Burden My Heart, so I will Act

What kind of world our we leaving our children AND what kind of children are we leaving the world?”

It is common to hear that people don’t let their minds go to “that Place”, by this they mean the place of horror that others are currently enduring. A place where others are exploited, used and sacrificed for the sake of greed and depravity.  They know it is a reality and they know it is awful but they truly can’t or won’t let their minds linger in this place or even venture toward it. I can understand this. 

Several years ago my prayer was “God burden my heart with the things that burden your heart.” After many months of God answering this prayer and giving me a glimpse my tearful prayer was “Stop God, please make it stop. I can’t take it.” 

I was living in a beautiful home with an amazing view of our city lights and each night as I lay in bed I could see what should have been a lovely expanse of light below. But instead I couldn’t forget the images of Bombay and how similar the city lights also looked from above. And then as the lens zoomed in on what lay below, the grit of the street below the glowing lights, the Red light district in all its horror of human suffering would silently scream at me. Millions of miles away, safe in bed in Kelowna BC, I couldn’t stop the torrid of images every time I lay to sleep.  I had to ask God to stop it for me; I had to ask Him to help me be a part of stopping this horror for those women, children and yes men living in such a reality.

Now, many years later I still go there. I still go there in my mind. I still imagine that it is my children. I still imagine that it could have been me, and that is how I fight. The reality of this dark world still haunts me, and I am thankful for this as it keeps me motivated. But I am also thankful God did give me reprieve. He doesn’t allow me to see all, to know all. He shelters me from being Him and invites me to be obedient to Him and to do my part. 

So when I think about our world and I think about what kind of children I want to leave this world, I think of a servants heart, of loving others even when it hurts, even when we have to sacrifice and risk it all, go blind and move forward – even when it is dangerous to do so. I think of raising men and women to be moral, to be leaders, to have faith and to be solid in their foundation. 

“I suppose I’ve never been afraid of dying but how tragic it would be to live a long healthy life of security and never lay down all that I am for the one who saved me to begin with.”

I am not the final answer, none of us are. This is not the end of the story and for that I am grateful. But for me, I continue to breathe in and out each and every day, I get out of bed, I put one foot in front of the other and I persist. I persist in the pursuit of equality, of loving others as myself, as I would my own children and my own family. I whisper to the broken- hearted with each step I take “I see you, You are not alone, You are not forgotten.” Together may we rise to meet this call.