Future Hope

Where I'm living feels "primitive" compared to American life. And this is actually a wealthier part of India. Most people wash their clothes by hand, use wells for their water, boil the water so its safe to drink, for sure don't have air conditioning, take showers in cold water, and don't own a car. It just makes me think about how even a very average American, like me, who on no level has ever had a lot of money by American standards, can't begin to compare to how the large majority of the world lives. Its not even fair to try to compare our comfort and luxury.

However, I think its the "lack" and the struggle that causes India to be such a religious nation. Everyone here follows a religion, Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism, Christianity. They need something bigger to live for, something to give them a future hope.

Israel in Jesus' time was poor, oppressed and hurting. They were longing for their Messiah. They ached for a deliverer from Roman rule and oppression. And He came. Jesus came for them. He offered them hope.

But He didn't come in the way they expected, which is why so many didn't recognize Him. He did physically restore people and looked after the poor. But He didn't crush the Romans. He didn't fix the problem, not in alignment with their temporal mindsets, anyway.

Jesus offered a future hope, an eternal salvation, a time and place where there is no death or suffering, no poverty, no need, no want. And no oppression. No injustice.

That future hope is very much needed now. We live in an oppressed, poverty-stricken world. To me, even being born an American feels like an injustice to the massive part of the world that lives in poverty. How is it fair?

I don't know why I was born in America. I don't know why I have hot showers and washing machines and a soft bed. I need Jesus to keep me constantly aware that I am accountable to sharing my wealth with the poor.

One thing I do know, though, is that Americans need the future hope that Jesus came to share with a poor, oppressed, and hurting Israel. Americans also need a future hope, an eternity without the pain of losing a newborn child, without the sting of loneliness, without the heartache of a shattered marriage.

Jesus came to seek and to save that which was lost. And Americans are just as lost as people who have nothing. Though our luxury and comfort and wealth can blind us, we are naked and poor and hungry. We have everything, but the one thing we need is Jesus. If God gives the "rich" vision to see past their wealth and comfort, we see that we are poor. Poor in spirit. And its the poor in spirit who inherit the Kingdom of Heaven. We need Jesus.

"Then Jesus said to his disciples, 'I tell you the truth, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.' When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished and asked, 'Who then can be saved?' Jesus looked at them and said, 'With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.'" Matthew 19:23-26