Fool for You.

Earning my first paycheque was a milestone. It was a great privilege to give a portion of it to my parents, to thank them for all they had done for me, and in gratitude for their upbringing thus far. In Africa, I had decided that before I received my pay, I wanted to make a commitment to myself regarding my spending, lest I ended up some time down the road buying Aldo and Kate Spade.

I had read: “Honor God with your wealth, with the firstfruits of all your crops.” – Proverbs 3:9

What does that mean? God, surely you don’t mean for us to give you the entirety of our first pay? Isnt that being a little too extreme, legalistic even?

I realized how different things looked when I gazed at them from a different perspective.

I asked myself- to whom does this money belong to? I had thought about this long and hard during my time in Mozambique.

If it belongs to me because I earned it with all my hard work and long hours slogging, then every bit of it that needs to be given away becomes a pinch. Giving 30% to my parents becomes too much, giving any more than 10% to the poor becomes difficult and spending more on more high-end brands and luxuries then becomes a right I deserve.

After all, it’s my money.

I will never forget the day I was in Mozambique, squatting at a dirt patch with a group of children fighting with each other because they were hungry; I will never forget how a group of boys tailed me and pushed me when I refused to purchase a schoolbag they wanted to sell to me, one that they had probably procured by making up a sad story or begging from a tourist; I will never forget not eating meat with the children during my entire stay there because “it costs too much, we only buy it when there’s enough money for everyone”.

It made me wonder- if love and compassion truly exist as more than ideals, then does not my money belong to God and to the poor? Though I earned my pay, did I earn my right to be born in a first world country, did I earn my right to a good education to enter medical school, did I earn my right to clean water and three meals a day? Why do we hold on so tightly to our little luxuries at the expense of another’s need.

To whom does my money belong to. That is the question.

It was then that it struck me- my money belongs to the poor. All my expenses, then become a taking away from the poor.

From this perspective, Generosity, then, becomes not noble, but normal.

Foolish child, you might say. What about savings, what about reserves for a rainy day, what about backup for an emergency?

It was Francis Chan’s sermon on The Joy of Suffering that hit me hard- are the states of children starving in Africa, the atrocities of child sex slavery in Asia and the injustice of abuse not emergencies then?

I’ll be honest. I do have a lot of everything, still. I do take my family out on treats. I do make sn effort to shop and dress well for work. I do.

But I will never forget what I saw in Mozambique, how simply the missionaries ate and lived and dressed- how a young missionary woman my age was wearing all but 2 outfits during her stay, how she and her husband served God from a little shack of a house.

One day it struck me: My money belongs to the poor in the mission field and to the needy all around us. Is there anything I lack?

I attended a beautiful wedding yesterday. Lots of people put money in red packets for the bride and groom. The bride was in a beautiful bridal dress- she was stunning. Perhaps I might be foolish to say this so soon but I think I might not choose to wear a wedding gown when I marry, if I ever do. I think I might ask my husband-to-be if we could put the money we collected to a fund for the poor. I am writing this now so I remember this thought.

Because this is not my money, never was and never will be.

Perhaps I wil regret saying this someday- because things were not easy in Africa. We lived on insufficiency and yet sufficiency every day. There was not enough of anything, and yet enough of everything. And I’m not sure if, without daddy’s continual pampering, I could still hold my ground. I’m not sure if I would regret saying this someday, on finding out I needed a surgery and had no money for it, on realizing I needed money for something else and not having it. I’m not sure if without daddy, I could stand not being pampered. I don’t know.

One night in Africa as I prayed about various things about the future, I journalled and wrestled with God about small and petty things- telling Him I wanted, if ever, someone who could provide for me at least a decent level of comfort, pamper me, bring me out in a car- I wanted at least a semblance of a comfortable life. I deserve this, don’t I? A part of me was afraid of dying to my flesh. It was afraid of what I was seeing and experiencing in Africa- God, this is so hard. There is nothing romanticised about this so-called “nobility”. Stupid things people had said to me before haunted me, “You should get together with another doctor, someone of higher social standing.”

God, why is my flesh like that? I was angry with myself, yet unable to ask for any less. I asked God to speak to me. That very night, I had a dream.

I dreamt I was getting married to one of my schoolmates, the son of one of our famous professors, ha. There was a huge banquet, immaculate decor, huge chandeliers raining from the ceiling and heavy, textured cloth draped all around the furniture and banquet hall. The wedding cards were made of the best quality, with gold letters etched onto beautiful art-paper. I was clad in an ornate gown, with a neverending train dripping behind me. There were something like 80 tables, hundreds of guests and all the big professors and famous people were there. All my best friends were running around making sure things were going smoothly. In a daze, I gathered them one by one around me.

Then, I announced I was calling it off.

“Why?” they asked.

“Because I would never marry someone like that.”

And instead of being disappointed and shocked, they were so relieved.

Then before I had to deal with the messy aftermath following the decision, I woke up.

I know most would call me foolish. I have been called so multiple times. Foolish for travelling by myself to poor places, foolish for wanting to publish books, foolish for wanting to make a difference, foolish for letting you pursue me, foolish for treating money this way.

Sometimes I wonder how radically different our spending and our world would be if we saw our money as not our own, but as taking from the poor, taking from God. Sometimes I wonder how things would be like if we saw our possessions as gifts and not rights. Sometimes I wonder, if we could truly live this way, day by day trusting in God, trusting that He would always provide for us and bless us in abundance, living as so-called fools, fools of this world which tells us to hoard, spend, earn, hoard, spend, earn.

Sometimes I think, I’d gladly be a fool for You.