I knew would have to do this sometime. Today's the day! I'm going to document everything (or at least some for now) I received at the Faith and International Development Conference last weekend. All while sipping Maxwell House with a touch of CoffeeMate French Vanilla, and listening to some brutal, face-pummeling, hardcore. The band's name is Belie My Burial, you should look them up and buy their EP. My favorite song is "Paper Idol"; it has a sick video too. Their music is, for lack of more appropriate terms, destructive, inspiring, and beautiful. Yes.
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?
10 and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,
then your light will rise in the darkness,
and your night will become like the noonday."
The rest of the chapter is worth reading. If we claim to be God's people but don't care for the poor, we are not his people. It is God's intention for his people to care for the poor, as noted above. Our faith calls us to action (1 John 3:17-18). I wish that more emphasis was placed on the poor in our churches and communities; the same amount of emphasis found in the Bible.
For the next segment of my blog, I will be listening to Switchfoot, Hello Hurricane. I will stop drinking coffee. I will be missing chapel, but this is far more rewarding. I love Jesus!
There was a dude, pretty sure his name was Milton, or something Milton, who talked about world health, it's improvements and downfalls. He mentioned that many science and political dollars have been spent in the past towards world health. Things like PEPFAR, PMI, The Global Fund, The Gate's Foundation, and the Global Health Initiative have made significant progress against HIV/AIDS, malaria, TB, and malnutrition. However, the work is far from done. Milton had some sad statistics: 36% of all babies born in Bangladesh are low birth weight, 43% of under 5's are stunted because of malnutrition, and 48% of under 5's are underweight. This was just one example of malnutrition and deprivation in the world.
One of the most interesting portions of this presentation was his chart of behavioral determinants: Communities and Societies surround Organizations, which surrounds Social Networks, which surrounds Individuals. It was interesting to see in pictorial form how people are affected. This chart is something that I will remember in the future, simply because it is insightful as to how people are accessed and affected.
Milton showed a few charts; one of them was a chart of GNP, gross national product, with relation to life expectancy. It was surprising to see that life expectancy was very much the same down to a certain point, when GNP fell to terribly low numbers. Essentially, it is not necessary to have a high GNP in order to have equally high life expectancies in the world; the poor can live just as long, provided they have basic health care. The question that Milton posed was this: can the developing world get healthy before it gets wealthy? The missing pieces are you and me. Everyone is in some way responsible for health in the world.
I am always yours. ~Switchfoot, "Always".
One more part of the conference before I run to class. We watched the film Pray the Devil Back to Hell, an inspiring story about a woman in Liberia who rose up with other women to protest war and injustice there. She worked with both Muslims and Christians to end suffering. It was touching and powerful. The film addressed some of my deepest concerns about social justice and evangelism, as to how they work together or contradict each other. I've hesitated in the past to swallow up social justice issues, because it seems like a waste in comparison with the terror of hell--why do these issues matter, when eternal salvation is bigger. However, because of the film, I can now see that Christ won't reach anyone until bullets stop flying; Christ won't reach anyone because bullets don't pick and choose. If people are dying anyway, it would be wrong to reach their souls alone. I will not refuse people justice because they don't accept the truth.
Sing it out, sing out loud. I can't find the words to sing. You be my remedy, my song. I see you with what's left of me. ~Switchfoot, "Sing It Out".
More soon.