June 27
Chris and I are headed today to South Dakota. About 8 years ago, I went with a group from
my church to hold a basketball camp through Oyate Concern. Run by missionaries living on the Pine Ridge
reservation, the organization works with the Lakota Sioux living on Pine
Ridge. Our goal was to go and support
the missionaries and help encourage leadership among the Lakota youth and be
the hands and feet of Christ by serving.
I had a great time there with our team.
I think the team returned one more time, but I was unable join them because I was back in school working on my PPS credential and school counseling
masters.
When I found out our Jackie wanted to do a basketball camp
again this summer, I thought it would be a great opportunity to return this
time with Chris and serve together. I
guess when she had returned this last winter with another team member, some
of the kids, now teens, remembered the basketball camp fondly, and so she
gathered up some of the old team and started planning.
Working with the youth on Pine Ridge reminds me a lot of
working with the youth in Santa Ana.
There are some similar characteristics of the population – in particular
poverty and a sense of being unwelcomed or unwanted by the United States. Pine Ridge Reservation has some of the poorest counties in the
US. Alcoholism, depression, suicide, and
health issues – in particular diabetes – are rampant on the reservation. Statistics I was recently told, not verified,
are pretty astounding. I was told 90%
unemployment, the average income yearly is $3500 - $6500, and the average life span of
women is 52 and men is 48 (Click here for a link to these statistics http://www.4aihf.org/id40.html). Recently
there has been a lot of brain research that shows a connection between poverty
and brain development. I’m sure part of
it goes back to nutrition and the difficulty those struggling financially have
to eat healthy foods, but more and more studies are showing how stress and
trauma also impact brain development, which often goes hand in hand with poverty - especially I'd say generational vs. situational poverty.
What has to be understood to also understand the people on
the reservation is their history. It’s
not such a pretty history, with the US government violating treaties because of
discovered gold, and a massacre of women, children, and elderly at Wounded
Knee. There is no wonder that there is a
distrust of the US government. When you
break down 125 years generationally, we are not talking of a distant history,
but a history that happened to great grandparents and grandparents of people
living today. While there may no longer
be eye witnesses alive, there are certainly people still living that could have
told the stories by people who actually lived through these times. So, I’m not going to go into a political
tirade here on who was right, wrong, or whatever because what do I really
know? I do think though that we can see
that reconciliation is needed and that there are some real reasons behind the
lack of hope, poverty, and brokenness seen on the reservations.
Sadly enough some of those abuses came not from the
government but also from the church. I
think some people hear we are going on a mission trip and they think we’ve
already done enough in history to harm and degrade the indigenous populations
as a Christian church and I’m not here to make excuses or even try to explain
the past. All I know is this, I have a
hope because of a Savior who came to save me from myself and my selfish flawed
nature and the selfish flawed nature of the humans with whom I share this
earth. My hope is not necessarily to fix
the problems here on earth, as much as I’d like to and I think we should strive
to do so as best we humanly can, but my hope is based on the knowledge that
life on earth is temporary and I believe in an eternity in which God reigns and
goodness is restored. This is a hope I
want to share with others. The love I
have been shown needs to be shared.
There was something I learned at Simpson when doing missions
there was that short term missions are best to support and encourage the people
who are actually living there among the people.
What real impact can I have going for 3 days, 3 weeks, or three months? I pray to have some impact, but the most
effective are the ones who are there daily, building relationships, seeking to
understand and living life with the people group. I was so excited to hear that Saddleback’s
peace plan was also built upon this concept.
It’s not about going in to give hand outs, coming in our privileged
American high horse and thinking our presence would automatically bless and
change things for the better. It’s about
using the resources we have to help those living in the areas of great need to
make the changes themselves. We are not
coming to impose our culture, which too often in the past was the mistake made
by, I believe, many well intentioned missionaries. It’s a tricky thing to distinguish what is
actually Biblical truth versus culture.
The love of God and the hope of the Cross transcend culture. So, here we are trying to share this by
serving. We are supporting the
missionaries with some construction, we are holding another basketball camp to
encourage and empower youth into leadership, and we are trying to build some
relationships and show that beneath the skin color and the lifestyle, human
beings have the same needs, wants, desires, and struggles. I have found something that has encouraged
me, filled me with hope, and helped me face difficulties. I want to share that.
Since my blog was not originally a travel journal, but a
place for my ponderings, I can’t help but insert all this into my trip
journal! Chris just asked me what day I
was on, and I responded my intro! He laughed…because he knows I’m long winded
at times. But, I do like to record my
travels and experiences to I return to our journey…
Chris returned home from a trip to Virginia late Friday, so
we did not get packed and out of the house until early afternoon. After running a few errands, picking up last
minute items, dropping off the dogs, and getting a late lunch, we headed out on
Interstate 15. The trip to Vegas was
familiar, but we did fill up with gas there in a not so great part of the
town. Homelessness and poverty can be
found just about anywhere. After Vegas
we continued through the Nevada desert and into the upper northwest corner of
Arizona, where we stopped at a Walmart for bug spray, sunscreen, and work
gloves, as well as a light dinner at Subway (Chris and I have been counting
calories and trying to lose those newlywed pounds we gained in our first two
years of marriage….road trip food is not conducive to this goal).
Chris was working furiously on the computer while we still
had decent internet connection to book our hotels for the trip. He luckily had six free nights through the
hotel booking company he uses for all the traveling does. Between my diesel Jetta and his free hotels,
we plan to make this a very inexpensive trip.
I’m pretty excited about our itinerary.
I love that Chris is also so tech savvy.
And we get along so well, it’s easy to travel with him and make
decisions with him.
Night fell, and we
continued into Utah. Passing the sign
for Zion, we decided we would visit there and Bryce Canyon on our way
home. I could see at times the glow of
the moon bouncing off of white mountain sides.
We stopped at a travel gas station, and it had probably one of the
nicest cleanest bathrooms I’ve ever seen.
We drove a bit through a small charming town that had a lovely white
house with a picket fence for sale. I
tried to convince Chris we should move and buy it, but he had no interest.
There was plenty of road kill lining the interstate. A few deer lying dead at various places on
the road convinced me that the signs of deer crossing were a cause to be very
vigilant. The smell of fields told me we
were passing farms. I hate driving at
night partly because I can’t see the surroundings, and that’s the whole point
of driving!
Our hotel was in Orem and we didn’t arrive until just after
2am. We forgot that we would lose an
hour due to the time zone. After settling in, we slept for the few hours
until the next leg of our journey beckoned.
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