"I am hungry" - Lesson #2

What do you say when a child, dirty and wearing tattered scraps for clothes, walks up to you, looks into your eyes and says "I am hungry", holding out their hand in expectation?

Complications to the situation:
1. These are most likely the only words in English that they know, so there's no real conversation that can be had.
2. I actually don't have any food or money on me.
3. If I were to provide for the felt (and yet very real, physical) needs of this child, I would encourage a life of begging which would potentially cripple future hope for stable and dignified work.
4. I am on my way somewhere, so I don't even have time to spend.
5. This request catches me off guard...

Things that are true:
1. God is in this.
2. God knows the name of this child, and He knows all of their needs.
3. God is able to provide for their every need, much more sufficiently than I would ever be able to do.
4. God loves this child more than I do and more than I could ever know.
5. God hears the cries of his children.

I looked the child in the eyes, touched them on the shoulder, and with deep emotion and love in my voice said, "I am so sorry."

Looking back on the situation, sometimes I wish I had said more. I wish I had known more Kinyarwanda to be able to explain the situation... I wish I had taken time to hold the child, to pray for them and entrust them to the loving God who sees them every moment of their life. I wish I wasn't always going somewhere...

But I do have peace in knowing that God's Spirit is alive in me and uses me in my brokenness, my fallenness, when I am taken off guard. He is doing a work in and through me. He is redeeming and saving his world, and I am part of that by his grace. And although the child didn't hear the prayers that I prayed for them, I know that my God heard them, and know that He knows right now what that child is up to. He knows how long it has been since that precious child has eaten, and He owns all of the banana trees and maize fields in all of Rwanda. And He is loving and just and all-powerful.

And so, even though I can't see the work that He is doing, I trust that He is beginning and completing His work. He is hearing and responding to my prayers, and He is sustaining and redeeming His world.

This is my Father's world
O let me ne'er forget
That though the wrong seems oft so strong,
God is the ruler yet.
This is my Father's world:
Why should my heart be sad?
The Lord is King; let the heavens ring!
God reigns; let the earth be glad!