Concerning Houses

One of the weeks of camp this summer was S.A.M. week--Seesalt And Missions. During that week, the first full week in July, the campers split up with their church groups and were sent out every afternoon to various projects in the Conway/Myrtle Beach areas. Some were helping with other charities, many were helping on reconstruction projects at various homes, and still others were doing beach evangelism and backyard Bible clubs. We reached out to the surrounding community and I believe made a lasting impact...but I know it made a lasting impact on the campers and also the staff.

I ended up on some great projects working with an awesome team from Whitesburg, Kentucky. On Tuesday we worked with a ministry called Help4Kids, helping them pack bookbags full of school supplies and wrap toys that had been donated as gifts for the kids. When we ended up finishing pretty quickly with all of that, I had to scramble a bit to find something for the youth to do for the next 2 hours. So we spent the rest of our time there sorting clothes and organizing their headquarters as much as we could. The ladies that work there really appreciated that. Although the work was mundane at times, it was a great time of working together as a team and learning to do simple things as service for God. I think we all learned that missions isn't always evangelism or other "mission-y" things like teaching a Bible study. Yes, missions can take many forms...

The other two days we helped paint the interior of a few rooms of a lady named Bobbie's house. We arrived the afternoon of the 4th of July and after making a few decisions with Bobbie--like which rooms she wanted painted and what color--the youth got to work by moving some furniture and putting down drop cloths. After a quick tour of the house though, it was quite overwhelming to me and a lot of the youth too that the house needed a lot of work done. Bobbie's 2 bedroom house was the home to several kids, best we could tell, and the conditions were average at best.
A simple paint job wasn't going to cover it. Our rollers and brushes were not going to bring a father figure into their home, or get them out of that drug-ridden neighborhood...but painting--along with our friendship and love and some leftovers from lunch--that's what we had to offer those two days, so we set out to do our best at it.


As we dealt with the reality of Bobbie and her kids' and grandkids' living condition, it definately made a deep impact--I think because a lot of us thought about the great homes we had grown up in with loving parents. It especially hit me, because I went into that week of camp just having learned that my parents were going to move from the house we had grown up in. What can I say...I'm a sentimental guy, and there was a big part of me that wanted my parents to stay forever at 1040 Campbellton Place and grow old together in that house. I wanted to bring my kids back to that house one day, share stories of memories with them there, and Thanksgivings and Easters there like we had with our grandparents.
But as I juxtaposed Bobbie's world with how we had grown up, I realized I had a whole lot of great memories to be thankful for that these kids couldn't hardly dream of...and that was a lot of the youth's reaction throughout the week.

Each night before the service we had a share time, and we heard from a lot of different projects. Several other groups were working on construction projects and had come face to face with poor living conditions too. I heard a lot of them say that it really made them thankful for the lives they had back home. But as I thought more about that, I was hoping that would not be the lasting impact from the week for any of us. The Lord reminded me of a passage He brought me to when I first encountered abject poverty in a third world country about 5 years ago. I found myself asking "Why?" and wondering how people could live in these conditions while I lived in my comfy house, totally unaware and unbothered, half a world away. Why had the Lord blessed me with these earthly comforts while these in Africa struggled to get by?

The passage was in Genesis 12, His first covenant with Abraham, and was a direct answer to my questions (the Holy Spirit is good like that). Verse 2 in the chapter reads “I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing." What I took from that was that the Lord blesses us so that we will be a blessing to others. Do we know why He chooses to bless some and not others? No. Before this chapter in Genesis we don't see much of Abram, just his lineage, but no character traits that would lead us to think he deserved the Lord's blessing. The Lord just chooses to. In the same way God hasn't blessed us because we are good or deserve it. Am I better than Bobbie or the kids that live in the poor conditions in her home and on her street? Certainly not, we are all sinners in need of God. So why did God choose to give me a great upbringing? Based on this passage it's so that I can be a blessing to those who are in need, the least of these. He has blessed me and now I can be a part of Him blessing the nations.

So what was my takeaway from the week? To be happy and grateful for (and not sentimental and sad that my parents were leaving it) the great home life I had growing up; but not to end there. I hope the awareness and gratitude of those great physical blessings lead me to bless others who have physical needs. And also in the spiritual realm too...if we know God we've been blessed with that knowledge, not just to preserve our own souls, but to share that eternal life with others. No, we aren't blessed so we will be thankful and that's the end. It shouldn't stop with us, but we are the means to the end of blessing and serving others.

We are blessed to be a blessing.