I have indeed seen the misery of my people…
I have heard them crying out…
I am concerned about their suffering…
So now, go. I am sending you…Exodus 3:7,10
Every Wednesday morning our USA staff celebrate Community Breakfast at Baker's house. We eat French toast and drink carefully rationed Starbucks. We talk about our weeks and do devotions and sing praise songs. Last Wednesday, we listened to a sermon of Rob Bell, the teaching pastor at Mars Hill Bible Church in Michigan. His insights into Exodus felt like they had burst right from my own Alteño street. I think he must have listened to some of our friends who prostitute talking at the center last week, or watched my neighbor swinging wildly at her children when she woke up still drunk on Sunday morning.
Even though he hadn't seen El Alto suffering, Rob hit some kinda nail on its head for me. As he talked about the Israelites slaves, the faces of my enslaved and oppressed friends danced in my head like the sugarplums in that poem.* Rob explained that God loves liberating people, both physically and spiritually. He pointed out that in Exodus when the people cried, God heard.
The people cried out and God heard.
Sometimes it's all I can do not to fall on my face and give up. The other night I was in one of the brothels with Andy, inviting girls to lunch at the center the next day. I was depressed. How can you not see your friends in that red glow, watch them light up when they see you and smile for the first time that night, know that your hug will be the only loving embrace they receive that night, and not get depressed? A loud commotion across the room broke into my depression. Most of the girls ran to join the uproar. In a few minutes police had flooded the place and were questioning one angry girl. She was 18 or 19, new to El Alto and probably new to the work. A man had touched her without paying (illegal in a country of legal prostitution) then started hitting her and calling her terrible names when she demanded payment. He escaped before the police came. We were left with the angry women of the helpless brothel justice squad.
What could I say? I hugged her, I told her to be careful, I told her if she came to the center I would teach her some self-defense. I told her she needed to leave this business.
When girls like her cry out against the injustice, the abuse, the pain, I am helpless. I have less than no power. I can only point her towards God. And knowing that God always hears her gives me energy to trip through one more day.
Rob Bell also preached that the cry of God's oppressed inaugurates history. When people cry, things happen. One of the most happening stories in our lives right now is Hans's story. Hans worked as a transvestite prostitute for four years. My directors met him when they first came to El Alto. He jumped in and out of their lives while they prayed for him until, by God's grace, he contracted tuberculosis. God took him down hard and put him in the hospital. And from there, he cried out. From there, Andy and Andrea were able to convince him to check himself into a Christian rehab center. And there, he finally reached back towards the God who had been chasing him. To us, he is unrecognizable. Not just because we've never seen him dressed as a man. He is another person entirely with Jesus shining through him.
The last thing Rob said was that when we hear the cry of the poor and oppressed, we are with God. A few weeks ago I took my two Servant Team girls to Missionaries of Charity to begin volunteering. The Missionaries of Charity Sisters opened a home in El Alto in line with Mother Theresa's vision to give the poorest of the poor a place where they would be shown care and love and dignity. The Sisters serve men and women with the most debilitating cases of physical and mental disabilities that I have seen. They bless us by allowing us to volunteer there.
Volunteering is rough on the Servant Team (and on me too, who am I kidding). We mop feces from the floor, wash and shower women who can't stand by themselves, and feed women who can barely hold a spoon. Then there's laundry by hand in icy cold water, scrubbing massive pots and pans for the next meal, and changing their bedding. After four hours, I walk home more exhausted than when I taught grammar to fourteen-year-olds. But Christ says, “Whatever you did for one of the least of these [sisters] of mine, you did for me.” And sometimes, just sometimes, I'll be talking to one of the women, holding their hands or stroking their hair, and Christ peeks out through their eyes. Sometimes He'll wink as if to say, “You found me, in disguise no less. Keep seeking, and you'll find me in other places, the last places you may look for me.”
Rob's sermon was good to me this week. It's easy for me to get caught up in the programs of the center and the schedule of the Servant Team. I forget what I'm here for. It's hard for me to believe that God said, “I heard their cry, Cara, so I'm sending you.” Yet, I know that God is all about spiritual and physical liberation. All I have to do is proclaim it.
In Christ,
Cara Strauss
*To give credit where credit is due, that delightful imagery comes to you from Clement Moore's “'Twas the Night Before Christmas.”
To Contact: Cara Strauss
c/o Heather Coaster
Casilla 25022
El Alto, Bolivia
<carastrauss@yahoo.com>