On the Ground - Reality Sets In (Part Deux)

On the Ground - Reality Sets In (Part Deux)

NOT ONLY DID THE DEATH sting of the AIDS epidemic become personal, suddenly I could better relate to Bruce Wilkinson’s description of the crisis in another part of the world.

Maybe like this: Put the population of Los Angeles and New York City together. Let that combined metropolis be made up of only needy children. In that whole city, let there be not one mother or father. Let there be a ramshackle home where a nine-year-old boy is the head of the household. Let his six-year-old sister leave home every morning to look for food.

Now let these children be yours.^a

V held my hand as we walked to the clinic for his daily treatment. We donned our sunglasses as we strolled under the hot Indian sun and pretended we were movie stars as the cameras rolled. Hamming it up for the camera, V, with his quirky sense of humor, made me forget he was dying—until I looked again at his frail, tiny body as we entered the clinic. The treatment is losing its effectiveness. This is not a chronic disease; it’s a death sentence, especially for the children who are too weak to fight.

“I was naked, and you gave me clothing. I was sick, and you cared for me. I was in prison, and you visited me.” Then these righteous ones will reply, “Lord, when did we ever see you hungry and feed you? . . . When did we ever see you sick or in prison and visit you?” And the King will say, “I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!” (Matthew 25:36-37, 39-40)

Just as I had seen my past while reading to V, now I stared into the reality of the future. When you step off the bus and get on the ground, reality sets in. And only when reality sets in can we collectively solve the problem—here at home and abroad.

^a Bruce Wilkinson, The Dream Giver (Sisters, OR: Multnomah, 2003), 7–8.