Eden is Broken

I’m guessing Eve hit Adam up for spare change as they left the Garden.

It’s probably one of mankind’s oldest dilemmas: How do I get money from your pocket into mine? Nearly every company ever founded has tried to navigate that mystery.

I hate it.

No, I loathe it.

I want you to keep your money. I even want you to have more.

And there you find my heart – and heartache.

I want those kids in Haiti to have more, too.

They are not random faces to me. They are Markenley, Ephraim, Hamoul and Videline.

They are 15, 9, 8 and 6.

Shy until you stick around long enough to see their laughter. And tears.

I’ve emptied my own pockets, because I care. Soulfully.

Their devastation has devastated me.

Their hunger leaves my chubby belly aching with sadness.

Their innocence and ignorance shame my underused education.

It’s time for school to start. There are 80 other little kids in this tiny Carrefour slum, killing time in the dirt, because there is no money for them to learn.

Elections bumped regular schedules a bit. So did the economy. (Hah. Dare we call their collapsed system an economy? We think in such lofty spaces. They live in squalor. What the heck is an economy when there is NO work and little school?)

What the earthquake didn’t crush, their broken world keeps flat.

But.

There are those who yearn to learn.

There are those who ache to teach.

The parents can’t afford to send their children to school and the schools can’t afford to pay teachers a wage.

Without education, what future is there?

Imagine no reading or writing or confidence to communicate.

I haven’t been able to do much in Haiti. I’ve grown close to a few people.

Close enough to see them as people.

Now you see my heart – and heartache.

I also see you as a person. And you have your own troubles.

So it comes down to this: We are all children of God.

I’m pretty sure He wants us to take care of each other.

P.S. If you want to help a few children in Haiti go to school – think of it, perhaps, as tribute to the ones who sent you to kindergarten and bothered to teach you there – then I thank you as one member of our vast, beautiful world’s family to another.

Click HERE for a pretty painless way you can help.