There are days when the struggles against poverty, injustice and disasters can weigh heavy on those who have chosen to work in organizations dedicated to these causes.

I have recently been reading a book by Ed Walker who has worked in the Disaster Management Team for one of our partners, Tearfund UK. In “Scorched Earth” he gives a first hand account of the human tragedies that his team faces on a daily basis. Stories of families affected by the conflict in Sudan where our organization works with Tearfund are disturbing to say the least.

I have a great deal of respect for these workers, their dedication and their resiliency. As an aside, organizations such as Tearfund UK and others watch carefully for signs of the affects this work has on their employees and are to be admired for the care and support that they give.

If there is credibility to the term “weary in well doing” it must surely apply to those who daily give wholeheartedly the best of themselves. At times you feel the weariness in Walker’s words. Other times you recognize the internal torture that comes from facing unspeakable human tragedy. But there are also exhilarating descriptions of the celebration and even euphoria that is unique to being a first hand witness to transformation and hope rising from the ashes of extreme poverty and suffering.

Observing the lives and work of so many workers such as Ed Walker and more well-known ones such as Henri Nouwen, we sense that there is something much more enduring than compassion. There is a deep rooted love. And this love endures not only in their own lives but in the transformed lives of those they have reached; individuals, families and entire communities.

Jill Carratini for Ravi Zacharias’ “Slice of Infinity” wrote about “the love we write across the lives of others”.

Paul reminds us that love is the greatest mark our lives can leave behind because it belongs as much to eternity as it does to this moment.  Even after our faith becomes sight and our hope is fulfilled, love endures, continuing on from the present and into days long after us.  In love, as in worship, the present touches eternity, and what is seen in part whispers of the promise that it will one day be even more fully known.

It is a conviction to live with, and for Christians, it is one we are called to live. “My command is this,” says Jesus. “Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13-14). In the lives we reach out to, the hands we hold in times of despair, and in the hearts we vow to love, we leave the indelible marks of eternity. As we would respond to pangs of hunger with food and water, we are called to respond to the cries of a broken world with the love of God, made known at the Cross. Greater love has no one than this. Like a postcard circulating long after our days, the love we write across the lives of others will continue to speak, whispering that God is among us, crying out beyond the grave that could neither silence nor contain Him.

Laurie Cook,
C.E.O., World Relief Canada