Cast Your Burdens...

by Melanie Kerr
Published November 28, 2005

Amanda was five years old. She was small for her age, her tummy distended with malnutrition. She didn't speak a word of English but prattled on in her native language of Zulu with its curious clicks, bringing me dolls and balls to look at and admire. She smelt of dried urine and I hesitated to pull her up on my knee, trying hard not to wrinkle my nose in disgust. She sang a Sunday School song in a high lilting warble, nodding her head from side to side while she ran sticky fingers through my hair.

"Cast your burdens on to Jesus…for He cares for you."

Amanda spent her days in an orphanage on the outskirts of a black township in Durban. A filthy stream of water ran along side the back of the buildings. A fence of chicken wire had been pulled down allowing the children to play in the water. Many of the older children had liver infections caught from bacteria. There was no medicine for them and they became ill.

Two concrete buildings, just a little larger than the size of a garage, housed sixty-four children of all ages. There were no beds for the babies and toddlers, so they slept on the floor. Two cots pushed against the wall were filled with clothes that had once been washed, but were no longer clean. Three blankets, stiff with dried urine covered them while they slept, bodies nestling against each other.

While Amanda sat in a bowl of warm soapy water, I washed her gently. She sang as she splashed joyfully.

"Cast your burdens on to Jesus…for He cares for you"

Every morning the missionary team went to collect boxes of day old vegetables from supermarkets and bread from the local bakers. Sometimes there would be left over cooked chicken. It was enough to make a thick soup which they mopped up with chunks of the hardening bread. A tap in the middle of the courtyard supplied running water for washing up. Sometimes there was no water and huge tankers would park on the main roads. Children with buckets and bottles would collect the water and walk home, balancing containers on their heads.

Sometimes a child would find a mango and sit in a corner, shielding it from the other children. Fingers dug in to the soft flesh, scooping up dripping red sweetness into their mouth. Amanda stood nearby with her eyes fixed on the fruit, hoping for a share. When nothing came her way she would saunter away singing softly.

"Cast your burdens on to Jesus…for He cares for you."

Despite the nourishing soup, Amanda and the young children seemed to be always hungry. One of the team diagnosed that they had become infected with worms. Just before bedtime, the children were given worm tablets. The night was long with the sounds of retching and sobbing. Like spaghetti fallen from plates, the worms writhed on the blankets, evicted from the children's stomachs. We took the blankets to an open patch of ground and set them alight.

Nursing her sore tummy, Amanda rocked back and forth as she sing.

"Cast your burdens onto Jesus…for He cares for you…"

Back at the Mission house I wept. I wept because I smelt of urine. It clung to my clothes and to my hair. It clung to my skin. I wept because I had not wanted hug the children or lift them on to my knee. I wept because I had wrinkled my nose in disgust. I wept because Amanda kept singing about God's care that seemed to be absent, and He did nothing to lift her burdens.

I wept because I realised the absolute poverty of love in my heart for these children.

I didn't sing. I shouted! I raised my fist shaking it with anger.

"Why don't you do something real, something that would make a difference to their lives? Why don't you help them? Where are you in that stinking place, God?"

Then He spoke.

"I did do something real - I sent you there! I am making a difference to their lives - through you. I am there in that stinking place - I am there because I am in you!"

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