Donald Miller's Blog, page 72

Saturday Morning Cereal: The Best of the Internet This Week

On the weekend we pour a little more cereal in your bowl. We hope you enjoy some reading from our regular contributors, some viral videos and other great finds from the internet. This is what we loved this week. Share your favorite articles and videos in the comments below.

The Best From Our Contributors

The Danger of Having Role Models By Brian Gardner

Beauty: The Race We’re All Losing by Andrea Lucado

Let’s Put Your EGO In Perspective… by Carlos Whitaker

Things We Are Into

We are really excited that Ben Rector will be at our conference at the end of the month. This music video was recently released by Ben and his crew. Isn’t it an amazing video? Who is excited to see Ben in San Diego?

The Best Viral Videos We Found

Last week, the kid video won the majority vote. What about this week? Vote for your favorite below in the comments.

Saturday Morning Cereal: The Best of the Internet This Week is a post from: Storyline Blog

Every Story Needs A Comeback

There’s that one scene in every great movie. You know the one I’m talking about.

That scene where it looks like the hero is about to lose it all.

When George Bailey cries out to God in a drunken stupor, “I’m at the end of my rope.”

When Luke Skywalker finds out that his is the only spaceship left in the attack against the Death Star.

When Buzz Lightyear realizes that after all this time, he really is just an ordinary toy.

We can all relate to those characters, especially Buzz.

We start out this life believing we’re capable of doing anything, that we’re invincible, that we can fly. Then life gives us a couple of dozen smacks across the face and we’re left struggling to believe if we ever possessed any value at all.  Our disbelief opens the door wide open to Fear who invites Pain and Struggle along for the party, initiating a cycle of Pity Party Paralysis.

*photo credit: kevinpoh, Creative Commons

What’s interesting about each of the on screen scenarios is that in each case, the hero never makes it out of their sticky situation without the help of another person.

Clarence jumps into the water to save George Bailey.

Han Solo swoops in at the last second with the Millennium Falcon.

And even a former enemy in the form of an old cowboy doll becomes Buzz’s biggest supporter and confidant.

Every one of our stories is eligible for a comeback.

First, however, we need to believe that a comeback is indeed possible and we are worthy of receiving one. We need to kick some late night partyers out of the house and put Pity Party Paralysis to bed.

Second, we need to understand that most comebacks don’t happen without the help of someone else.  This is usually a harder pill to swallow than the first. Our modern image of what it means to be a hero is often framed by the cultural narratives we interact with daily, narratives that say we have to have it all together or we can buy our way to success in just a few simple payments.

Look closely and you’ll discover these narratives are written in airbrush and Photoshop.

Truly great stories are written in the blood, sweat, and tears of their heroes and those they choose to journey with.

If your story needs a comeback, cast out a lifeline. No it’s not sexy. Admitting you need help, that you are in fact, just an ordinary toy whose batteries are worn, never feels fun.  It is however, the way most comebacks begin.

Perhaps you’re living at the height of your story right now. Maybe it’s time to take a cue from Clarence, Han, and Woody and become someone’s liberator. We should all be looking to find ourselves in the process of rescue. Sometimes we’re the life preserver. Sometimes we’re the life.

Every Story Needs A Comeback is a post from: Storyline Blog

Church Anywhere and Everywhere?

Last week I blogged a couple times about why I haven’t regularly gone to church. I’m hoping both blogs were good conversation starters. I’ve gotten some flack, but honestly very little. I’ve found most people were incredibly kind and gracious, even those who disagreed with me. The blogs presenting dissenting opinions are to be expected and completely understandable.

The hardest part about the ramifications of those blogs involved the relationships I have with pastors.

I’ve many close friends who are pastors. I actually went to a church service Sunday night to hear a friend of a friend preach and enjoyed it very much. But even I felt that deceptive polarized pull of “Wait, are you supposed to be here? Aren’t you either in or out?” Which is something I hadn’t felt before, but how the blogs were received. I consoled myself by reminding myself I’d never left “the church” just simply didn’t attend many services. Still, I wondered whether people thought I didn’t like them, and specifically, I wondered whether pastors thought I didn’t like them.

After the service I grabbed dinner with my pastor friend and asked “Are we okay?”

He told me we were, that our friendship had nothing to do with my opinions. He also expressed some disagreements and then we had a great conversation about church, what it means, why it matters, what it is and so forth. One of my favorite lines of thought had to do with a question “If the holy spirit were pastor of a church, what would that church look like?” I thought it was a great question. Perhaps, somehow, theologically speaking, He already is the pastor of a church. Not sure how that works.

