Chapter Seven

Are The Needs Too Great?

     Remember the numbers: 30,000 children a day die from preventable poverty-related causes, 800 million people are malnourished,  every few seconds another orphan is added to the already 143 million orphans, an estimated 246 million children suffer in the bonds of child labor and 121 million children around the world have no opportunity for education. 

     The response to such numbers is often to turn away and ask, “What can be done in the face of such huge needs?” 

     The story is told of a young boy walking on a beach where hundreds of starfish had washed up and were dying.  One by one, he bent over, picked up a starfish and threw it back into the sea. A man standing nearby mocked the boy saying, “You’re not really going to make a difference. Most of these starfish are going to die.”    In response, the boy picked up another starfish and tossed  it into the waves. “I made a difference to that one,” he said. 

     Now think about this: If the boy recruited hundreds of others to come to the beach and rescue starfish, they could save nearly all of them.   

     Eighty percent of U.S. adults claim to be Christian, 160 million people.   If you decided to save the 11 million children who needlessly die each year, you will not get very far.  But 160 million U.S. Christians can easily save 11 million children a year, if we decide to.  Do all you can, and ask every Christian you know to do all they can, and the job will get done! 

     The more I quote the “11 million children” number, the more numb to it I get.  As the saying goes, “A single death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic.”  We must see this as God sees it, not as a statistic, but as 11 million separate tragedies, 11 million children He loves.

     You may be skeptical that Christians can save tens of millions of lives.  Pearl Buck once said, “The young do not know enough to be prudent, and therefore they attempt the impossible -- and achieve it, generation after generation.”

     Or to quote a more reliable source,

Then the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah:

“I am the LORD, the God of all mankind.

Is anything too hard for me?”

 

Jeremiah 32:26-27
 

     The erroneous opinion that “it can’t be done” is the biggest obstacle we face in the fulfillment of Jesus’ command to feed the hungry.  As Paul said, “I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.”   If God wants it done, and He does, and if He has commanded us to do it, and He has, won’t He give us the ability?  He will!

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