Sleeping Beauty

I caught her as she fell off the bench in a slump. One more second and her head would have hit the cement floor. She didn't even wake up. It was in the mid-nineties and we were teaching the weekly Bible story at the church. The room was stifling without any breeze for relief. The fetor of fifty-three sweaty and soiled bodies saturated the air as the children sang. Each one an exhibit of paucity: threadbare and torn shirts hanging off their shoulders, swollen bellies crying malnourishment and worms, and angular arms and legs looking more like sticks. These are the children of poverty.

I held the sleeping little girl close until we were drenched in our sweat. Perhaps it was the union of hunger and heat but I had heard that two El Shaddai children had fallen asleep in class because of malaria. I prayed it wasn't her plight. As I looked at her sweet face, it was all I could do to not grab her and take her away from the big bad poverty monster. I imagined her washed and cleaned with a fitted white dress and pink ribbons, her torso filled to proportion, toys and books at her disposal, and an education to secure her future. I could do this for her...but who am I?

Who am I and what is my responsibility? To bolt in as the white knight on a white horse and barrel through the path of least resistance? To sever the ties that have woven the fabric of her entire existence? To sit taller on this rubble heap and demand my assistance? Who am I?

I am a learner. I silently prayed for her and her family. I prayed that God would give me the grace, patience and wisdom to work within this poverty and not run away from it. The guidance to walk alongside the families and restore their dignity. The discernment to know when helping can hurt. And most of all, the insight of my own poverty domains.

I put the little girl back on her feet as she woke from her slumber. We joined the other children as they left the church....it was good to get a breath of fresh air!