Last weekend St Peter’s Youth Group had a night out in the grounds behind St Paul’s Rectory. They were to experience life in a third world country. It was only over night but it was an uncomfortable experience for them all. I wonder how the rest of us would manage?

Here are 9 Steps to Third World Living

1. take out the furniture: leave a few old blankets, a kitchen table, maybe a wooden chair. You’ve never had a bed, remember?
2. throw out your clothes. Each person in the family may keep the oldest suit or dress, a shirt or blouse. The head of the family has the only pair of shoes.
3. all kitchen appliances have vanished. Keep a box of matches, a small bag of flour, some sugar and salt, a handful of onions, a dish of dried beans. Rescue the moldy potatoes from the garbage can: those are tonight’s meal.
4. dismantle the bathroom, shut off the running water, take out the wiring and the lights and everything that runs by electricity.
5. take away the house and move the family into the tool shed.
6. no more postman, fireman, government services. The two-classroom school is three miles away, but only two of your seven children attend anyway, and they walk.
7. throw out your bankbooks, stock certificates, pension plans, insurance policies. You now have a cash hoard of $5.
8. get out and start cultivating your three acres. Try hard to raise $300 in cash crops because your landlord wants one third and your moneylender 10 percent.
9. find some way for your children to bring in a little extra money so you have something to eat most days. But it won’t be enough to keep bodies healthy–so lop off 25 to 30 years of life.

If we are to empty ourselves, as Christ did, in order to identify with fallen humanity, we can also through in a hefty serving of grief. Imagine the grief which must overwhelm the victims of the Pakistan floods, who have lost all of the above… and many of their loved ones. Will we watch in silence or lift our hands to help and voices in Prayer?

Blessings

Rev Shan