"Do You Know You Matter?"
Thoughts on Haiti
Julie Hallman
As our plane descended into the air surrounding Haiti, the brown haze from all the debris in Port au Prince was present over the entire island. This trip had been unexpected. I was here in November, again in December and now in January, about 10 days after the devastation I’ve come to know as THE earthquake. Many things in my life will forever be measured against the time frame of Tuesday, January 12 at 4:53 pm. ALL things in Haiti will be measured against this date. It didn’t take long to see the devastation in Cap Haitian. It wasn’t in the buildings, though we did see cracks in the concrete of some area churches and houses. It wasn’t the rain that began mid December and continued all but 2 days until mid January. We saw several dwellings, some still too submerged to survey, damaged by the water. It wasn’t all the people who wandered the streets. Imagine having 100,000 people descend on your city in a ten day period with 2000 more added every day. We have infrastructure and still it would tax our resources mightily. It wasn’t any of these things that told me life would be forever different. It was the eyes. Some were blank, as blank as any I’ve ever seen, as if not really connecting with the movement around them. These were the eyes of the refugees. Some eyes were full of fear. These jumped at sudden movements and noises and looked ready to bolt at anytime. Other eyes were full of sadness, a sadness so deep I longed to join them in it at the hope of alleviating just a small portion so they could bear it. Could MY heart bear it? A fear of my own crept up inside me. So many needs. So many, many needs. Even now my chest physically hurts as I contemplate the many we could do nothing about. As I thought about what to do, which tactical approach to take, I was reminded of something I had read recently in Matthew 9:35-37: “When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, "The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few.” I’m convinced there is so much behind the words “he saw the crowds” that we don’t get. Jesus didn’t just see a crowd, he saw the individual. He saw and had compassion on each one as an individual, not just on the “crowd” as a whole. How? How could He bear the pain? How could I? I learned on this trip that with Him in me, around me, and beneath me I can do what I think is impossible. Oh, I knew that little fact before, but I lived it in a way I never had before. I learned to see the individual in a new way, to value each soul, not as humanity, but as A human. As A human for which Christ gave His life as surely as He gave His life for me. As I talked with an individual, I found myself concentrating only on the one with whom I was speaking. It was as if no one else mattered. I became oblivious to the fact that others were waiting to talk with me. This was not from me. I’m the task oriented one. How many needs can I meet today? Check you off my “to do” list… Move on to the next one…God forgive me. At the Azile and again at the hospital, the “act” of bringing food and medicine became secondary. Holding a hand, asking a name, searing that name, face and eyes into my memory…beseeching the Almighty on their behalf….this was of prime importance. I had the chance to have a conversation with one young man that will forever shape the way I share with the lost. The pain in his eyes was somehow different from so many of the others; it was the pain of hopelessness. Not so much hopelessness about his circumstances, but hopelessness about himself. I looked into those eyes and asked him, “Do you know that you matter?” He didn’t know how to answer. “Do you know that you are important to God and to me?” “No”, was his answer. “I matter to no one.” The question was one I had only asked of myself, never another. I confess it never occurred to me. But it is the root, the foundation, the core of everything. I matter to God. Not as a crowd, but as an individual. Henry Claud is the name of this young man. He is now my brother. And I have a new set of eyes seared into my memory. These eyes held hope. May I never, ever forget this lesson. I pray it is first and foremost in my heart and in my thoughts. May it drive me to respond with my actions and my words to every person God puts in my path to ask the question: “Do you know you matter?”