March 2, 2009
Definition of Extreme Poverty
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Selfishness and lack of dignity and understanding.
My simple note is a matter of thanking bro. Kees Boer for his honest, sincere and wonderful messages given to our fellow brethren here who commented concerning his explanation of those living poorly in terms of materials yet very rich in terms of their spiritual growth which resulted their dependence on God. Compared to those who has wealthy possessions yet, without Christ, are very poor. I hope and pray that bro. Kees would be able to read this note!
Kees Boer,
Thanks for posting all of your discussions and definitions of extreme poverty and as well as deftly and lovingly answering those who understand it not. Thank you also, for your true understanding of poverty, life without Christ. As a former atheist, I know the hopelessness and meaninglessness of such a life.
I came from an upper class family, having all the material blessings, but no purpose for my life, beyond hedonism, which is ultimately empty living. Through a point of crisis, I became aware of what Jesus had already done for me, believed He had done so and was accepted by Him; the former Christ-hater, now free to live an abundant life, forever. Wow!!!!!!!! Such Joy and Assurance!!!!
Poverty, by the world’s standard, will be that of the UN, and so it should. Abject and true poverty, is that of spirit, one dead to the abundant life Christ offers it, now, in this body, as well as eternal life, in heaven, with Him forever, one glorious day. When combined with material poverty, life without Jesus is despairing hopelessness beyond compare.
Compassion recognizes these needs, and combines the two opportunities, for material and spiritual provisions of a child in its care, in a unique way, as the sponsor and child relationally interact through letters to one another.
I’m in a season, where I have no means to pay the electric and water bills. BUT, I have Jesus’ Spirit within me and all His Promises, among which are to never, never leave me or forsake me, and He’s proving Himself True. His Body, which we call the Church, is ministering to me in ways I never imagined needing. From it, my Faith is being bolstered as I’m seeing Him provide for us, through His Children, The Church. I’m temporarily “poor”, in material terms, but I’m incomprehensibly rich, in His Spirit.
I have one amazing story of His provision I wish to share. Last month, I told my husband that we must discontinue support of our Compassion child, as we had no means ourselves, and no way to fulfill our support to this darling child. He insisted against it. The next week, we received the unbelievable letter from Compassion, that our sponsored child no longer needed our financial assistance! What an amazing God-incidence! When income for us once again resumes, we will ever so joyfully continue to support another child through Compassion.
I needed your perspectives, Kees, for very personal reasons, today. Thank you for sharing them and encouraging me with it.
Keep up the good fight for these children!
Kees,
I would have to say that there is nothing wealthy about dependence when there are countless others who will actively shape their own futures and that of their complacent peers.
Dependence on God is very rich, because He is souvereign over all. As a matter of fact, without trusting in Christ for our salvation, we are hopelessly lost, facing an horrific eternity. If you see for instance the temptations that Christ went through, all of them are temptations of Satan to get Christ to act independently of His Father. Just today, I spent the day with children in deep poverty. Many of them don’t have food every night. But they are full of joy. And in many ways far richer than some children in Western countries that seem to have it all, but have no purpose and joy in their life. I’ve seen very “rich” teenagers become drug addicts….. Material possessions can be as much of a snare of Satan as deep poverty. Ultimately it is all about Christ. Without Him and a deep dependence on Him, we are very poor, no matter how successful or wealthy we seem to be here on earth.
People who live in extreme poverty are people who cannot meet the basic needs of food, water, shelter, sanitation and healthcare.
Too many people live in this state and too many people are ignoring the issue. Who ever gave the right for humanity to think that it is okay that we divide those poor and those rich, is a dick head. If we can’t look after each other then our world will fall apart. Wait, it already is!
I am no preacher of God or any other form of religion. I just have strong beliefs in what i can do and in what humanity can do, to save what is left of Mother Earth.
Can not meet basic needs food, shelter, medicale etc.
I don’t doubt your sincerity Kees but your spouting dogma will not feed the hungry people of the world. If jesus gave a hoot for the poor in the world he could help by not inflicting his ‘disasters’ upon them for a start! He does seem to get a kick out of punishing the most disadvantaged with his earthquakes, floods, wars and sundry other unpleasantness, unfairly heaped upon those least able to cope. Jesus Christ, you must be joking, when will you realise that religion is based on myth and fantasy?
Laura, If you knew, truly knew any materially poor person, then you would know God. God lives in the poor. Those that are materially poor depend and love God in a way that most cannot understand. Go and spend time with a very poor person-then you will meet and know God.
Hi, Jason, that’s actually not so much my point. Rich people can depend on God. They have to make more of a choice to do so.
What I’m actually saying is that what we consider the “poor” in those countries are really the rich, because they are rich with dependence on God.
See, in reality, material possessions here on earth are very temporal. We have an eternity in front of us. Our lives here on earth are just like an entrance into eternity. Some people have been given a nice entrance, some a not so nice entrance. What we do with our entrance has an effect on the rest of eternity.
The most important thing is to realize that none of us deserve to enter heaven. We have all broken God’s laws and if it were dependent upon our performance here on earth, we would all end up seperated from God in a place called hell. To go to heaven, we must have the righteousness of God or must be perfect. Rev. 21:27 says that even someone, who lies can not enter heaven. So, no matter what a person does, they can never enter heaven. You can sponsor 500 children, which would be a good thing to do, but it will never get you to heaven.
