When my daughter said, “first world problems” that stopped me in my tracks.
My mobile device needed charging – I needed it to be charged, because I didn’t want it to be in a position where I would require usage of the phone and the battery would be dead. That’s what I needed, only to discover someone had damaged my charger at the worst possible time because it was right when I needed it. The family were made fully aware of the injustice of it all in no uncertain or subtle ways.
My daughter wasn’t being cheeky or rude, but she made the comment and the air was taken out of me.
Here I am spending energy talking about something that expresses the privilege I have of where I live. I live in a sphere where I have a mobile device. That device can be charged and getting another charger wouldn’t be that much of an inconvenience once I quit the grumbling. I can utilise that device to access and view, communicate and make note of a myriad of activities and events. I am tremendously blessed just in having that.
Not only that, but I have a wife and three children who live fairly comfortably in a decent home so that when I grouse about a charger for a mobile device, they are there to hear me. The family isn’t dealing with the effects of divorce. The children are in good health. I am tremendously blessed just in having that.
Meanwhile, even in the city in which I dwell, there are those who have no access to a mobile device. There are those will not be able to find shelter of their own tonight. There are those who are dealing with the ravages of abusive environments or broken homes. There are those who struggle to find clothes to wear, there are those who struggle to get up in the morning and who are dependent on illegal and legal medication to keep going to any degree. That’s in the city. The condition worsens when I consider the country … and as for the rest of the world …
So I am humbled to recognise that I am blessed. And I am moved to do somoething about the reality of the poor and the lowly. Give, sure. Give time, give resources, give money. Yeah give. It’s the way that shows the love of God. As well as giving in those ways, though, there’s also giving the heart for them in prayer.
I am a recipient of being enriched, because the Jesus the Son of God who was in glory, became poor and took on the form of a man and was shamed and disgraced, and brutally murdered. He did it all and prayed that folks impoverished like I was in Spirit would be enriched by knowing Him. By trusting Him. By seeing that life is in Him. And that life is an ever-giving one. He looked at my condition, gave for me and prayed for me – in fact He’s still praying for me. Praying that now that I’m not where I was, I don’t forget where I was and recognise that others are where I was and need what I need so they don’t have to stay where they are. And even while they are where they are, for the good it’s important to pray for them. To pour heart our heart for them in prayer and even get in touch with God’s heart for them, see His desire for them and the delight He takes when they experience Him. They can experience Him – when we pray.
It puts my phone charger crisis into perspective.
(Photo by Shail Sharma on Unsplash)
For His Name’s Sake
Shalom
C. L. J. Dryden
Life With CD 