Today I helped a man make about $5 US. For the last 10 years, Erwin has worked at the garbage dump. Not as a gatekeeper, or a truck driver, or a bulldozer driver, but as a garbage picker. It’s not an official ‘job’ the way we understand work, but it’s how he earns his living. Well, earning a living may be an exaggeration, but he earns enough to survive with his wife and three kids.
As I joined Erwin in his daily quest for plastic, stepping through rotting food, dirty diapers, and broken glass, I realized how strange life is. Why was I born into a life of plenty when so many others are struggling for survival? Why do my kids get to live in a house that has a bigger living room and kitchen than many full homes in places like Belize?
As I reached for another small plastic bottle to put into the garbage bag that Erwin had provided me, my gaze lingered on a dirty Winnie the Pooh stuffed animal which was lying on top of the heap. My own children had a toy just like it, even though it was situated thousands of miles away. Two worlds came crashing together under the sweltering sun of Belize. In a moment of insight I became aware of how God must hurt because of the pain and hardship our world produces. Starving children, disease, and garbage picking all seem foreign to me, and yet it is a fact of life for so many people.
In Isaiah 65, it says that the New Heaven and New Earth will be a land of joy and peace. Verse 23 says “They will not labour in vain, nor will they bear children doomed to misfortune”. I’m sure this verse holds special meaning for people like Erwin, who raises a family in a place with little hope as he toils at the dump in the hot sun for only a little bit of money.
Before long, my experience from today will fade into a distant memory, no longer evoking a paradox of despair. And for those of you reading, these words may only be a point of interest for you which also disappears after clicking through to your next internet distraction. Will it? Should it? I pray it will not fade but rather fester in your heart and foster a more intimate relationship with God.
Erwin will most likely still be picking garbage next year in the hot Belizian sun. What will you be doing then?
This sounds like one of those paradigm changing experiences.