Regardless, though, the vision I got was of a pastor who sees his or herself as a pastor to pastors. What I mean is, a pastor who spends sunday equipping the congregation to be pastors themselves, that is to baptize people through the week, perhaps in their home swimming pools, to guide people through communion, perhaps around their own dinner tables, to teach the Bible to their friends and neighbors, to sing together in their homes, to make meals and share them with the sick and so forth. Then, on Sunday, “pastors” could gather to encourage each other and share stories about their own “churches” in the world. I even imagined buying a bunch of little sheriff badges so a pastor could “deputize” their congregations as priests in God’s kingdom, answering to the Holy Spirit and doing the work of Jesus directly.

Some of the most significant spiritual moments of my life have been when I’ve stepped into the authority God has given me as a priest in His kingdom.

I’ve not done it often, because it feels strange, but I’ve done it and it’s been great. I remember pulling over on the side of the road with friends, climbing into an old abandoned building that we thought looked interesting and doing communion on a loading dock using hot chocolate and cookies. We prayed together, remembered the Lord together. It was a fantastic bonding moment between us but also between us and God.

*Photo Credit: Johan Larsson, Creative Commons

And I remember another time when some friends and I were climbing around behind a waterfall and one of them, my friend Adam, turned around and asked me to baptize him. Are you being serious, I asked? Yes, I’ve never been baptized. So right there in the roar of the waterfall we gathered together and prayed and we baptized my friend Adam. Then we baptized more folks who’d not been baptized before. We raised our hands up toward the waterfall and felt the power of Jesus slide down off the mountain.

The thing about those moments, though, is they remind me Jesus is sharing agency with us here on earth.

He’s sharing His power to love people, to bond with Him and to be “priests” in His church.

To be fair, I’m wired a bit differently. I’m creative and I’m a risk taker. I realize a mistake I often make in my writing is assuming people are wired the way I’m wired. They aren’t. Most people are looking to “do it right” and play by the rules. This saves them from the trouble I often find myself in. They’re smart to do so. But I think there’s a place for people like me, for people who read Hebrews and scratch our heads and wonder whether God has given us more agency than we’ve accepted.

I think He has. And I think in a decade or so, it would be beautiful if a shift happened in our cultures, where pastors played more the role of Gandolf or Yoda (I’m not new age! Don’t attack me!) and saw their congregations as young, struggling heroes, scared to death but with a massive responsibility to be priests in the kingdom of God. What if we really were called to that kind of adventure and at church we were being equipped to do pastoral work, to have authority and agency?

The reality is, life would get messy. To let the church know they have much more agency than they ever realized would open a can of worms and there would be theological arguments left and right. Even Calvin believed it was only the Apostles who were supposed to baptize. One of those rare occasions I disagreee with Calvin, by the way. He proposed that because when Jesus said “Do as I have done” he only meant that for the apostles because those were the guys he was talking to. I don’t believe that. That seems like a stretch and one of the rare occasions where Calvin grasps for a little bit of power.

Still the motives are pure. Letting just anybody perform the sacrements could create chaos.

And yet I see an awful lot of organized chaos in the book of Acts. I wonder if we’ve not lost the stomach for that kind of adventure?

Here’s the thought from John Calvin on the matter. He would certainly disagree with me. Hope this continues a healthy conversation, though. What would it look like if next Sunday, every pastor released their congregation into their own agency? What would come of that chaos?

Church Anywhere and Everywhere? is a post from: Storyline Blog

Why God Sometimes Goes Silent

There have been a few times in my life when God has gone completely silent. I would ask him questions, scream requests, beg and plead for him to respond—but he wouldn’t say anything. It was like He was gone.

It wasn’t until recently I had a revelation about why this might happen.

At the end of last year, I was traveling a ton. And, for the first time in my two years of marriage, I was traveling without my husband. This wasn’t a big deal for us, except that it was a change from our usual rhythms, and I’m finding in marriage that anytime you change your rhythms, it has this way of throwing you off balance.

So by the time Christmas came around, we were awkwardly out of sync.

It was weird, because while our relationship certainly hasn’t been perfect, our problems have never included silence. We have this fiery way of relating to each other (reflective of our temperaments) always either sublimely happy and laughing, or raising our voices and stomping around.

*Photo Credit: Oleh Slobodeniuk, Creative Commons

But by the time I came home from my final trip last year, there was no laughing or stomping. There was just silence.

