A royal baby was born today. A baby that will undoubtedly grow up in a fishbowl, his every move fawned over, analyzed, photographed, and reported as if it were earth-shattering. He will have loving parents to dote over him, a staff to serve him, a press that hounds him, and a fan base that will swell and wane over and over like the tide of the ocean. He will one day rule, if only in the hearts of those that put people on pedestals simply because of pedigree. Will he know what it means to suffer?
Also today, across the world and across two oceans, in Syria, a nameless unphotographed baby, like countless others before him this month, is born in a refugee camp, drawing his first breaths in the middle of conflict, a deadly war. He will be on the move soon enough, already fleeing and hiding and struggling to live before he ever learns to smile. Tomorrow is not guaranteed; it is only the faintest of hopes. Hundreds of thousands of children sleep tonight in a tent on dirty ground not knowing whether tomorrow they eat or not, move or stay, live or die. Families are broken, scattered, displaced, diminished, and shattered by wars they did not start and have no power to end. This baby of no recognition and no worldly significance, whose sole purpose it seems is just to survive—will he feel loved?
In Afghanistan, a village of young girls risk disfiguration by acid being thrown on them simply because they wish to go to school in secret. An eleven year old girl in Yemen begs for death rather than being forced to marry. In Thailand, hundreds of thousands of under age children are abused every year in childhood sex-trafficking and prostitution. In America’s capital, more than 40% of high school kids don’t graduate. Granite columns and indestructible walls meters thick fill up the entire epicenter of capital landscape, yet kids fall thru a broken system of family, culture, and community like water thru a sieve. In Africa, hunger, AIDS, and death by Malaria still exists despite decades of humanitarian aid both government and private. Why?
The world is on fire because we are at war. There are wars on drugs. There are wars on women and children. There is war between social classes and political parties. We are at war and we fight. We fight over land, food, politics, possessions, principals, philosophies, lifestyles, religious belief systems. We fight over what is true. Often we just fight, seemingly for no reason at all. We fight because our rage over takes us. Our inner evil is compelled to extinguish that which opposes us or our right-ness. We are at war within ourselves as we easily love one person or group of people and detest another individual or group. We exchange our peace, our righteousness, for a need to be right, a need to own or control, a need to possess or win. We exchange love for a lie.
When you look at the world, what is it that you see?
There is so much fighting, and evil, and brutality, and pain and so much needless suffering. And yet there are those small voices, the small minorities with limited resources, small hands, big ideas, and bigger hearts that risk death and dying daily, armed with nothing more than a sack cloth of courage and a heart full of faith trying, always trying. They try desperately to feed the hungry, shelter the orphans, assist the dying, spread words of peace, trying their best to litter humanity with goodness and gentleness and kind deeds.
It is a world of dark and light, of yin and yang, a garden of good and evil. But these days the weeds are rooting ever deeper, trying desperately to strangle the good fruits of human goodness. It’s easy to despair as we watch the world around us all ablaze. It feels as if we are flaming out, we’re burnt out, past the point of being able to care.
I say don’t give in. Don’t give up. Don’t ever give up! Return to love. Help your neighbor or whoever God puts in your path today. Write respectful letters to those in power that can make a difference. Above all, do not remain silent. Use your voice to point out injustice, and to persuade others. But then DO SOMETHING! Use your hands to help others. Use your mind to stay centered on solutions, not just rattling over the problem. Find small ways to be the change you wish to see in the world.
We all have the opportunity to be the royal sons and daughters of a higher law, a higher King. We can discern without diminishing. We can serve with humility. We can love without limits. We can rise above the madness.
Feed. Pray. Give. Serve. Love.
Where is the love? It’s up to each of us to light the way.
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For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Ephesians 6:12
“This world’s anguish is no different from the love we insist on holding back.” Aberjhani – “Elemental: The Power of Illuminated Love”
“Peace is the fruit of love, a love that is also justice. But to grow in love requires work — hard work. And it can bring pain because it implies loss — loss of the certitudes, comforts, and hurts that shelter and define us.” Jean Vanier – “Finding Peace”
u2areloved 