Pondering a Memory

Who can say what a person thinks in that moment when reason and logic do not line up with the heart? Compassion...can it be, that at times, it is more logical than reason?

Can reason sometimes be used in a way that excuses a person's choice to not have compassion on another?

I don't know.

All I know is that in that moment I had no reason. I had no answers.

It was a moment that found me under the hot African sun, swatting away flies as I walked single-file behind my friend and interpreter. We turned the corner of a wall and found a mother sitting in a hut that was no bigger than a walk-in closet. It had no doors, no windows, it was nothing but a mud and stick shack.

She sat in ash, next to a small fire with a pot in it. With a wooden spoon she stirred the little flour she had, turning it into a thick substance that turns to rock in the stomach.

African Hospitality would have her invite us in to share the meal with her, but that day she simply had none to give. Little children ran in and out of the hut as we sat in a semi-circle around her, waiting to speak to her about the God-Jesus who loves her. 

I never fully understood the conversations that went on during these door-to-door visits, but what I lacked in  audio attention I made up for in visual.

So as my friend spoke beside me, I simply watched her.

She sat with legs crossed over and listened with an impatient gleam in her eye.

Could I blame her that she did not want to listen?

Would I listen if I were in her place?

Who was she, that she would be with nothing but a small pot of flour to feed her children and herself? And who was I, that I would be without nothing? Without need or want?

Almost a year later to the day I sit in this quiet kitchen with a glass of "pur" water by my side. After a day of health-food shopping and easy cooking, I sit here full and content. Not five feet from me is a fridge full of food to eat on a whim.

This is the truth.  

The truth, bitter and moving as it is, is that I don't know what it's like to eat rocks just to try and satisfy the insatiable gnawing in my stomach and weakness in my bones.

The truth is that I do not know what it's like to go without a choice or preference for food.

I do not know want, I know only greed, which comes after want is filled. I have what I want, and yet I want more.

Why? God, why? Why do we do that? Why do we accumulate for ourselves and yet are never satisfied? That's not the point of life, is it? To gain for ourselves nothing but the feeling of not having enough?

I may have seen starvation and poverty in Africa, but I will never experience in full what it is like. I may have seen it, but at the end of the day I go home to food and water and comfort: things I did not, in a single moment, earn and could not, in a single moment, deserve any more than that woman with her children could.

And yet at the end of the day, after all has been said and done, I feel like the lesser between us. I feel as though she is greater than I. I feel as though she, though among the least of all people now, will be first in the kingdom of God.

I feel it, though I can't explain it. Perhaps it is because when all is said and done she is one of the people I will answer to.  

I came across this realization only after I was honest with the discomfort and sadness that lingered in this memory. When I was honest I realized that if I could, I would get on my knees before her and say that I am so sorry. For some reason that I cannot fathom I would seek her forgiveness.

Perhaps it stems from a guilt that I would have so much more than her, all of which I know that I do not deserve and yet take advantage of on more than a daily basis.

Perhaps I would apologize because I look back on her and a gentle reminder forms in the back of my mind, that I have been given much for a greater purpose than just to serve myself.

That to those who have much, much is due.

Perhaps I would apologize because I have yet to pay it forward.

I would beg her forgiveness because here, in this comfortable society, it looks like I have time to set my heart on doing so.

But the truth is that she doesn't have time. They don't have time. To those without food for tomorrow, today is all they've got. And even that is not a guarantee for any of us. So why would I believe that I have time?

If I could, I know that I would tell her that I'm scared. I'm scared that loving her and people like her might cost me more than what I want to give; more than what's comfortable for me; more than what's "reasonable".

I would tell her the truth- that all this time I have reasoned away my compassion. I have reasoned that to give so much is just not normal for a person like me to do.

And for that, I know I am deeply sorry.

I would apologize because I know that in the face of that woman there is the face of Jesus, and that I might have to answer to Jesus through her eyes one day.

For if we were to come together before Him, would He be looking through her eyes upon the situation, or mine?

The answer lies in another question:

Which one of us was in need?

Which was hungry and not fed?

Who was naked and not clothed?

Who was sick and not taken care of?

And which one of us
Was?

“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.

 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

“The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’

“Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

“They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

“He will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

“Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”

-Mathew 25: 31-46