The Really Real

In Nicaragua, I see reality...and it's REALLY real. There's the children my lawyer tells me about who need parents. There's the poor who greet me at a restaurant or tourist spot asking for money.  There's the many villages filled with homes that look more like sheds in need of repair. All around me people are hurting...they need help. 

In the United States, it was like I was hidden behind a pretty curtain. I knew there was pain and loss and need in the world, but it was all on the other side of my pretty curtain. I could plant my flowers, paint my walls, go shopping, eat out, catch a movie, and only give the other side of the curtain my attention when I WANTED to. Here, I see it whether I try to or not. 

I remember this pamphlet I saw as a teenager. On the front it showed Christians on an island worshiping with hands raised on a mountain top. Their eyes were lifted to the skies to find Jesus but he was behind them in the water rescuing the drowning, crying out for them to join Him...

Statistics are just that until you look in the eyes behind the numbers. Then they quickly become mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, daughters, sons, friends...

I've been so stupid to live so long behind my fake, pretty curtain! Now I've seen and heard. And what happens as a result, I just don't know. I HOPE I'll never be there same... If I retreat behind my pretty curtain and carry on as *normal* then God help me. I am to be pitied. 

"If you say, “But we knew nothing about this,”does not he who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not he who guards your life know it? Will he not repay each person according to what he has done?" ~Proverbs 24:11