We would wander around the house, doing our own things really—him going his way, and me going mine—and there was no yelling or fighting or anger or unkind words. There was just quiet, so unusual to what I know about us. He felt so distant, in a way he had never felt before.

I thought about speaking up on a few occasions, but honestly, I wasn’t sure what to say. It wasn’t like I could point to a specific issue or instance: “When you said such-and-such, it really hurt my feelings. Can we talk about it?”

He hadn’t said much of anything. Then again, neither had I.

Which left both of us wondering, I think: Who was going to speak first?

I don’t remember exactly who spoke first, but eventually, we did talk about it. It started off pretty awkward, like trying to describe something you can’t see, you can only touch and feel as you tiptoe around in the dark. I was scared to say the wrong thing—to step on a land mine hidden by our shadows of silence. We moved slowly and cautiously. It took us a long time to make progress.

But eventually, it was like someone turned on the light.

It wasn’t one of us who had stopped talking, stopped communicating, stopped coming close. It was both of us.

This was completely frustrating for me at first, because I could point so easily to moments I had reached out. Remember that text I sent? Remember that question I asked? Remember that long phone call? But the more we talked, the more I realized he could point to as many situations where he had been the one left hanging.

Remember that thing I asked you to do (that you never did)? Remember how you interrupted me and cut me off?

No wonder my husband had gone silent. I hadn’t been really listening.

And when I had that realization, it reminded me of those times in my life God had gone silent. Could there be a connection? Of course, our human relationships are not exactly like our relationships with God, but they can often act as a comparison. They can help us understand.

And when I compare my relationship with my husband to my relationship with God, it helps me understand why God had sometimes gone silent all those years before. It wasn’t because he didn’t love me. It wasn’t because he didn’t care.

A relationship requires two people to function, two people to find a balance. (tweet this)

And, for all intents and purposes, I had disappeared from my relationship with God.

I was still there physically, but had checked out emotionally. I would reach out when I needed something, or when it was convenient, but rarely showed up ready to love and serve and listen and hear. I did plenty of things to prove how lovable and worthy I was but rarely let my guard down enough to allow him to see the real me.

God hadn’t given up on me. Neither had my husband.

It was just like each of them were saying, in their own ways, “When you decide you want to be in this again, I’ll be here.”

I had never thought about God this way before. I had always thought about Him as sort of impenetrable, unfeeling, un-moveable no matter what I said or did. But then again, I guess I sort of thought of my husband this way too. It wasn’t until each of them went silent that I changed my mind.

That’s when I realized how much I mattered in each relationship, how much responsibility I had.

And so it was in speaking up, in wandering around, in trying to explain something which I didn’t understand—it was in forging new territory, moving, changing, adjusting and opening—that I began to hear them each speak again.

Why God Sometimes Goes Silent is a post from: Storyline Blog

A Candid Conversation About Unfulfilled Dreams

This evening I read a wonderful sermon by Martin Luther King Jr. I’d not read the sermon before but was especially moved by the topic.

It’s a painful idea, isn’t it? The phrase “unfulfilled dreams” has a lonely tone, as though when our dreams go unfulfilled life has short changed us. Life or, perhaps, God.

In his sermon, Dr. King spoke of Gandhi’s desire to unite India and yet he died with the country split. He spoke of David’s dream of building the temple, but of how David died before the work was complete. And of course Dr. King would go on to be assassinated before his now infamous dream would be anything close to realized.

It’s an aching truth we are not guaranteed our dreams will become a reality.

I take issue with Christian teachers who teach otherwise. Because we have a vision does not guarantee that vision will happen, regardless of our faith.

But this caused me to also consider the beauty of the dream, the beauty of the vision all the same. It takes such courage to have a dream. And it takes more to communicate that dream, and even more to take steps to make it happen.

I’ve no doubt Dr. King, Gandhi and King David each enjoyed their lives. Each of them lived lives filled with conflict and pain, and none of them got what they wanted within their lifetimes, and yet a meaningful life doesn’t have to be a life in which our dreams are fulfilled. It’s enough to dream, isn’t it? To dream is to inspire, regardless of whether the dream becomes a reality.

And their dreams live on today, perhaps without their knowing.

*Photo by Alves Family, Creative Commons

We are still moved by their dreams. We walk the Mall in Washington and are moved by the speech that was once given there. We see generations of Jews still praying at the western wall, dreaming their own dream about a temple rebuilt.

