Great Poor

The Greatest Poverty

Excerpt from the book:
Hope Lives~A Journey of Restoration
by Amber Van Schooneveld

“I shudder to think that when talking about poverty and my role in reaching out to others, I might sound arrogant, like some imperialist who, in my presumed superiority, condescends to help those “poor, poor souls.”

That’s hardly the case. I may not be doing much better than those in poverty myself. I’ve seen poor people worship, and they’ve definitely got me beat there. The poor thirst for God more than I do. They call out to Him more than I do. Sometimes I suspect they love Him more than I do. My faith seems cold and stiff next to theirs. No, I’m certainly not some kind of superior benefactor.

I, too, am embroiled in a battle. All of us are. For while there is a poverty of too little, there is also a poverty of too much. Satan can squash souls by making them believe they are insignificant and alone. But Satan can also entwine and imprison my soul in the poverty of too much.

I don't always feel rich, but I am. And riches are an equally potent, if not more potent, weapon to ensnare a soul. The poverty of too much can freeze my heart. It can deaden compassion. It can paralyze hands. Mother Teresa saw an awful lot of poverty—horrible poverty—and still decided this was the greatest poverty: “to decide that a child must die so that you may live as you wish.”

I am in the greatest poverty, a poverty of my soul, when I eat my fill and lounge on my couch, while thinking only fleetingly of others not as materially blessed as I have been. My poverty is real when my love is deadened, medicated, frozen by too much. And my soul is maybe in even more danger than those in the poverty of too little.

I am no great emissary kindly bringing restoration to those people. No. I am simply a fellow human, given a different responsibility and role to play on this earth. God placed me where I am, and He placed others where they are. The goal isn't for others to become like me, a wealthy American. The goal is simply for everyone to have enough. Those in poverty need enough—enough food each day, enough clean water to lead a healthy life, enough dignity to be the masterpiece God created them to be. And for me, straying closer to the poverty of too much, I need to move further back toward enough, to use what I have been given to help lift others toward enough, to use my resources to love as Jesus loved.”