. I cherish the time they take to be with me when I come to see them. I find I want to be known by them...not for myself but for them. I want them to remember I am their fan, I believe in them, I love them, I know their names, that they are important and remembered by someone, and that that makes them special.

I look at these kids and I know what I should think: that they are the ones that should be grateful to me for being with them like this. But I don't think that at all. Because all I can feel these days is gratitude for getting to be with them. I'm so grateful to know them, to be a part of their lives. I am the one who is grateful, and I'm even grateful for that.

 The truth is, I had no idea that any of this pertained to how God sees me. I didn't even see how it was possible until I felt it in my own heart for these kids. These precious, little ones that I already feel I could give up so much for after only knowing them for a few months.

All  I can say is, He is so good to us. His children. Whether in the slum or out of it. And I never want to stop thanking Him because of it.

Just Uploading Some Thoughts

Words can’t express how I’m feeling right now. Maybe instead of trying to describe it I’ll just explain the instances that have made me feel all of these things.

Beatrice and I talked to a teacher of a small Christian preschool today. Her school is just down the street from our home.

She was telling us about the kids there and shared some stories of other kids she’d seen or heard of. She told us a story of a three year old boy who got locked in a freezer. Whether he was dead already or not she was unsure. Her friend found him and fainted.
She told us this story of a house maid who injected one of the kids she cared for with her HIV positive blood. The boy was three. He’s seven now, fighting to stay alive but still lagging considerably behind the other kids. He attends this teacher’s school.
She told us this story of coming across the body of a new born baby girl who had been done away with and thrown out in a paper bag. Dogs had come and eaten away at the body, and that’s how this teacher found her.
Beatrice said last week before I came she had found a new born baby in a garbage ditch in the Kibera slums. It was the first one she’d seen since starting the ministry, but she said that as she was walking away in shock someone came up to talk to her about it. They told her they were surprised it was the first one she’d seen, normally they see 3 or 4 dead babies a week.

It’s normal for a young girl to pay 5,000kshillings to be taken somewhere and get an abortion done, fast and easy.

There have been children in this King’s Kids Academy in the Kibera Slums who have just disappeared. Tom and Beatrice try to trace them but they normally can’t. Sometimes they find out the child’s fate, and it’s usually that the child is sent back to the village to possibly starve to death or worse. Sometimes they’re married off (the oldest child in the school is 13).
Sometimes they’re disposed of…

I just want to hold those babies, to save them. Everything in me wants to scream it’s not fair and to do something about it.
But the truth is there is no way that I can fix it. There is no way that I can stop the injustice. I can’t stop the killing of babies and the abortions.

I can’t stop the children disappearing.

I don’t have an answer for those who don’t have enough money, enough love, enough food. I don’t.

I didn’t have an answer for Alisha, a thirteen year old girl from the slums of Kibera who was rejected by her abusive aunt and kicked out a few days ago (short story: starved and neglected she wished to go home to her mother in the village. But her mother was too poor to help her in the first place and so sent her to the slums…she’s been unwanted everywhere she’s gone).

What is the answer for her? Who wants her? I don’t have the money to support her. I don’t have a place she can go. I can’t guarantee her safety in the future. I don’t know.

And neither did anybody else. Nobody knew how to help her. Even if she found a tolerable place in the slums it’d be doubtful that anybody would show her the love and attention she needs. She needs healing it’s doubtful she’ll ever get.

I kept asking, “God what is your future for such a girl?”

That seems to be the only thing I’ve found myself praying these days…God, what is your future for such a baby? Such a boy? Such people? God, nobody can help this child. I see no way that she can be helped. Lord, it’s all yours. Please help her. Please. I beg you, do something…do anything...please, help. Please…

So with Alisha…I did the only thing I could do in the short time God gave me with her: I held her. I held her and prayed and cried along with the teachers of the school.

Whatever happens to her is out of my control, but in the time given to me to be with her I know what I will do. I know the best thing I can do…I can love her. I can pray with her. I can hold her and listen to her, show her as best as I can that she’s wanted.

These kids…I don’t have answers for them. I can’t save them. I don’t even know if I can help them. A lot of them I can’t. I can’t…

But in the short time God has given me to be with them…some of them I only get to see for a moment, others maybe longer…I know what I can do. I can give them a hug. I can make them smile, laugh. I can sing songs with them. Play games with them.

And in that short time, through those small actions I can show them a greater truth. The truth that they are loved, cherished and adored. The truth that they have a place in this world just as I do. I can show them that the place they belong isn’t in their homes or their countries, but in their hearts. And that place is with Jesus. He accepts them. He loves them, cherishes them and adores them.
He is all about the forgotten, abandoned, rejected and lost. He is all about what we are not.

“For God chose what is low and despised in the world, the things that are not, to bring to nothing the things that are.” –Paul (1 Corinthians 1:28)