The Silent

Children in Africa with distended stomachs and bony appendages. Children in South America with tear-stained faces. Pictures that stir an emotion within anyone with a semblance of a soul...We think, "Who would let this happen? Why isn't someone doing something?" You rarely see infomercials or hear a plug at a conference for inner-city youth in America... My purpose is not by any means to bash any individual or organization whose mission is to meet an international need. Help is obviously needed. My purpose is more to point out another need that is often ignored. I would be humbled to be the voice for the silent, the unnoticed.

Two years ago I started a journey in an organization called Youth Impact through Grace Bible Church in College Station. I had heard about it in high school through two of my youth leaders who had been involved when they were in Aggieland. As a little background of what it's about, Grace's description is as follows: "Youth Impact is a ministry at Grace Bible Church that seeks to empower at-risk youth in our community to become Godly leaders. We do this through focusing on evangelism, discipleship, and providing for the needs of the children."

BELIEVE me. I was terrified. I had an(extremely bigoted) image in my head of children, who unlike the smiling, newly healthy, loving and thankful, soccer-playing African kids on the infomercials, were savage and mean and just out to cause problems. And as for their parents: usually living below the poverty line, neglectful, abusive, lazy. I can't express in words the level of my shame at such idiocy. God, in his abundant grace, had led me to a place where I would be slapped upside the head lovingly.

He slowly began to paint a new picture-one of a vicious cycle of poverty, low self-worth, and depression. I noticed that these kids were really like any other middle schoolers-awkward and a little standoffish at first. Then there were the fights-loud outbreaks of shouting and name-calling- broken out over a show of disrespect, a breech of an unspoken code. (Sidenote: I do not want to pigeonhole these kids. God knows they're already stereotyped enough. EVERY kid is unique.) As a creature of harmony, the fights really freaked me out...a lot. I couldn't understand what the big deal was and why it was worth such violence. Then retreat came, and the lovely wife of our male director started spouting off unbelievable wisdom. She spoke of how when a child experiences any kind of trauma at a young age(many of our kids do) it affects them biologically. Their neural pathways form in relation to that trauma, literally hard-wiring them for chaos and confusion, and their brain, statistically, is up to 30% smaller than the average child's. You hear these stories of kids that seem to be trying to cause as much trouble as possible at school. They start fights, they disrespect their teacher, they don't want to learn, or they have problems trying to learn. I judged these kids...granted, even without the knowledge of biology, I shouldn't have, but I did. I should have had Christ's view of them and seen them as broken humans like the rest of us, but I didn't. But God was gracious enough to show me His perspective of a child who is broken AND feels like the entire world is against him or her.

I've known a girl whose parents made her get an abortion at 12 years old. I've known an 11 year old girl that stepped in front of her 9 year old little sister to take the beating from her crack addict dad. I've heard that same girl break down and cry, terrified of her dad getting out of prison. I've known an 8 year old little girl whose mom was putting her up for adoption just because she didn't want her anymore.(Not all of these are YI, some TRU camp at Sky Ranch.) These stories don't need explaining. They are real, and they are tragic. And they are in TEXAS.

And the cycle is awful...they get chaos and violence at home AND at school. The whole community reinforces the damage. But praise God....as I spent more time in YI with the kids and the leaders who were faithfully loving them, I started to notice change. Even the hardest, roughest girls, who glared at leaders and started fights with other kids, when embraced with Christ's love, start to open up. For some, it took 2 years to finally accept the love. There are scary statistics that a child born into poverty and violence and crime and trauma ends up the same exact place his family does, but the Lord has SHOWN that His love conquers all, changes all, and redeems all. He has been teaching me to pray for his children boldly. I struggle with praying and thinking of statistics....kind of like "Lord...if it's in your will to help these kids...but statistically you won't..." What a load of poo. He has promised that He loves His creation, that He desires that all come to know Him, and that He is all-powerful and can overcome any history, any sin, any problem. So now I try to pray like Abraham did for Sodom and Gomorrah, imploring His nature of mercy and grace, to have mercy and grace on myself, my leaders, and my kids.

I don't mean this to be a soapbox or a plug for YI. Sometimes, a step into ministry taken just out of a sense of duty can cause more damage than good. But consider...there are plenty of problems abroad, but there are just as many problems in America, and the workers are few.

I'm already looking forward to my next blog post. It's in the works... :) Much love, people.

Shalom,

Kate