Meet My Neighbors...

"Love your neighbor as yourself..." Jesus. (Luke 10:27)

Today I was afforded the opportunity to walk into the "Zambia Compound" to visit a home of a child, sweet C, who attends our school. The compound is something like a squatter village, with many homes that house over 2,000 children in our area. Our home is about .5 mile from this compound. Those who live within it... they are my neighbors.

I have been in the compound before, by car, but never by foot. I walked with E and Z, along with visiting Vision Team members.

I cast my eyes upon children... every which way that I looked. I saw children with no clothes... I saw a mother struggle to carry her twins: one on the front and one on the back... I saw a little boy who had a bad cut on his face, needing a mother's care. I saw children tending to themselves with their mothers laying lifeless under a tree. We encountered men who had clearly had too much of something, and were aggressive with the children we love. I met a mother who has 4 biological children, and is caring for her dead sisters 2 children. She has no job. She has no husband. The oldest child is deaf and mute. Yet she says "Without Jesus Christ, I could not face these trials."

It simply isn't right. For us to live as if this does not exist, and for me to live as if they are not my neighbor... is wrong. To not love them as Jesus would is a reflection of a hardened heart.

So... meet my neighbors...

And so...

"... who is my neighbor?" (Luke 10:29)