This weekend I spent some time with a family at a local lake. They live at the lake. We BBQ'd, drank some beverages, and took a ride in the boat around the lake. He showed me some massive million dollar homes that were built and being built. Huge. The boathouses were as large as my home. Magnificent stone work, landscaping and backyard pools with people standing about visiting, eating or swimming. Some of these 2 to 3 story homes only had 2 or 3 people living in them. Some were just winter or summer homes. In the boathouses were at least one boat, some had boats and jet skis, or whatever.
Yesterday, while working I was made aware of a 14 year old student who was deemed homeless by his school district. Seems the bus driver had taken him home, except he asked to be dropped off at a different location. A camp ground. A camp ground on a lake. The same lake I had ridden in a boat around just days before. His family had lost everything, including their house, and their car had broken down as well. Some people went out to check and they were living in a tent since last wednesday. This isn't your average family. No, they got problems other than this. Crazy mom. Dad in prison. Kids doing best they can but not much to do it with. Huge dysfunction.
One Lake. Two extremes. This campsite literally sets admist million dollar homes. They live in a 12 x 8 tent. These homes are up to 8000 sq ft. And I wondered what Jesus would think of the whole situation. Its not that I think everyone should live in a tent to be equal...but somewhere the disparity, and them being literally yards apart, struck me as something being totally out of whack in this world. 2 people living in an 8000 sq ft home while a family lives in a tent not yards from you. Maybe it would not have appeared so lop-sided to me if the homes had been more modest, or was within reason of what was needed. Or maybe the tent was bigger. And the family kind of put themselves in this position by making lots of bad choices... but still.
1 comment:
yessir. absolutely.
here's what i think jesus would say:
if you seek the kingdom of god first, you'll have everything that you need.
if you're willing to leave everything behind, or let go of your shit, you'll find that there's more than enough - a hundred times what you thought - but it's not about the HAVING ... it's about the SHARING.
one author i was looking at said that the early christians would say that if someone had too much food and another person starved to death, the one with extra food was a murderer.
eek.
what's THAT say about the multi million dollar ministries we american christians have built?
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