Monday, February 15, 2010

Water Walk


On Saturday our family and a few others walked a mile with empty buckets, filled them in a creek and walked back. It was an amazing experience, but I think one of the kids summed it up best. A few hundred yards into the return trip, leaning away from the weight of her sloshing bucket she turned her face to mom and said, "I want to go to heaven right now. This is too hard."
This week I was reading about our misconceptions about the poor, namely in regards to their work ethic and ingenuity. I know I have assumed that opportunity is available for anyone who is willing, but the 'bootstrap' promise of the American dream is elusive when factors (like clean water) are outside of the control of the individual. And so I thought, as I carried, of Bono's remark about "an accident of latitude" deciding one's fate.
When we finished walking we lined up the buckets. There wasn't even enough to fill an American bathtub and the water was murky.
Thank you, Lord, for opportunities to understand a little better.

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