with my net income. – Errol Flynn
We were invited to a fund-raising dinner for a charitable organization last night. As I was getting ready for the evening late yesterday, slathering shaving cream onto my face (thought about shaving the beard I grew during the mission trip – decided against it and rinsed the shaving cream off), I was thinking that after three years of my son being in private college, I could not really afford to be much help to the fund-raising effort. Hey, one of Brandon’s textbooks this year cost $100. Cost of all his books this semester: over $400. And then there’s food and housing and clothing and, oh yes, tuition. I’d write the total figure down here but I can’t bear to see it in print.
So I finished at the sink, pulled on a dress shirt and suit pants, started picking through the dozens of ties I own, trying to decide which would look best, and continued my self-obsession. I have, at times, joked that when it comes to financial matters, I have all the money I need to last the rest of my life… unless I buy something.
If you can count your money, you don’t have a billion dollars. – J. Paul Getty
John D. Rockefeller was once asked, how much money is enough? His answer? A dollar more than you have. So the rich are different. They’re funnier. Only thing is, I don’t think he was joking. I have heard it said, make money your god and it will plague you like the devil.
This morning on the radio show I was talking about the couple from Iowa who won a $200 million Powerball jackpot. Lottery officials said the odds of winning were 140 million-to-one. They beat the odds. She works at Wal-Mart. He is a car detailer. I write that in the present tense but feel those may already be past tense details. I have got to believe if you wake up with $200 million suddenly in your checking account you’re probably not thinking about spending your day wearing a plastic name tag and greeting people at Wal-Mart. "Hi, my name is Carla. I just came into work today so I could tell you I'm rich and don't have to shop here anymore, let alone work here. I have to go now. I hear the Neiman-Marcus Christmas catalogue is out and I want to order early." Her husband, on the other hand, may continue to detail his own car. Some guys love doing that. Or, he could just buy a new one every time it gets dirty.
Haven’t heard what they plan to do with the money. I always wonder, when I read about someone winning a ton of money. That’s always the first question reporters ask. So, how you gonna spend it? It would be easy to judge them for how they decide to spend their cash. After all, they’ve got so much. Not like the average Joe. Not like you or me.
Hmm. Right.
Back to the dozens of ties in my closet and the choice of suits. Not to mention what I spend at Starbucks every week. Come on Brad, lighten up. Your average latte only costs $3.07 plus tip.
Yes, that’s true. And half of the world, nearly 3 billion people, live on less than two dollars per day. 1.3 billion have no access to clean water. I learned last night that the majority of childhood illness around the world is a direct result of unsanitary water.
In the time it will take me to write the words in this blog post hundreds of people will die of starvation. Imagine that. Hundreds more will die by the time I go into my kitchen, make a sandwich and eat it.
Bono, the front man for the Irish band U2, said in a speech recently, “where you live should not determine whether you live or die.
But in this world, it does. This fallen, broken, troubled world.
Why am I so blessed? That is not a rhetorical question. I ask sincerely.
The dinner for World Vision last night was great and the speaker even better. He is a successful businessman who has in recent years had his life changed by a trip to Africa. He witnessed unbelievable poverty, saw people die before his very eyes.
He saw more orphans and widows than he could count. He saw that, despite what the numbers may portray from thousands of miles away, people don’t die en mass. The death toll is not just a statistic. Each one that dies is an individual, just like you and me. Each death leaves devastated loved ones asking why. His friends have asked him why one needs to go to Africa to help people? Isn’t there work to be done here? He said, yes, clearly there is plenty of work to do here in our own country. You don’t need to go anywhere. But, personally, he said he will be forever indebted to Africa, that Africa awakened him when he didn’t even know he was asleep. It allowed God to give him his own personal passageway to meaning and purpose. And he prayed that everyone who seeks one will find a similar path, that each will find his or her own Africa.
Back in the 1950s, having had his eyes opened to Third World struggle, another man prayed that his heart would be broken by the things that break God’s heart. That man went on to start World Vision, an organization dedicated to helping children and their communities reach their full potential by tackling the causes of poverty.
I remember praying before leaving on a mission trip this past August that my eyes would be open to see, and my heart willing to embrace, the things God had in mind to show me. While in Afghanistan, seeing things first hand I had never seen before and considering the varied forces working against peace and stability for the people there, it was hard not to feel a sense of hopelessness.
But I am only human, and while my vision is limited I know that hopelessness is not a characteristic of the heart of God.
(Click here for information on World Vision)
