My blog isn’t exactly an internet sensation.  But that didn’t hit me by surprise.  Here’s what is exciting:  the Wannabe Humanitarian blog has been visited on 30 occasions.  Did 30 different people read my thoughts, or did my wife and mom visit a bunch of times in order to boost my self-esteem?  The world may never know…

I haven’t put pen to paper – or fingers to keys – for a while.  I’m suffering from writer’s cramp, or writer’s block – whichever it is.  Hey Mashburn, don’t laugh.  You just keep “tweeting.”  Hopefully, I’ll get better at this and learn how to offer up meaningful posts a little more often.  Right now, I’m getting some assistance from a book written by Richard Stearns.  It’s called “The Hole in Our Gospel: What does God expect of Us? The Answer that Changed my Life and Might Just Change the World.”  Every Christian needs to read this book.  Here is an excerpt:

“I don’t think I’ve ever been to a place as spiritually dark as Gulu, in northern Uganda.  Gulu is the epicenter of more than twenty years of violent atrocities committed by the so-called Lord’s Resistance Army and its leader, Joseph Kony, a monster who has declared himself to be the son of God.  If Satan is alive and manifesting himself in our world, he is surely present in this cultish and brutal group whose trademark is the kidnapping of children who are subsequently forced at gunpoint to commit murder, rape, and even acts of cannibalism.  During his reign of terror, it is believed that Kony has kidnapped more than thirty-eight thousand children, killing some and forcing the rest to become killers themselves by conscripting them into the LRA as child soldiers.  As a part of their brutal indoctrination, the children are often forced to hack their own brothers or sisters to death with a machete – because bullets are too precious to waste – and then to drink the blood of those they have killed.  The girls, often just twelve or thirteen, are gang-raped and forced to become sex slaves and ‘wives’ to the rebel commanders.  As a result of the LRA’s gristly raids over two decades, some 1.5 million people have been driven from their loan and forced to live in camps for internally displaced persons in and around Gulu.  It was in this unlikely backdrop that I witnessed the awesome power of the gospel that has become so tame to us in America.”

Christians are called to love and care for our neighbors.  Are the people of Uganda our neighbors?  In this age of international travel and instant communication – think email, TV, internet, etc. – the answer to this question is an undeniable “yes.”  Are the children of Uganda worth less than our own?  Most certainly not, but we act as if these children are less important than our own.  I mean, who could watch their own child hack his or her sibling to death with a machete, or witness their next door neighbor’s daughter fall victim to a gang rape, and take no action?  But since these children are a world away, we are going to close Internet Explorer and move on with our lives (i.e. take no action), right?  Here are some other rattling statistics I learned from Rich:

  • 26,500 children die daily of preventable causes related to their poverty
  • 1 billion people – or 15 percent – of the world’s population lives on less than $1 per day
  • 2.6 billion people – or 40 percent – of the world’s population lives on less than $2 per day
  • Americans live on $105 per day
  • Today’s 1,125 billionaires hold more wealth than the wealth of half of the world’s adult population
  • The wealthiest 7 people on earth control more wealth than the combined GDP of the 41 poorest nations
  • The poorest 40 percent of the world’s population accounts for just 5 percent of global income.  The richest 20 percent accounts for three-quarters of the world’s income
  • The top 20 percent of the world’s population consumes 86 percent of the world’s goods

We have got to do something about this!  If we don’t, who is?  Here is a quote from a guy who “gets it:”

“Fifteen thousand Africans are dying each day of preventable, treatable diseases – AIDS, malaria, TB – for lack of drugs that we take for granted.

This statistic alone makes a fool of the idea many of us hold on to very tightly:  the idea of equality.  What is happening in Africa mocks our pieties, doubts our concern and questions our commitment to the whole concept.  Because if we’re honest, there’s no way we could conclude that such mass death day after day would ever be allowed to happen anywhere else.  Certainly not North America or Europe, or Japan.  An entire continent bursting into flames?  Deep down, if we really accept that their lives – African Lives – are equal to ours, we would all be doing more to put the fire out.  It’s an uncomfortable truth.”

Pretty deep, huh?  Are you wondering who said this?  You might be surprised.  These words were not spoken by a prominent Christian figure.  In fact, these words were uttered by a celebrity.  Yes, the same kind of celebrity that Christians are so quick to judge.  We should tip our hats to Bono.  As one of the greatest humanitarians of our day, he is doing the work that Christians were called to do – the work that many of us overlook and view as optional.  Check out 1 John 3:11-24:

11This is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another. 12Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother’s were righteous. 13Do not be surprised, my brothers, if the world hates you. 14We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love our brothers. Anyone who does not love remains in death. 15Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life in him.

 16This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. 17If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? 18Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. 19This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence 20whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.

 21Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God 22and receive from him anything we ask, because we obey his commands and do what pleases him. 23And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us. 24Those who obey his commands live in him, and he in them. And this is how we know that he lives in us: We know it by the Spirit he gave us.

I mentioned last time that I don’t know where to start.  Really, that’s a lie and an excuse for inaction.  While they might not be public, profound, significant or great,  there are plenty of easy, convenient ways to begin my journey.  My family is going to start by sponsoring a child through World Vision.  Only God knows what’s next.  Right now I’m enjoying a root beer and “Hosanna” performed by Hillsong United.  What a great song.  “Break my heart for what breaks Yours” – that is going to be my prayer.