Friday, January 15, 2010

haiti

my mind is realing with thoughts of haiti today.

i couldn't stop dreaming about their torn apart country and the many torn apart lives. the children on the side of the road wondering why their parents haven't come to get them. the parents who are combing the city trying to find their children. the tears. the screams when another body is pulled from the rubble and it is identified as family, cried over and sent away to be disposed of quickly so infection and disease do not add to the problems. i hear the sounds. those awful mourning sounds. i know what those sound like and to imagine them in the tens of thousands makes me want to crawl back into bed and cry.

haiti, such a poor country. a country that relies on other countries for medical care and now they are facing one of the biggest medical crisis of the century. the millions of lives that have been transformed by the movement of plates is incomprehensable. i want to DO something. sure we will give money, but at times like this i want to get off of my comfortable white butt and really do something. is there a child that needs a home now? what are we called to do in times like this? where would Jesus be in the midst of this tragedy? i send up prayers but the problem seems even too large for mere prayers. how does one rebuild a city the size of the state i was born in? how is this even possible?

i sit on a comfortable chair, typing at a computer, listening to the sounds of seseme street, the clinking of a spoon on a bowl as micah eats his cereal, beatrix is asleep in her warm bed. i can't even ask why. that seems ridiculous. it just happens. the truth is things like this happen all over our world everyday. i think this one is hitting home to me because it is close. we in america are all about proximity aren't we? if it is close enough to effect us than we care.

i am tired. there is too much hurt sometimes. there are good and beautiful things here too, but sometimes, every once in awhile, the saddness threatens to close in around me and i cry out to Him. no more death, no more disease, no more lonliness. the promises of God's kingdom. hope. hope seems so small at times such as these. i have questions, but my questions can wait for now. i just want to help. i just want to take the cries, the screaming, the tears and help.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Lydia, thank you! I really liked your thoughts on proximity as our reason for caring or not caring about different people or tragedies. It's so strange. I have also found sometimes that it is easier to "surface" care about people far away, because sooner or later you can stop caring about them and there is so much distance, there is nothing that those who need our care can do to get our attention. Choosing to care about someone who is very close and in need, is difficult, because we know that we can't just stop one day. Our lives become intertwined. Thank you for thinking with your heart!