Just What I Needed

This weekend was one of the best weekends of my entire 2 years in Jamaica. I went to Kingston with Junior (Jamaican YWAMer and friend) to visit my friends in Majesty Garden, his home community. How do I describe such a place?

Majesty Garden is an inner city ghetto, a shanty town where kids play football in the streets in their underwear with a ball made of taped together garbage. As I walk around I hear comments like, “Yo, whitey. Yuh wa'an a black man? Go home an' get yuh own kind.” And the latest pick-up line:
Jamaican man:“Ey, psst. One minute. Yuh married?”
Em:“No man, but Jesus is taking care of that.”
Jamaican man:“I am Jesus.”

The hot, muggy air accentuates the pungent odour of marijuana and raw sewage and I'm not sure if that's what gives me my pounding headache or if it's the constant noise. Literally 24/7 of blaring radios and fuzzy televisions plus the night time dancehall music playing at the bar/shop next door as I try to fall asleep. The walls don't reach the zinc ceilings above so everybody hears everybody's entertainment. There's nothing that I could logically like about this place and yet there's something about it that gets my heart and of course, it is the people.

My friend Missy and I stayed in a 2 room “house” that belonged to her parents and is now just there for emergencies because the walls are made of cement so bullets can't go through it when there's a shoot out. Missy and her new husband Romi live just down the road in a one room house about 12 ft by 10 ft. It's amazing how much stuff they can fit in there! I felt so loved and welcomed and a part of their life this weekend, I actually had knots in my stomach when I had to leave.

Romi & Missy

It was refreshing to catch up and laugh with people, some of whom I hadn't seen since I did my DTS outreach there in 2005. Some still talk about it as if it was the biggest event of their lives when 24 of us moved into their community for a week. Junior told me had skipped school everyday just to be with us. Not exactly what we had been aiming for but it's good to know our presence made a difference to them.

The Kids
Everybody lives there without rent and gets electricty for free by wiring their place up to the nearest powerline. Kids are always roaming around and many don't go to school 'cause their parents just don't bother. I asked Junior what a lot of these kids hope for. The answer: guns and money. One particular little girl I can't get out of my mind is"Allie". She has an extremely bad skin rash, especially on her neck where her skin is cracked and crusty. She is 10 years old and has never been to school due to her condition. She doesn't have ointment anymore and her mom won't take her to the doctor because she thinks Allie's skin condition is a punishment from God for some covenant Allie didn't keep with Him. I can't imagine the rejection this beautiful little girl faces everyday from kids and even her own mother. The future looks so bleak for her. I planned to talk with her mom while I was there but didn't get a chance. It started pouring during church and we had to leave right after to catch our 4hour bus ride back to MoBay. I'll see if I can send any medicated ointment down to Missy to give to her.

Government Aid?
The current government started a building project in Majesty with the idea that the community will move into the apartments and make monthly payments to eventually own their place but the people don't want it. Most don't have jobs so they can't commit to pay for the new accomodations. A lot of people don't bother to look for jobs (receiving money from relatives overseas is the #3 source of income for Jamaicans) and those who do seem to look for work have a hard time getting anything steady. A couple of my friends were without work for 6 months until one of them recently got a temporary position at a paint factory because of a new deal with Cuba.

The Harvest is Plenty, the Labourers are Few...
I see such contrasts here. Yellow garbage bins painted “Keep Majesty Clean” while Patrick's building literally stands in sewage. Guys who sit around smoking ganja all day while others make chairs to sell at the markent and dream of having their own business and getting out. For Romi, it's a career in graphic design. The talent is incredible -from voices I hear at church to Romi's paintings that adorn the walls of his home. Patrick and I walk through the neighbourhood at night talking about what it would take to change things here. He says people's minds have to change; their outlook on life, otherwise the cycle will just continue. A verse I read in church that Sunday morning struck me as very fitting for this place. Moses tells the Israelites all of God's promises but they are not ready to receive them becasue of all the hardship they've endured.

Exodus 6:9 -“Moses reported this (the deliverance, redemption, being God's chosen ones, the promised land, etc.) to the Israelites but they did not listen to him because of their discouragement and cruel bondage.” Majesty Garden is a place of beautiful potential but the people are so broken in the cycle of negelct, abuse, poverty, violence and more.

This is where I realize anew that it takes a lifetime to see big changes; to disciple a generation. It takes years to build trust with someone to help them believe what is true about who they are instead of the lies Satan feeds them. It makes a difference when you can believe that you were created by God with a purpose; that He has intentions specifically for you. And it takes a lot of love to bring healing to wounded hearts. But God has enough love to give. And I think the way He chooses to show it the most is through us.

Looking at the children playing in the streets with a backdrop of colourful, rusting zinc panels that make up their homes stirs up familiar questions found in a song I sometimes sing:

Will you leave yourself behind if I but call your name?
Will you care for cruel and kind and never be the same?
Will you risk the hostile stare?
Should your life atract or scare?
Will you let me answer prayer in you and you in me?

“Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” -Jesus
Matthew 10:39