The Indicator of Compassion

When Toby was in high school, he wrote an essay on world hunger and ended up winning a two-and-a-half week study tour in Africa through World Vision.

Toby was not only struck by the beauty of Ethopia, but also by the rampant poverty. One day during his trip, he was at a World Vision distribution camp, handling out food and supplies and playing with some local kids. As Toby and the other World Vision personnel were getting ready to leave, an eleven-year-old boy tapped him on the shoulder. The boy stared at Toby's T-shirt. Then he looked down at his own shirt, which was thin, dirty and filled with holes. He looked back at Toby and shyly asked, "Could I have your shirt?"

Toby was not prepared for that request. His luggage was a long way away, and he would not return to it all day. This would mean that he would have to go the rest of the day without a shirt in the blistering African sun. There was no time to think about what to do or say. He just backed away from the boy, shrugging his shoulders as he stepped onto the bus.

As they drove away, the weight of that one request gripped Toby and would not let him go. He continued thinking about it the rest of the day. That night, everyone in camp talked about their experiences through the day, but not Toby. He was thinking about an eleven-year-old boy who just wanted a T-shirt. He kept thinking about what Jesus had said: "Whatever you did not do for the least of these, you did not do for me." Toby waited until everyone in the compound went to sleep, then he went back to his room and broke down and cried.

The memory of that scene haunted him the rest of the trip. Everywhere he went, Toby saw that boy's face. Even when he returned to his home in Michigan, he was not able to put it out of his mind. He thought about how people in America have so many T-shirts that they ran out of places to put them. He resolved to do something.

He organized a T-shirt drive called "Give the Shirt off Your Back." He started collecting them door-to-door. He persuaded some 7-11 stores to set bins for collecting the shirts. Local media outlets heard about the story and gave it some airtime. The next thing Toby knew, it seem as if everyone in Michigan had heard about it. He collected over 10,000 T-shirts.

He was faced with another problem. How do you get two tonnes of T-shirts from Michigan to Ethopia? He called one relief agency after another, telling them his story. He received always the same answer: "We'd like to help, but it's too expensive." How expensive? He called the United Parcel Service and asked how much it would cost to send two tonnes of T-shirts to Africa: The response: US$65,000.

So Toby prayed some more. "Okay, God, you raised up these shirts. Now how are you going to get them where they belong?"

Finally, Toby was put in touch with an outfit called Supporters of the Sub-Sahara Africa. They happened to be taking a shipment of supplies to Africa and agreed to take his T-shirts along for the ride. There was just one hitch: They could take them only to one country. Would it be alright, they wanted to know, if the shirts went to Ethopia?
Toby does not know exactly where the T-shirts ended up, but he hopes one of them ended up in the hands of a certain boy. "I'll never forget that kid," he says. "I know its unlikely he'll get one of the shirts I sent. What are the odds of that? But I can pray. God can do anything."

--If you want to walk on water, you have got to get out of the boat