There is no guarantee our dreams will come true in our lifetimes, and for some, dreams will never be realized at all. But is that the point of dreaming?

Must our dreams be realized, or is the call to dream them in the first place?

Humans are given the ability to dream. We are given the ability to imagine a future and then the ability, in part, to make it happen. In this way we have been made in God’s image. We can imagine things and then turn them into a reality.

I believe a human being has more than an ability to dream. I believe we have a responsibility to dream. I believe we who know God should point toward the distant horizon of a better world and lead the world to that place.

And when our dreams don’t become a reality, we must realize our dreams have power all the same. They can motivate those around us. Our dreams can inspire generations who will keep the work going to realize a good and proper dream.

We must understand the realization of the dream is not so much the gift as the dream itself.

So my question to you is, have you stopped dreaming? Have you stopped having a dream and if so, why? And what is lost in the world because you have given up your dreams?

The scriptures say “And it was in the heart of David my father to build a house for the name of the Lord God of Israel.”

God did not give David his dream, but God honored David’s dream and was pleased by it.

What is your dream? Is it a healthy family? Reconciliation? Forgiving an enemy? A church? A mission field? A book or a song? What is your dream and why did you let it go?

Are you waiting for a guarantee it will happen before moving forward?

If so, don’t.

Simply have the dream, do the work, honor the Lord and inspire the world.

Let me ask you this: Is there a dream you’ve had that you are realizing is not going to come to fruition? And how does that make you feel? Are you still inspired to pursue that dream? Feel free to share your story in the comments below. And feel free to chase the dream even when the outcome is unknown — that’s called courage.

A Candid Conversation About Unfulfilled Dreams is a post from: Storyline Blog

A Creator is Ready When Luck Strikes

Every successful creator has friends who think he or she is lucky.

They met that one curator at a coffee shop, or Oprah’s housekeeper accidentally left that book behind in the kitchen.

And the truth is their friends are right. They did get lucky. Everybody gets lucky.

*Photo Credit: NYC♥NYC, Creative Commons

Luck is like the weather, it comes and goes, it makes crazy things happen randomly. But unless you actually spend the hours painting those paintings, meeting the curator amounts to nothing. And unless you put in the year to write the book, it can’t get left behind on Oprah’s counter.

Luck favors the prepared.

My friend Melisa told me about some people she’d heard of that win sweepstakes professionally. They enter drawings, lotteries, play bingo and sweepstakes and win an enormous amount of money every year. Are they lucky? Perhaps, but you would be too if you spent eight hours a day filling out forms and entering contests. It’s not unlike that with a creators work.

Don’t worry about luck. You can’t do anything about the weather and you can’t do anything about luck. All you can do is work. All you can do is create, and let your work go into as many places as it can so that good things will randomly happen.

A Creator is Ready When Luck Strikes is a post from: Storyline Blog

Saturday Morning Cereal: The Best of the Internet This Week

This week we are going to pour a little more cereal in your bowl. We hope you enjoy some reading from our regular contributors. This is what we loved on the internet this week. Share your favorite articles and videos in the comments below.

The Best From Our Contributors

More Love, Less Hustle By Shauna Niequist

I’m Not Waiting on God by Allison Vesterfelt

7 Life Inaccuracies Portrayed in the Super Bowl Ads by Joshua Becker

Things We Are Into

One of our regular contributors, Tsh Oxenrider, released a book this week called Notes From a Blue Bike. We are loving the message of the book, and think you will love it too.

Learn more about the book by watching this video, or pick up a copy on Amazon.

The Best Viral Videos We Found

Last week, the The Kid President video won the majority vote. What about this week? Vote for your favorite below in the comments.

Saturday Morning Cereal: The Best of the Internet This Week is a post from: Storyline Blog

How I Found Strength From Letting Go of My Goals

I hold onto some things very tightly. Like white-knuckles-gritted-teeth-if-I-let-go-I-die kind of tightly.

It’s actually amazing I have the energy to do anything else. Anything but hold onto these things. I don’t believe I am alone in this.

I think the majority of us are probably walking down the street, teeth gritted, knuckles white, nails digging into our palms, holding on so painfully tight to things that were never ours to begin with.

*Photo Credit: eekim, Creative Commons

Do you know the things I’m talking about? They’re different for everyone. For me, most recently, it was training for a marathon. Around Christmas I decided to train for my first full marathon and was training away, counting my miles and trying to eat more whole foods, and figuring out how I could squeeze in a run during my lunch break when I got a cold that knocked me out for a week.

