testimony time

a buddy of mine is serving in india, we get regular updates from him and i always look forward to the section he titles "testimony time". the following is his most recent testimony.

“Yah, yah!”
“No.”
I look at her straight in the eyes, trying to convince.
Please let it stop.
“Yah, yah!”
She follows me with her words as I walk away.
I feel her tug my arm with one dusty hand as she holds out the other.
“No.” I wave my hand up in a stop sign, continuing to walk away.
“Yah, yah!”

To my untrained ear, this sounds really arrogant.
I told her plainly no.
I had my reasons.
Hundreds of millions of poor. Will I stop for everyone?
Corruption and greed infiltrate normal, need-based begging.
There are better ways to help.

Yet she follows me and shouts, “Yah, yah!”
I feel like we are arguing.
No-Yeah-No-Yeah
“She is not saying ‘Yeah,’” my friend explains.
“She is saying ‘Ayya.’
“It is a term of high respect, like ‘Sir.’”
Oh.

The theology of poverty in India is similar as in the states.

The thought is, "How can I help the poor?"

We forget...we ARE the poor.

To see needy people is no longer difficult for me.
It doesn’t pain anymore to walk by the poor, the crippled, the malformed.
I adjusted to that a while ago.
The challenge is to keep them close.
To feel that they are not a number, but that they are your brother, the very image of God.

A man may give his son an apple because he knows it’s good for him.
But he also gives him candy, because he knows it’s good for both of them.
Undeserved, unhealthy, unhelpful candy.
And should I constrain my giving only to what is helpful?
But what will that do to help my soul?