God saw that situation and He sent His Son, Jesus to die on the cross to pay for our sins. He was our substitute. In other words, Jesus took all of the blame of my sins on Himself and He paid for them on the cross, when He died. Then 3 days later, He rose from the dead, proving that your and my sins have been paid for.
Now, all He asks us to do to go to heaven, is to simply put our trust in what He did on the cross and all of our sins are forgiven.
John 3:16 is a famous passage. It sums it up nicely: “For God so loved the world (that’s you and I), that He gave His only begotten Son (that’s Jesus Christ), that whoever believes (That means to trust or to rely upon) should not perish (spend eternity away from God), but have eternal life.
If you have never placed your trust in Christ, you can do that right there where you are sitting. Simply rely upon what Jesus did for you on the cross. Some people do this by saying a prayer to God, like this (though saying a prayer is not necessary) “God I know I’m a sinner, but I believe that Jesus came to earth and die on the cross for my sins and I want to place my trust in Jesus as the One, Who paid for my sins. Thank you for dying for me. Amen.”
If you just placed your trust in Christ, then you can know on the basis of God’s Word, the Bible that you have eternal life. I John 5:13 says: “These things have I written to you that believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may KNOW that you have eternal life.”
Now, here on earth we can continue this trusting relationship for other things too. And that’s why many poor people are really rich. Because if they placed their trust in what Jesus did for them on the cross, they are going to heaven and their eternity is secure. I told a Compassion child not too long ago that the biggest mansion here on earth is a dump compared to what they will get when they get to heaven. (This Compassion child had placed his trust on Jesus to save him)
Kees
Because of course that’s going to save the children in Africa correct?
Actually, that would save a lot of the problems in desperate poverty.
Let me give an example of Bolivia, because that’s where I lived for altogether 7 months. Bolivia is the poorest country in South America. I worked there in very poor neighborhoods. A lot of the problem of the poverty there is spiritually based. It’s not physical. Yes, there is obvious physical poverty there and it should be met. But the physical poverty issues like a lack of water, a lack of food, a lack of education, etc…. are symptoms of underlying spiritual problems.
Let me give an example of what happens all the time over there. A mother has to work 12-14 hours/day for around $2/day. She has a little girl that she has to leave home in her shack. This girl is there with a little beat up television and in the area there are many gangs. She never hears her mother tell her that she is loved. For all intents and purposes, she is being raised by the television, which is like American television, i.e. most of it pretty much a bunch of garbage. When she is 14 years old, she meets some boy, who tells her that he loves her. These words become very powerful and a year later, she is pregnant and the boy has run away to somewhere else.
Thus she gives birth to a little child and now she has to work 14 hours/day and the cycle started again.
Now, if you were to just “feed” this little girl and took care of her medicine, then that would be great. There is nothing wrong with that, but what this little girl really needs is to be in an healthy environment, to know about the love of Christ and to accept the Gospel. Then she knows she is being loved, then when a sponsor on top of that demonstrates that same type of love by praying for her, writing her letters, showing how much he cares for this girl, then you can see the cycle of poverty in this family broken. Then when she grows up, she will make a huge impact on her family. Then she can make a difference in her community. Now, you’ve really affected not just that girl, but you’ve affected that whole community. I’ve seen this happen so many times. Does that make sense? I can give a lot of examples of this, but I really believe that it is the Gospel in conjunction with the help to eliviate those symptoms that will ultimately break the cycle of poverty in those countries. Without that wholelistic approach you’ll just be putting on “bandages,” and you’ll have to do it in the next generation again and again, and again.
@Kees Boer – I’m sure if they really were rich, they wouldn’t be very dependent on god. I’m betting they wouldn’t even care.
In the greater scheme of this, extreme poverty is really not having Christ.
Last week, I was in Medellin, Columbia in one of the projects, visiting one of my children and two of the children, that I had just found sponsors for.
The pastor gave a small devotional, sharing how much he appreciated the visit and how I was taking care of the poor. I felt kind of funny there, because I felt like I was visiting the rich. Not that it escaped me that I was in the midst of a very poor slum with gangs and drugs, but these children and their families were so dependent on God and Christ, that I felt like I was really the poor visiting the rich. Being dependent on God was to me a huge part of being very rich.
Kees
I agree with not having christ.
The answer is:
Living on less than $1 a day. One in six people around the world lives in extreme poverty.
(Sources: unicef.org/mdg/poverty.html)
Extreme poverty is not having adequate food, shelter and clothing…. and no hope of getting it in the future.
Extreme poverty is living on less than £1 a day
Less than $1 a day
These questions have been very educational for me…
Extreme poverty is living on less than $1 a day.
The UN defines extreme poverty as living on less than $1 a day–which severely limits a person’s ability to provide for their basic needs, such as food, water, and shelter.
Defined as when a person cannot meet their basic needs for food, water, shelter, sanitation, and health care.The World Bank defines extreme poverty as living on less than $1.25 per day. Over 1.4 billion people can be defined by this. 🙁
Living on less than $1 per day.