Justice and Mercy, like Milk and Cookies

Each morning, I am gently nudged from slumber by the rooster up the road, whose body clock, I’m convinced, needs to be reset – they’re supposed to crow at sunrise not 4:30am right!? A little while later, I am plucked again from the land of sweet dreams by the sounds of a family preparing for the day… There’re the grumpy moans of the youngest who declares his opposition to a cold bucket bath and having to go to school. EVERY morning. There’re the patient explanations from his mother and older sister as to why he needs to shower and go to school. EVERY morning. There’s the gentle swish as the ground outside is swept with a grass hand-broom – prepared to receive guests or simply to be walked on a few minutes later as everyone rushes off to work or school or university. Our family value education. There’re the sounds of tea cups stirred. Of water washing – a body, a floor, clothing – everything is cleaned. There’s the gentle sound of conversation and then there’s the singing… Oh the sweet sound of the singing that floats up through the rickety wooden floor boards. I place my feet into my house shoes and shuffle through to our simple. very simple. Living area and pour myself a cup of black tea and again I am hit with the power of the privileged position in which I find myself to have been completely absorbed into this family to have been absorbed into the culture that is Congolese, and more than that, the culture that is Kingdom.

A mere 20 metres up the road; between where we live and the small shop that we fondly refer to as ‘our water man’ (for obvious reasons) resides a family whose rising is a lot less warm and fuzzy than mine. Each morning, Evette and her family rise not knowing where there next meal will come from or whether they will eat at all. They have no plan for the day. There is little to clean and even then, there is no washing soap to clean with… Little Evette is beautiful in every way, she is among the favourites that I don’t have within our neighbourhood ;) 9 looking 5, she greets us with a smile. Every time. Though her bones protrude rudely from beneath the rags that are loosely draped to cover her small frame. But she is beautiful and perfect and never asks for a thing; not biscuits or chocolate or a snack. Nothing. Her tiny hand – completely lost in mine is enough…  We talk and we tickle and she giggles and she runs and we hug and every time there’s a tug… A tug on my heart and the part of me that recognises that fighting for justice often looks like mercy!

And then… And then, there was the day that there was no smile and there was no running and there were only sad eyes and lips wrinkled by dehydration and right then… My heart broke… Right then, compelled by the love of the One who loves perfectly, we had to do something…

I love the kindness and the gentleness with which my Jesus talks. He and I had been discussing generosity… again… and what it looks like to live a life laid down and generous. Nothing I have is mine. It all belongs to Him and He loves to support my habit of generosity as we love those, weak and frail and poor and starved. And so as Lisa (an amazing young women I have the privilege of running with in the conflict zones of DRCongo right now) and I asked Papa to give us Heaven’s strategy to love this family well, to empower them to flourish well above the bread-line by teaching them how to fish rather than giving a fish to last one dinner, His voice was clear as crystal. To me – “Give $50 and hold $10 to sow into month 2 as you mentor budgeting and the concept of profit and re-stocking” and to Lisa – “You’ll give $50, but it’ll cost you $60”. With absolute clarity and confidence, so began this family’s journey. Justice through love.

Two weeks later and again we’re greeted by smiles and hugs and relief. A table of fresh produce and tomato salsa and garlic cloves right near the house (our new favourite place to buy tomatoes) and another in the market – this family will eat. A process simple, so simple in fact, that it may have been easy to miss. Jesus doesn’t miss a thing though… ever… Justice through love. Love looks like something and sometimes it looks like micro-enterprise with the family between home and ‘our water man’.

 

As I awoke this morning, to the sound of one of our Christmas roosters crowing IN our house and had another “I love my life moment”, I became aware that this morning, there might too be the gentle swish of the broom at Evette’s house, that her family too might be having quiet conversation, that there may too be cleaning. And the singing, the singing might too have begun… All because my Jesus loves…