I’m sitting at the kitchen table on Christmas Eve, my family getting supper and Christmas tree lights blinking in the background, trying to summarize the last 3 months into 20 top principles of development. After searching through my journal and notebook, picking out my favorite principles (which I narrowed down to fifty), and trying to explain what I’ve learned about community development in a five sentence paragraph, I’ve decided a quote is the best way to do it. It’s from what I would say is THE foundational book on community development. Interestingly enough, it’s both a biography and an autobiography. The main author was our key teacher during the last 3 months. He not only has a profound knowledge of human nature, but writes from hands-on experience in hundreds of communities from many different cultures worldwide. He has worked with communities suffering from relational and spiritual poverty in the U.S. and Europe all the way to starving, marginalized communities in Latin America, Africa, and Asia. I knew and respected him before I got to Costa Rica, but experiencing this school with him, watching him live both inside and outside of the classroom, has not only challenged my intellect, but my heart and the way I live as well. This is an experience he had:
“On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
‘What is written in the Law?’ he replied. ‘How do you read it?’
He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
‘You have answered correctly,’ Jesus replied. ‘Do this and you will live.’”
I want to point out a few things:
• My teacher didn’t answer the man’s question- he encouraged him to find his own answer.
• The man’s correct answer (or the solution to his problem) was holistic- it involved every area of his being and life.
• The solution began with living in relationship, intimacy, and obedience to God.
• The solution was manifested in relationship with other people.
• Knowledge of the correct answer wasn’t the solution; the solution was the application of the principles in his life.
If community development does not focus on changing a person’s heart and beliefs, all the practical solutions in the world are treatments, not cures. Poverty starts in our beliefs, and translates into our physical lives. The solution starts with God. The desire for change has to start with the community, and they will value and participate in the change if they discover the solution for themselves. And as my teacher says, knowledge is worthless unless applied to our lives. Transformation begins with me.
That’s a glimpse and a summary of the last 3 months- there is so much more about how and when and with who and with what that really I think you should just go take the school and discover it for yourself ; ). Thank you, everyone who has been a part of this journey. I'd love to share more specifics with you personally, so get in touch if you're curious ; ). Merry Christmas!
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