What if gratitude was a verb?

Last week on World AIDS Day I showed the film A Grandmother’s Tribe at our church, to a room of mostly Jr. High kids and a few adults. It is a story of two grandmothers from Kenya who are preparing for their Christmas celebrations and raising their grandchildren because their own children have died from AIDS. One thread that was woven through the movie, from the grandmothers and the grandchildren, even though they lived in terrible poverty with unbelievable hardship - - - is GRATITUDE. This really struck my CCC teammates, Dion and LJ, and they’ve been talking about it since; how little we Americans understand about how grateful we should be, how often we Americans seem to confuse wants with needs and are disappointed when we don’t have things that are complete luxuries for most people in the world (especially at Christmas).

Since the film’s showing numerous people have asked to borrow my DVD and have expressed that they want their kids to watch it so they will feel more grateful. I should be thrilled with this, more people spreading the word about the injustice and plight of people in Africa. Right? But for some reason this sudden interest in helping people feel more grateful troubled me. Thinking and praying about this unusual response for the past few days, I finally realized what is that is bothering me. GRATITUDE IS JUST A NOUN.

Thank you Willow Creek Leadership Summit

Friday August 6, 2010 - Two years ago today my life changed forever at the Willowcreek Summit. I had just returned from Swaziland, Africa, feeling called to continue serving there but frustrated that the local people we had come to love seemed unwilling or unable to participate in their own solutions. Volunteerism was nearly non-existent. Instead they seemed dependent on us (and other western help) to address the complex problems they faced every day. I sensed that the help we offered was not really helpful, at least in a sustainable way, but didn’t know what to do differently.

The Lazarus Effect

I want to share a few thoughts with you about a new HBO documentary called The Lazarus Effect about the use of Anti-retroviral treatment for HIV/AIDS in Africa. But first, a few comments about the biblical story from which the title comes.


I think it is interesting that before performing the miracle, Jesus stopped in town to pick up the sisters, Mary and Martha, and the crowd of mourners. And he wasn't just looking for an audience; He was looking for partners! Consider His words starting in John 11:38: Then they came to the grave. It was a cave with a stone rolled across its entrance. "Roll the stone aside,” Jesus told them .

Jesus could have commanded the stone to move. In fact, a stone moving by itself might have made the overall miracle seem even more impressive! But He knew the impact of a miracle shared by an interdependent community, so Jesus made them partners.

But what he asked next would require more from them than simple stone moving. He would ask them to become humble, vulnerable and genuinely compassionate by getting dirty. Touching a dead person would cause them to become unclean, unacceptable themselves. Jesus knew this, yet in verse 43 He said: "Lazarus, come out!" And Lazarus came out, bound in graveclothes, his face wrapped in a headcloth. Jesus told them, "Unwrap him and let him go!"

Rereading this passage, it occurs to me that there are two types of Lazarus effects. First is the obvious and miraculous transformation in the recipient from the healing touch of Jesus. Less obvious but perhaps even more powerful is the transformation that happens in the hearts of the stone rollers and unwrappers. The biblical story ends with Lazarus out of the tomb, unwrapped and alive. We know what happened to Lazarus and can imagine how the memory of being raised from the dead changed him forever. What we don’t know is how those who participated in the miracle were different, yet I think it is fair to imagine they also were also changed forever. When we are willing to get dirty, Jesus uses us and changes us at the same time.

The HBO documentary, The Lazarus Effect depicts the miraculous transformation in AIDS victims, in just 40 days, from getting onto an anti-retroviral regiment that costs just .40 cents per day. As we learn how ARV’s restore life to AIDS victims, we also hear Jesus calling us again to become His partners; to roll away stones and take off grave cloths.

Watch this 30 minute documentary here: The Lazarus Effect

A history lesson

Last week I had a short but interesting conversation about Africa with a friend. Reflecting back on the conversation now, it occurs to me that the perspective expressed by my friend might be one of many Americans. My friend, perhaps finally voicing a suppressed angst and cynicism about our work in Africa, said this (my summary):

“The fact that so much of the African continent seems to be caught in an endless cycle of disease, poverty, illiteracy and civil war is Africa’s own fault. The rest of the world managed to move through history learning how to overcome these things, and African people have had the same opportunity as the rest of the world to create their history. It is not our responsibility to rescue Africa from self-made problems, and doing so keeps Africa stuck in the cycle.”

Rubbing off . . .

When I was a little girl, my grandmother’s house had white washed exterior walls and a courtyard with a fence that was also whitewashed. When my sister and I played in the courtyard the whitewash would rub off on our clothes. In fact, it seemed like just hanging out near the whitewash would cause it to rub off on us. We were pretty oblivious to the influence of the whitewash on our clothes while we were busy playing. It wasn’t until we came inside and were away from the courtyard that we noticed how the whitewash had affected us.

Isn’t how it is with things that rub off, good or bad? It’s not very often that we try to get something on us, it just happens. That is what happened to me last month in Swaziland.

Christmas Paradigms

Webster defines paradigm as: A set of assumptions, concepts, values, and practices that constitutes a way of viewing reality for the community that shares them, especially in an intellectual discipline.

I think that paradigms are difficult to change, mostly because we don’t realize that we have them. I think that the way I view reality IS reality, and it never occurs to me that reality might be different. In fact, perhaps our paradigm can only change when we are shocked and rocked out of our reality by some kind of outside force.