'The Lottery'

Growing up, I was taught that playing the lottery would impoverish my family and leave me stuck in a dependent cycle of desperation. Dave Ramsey  preaches the same message…the lottery is a financial wasteland of scratched paper, not-close-enough number series, and dangerous dreams of ‘what if’ and ‘one more’.  Statistically, many of the people that play the lottery live in the lowest income neighborhoods, and there are many factors that contribute to the belief that winning the lottery will magically solve a myriad of problems.  It’s desperation.

Desperation is what often causes people to throw away what they know about the odds and take a chance.  And not all lotteries are equal.  People will ‘risk it all’ emotionally, spiritually or physically. Sometimes it’s for love or a broken relationship.  Sometimes it’s for a career move, political cause, or championship game.  Sometimes it’s for our family.

As Americans, we rarely play the lottery with our drinking water.  We’ll pay more, invest more, and do whatever it takes to provide our families with safe drinking water.   We expect water to be free with our meal, ice to be available, and the container to be sanitary.  We pay $1.00 for a liter of Smart Water at Publix and turn up our noses at the slightly funky smell of well water. Even the most basic of us are water snobs, simply because we have the luxury of demanding clean water.  We’ve never known the real desperation of intense thirst.

Because people in America do not die of thirst.

Men, women, and especially children die of thirst in West Africa every day.  But quite frankly, it’s hard to grasp that over a billion people are in desperate need of drinking water.  So, think of the other risks you take…and substitute water. If you couldn’t demand clean water – if you were dying – what would you do? In scorching heat, with crying children, with a dry and swollen tongue…what would you do?  I’m not talking about an unusually hot day.  This is LIFE.  It’s every day.  Your cousin died of dehydration last week.  Your baby is unresponsive.  Your mother has continual diarrhea and cannot stand.  What would you DO?  Would you drink from the bucket of water possibly contaminated with roaches and unknown parasites?    Would you risk it?  I would.  College degree and all, I would take a chance and risk (inevitable) death for a drink of water.   I would dip my finger in the water and try to give my baby a drink.  I would pray that th e billion-to-one odds of contracting a waterborne illness somehow pass by me and my family as we struggled to survive one more day.


This borrowed from Water of Life Ministries -