The Power of Goose …An Update from Joanna

The Power of Goose
I was sitting amongst the cuddliest group of kids I’ve ever been with, thinking.  I had a cuddle bug to my right and to my left, as did most of the people on our team.  I wondered how hard it would be to leave, for them, for me.  There are twins that just melt my heart and little girls that give me drawings daily.   We were sitting in a big circle.  They like making circles, they get to all fight over holding our hands.  I had one of the twins on my left playing with my panda watch, which I bought as a joke and would give it to him if there weren’t 16 other little ones who would be jealous.  To my right is a young girl, about 13 who passed me notes and drawings all day that say, “I love you.”  I didn’t expect to make such strong connections.  So here we are, in a circle, playing, “Duck, Duck, Duck…GOOSE!!!” 
It’s at odd times that Jesus just shines through to make a point.  I’ll be on a ferry to the orphanage that we’ve been working with, thinking, about poverty.  When you think you’ve seen dismal conditions, just wait, you’ll see something more dismal yet.  Cambodia is the first country where the poverty is this tangible, in the capital never the less.  I wish some more remote regions were on the itinerary so I could see what some less “developed” regions look like.    I saw three hammocks strung in a circle and had a sense that that was were the old women in one of them slept.  I have seen more naked children here and have no doubt that it was either food or clothes. 
As a child I hated Duck Duck Goose.  I never was fast enough to catch whoever had chosen me and would be happy to never be chosen at all.  However, the kids requested the game and we found out that they REALLY loved it, regardless of the fact that most of them don’t know what a duck or a goose is and is likely to never come in contact with one or the other.  There are about 50 children and as Michael starts around you start to hear the choruses of “Cho me!!! Teacher, cho me!!!”  The latter part of chose seems to have escaped them and it sounds a lot like “chew.”  Many, as the game goes on, start to plead the phrase wanting desperately to be chosen.  It was as I watched the kids put their hands up and yell out, “Teacher, cho me” that I realized the power of goose. 
As a child, “goose” just meant I had to run and show everyone how slow I was.  But now, I see it through an orphan’s eyes.  They rarely are told they are special, chosen for anything.  So here we are playing a silly game and I get to tell them that I chose them.  For a few moments, running around the ring, their faces light up.  I start to cry but it isn’t the time for tears so I put a smile back on my face and tickle a little girl of about two who plops herself in my lap.  Jesus chooses us but how often we see it with a privileged perspective.  I think we all need to go back to seeing things as spiritual orphans.  Maybe then we can see the power of “GOOSE!”