Jen Bishop is a farmer in rural Malawi. It is a harsh environment, and Jen struggles to scratch a living from the soil. For 34 days in February and March this year, cyclone Freddy became the longest-lasting tropical cyclone on record, and Malawi experienced a year’s worth of rain during this time. The cyclone has had a devastating effect on Jen’s harvest. Added to this, the soaring costs of food, fuel, fertiliser, school uniforms and school fees are crushing her dreams and keeping her family in poverty.
Jen is also a loving mother to two hard-working boys. Both have earned places at top tertiary education colleges, which is very rare for young people from her rural area. But Jen has a terrible dilemma; she cannot afford to send them both. Rising costs mean Jen can pay for only one of her sons’ college courses. “My heart longs to see our children finish school,” she says. “These dreams are very important to me, because by doing so, I’ll be sure that I am creating a good future for the children.”
Put yourself, for a moment, in Jen’s shoes. How would you feel if you could not offer your children a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to lift themselves out of poverty?
And what about us? What should be our response to Jen’s dilemma?
Next week is Christian Aid Week, and Christian Aid is asking us to focus our thoughts and prayers on people like Jen in Malawi. I would hope that our response should be one of empathy and concern. It should be one of prayerful gratitude for our own circumstances. Importantly, it should inspire us to give and do what we can to lift communities and individuals, like Jen and her family, out of poverty.
Supporting people like Jen is not an act of charity. Nelson Mandela put it well when he said: “Overcoming poverty is not a gesture of charity. It is an act of justice.”
The need for justice is a recurring theme in the Bible. We are called to “act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with [our] God.” (Micah 6 v8). In prophesying the coming of Jesus, Isaiah said:
“Here is my servant, whom I uphold,
my chosen one in whom I delight;
I will put my Spirit on him,
and he will bring justice to the nations.
In faithfulness he will bring forth justice;
he will not falter or be discouraged
till he establishes justice on earth.” (Isaiah 42, v1, 3-4)
Christian Aid’s response is to work with Jen and other communities like hers, to give them the justice they deserve. As well as providing disaster relief following hurricane Freddy, Christian Aid is working with communities in Malawi to form cooperatives of local growers of the hardy “pigeon peas”. Through cooperatives, local farmers can share best practice and costs such as safely storing the pigeon pea seeds. Importantly, by working together they can sell the peas for a better price, avoiding unscrupulous middle-men. They can turn peas into profit.
What can we do this Christian Aid Week to give, act and pray for justice in our World?
Philip Clarke
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