On top of that, I realized I was going to be out of the country for two weeks right before the race. I freaked out, as I do when I realize I’m no longer in control of a plan I have been plotting. I tried to think of ways to make up for the lost training when I was sick and tried to figure out if there would be treadmills at my hotels overseas.

I was spiraling and grasping for control when suddenly I whispered something very quietly to myself, something I don’t tell myself very often at all:

“You don’t have to do this.”

I hardly recognized my own voice at first. I am the one who obligates herself to her goals because they are simply hers and she has to. To prove it. Whatever it is.

But something about that simple statement clicked with me and released me and made me feel so free. “I don’t have to do this.” I kept saying it over and over. Those words felt like surrender and empowerment at the same time—something I didn’t know was possible.

So I let the marathon go for now. I may still do it, but only if it makes sense. The point is, I don’t have to do it.

Marathon training is a small example here. We hold onto more important things than that.

Heavier things that are more painful and difficult to release. You are holding them now as your read this.

But I’m beginning to wonder if the pain of holding onto things is painful because those things are not meant to be held. And maybe if those things are not meant to be held, they are meant to be released and we can whisper to our control-freak selves, “You don’t have to do this.”

Maybe letting go altogether is too much for you right now, but what if you loosened your grip? What would that look like? I think it’s worth a try.

How I Found Strength From Letting Go of My Goals is a post from: Storyline Blog

How the Secret of the Snake Changed My Life Forever

Many years ago I struggled with some pretty severe sinful patterns in my life. Some would call them addictions, and if I’m being honest, they were. These weren’t your run-of-the-mill sinful patterns. They were the kind that destroy lives and break up marriages.

Which, for me, they did both.

In the darkest hours of these struggles, I found depression and a desire to end my life. At the worst point, I truly believed there would be no way out except to die.

It wasn’t one specific incident that brought me to that place, but rather a slow fade. There were signs along the way, which looking back, were evident. But over and over again I chose what I wanted in the moment over what I knew would be good and right in the end.

I lived my life the way I wanted to, without regard for anyone else—God included.

On one particular night, when I came very close to ending things, I received a phone from my stepfather, and the words he spoke to me that day changed the course of my entire life.

“Your mother and I are hurting right now because of what you’ve done,” he said, “and we are very disappointed in you. However, I wanted you to know that nothing you have ever done is unforgivable by God, or by us. We love you.”

That phone call literally saved my life.

In the coming weeks, I let God in. I accepted the gift of eternal life, and began to fall in love with Him. I started going to Willow Creek Community Church, where I was welcomed into a family of believers who helped me rebuild my life.

While attending Willow, I was blessed many times by the teachings of John Ortberg.

One of those messages was called “No More, The Power to Stop”, in which he talked about the destruction of addictive and sinful behavior. In typical fashion, John’s opening story caught my attention immediately. It was entertaining, but as he ended, I was blindsided by how life altering it would be.

Here’s an excerpt from that message:

“Gary Richmond used to work at a zoo that had a thirteen-foot-long king cobra. It’s venom glands contained enough poison to kill a thousand adults. The cobra had a scar that made him look like the embodiment of evil, but worse, it meant that when the snake shed his skin, the eye cap did not come off. It had to be removed by hand. And, unfortunately, snakes don’t have hands.

*Photo Credit: Oleh Slobodeniuk, Creative Commons

This required a team of five people: two keepers, the zoo’s curator, a veterinarian, and Gary – whose job was to furnish the scalpel and sponge to the vet. The cobra slithered from it’s den, spread it’s cape, raised itself up to full stature, and looked at the five intruders, deciding on his first victim. He chose the curator. With lighting speed the keepers threw their nets around the writhing snake, the curator grasped it behind the venom glands, and the vet said, ‘Let’s get this over.’ His hands were trembling; beads of sweat were dripping off everyone’s forehead but the snake’s.

The vet asked if Gary had any cuts on his hands.

“No.”

He told Gary to wad up paper towels and stuff them in the cobra’s mouth.

“Okay.”

The cobra bit and chewed until the towels were yellow and dripping with venom.

As the team worked, the curator explained that every year several full-grown elephants die from king cobra bites. A man could never survive a bite with a full load of venom. This is why he was having Gary drain the snake’s venom sacs. The curator’s hands were sweating, and his muscles were weakening; his fingers were starting to cramp – which could not have been good news to anyone except maybe the snake.

