Ponderings

I was going to make a post about how hard my dog's life is (a joke of course, he has a fabulous life, lazy thing). But I've realised there is so much more I need to do with my life, I can't spend my days drawing pretty pictures and pottering about safe little Lancashire. All my plans, my 3 aims in life: Happiness, Marriage, Children, all irrelevant. There is so much I can do with my life and want to do with it, in fact need to do with it.

I'm in an extremely fortunate and privileged position. I may not live in a mansion with no worries or problems, but I have a loving family, supportive community, a nice warm house with plenty of luxuries that we all take for granted, and of course I'm educated. I don't even have a real bed at the moment, yet I realise how extremely lucky I am when other people with even more fortunate lives spend their days complaining and moaning about this wonderful country we live in and how their life is so miserable and tough or stressful. Yes it may well be stressful, but there are so many people in the world who are worse off yet appreciate what little they have so much more.

I'm sick and tired of people whining about the NHS, saying they're useless and rubbish. Yes it could be improved, but at least we live in a welfare state and have free health care. You go to America, if you don't have health insurance and you have an injury or become ill and can't afford the bills, you're really screwed. Doesn't happen in England, pretty much anyone can get treatment. A 6 month waiting list is far better than no treatment at all. And of course in so many parts of the world, there is no option of treatment at all, there is no health insurance, you can't pay the hospital bills, in fact you can't even get to the hospital, you just have to put up with any injuries and illnesses and pray you survive.

I got so angry with a certain person in my life who insisted we were living just above the poverty line. I've never been anything close to impoverished and probably never will be. I've never seen absolute poverty with my own eyes, but the poverty I have seen in person in places like Kenya and Peru is still shocking. 4 families sharing a room about 10ft x 14ft, one fetid mattress, a table and a few broken chairs and a bunch of chickens running about. The children's entertainment involved picking the paint off the walls and using the flakes as betting tokens for hand games similar to rock paper scissor. I challenge the people who say England is "going to the dogs" to find someone living like that here.
I could go on forever about the things we all take for granted, myself included, but it won't achieve anything.


Now the big question is what do I do? Ever since I was little I've wanted to go on mission, whether it be abroad but somewhere relatively safe, say working from a Christian compound, in the middle of a war zone or somewhere where the church is persecuted, or even in the grotty estates of Manchester. Who knows what I'll do, all I know is there are so many people suffering out there and with God's help I can make a difference, only a very small difference admittedly, but at least it's something. I know I need to do something, life is short and I have to make the most of it.

I've got a long road ahead of me, a lot of soul searching to do and getting right with God, getting to know Jesus again. It won't be easy, but I'm very much looking forward to it. I've been in a very dark place the past few years without Jesus by my side, but things are looking up again since I've put God back into the driving seat.