"I Want to be a Doctor"

No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.

Matthew 6:24

I was chatting with a seven-year old friend earlier today when she leaned in towards me for a little tête-à-tête. I obliged, leaning close to hear what she might say, and she whispered into my ear, "When I grow up, I want to be a doctor." A smile lit my face. What a smart girl to be thinking about her future already.

"Why?" I asked her. "Why do you want to be a doctor?"

I wasn't exactly prepared for her response. She lifted her eyebrows with delight as she said very slowly, "I want to make money," rubbing her fingers together at that last word, like she was counting currency.

Oh horrors! Whatever happened to "I want to help people" and "I want to save the world"? What is this world coming to?!

But as aghast as I was at her statement, I had to admit that she was perhaps the most self-aware of us all. She had the wisdom at her age to voice what most of us only admit to ourselves after years of frustration. In truth making money and success in business are our very great, if not principal motivators for roughing it out through another day. Why is this so? I know it has to do with the sense of security that comes with having money. It's a truth of life: "Money answereth all things", so the Preacher says in Ecclesiastes 10. There are so many things we can achieve - for self, family, country and God - when we have money.

Having said that, like so many poets old and new insist, money cannot buy happiness. We know this just as surely as we know that night follows day. But it doesn't stop us from our almost pathological thirst for more and more money. I think most people are so driven by the desire for money because as humans we have a need to feel in control of our circumstances. Whether we admit it or not, trusting in something unseen and intangible is so much more difficult than trusting in what we can hold with our own two hands or, for that matter, in our wallet. Surrender is a very difficult thing for us to do.

But that is what God calls us to. When Jesus said, "Let the children come to me … for the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these," (Mark 10) he alluded to their implicit trust. "I assure you", he said, "anyone who doesn't have their kind of faith will never get into the Kingdom of God." We must trust first in God before anything else. Matthew 6 says, "But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well." Which would you rather do - Work for money or work for God and have money work for you? I know which I'll choose.

With love, Doosuur.

The Taimako Phenomenon

We were not idle when we were with you nor did we eat anyone's food without paying for it. On the contrary, we worked night and day … so that we would not be a burden to any of you.

2 Thessalonians 3:7&8

The Taimako Phenomenon. It's a term I coined to describe a concept that I think is key to the persistent poverty of the people of rural Northern Nigeria. "Taimako" is the Hausa word for the verb "to help". It seems to permeate just about everything they do and say from the marketplace to the motor park to the hospital. "Help", "help", "help" in all it's different inflections is all I hear from sunup to sundown. Nothing wrong with a culture of looking out for one another but, in this case, what is sacrificed in the name of help is probably not worth it.

I was doing my "farewell" rounds earlier today, visiting some of my colleagues of the past one year for one last time. One staffer took me to his place and showed me his drug store. It was a pretty rundown affair with a rickety old chair, dusty shelves and a very spare stock. He showed me several-year-old records of debts owed to him by friends, neighbors and relatives - all members of the "Taimako" society. Bad debts, the vast majority of them.

On my part, I remember having to say a firm "No" over and over again to different people I came across over the past year only to see their jaws quite literally drop in horror. They were shocked! How could I say I would not help?! How evil of me!

What is worrying in all this is the attitude I think this "help" mentality engenders among these people. They are very laid back, if not downright lazy. Not many are industrious and very few will go out of their way to struggle for what we may consider a better living. Why work hard for anything when you can get help next door? A pretty simple philosophy.

You know, I tremble with trepidation to be critical of anything the Early Church did, seeing as they were so filled with the Spirit, but from a limited perspective, it is easy to see how their experiment at communal living was fraught with so much trouble. Acts 4 says, "From time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need." Now extrapolate this scenario across a few years and an exponentially-growing population and you have a pretty messy, if not desperate, picture.

To the same extent that we as Christians encourage ourselves to lend a hand of help to the next person, we must also encourage him to stand on his own two feet. Perhaps that is the best way you can help your brother - make him help himself. You may not have to look far. Perhaps all you have to do is to submit somebody's CV, introduce a new business concept, encourage someone to finish his education or invest his money. In truth, like a friend has taught me, financial security is not just about having enough money to take care of personal needs. It goes beyond to include a "shell" of financially-dependent people surrounding you. I'm not secure until the people around me are secure.

So, like the proverbial fisherman, don't give me a fish. Take me to the waterside.

With love, Doosuur.

Season's Change

Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.

Hebrews 13:8

It's all happening so fast: The haze and chill are going and it's getting hot and dry again. The birds wake up early to sing their songs of joy and hope as the cold-blooded lizards are quickly dethroned by the warm-blooded rats. The mosquitoes return from their annual leave to give me perhaps the worst episode of malaria of my adult life.

These are all signs of one thing - Season's change. Yes, the Harmattan is on its way out as the Hot Season takes its place. The sun is already hot and blazing here in Kano and I'm so grateful that I don't have to endure it for much longer. You see, these events coincide with the end of my service year and I'm so grateful for the experience and that God has brought me this far. So, here I stand at yet another milestone in life. You know the thing about milestones - on the one side they tell how far you've come while on the other side they warn that there's still some distance to go.

You know the saying, "Change is the only constant thing in life." How true. It's sad to see some of my friends one last time and realize that I may never see them again. It's just the nature of our lives - you can be sure that a few years from now you will be in significantly different circumstances from where you are now. It may have to do with your career, your studies, your relationships, whatever, but it will be different. How do we deal with change? I wonder.

First, God doesn't change and because of that He's a steady anchor. He says it quite clearly in Malachi 3:6, "I am the Lord and I do not change." Our periods of change will definitely bring about feelings of insecurity and uncertainty but it's good to be able to hold onto something, or Someone, as steady and sure as God. He doesn't change and He is very able to help us through these periods.

Secondly, we must embrace change as a necessary part of our lives. Without change we couldn't grow and mature. Our experience would be severely limited making us less effective wherever we find ourselves. So with each new experience learn what you can and enjoy it for what it's worth.

Finally, as with each new season the year brings, there are joys and sorrows that come with every new phase of our lives, but then we can be sure that nothing lasts and the next season is on its way.

With love, Doosuur.