The curator wasn’t sure they could move quickly enough when it was time for the release. Then he explained what we might call the secret of the snake:

More people are bitten trying to let go of snakes than when they grab them.

Easy to grab, hard to let go.

John went on to explain, this is true of everything that can destroy human character: deceit, bitterness, pornography, greed, debt, and workaholism. This is the power of addiction, and sin is, among other things, addictive. These sins are serpents that will quickly weaken the human spirit.

After hearing this message, one thing became clear: I needed to stop grabbing snakes. I can’t tell you that I’m without struggle or that I no longer have issues with temptation. That would be ridiculous.

But what I can say is that my awareness of the secret of the snake has been tremendously helpful. When I feel the urge to do something I know will be dishonoring to God, I envision myself holding onto a cobra and trying to let go. I pray and ask Him to help give me the strength not to pick it up in the first place.

My fear of getting bit is sometimes more powerful than the pleasure I think I’ll get by trying to grab the snake. As Mark Twain once said, “It is easier to stay out than to get out.”

And so my life, and the way I view sin, has forever been changed.

How the Secret of the Snake Changed My Life Forever is a post from: Storyline Blog

How The End of Poverty Comes With The End of Violence

Over the years, I have sat with many poor mothers and fathers as they have shared their stories of surviving genocide, slavery, and abuse. The pain they describe is unfathomable—and I’m tempted to imagine that the people who endure it are somehow different from me. Maybe, somehow, they just don’t feel things like I do.

Maybe they expect less, care less, hope for less, want less, or need less. But painfully, over time, I have seen that they are exactly like me.

Lucila, a resident of the tiny Peruvian town of La Union, and the mom of a spunky 8-year-old little girl named Yuri, received dreadful news early one morning. “Someone on the phone said, ‘Yuri has been murdered at the party hall,’” Lucila told me, her dark eyes now beginning to swim with tears.

It didn’t matter that she was poor.

Like any parent, Lucila just wanted to know what happened to her daughter.

*Photo Credit: johnjodeery, Creative Commons

The last time Yuri’s family saw her was inside a local party hall owned by a much wealthier neighbor, Pedro Ayala. One of the children had seen Yuri go upstairs to the Ayala’s residence and never come back down.  Her family left that night, each adult thought the little girl was with another.  

The terrible mistake wasn’t realized until next morning

– when somebody had dumped Yuri’s crumpled body in the main street, in front of the Ayala’s residence.

Two police officers and a prosecutor came to the scene, but departed without asking the Ayalas any questions. Yuri’s relatives and neighbors were agitated. What was happening? Feeling desperate, they made their way into the party hall. Upstairs, they found a dirty mattress on the floor, soaked with blood. Next to it were Yuri’s little boots, her hat and clothes.

In Yuri’s case, the perpetrators left behind a shameful mess, but they never were charged or convicted with the crime. The Ayalas “took care of it” with their money and power. Horribly, in this rural Peruvian village, if you are a victim of a crime and you want the law enforcement to see justice on your behalf, you have to pay for it. Justice only exists for those who can afford it.

I would later meet a half-dozen other mothers from the same region who represented hundreds of mothers whose daughters had been raped. They told me the same thing: “The police just dismiss us and say, ‘I can’t help you.’ We don’t get justice because we are poor.”

I wish this were an isolated, terrible story. But it’s not.

According to a thorough report by the United Nations, “most poor people do not live under the shelter of the law, but far from the law’s protection.”

When we think of global poverty we readily think of hunger, disease, homelessness, illiteracy, and dirty water, but very few of us immediately think of the global poor’s chronic vulnerability to violence—the massive plague of sexual violence, forced labor, illegal detention, land theft, assault, police abuse and oppression.

While conducting research for our book, The Locust Effect, we found that you can provide all manner of goods and services to the poor, as good people have been doing for decades, but if you are not restraining the bullies in the community from violence and theft—as we have been failing to do for decades— that critical assistance can easily be stolen away.  Indeed, if we want to safeguard the vital work that so many are doing around the world to help our poorest neighbors thrive, then we must protect the poor from violence.

Without the world noticing, the locusts of common, criminal violence are right now ravaging the lives and dreams of billions of our poorest neighbors, like Lucila and Yuri. The challenge is to see violence for what it is and to end the impunity that allows it to happen again. If we want to witness the end to global poverty, we must reevaluate what’s been missed in our traditional efforts. We must change the game.

How The End of Poverty Comes With The End of Violence is a post from: Storyline Blog