How Long, O Lord?

As a middle-class, urban, citizen of the U.S.A., I have led a very sheltered life. This time I’m not talking about the cultural sheltering, though I was that too. I’m talking about being sheltered from the hurt and pain, from the needs and hungers of the vast majority of the world outside the comfort of “home.”

Sure, I lived in China for more than six months and saw people who swept the streets, probably as their only source of income. But I was only 12 at the time, still pretty happy-go-lucky. I don’t remember it ever affecting me very deeply. Sure, I’ve seen homeless people on the downtown streets of Hollywood, Washington D.C., and Dallas. That can definitely be a picture of true need, and I have wrestled with how to respond. But here I’m talking about something more.

Here I’m talking about living in the African bush, in the rural setting of a third-world country. Where life is so immensely different than what I enjoyed growing up.

Even in China, I only thought it was inconvenient that the washing machines were on the first floor when we lived on the second floor. I only remember one day that the power went off—and we knew it would be off ahead of time. I was sometimes annoyed that I had to use a squatty potty when we were out and about.

The past three months, I have learned to live in an entirely different way. When nature calls, I usually have to walk to a pit latrine—no seat to sit on there. I haven’t seen a washing machine or microwave in the time I’ve been here. Power is off around half the time. Almost everything—plowing, mowing the grass, shelling maize—is done either by hand or with simple hand-powered machines.

But these are minor inconveniences compared to what I really sat down to write about.

Two weeks into my stay here, a friend sent an email asking about disease and illiteracy here. At that point, it made me mad. I was almost exclusively seeing the beauty: the beauty of a culture which remembers how to live in community so much better than most Americans; the beauty of living again out in the countryside rather than feeling somewhat stifled by the big city; the beauty of feeling at home, even in a new place with new people, because it is a common Love which brought us together; even the beauty of the fantastic variety of birds I observed within days.

And it is true. There is an amazing amount of beauty here. God is at work here, of course, and He naturally has people here who seek to love and serve Him. I definitely believe there are so many things the people here “get” that our comfortable lives (or at least mine) “back home” make it easy to lose sight of.

In the subsequent 10 weeks, though, it hasn’t been all a bed of roses.

I have heard people at meals talking about how they had to run, run, run when soldiers came to their villages and started shooting.

I have seen a mother and daughter who come to church every Sunday in the same clothes…perhaps because they have no others. Their hair is not black, but a reddish color that I have read is evidence of malnutrition.

I have heard that parents here simply expect to lose one of their children to death by disease.

I have seen a toddler, usually full of life of laughter, lying almost motionless on a couch. His body, burning with fever; his breath shallow and labored. His parents stand by, seeming unsure of what to do because they have already taken him to the clinic and what they were given hasn’t helped.

I have heard stories of boda boda accidents, where men have been lying on the ground obviously injured badly. That sometimes people just keep driving by them, because if they stop and try to help they may just get blamed for the accident.

I have seen a ja ja (grandmother/elderly lady)—who can walk only slowly, slowly—gently lower herself to sit in the slim shade of a telephone pole to try and get out of the hot sun.

I have heard about the superstitions that are so deeply ingrained into peoples’ minds, even Christians. That if an owl perches in a tree over your house, somebody will die. That if you step over a pile of items arranged for witchcraft, something bad will happen to you.

I have seen masses and masses of people going about their daily lives in Kampala or even in Luwero and wondered on a deeper level than ever before if they have heard about the love of Jesus. {In the States, it’s easier to assume that the general population has had the chance to hear the Good News, in some form or fashion.}

I have heard stories of the death of parents or grandparents, or of poverty from widowhood, or of abandonment, or of broken families. And it could possibly be because I live at a ministry dedicated to helping those who have experienced losses such as these….but I can’t recall hearing a single person’s family history that didn’t include some sort of loss.

I have seen a young lady who wanted to go into the medical profession. But her parents died, and she had to drop out of school halfway through secondary school (high school) and take a low-paying job working at a hotel to maybe get enough money for tuition to go back.

I have heard a Ugandan say it’s true that if you’re in a boat that sinks you’ve got to dive down, swim as far away as you can, and wait until everybody who can’t swim has panicked and drowned before you swim back to find something to float on. Because if you try to help, they’ll just pull you down and you’ll die too.

I have seen that life here seems cheap. That death is easier to talk about plainly than in the States. That there is less sugar coating. No guarantee of treatment at a clean hospital with even basic modern equipment. Here, serious disease and subsequent death are a part of daily/community life, as contradictory as that sounds.

And as I have seen and heard all these things, my heart has wept and cried out to the Lord. “God, don’t You see this????? Don’t You hear the suffering of Your creation?” In my sheltered, developed-world upbringing, I have never been confronted with such a widespread view of the effects that sin and evil have brought into the world.

But in one of the moments of crying out late in January, I sensed the Spirit’s voice speaking truth back into my heart: A reminder that…as strange as it seems to us…God’s withholding of the end of time and suffering is actually part of His mercy. That even the pain that occurs is not yet put to an end because He is still calling people to Himself.

The call is to trust Him and His goodness, even when our human minds don’t see that goodness or grace in the pain.

In the past month or so, I saw this quote posted on Facebook: "Underneath our anger is a certain mistrust of God. Somewhere along the way we stopped believing that God is a God of love and justice. If we truly believed that our lives, our hopes and our dreams were in God's hands we wouldn't be quite so shocked when imperfect people hurt us or let us down."[1] It actually comes from a book about marriage, and it’s referring to a more specific pain than I’m writing about here….but the truth of it remains.

Whether I can understand it right now or not, God IS a God of love, and His character is as the One who is “just and the justifier,” even when He passes over sin in His forbearance (Romans 3:25-26). It is only through confidence in the One who brings beauty from ashes (Isaiah 61:3) that I can face the brokenness of the world.

And as I prayed for the youngest member of our Institute family, that little boy lying there so sick, I felt God asking me to pray with confidence and yet also with humility. Because in the end, He is the one who knows all things. He is the only One who knows what is eternally best for each person. And yes, I am immensely thankful that God brought healing to the little one. But God would be just as sovereign and just as good, even if He had called that little child home.

Several weeks later, this is one of the puzzle pieces God brought together with some others to create a picture calling me into deeper trust of Him. You can read about that here.

So I don’t have answers to the questions about what I am supposed to do about the hurt and brokenness I see. I do know I am called to love and service for my Lord. But even if I did everything I possibly could…even if I were a real-life superhero…I could not eradicate poverty or suffering. Only God can do that, and right now He is not finished with the world yet. Which means there is still greater good and glory which can come from it.

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[1] Susie Larson, Alone in Marriage, Moody Publishers (2007), pg. 24.