This Little Boy

Aylan Kurdi (2) and his older brother, Galip (4)

Both drowned this week when their boat capsized

as they tried to escape Syria and make it to Europe.

 

This little boy...
This little, lifeless body of a beautiful boy....
This sad, sad, unspeakable image of desperation....
I am, of course, speaking about the horrific image of the little Syrian boy that has reached all "corners" of the earth. This boy was about the age of my children. That fact alone takes me to a dark place today. I mourn for his late family. I mourn for them and the life they could have had in the safety of a safer country.

I try to understand the mother's desperation as she tried to escape the nightmares of daily life in Syria, something that neither I or a newscaster or Franklin Graham have any idea about. My biggest problem with my three-year-old lately is that she constantly makes a mess..with her thousands of unnecessary toys. My biggest fear for her has been that she has become spoiled and too obstinate...problems I'm sure that that Syrian mother never had to deal with. She had much bigger problems. Problems that she was desperate to leave behind.

Right now the internet is abuzz with "Is it okay that the image of the dead boy is out for public consumption?" THAT is the question? Are we now concerned that our eyes have seen too much? An image we cannot ignore? We've done a pretty good job ignoring immigrants for years, but now we see a picture of not only a child, but a dead child. And if even for a moment, a little bit of humanity leaks out of our frozen souls. It is an image that is difficult to just scroll past with the flick of a thumb.

Here is my reaction to the photo:
Shame on me! Shame on us!
Shame on all of Christendom for not stopping atrocities such as this from happening.
Shame on us being okay with being ignorant to turmoil around the world.
Shame on us for the way we spend our money and our time.
Shame on the things that we think we need to spend government time on.
Shame on us for things we spend church offerings on.

Shame on us for "living our lives for Christ" holding our golden tickets to heaven while hell is boiling up all around us.

The Bible is full of these statements:
Deuteronomy 10:18-19
¹⁸ He enacts justice for orphans and widows, and he loves immigrants, giving them food and clothing. ¹⁹ That means you must also love immigrants because you were immigrants in Egypt.

The "ain't my problem" mentality of The United States has got to end!

..........

Sorry, little guy, you were my problem and I didn't even see you.

Dear God,
Help us rip off our blinders to the world's needs. Let us be your instruments of peace. We know that truly following you comes at a cost...sometimes a cost of comfort and at a literal cost. Help us speak out for the foreigner even when it costs us friends, status and shedding our ignorant ways.
Have Mercy, Amen