the small things

This is an article that I wrote for one the AOG World Relief project sites...

"On Tuesday we drove about an hour and a half away to the village of Dai Chanh. Our destination- a small school for children ages 20 to 36 months. We drove up to the small building, cheerily painted a mint green outlined with purple trim. We were warmly greeted and entered one of the rooms to find 13 precious little faces staring back up at us. These 13 children come to the center from morning to early evening so that their parents can work. The school is somewhat of a hub for the area as it is home to the clean water filtration system that AOGWR previously helped install. Being home to the filtration system means that they are the clean water suppliers for all the other schools.

Though neat, cute and efficient the school is far from luxurious. Upon entering the room with all the children my eyes quickly did a scan and found only a few toys on a shelf. So imagine the kids’ pure delight at the sight of a big box with a promising picture of some sort of brightly colored contraption! The kids watched in wonder as some of the men started on setting up the new toy.

The real fun came when the “installation” was done and the new toy was ready to be played on. At first, though the slide was set-up and ready, the kids weren’t sure if they were set-up and ready! At first, they just stared, unknowingly at the slide. They didn’t know what a slide was! They didn’t know how to use a slide! After some coaxing and coaching a few brave souls dared to try. Shrills of delight from the sliders and fits of laughter from the spectators began to fill the room.

The ice had been broken, but it would still take some time for all of the kids to warm up. In the meantime, the men took apart the slide to morph it into a kind of rocking toy (the slide had 3 different set-up options). While the kids waited for the new toy option they decided to entertain themselves. The actual slide piece wasn’t needed for the rocking toy set-up so about 7 kids quickly climbed on the now horizontal slide. They sounded as if they were just about having the time of their lives. It’s the small things.

They played on the rocker for a bit and then waited as it was returned back to its slide-form. In the time between the different set-ups more children had summoned up the courage to give it a go and pretty soon all the kids were lining up to have their turn!

It’s the small things; indeed…it’s the small things. Not to discredit the small things but to in fact shed light on just how important and just how crucial they are; to in fact shed light on just how important something as simple as a play-set can be.

All too often, we are caught in the trap of self-defeat. “There is so much need in the world. I can’t do anything to even begin to tap that need. What can I do as one person? Or what can we do as a group/church/whatever?” It’s the small things. It’s a play-set that 13 children in the village of Dai Chanh village in the country of Vietnam…now have.

“Making life better” is AOGWR’s motto. We believe that making life better happens person-by-person, story-by-story, and relationship-by-relationship. We believe that making life better happens through money contributed by an individual to buy a play set-up for 13 children J We believe that making life better happens through the seemingly “small things” that actually end up to be anything but small."

Grace and peace and the third way,
Kait