“It is much more comfortable to depersonalize the poor so we don’t feel responsible for the catastrophic human failure that results in someone sleeping on the street while people have spare bedrooms in their homes. We can volunteer in a social program or distribute excess food and clothing through organizations and never have to open up our homes, our beds, our dinner tables … I’m just not convinced that Jesus is going to say, ‘When I was hungry, you gave a check to the United Way and they fed me,” or, “When I was naked, you donated clothes to the Salvation Army and they clothed me.” Jesus is not seeking distant acts of charity. He seeks concrete acts of love.” - Shane Claiborne
As I was completing my Bachelor of Human Justice this past spring, I found myself overwhelmingly met with the question: “So, what are your plans after finishing school?”. I was well-aware that I was expected to respond with an extravagant and detailed lifelong agenda that conformed to ubiquitously upheld North American notions of success and happiness. Consequently, in my travels from the forests of northern British Columbia, to the lakeshores of Ontario, to the craggy cliffs of Newfoundland, I spent this entire summer mulling over my options in determining a new route for my life. Quite frankly, none of the mainstream options offered any sort of appeal to me.
So for nine weeks, I’ve been living in Vicente Guerrero, Baja California, Mexico, at the same mission I served at for three months earlier this year. I spend my days in a swarm of dust and children, looking disheveled and frazzled at best. Although I have neither any training nor obvious gift in the area of teaching, children, or Spanish, I am working at a school for children with special needs. I teach Art classes five days a week, in addition to teaching English as a Second Language and tutoring in Math.
It’s not quite the glamorous nine-to-five job with the disposable income that most of my fellow classmates at university were seeking. And I never quite expected myself to persevere through four intense years of studying Human Justice to end up as an Art teacher for kids with special needs in Mexico, the last country I ever intended to visit. But I cannot imagine a better "use" of my years of study. After all, I never perceived my pursuit of a Bachelor's degree as a means to acquire a job. It was about being equipped with the academic and practical knowledge to effectively seek justice in a broken world...
Because donating money to Oxfam or Amnesty International was too easy. Because praying for the "world's poor" from the safety and familiarity of a church pew was not enough. Because I need to go beyond the comfortable and convenient ways of caring for human welfare, even if it takes me far from home...
Being a part of this mission has been an enormous blessing. It's inspiring to see people going beyond opening up their wallets to help their brothers and sisters in need. I’m impressed by my peers who have willingly agreed to give up a year, or several years, to commit their time purely to unpaid volunteer work.
Yet we are not perfect. Being a missionary does not make any of us noble - especially if our primary purpose in doing such work is to feel good about ourselves. Even those of us on the mission field can easily fall into a routine of just doing our job, nothing more. We all need a reminder, myself included, that God doesn't call us to fight for justice when we feel like it. We aren't asked to help out simply when we have the energy or a moment to spare. It's a full-time job; a lifelong commitment.
I know I could be contributing so much more. Most likely, all of us could. And I'm not talking about just being a little more generous around Christmastime. I'm referring to genuine acts of love, compassion, and service that all of us are capable of doing.
I can't imagine anything more devastating than reaching the end of my life and realizing that I could have done more.
Can you?
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