A Sword and a Dream

This is a revised compilation of some essays I wrote for an application.

To many people, service is about “giving back to the community” or “doing something worthwhile.” Those things are true. Serving does benefit the community, and it is worthwhile. But that is not what serving is to me. I do not serve to be a better person or to satisfy my conscience. I do not serve to justify the things I do solely for myself. Instead, I serve because I have seen people trapped within the walls of their circumstances and have learned that I have the power to hand them a key. I serve because, in doing so, people have changed the world. And so can I.

My desire to serve, though, goes way beyond wanting to leave my mark on this world. More than anything, my heart to serve is rooted in my faith. The Bible defines religion as “looking after orphans and widows in their distress.” Isaiah says to “spend yourselves on behalf of the needy.” Jesus calls us to be a servant of all, and James says, “Faith without deeds is dead.” I believe obeying God means serving others.

However, while I consider serving my duty, I also consider it my joy. Some describe the joy of serving as “warm and fuzzy.” I disagree. Puppies and kittens are warm and fuzzy. Serving is a different feeling altogether. When I hand a piece of bread to a hungry child, I feel a million things at once. My eyes fill. My lips smile. My heart breaks. My hand shakes. My soul sings. The feeling is a perfect paradox: heart wrenching, yet ecstatic. But joy nonetheless.

There is other joy as well -- joy that does not inspire tears but fits of laughter and toothy grins. For me, this unadulterated happiness is found among children. To carry them into an imaginary place far from the troubles of this world is a priceless entity. To be their hero and friend is an honor. To earn their love is a privilege.

In other words, although I serve to bless others and honor God, I also serve for myself. Because it makes me happy.

Most of the service that I have done addresses poverty, and I hope to fight poverty throughout my life, especially among children. To me, poverty is not just pictures of malnourished children in Africa or stories of families living in garbage dumps. It is children that I have known. Children with names. It is Araceli devouring the food I brought her every morning and crying when it was gone. It is Nexer’s toes poking out the front of his brown school shoes. It is Mauricio living in a tiny mud house with twenty other relatives and Jaime being raised by his twelve year old sister. I have seen poverty. I have hated it. And I have fought it.

I have fought it, but I have also seen how hard it is to make a lasting stand against it. Yes, I gave Araceli food, but when her family left the area, she was just as hungry. Yes, I bought Nexer new shoes, but his feet will keep growing, and I will not always be there to buy a new pair. It is easy to touch the lives of those in poverty, but changing them is a challenge.

For this reason, I want to learn as much as I can to make a difference in as many lives as possible. I dream of taking my passion, creating a vision, and changing the world. I want to care for these people, but I also want to learn from them. I hope that, by learning more about poverty, I can go beyond touching lives and start changing them. I want to fight the dragon that is poverty, but I also want to rescue children like Araceli, Nexer, Mauricio, and Jaime. To see them support their own families. To help them achieve a new life. And to hand them a sword of their own.

I do not yet know what form this will take, but I believe education is the key. In Honduras, I saw children “finishing” school after sixth grade. These children walked in the footsteps of their parents, right on track to make tortillas or dig ditches for the rest of their lives, unaware of the options outside their snow globe of a world. I saw lives wrecked by preventable diseases, solely because no one had ever taught them healthy eating and living habits. Distressed by what I saw, I hope to show these people a way to a better future, one that lies above the poverty line.

My passion for serving has become one of the driving forces in my life, and I believe serving is a huge part of who I am and who I want to be. Some might say I’m forsaking my potential—opportunities to be a doctor, a lawyer, or a scientist — and perhaps I am forsaking the American dream. But if so, I’m taking up the dreams of every child born into a life of poverty, and hopefully, one by one, making them come true. So I’d say it’s worth it.