Broken

A few days ago, a four-year-old girl from a small city in China died from an infection. She broke her leg very badly a few months back and was left at an orphanage. Of course I do not know the circumstances surrounding why she was left there, but my guess is that her family could not afford to pay for her medical care and made the heartbreaking and desperate decision to leave her where they thought she may be able to get help. The orphanage took her in but could not afford the care she needed either. She spent months in the orphanage with the horrible pain of a broken femur and the deeper emotional pain of abandonment. Love Without Boundaries, an organization that helps get medical care for orphans, came in and quickly raised the funds to help her. But it was too late. By the time they got her to the hospital, her leg had become infected and she could not recover.

These kinds of stories happen every day. So why did this one hit me especially hard? This precious girl was left at Leah's orphanage. She was probably there when we visited.

It is so easy to go on with life and ignore hard stories like these. There are a number of reasons for this. First, it makes us uncomfortable. We do not like to think about suffering. How many times have we brushed off a tragic story with, "Oh, I just can't imagine!" Conversation over. (Is it that we can't imagine, or that we just don't want to imagine?) We don't want to feel sad. We would prefer to dive back in to the busyness of our lives and try to forget.

Another reason we ignore is because it makes us feel helpless. This little girl's death resulted from an enormous number of factors. Political issues, poverty, lack of education...these are not simple problems and there are no easy solutions. Raising money for a surgery does not fix it. Neither does adopting. It is easy to become paralyzed because the problems we see are just too big and nothing we do will ever be enough.

There seems to be a movement in Christian circles to do more. Give, adopt, serve your community, etc. In my Reformed community (which I love dearly, just so no one reads anything into this that they shouldn't), I sense a lot of suspicion. We are rightly concerned about legalism. Legalism is dangerous. We need to understand that our salvation comes from the work of Jesus alone. We stand reconciled to God because of Jesus's death and resurrection and nothing we have done. We are incapable of adding to his work, which is why we can and should find sweet, sweet rest in what Jesus has done. This cannot be overstated. So understandably, those of us who hold this doctrine dear can become suspicious to pleas for Christians to do more, or to be things like "radical" or "missional."

But.

While these concerns are important, too often they hold us back from serving others, sharing the gospel, and making disciples. We turn inward when we should be drawn out toward helplessness and suffering. We should be drawn to it, not because we can earn bonus points with God or because we can save anyone, but because we know. We understand. We have been the suffering, helpless, hopelessly sinful person that has experienced love and the saving grace of God. We have been the child with a broken leg and no hope. Our hearts should break for our world and our communities in a way that compels us to act. Please, donate to missionaries. Participate in foster care. Bring meals to families or shut-ins in your church. Adopt. Spend time on the other side of town that you would prefer to pretend did not exist. Give until it hurts! Do not run from suffering or from situations that seem hopeless. Run to Jesus. Run to Jesus and find rest for your soul. Then you will be free to go and serve.