The other day some coworkers joined me on my weekly visit to
our New Horizon Center ministry in South Lebanon. We stopped to get some coffee just south of
Beirut, and I waited in the van while the others entered the shop. A security guard staffed at the complex
quickly came over and was a little concerned that I was blocking access to the
back of the building. It turned out my
parking place was fine and he started inquiring about where we come from. I explained that we’re from a residential
school and we serve needy children and orphans.
He then started asking me a string of questions: What are the ages of our
children? What is the extent of our care
and where do we get our support from? Do
we accept children of different religious and nationality backgrounds? He seemed to have purpose in his questions so
I asked, “do you know someone who could use our services?” He replied, “Me, I’m an orphan.”
Mohammad, a 21 year-old Lebanese, went on to share pieces of
his tragic personal story. He and his
siblings were abandoned by their mother and his father passed away ten years
ago leaving them all orphaned. They have
extended family but there’s very little engagement between them. Mohammad never went to school; he’s
completely illiterate. He does his best
to help raise his 15 and 13 year old siblings (only one has been able to attend
school), but it’s a daily struggle and his opportunities for employment are
very limited. The security job demands
14 hour work days for less than $500 dollars a month salary. Mohammad was
painfully raw in sharing about the challenges life has left him. He lamented his lot but made clear he has no
interest in living off the charity of others or being a dependent. I asked him at one point of the conversation
if he needs anything and he simply responded, “just God’s mercy.”
It’s not uncommon in Lebanon to find people, especially
young men, depressed about their life situation. Lebanon can be a cutthroat place where one
can work day and night and never get ahead. There is extensive poverty among
the Lebanese and, with the limited social support from the government; one can
be hard-pressed to find provision outside for his or her family network. Those that are orphaned or abandoned like
Mohammad are considerably vulnerable.
The anguish of this young man was apparent when he discussed
his illiteracy. “In this world you need to know something, you need to have a
certificate from somewhere. If you don’t
have an education then you’re nobody. There
was a girl I was talking to once but I had to phone chat through my little
brother because I can’t read or write.
When she found out I was illiterate she left me. I feel like such a loser.”
I tried my best to encourage Mohammad (which isn’t easy when
the painful reality is he has been robbed of rights and opportunities that can
never be returned). He knew early in our
conversation that we are from a faith organization- he had glowing things to
say about Christians and the practical kindness they showed him when he was
displaced by the 2006 War- and I reminded him that God promises an upside-down
Kingdom where the first are last and the last are first, the humbled will be
built up and the proud brought down.
Despite his lack of education Mohammad has wisdom on the real matters of
life; he shared in certain terms that faith is not the words of our lips or the
practice of our religious exercise but the belief in God and the treatment of others. This is very meaningful, but how much does it
actually smooth the stigma of being an orphaned illiterate with little prospects
of a respectable life?
One reason my little interaction with Mohammad struck me so
strikingly that morning was because of where I was coming from and where I was
going. I came from Dar El Awlad, a
residential program that came into existence nearly 70 years ago specifically
to serve children who found themselves abandoned or orphaned and without access
to their most basic needs. We exist
specifically so lives like Mohammad can receive what wrongs and misfortune has
stolen from them (as he shared his story with me I actually told him (maybe
inconsiderately) that he should have come to Dar El Awlad years ago). That morning I was going to the New Horizons
Center where we operate a literacy program specifically geared to children who
cannot or do not go to school and risk facing futures of illiteracy. Here between the two places I came across a
young man who needed both. Each day at
Kids Alive Lebanon we see hundreds of children throughout our programs receive
services and care, much of it dealing with education, yet on that day I saw one
of the countless of individuals in Lebanon that never came to us. I saw the alternate reality for our children;
I realized in a new way what their futures very likely could look like if they
had never come our way. On the one hand
it made me thankful for the opportunity we have to offer life-transforming
impact for at-risk children, but on the other hand it was a painful reminder
that there is still so much need that we are not even beginning to meet. Mohammad unsettled me.
What ultimately settles me, however, is knowing that God has
a special heart for Mohammad and all those who have been dealt a hand of
marginalization and vulnerability. The
scripture is ever-certain that God cares for the poor and directly shares in
their poverty, powerlessness and despair.
Christ was born in a stable among animals, lived without acquiring any
wealth or possessions of worth and died a brutal death at the hands of
injustice. God knows the frustration,
the disappointment and the despair of those who are illiterate, orphaned and
disregarded by people and society. That’s
how I could leave my little encounter with Mohammad with a troubled heart that
still insists on clinging to hopefulness.
He may journey through life in this world never knowing the opportunities,
privileges and rights that I so easily take for granted (like the ability to
even transmit these thoughts in my head to a typed text that you can now read),
but God’s Kingdom is an upside-down reality where the weak will be strong, the
poor will be rich and the last will be first.
This is the Kingdom we belong to, the one we are to make known to this
world and the one that gives all of us an ultimate hope in life, a life
everlasting.
but But the real heroes are the ones nobody sees! 
