Sharon.

I have been thinking a lot about the image of the little girl in my last entry. The one who smeared dirt on her picture while trying to sweep off paper scraps with her hand. It makes my stomach sink and my head all cloudy inside. I was talking it over with my dear new friend Jerusha [who is doing trauma counseling with girls forced to kill family members], and she took the image of the little girl and spoke a beautiful, haunting truth out of it. In this picture that I can't get out of my head is a girl that God created to be creative, and as she tries to uncover that creativity inside of herself, the reality of her situation smears across her attempt to be more, to be something different. The more she works to uncover her own desires and skills and beauty, the more the dirt crusted on her hand, the more the limits of her poverty and war cover it up.

What hurts me so deeply about this is that I can't really do anything to help her. I can love her in the immediate, I can care about her, I can pray for her. I can ask God to give her food, to wash the dirt of her body, to provide school fees. But God usually doesn't work like that. I have full confidence that He could help her in these ways, but I doubt that He will. Yes, i am doubting that God will provide for this girl. This is all very confusing. And overwhelming. This is just one girl of millions who are living in the disguisting hand of poverty, and many are far worse off. And it's so real. When I can barely hold this girl because her belly is so swollen and it awkwardly takes up so much space, it is real and it becomes my burden.

I wish that I didn't doubt God. That I could just trust Him with this. And that I wasn't so torn up and shaken. But then, is it really bad to be broken up over things that break God's heart? to cry with God over this girl? As much as I mourn for this little girl [whose name is Sharon btw], God weeps and weeps and longs for her to know that He loves her infinitely. He knows her inside and out. All her worries and fears and hurts. That is my comfort.

The neighbors are blasting Ne-Yo's "Sexy Love". I love this place even when it hurts.