What does it really take?

We have started the school year successfully and all is going well. That also means that Dash and Butterfly Personified have new literature books that must be read. I started with BP's since I have already read Dash's when BP was in 3rd grade. I just need to brush up on those. BP started with 'Sarah, Plain and Tall' but I had never heard of the next one that she needs to read. It is called 'Esperanza Rising' by Pam Munoz Ryan. The book was based on true events. I thought that it was an excellent read - all-be-it a little too 'real' for a fifth grader perhaps - and I went through it quickly. But that's not the point here.
There is a part in the book that I wanted to reference. Esperanza and her mother were having to flee to the United States for work. She grew up very rich and her whole life was being altered quite a bit. She was used to having servants and feeling above others. The passage says:
They had been on the train for four days and nights when a woman got on with a wire cage containing six red hens. The chickens squawked and cackled and when they flapped their wings, tiny russet feathers floated around the car. The woman sat opposite Mama and Hortensia and within minutes she had told them that her name was Carmen, that her husband had died and left her with eight children, and that she had been at her brother's house helping his family with a new baby.
"Would you like dulces, sweets?" she asked Esperanza, holding open a bag.
Esperanza looked at Mama, who smiled and nodded her approval.
"Senora, why do you travel with the hens?" asked Mama.
"I sell eggs to feed my family. My brother raises hens and he gave these to me."
"And you can support your large family that way?" asked Hortensia.
Carmen smiled. "I am poor, but I am rich. I have my children, I have a garden with roses, and I have my faith and the memories of those who have gone before me. What more is there?"
When they pulled into Carmen's town, Mama gave her three of the beautiful lace carpetas she had made. "For your house," she said.
Carmen gave Mama two chickens, in an old shopping bag that she tied with string. "For your future," she said.
Then Mama, Hortensia, and Carmen hugged as if they had been friends forever.
They watched Carmen greet her waiting children, several of the little ones scrambling into her arms.
In front of the station , a crippled Indian woman crawled on her knees, her hand outstretched toward a group of ladies and gentlemen who were finely dressed in clothes like the ones that used to hang in Esperanza's closet. The people turned their backs on the begging woman but Carmen walked over and gave her a coin and some tortillas from her bag. The woman blessed her, making the sign of the cross. Then Carmen took her children's hands and walked away.
"She has eight children and sells eggs to survive. Yet when she can barely afford it she gave your mother two hens and helped the crippled woman."

I have thought a lot about that over the past few days. Farmer Bob and I have always considered ourselves poor until recently, on one occasion having to take assistance from the church to get by. Farmer Bob works hard and we are in a better position now than we have ever been in 12 years of marriage. We prayed and fasted about where we should move to after he graduated from the academy. Heavenly Father told us to go to the poorest county in the entire state. After living here for less than a year we realized that we had never actually been poor. The people in this county are poor. Some of them aren't but a majority are. I have wondered what our purpose is here, why we keep getting told that we can't move from here. I think that one reason is to humble us and we have truly been humbled. You hear stories about poor people all the time, people needing help of all kinds, but it's never a part of your world - therefor never being a part of your consciousness - until you live in it. Even though we live above it, we are still in it. When I would help at the school for things like Santa shop, I would watch the kids come in and you automatically know the ones who don't have money. The sad thing is that they just sit down, gaze at all the things that they wish they could get, and quietly wait for the others to shop. I would go to the office and put money in envelopes with children's names on them, asking the Secretary to distribute them. She would always try and talk me out of it, telling me that I was wasting my money, but I knew how those children would feel when they found out that they had just a little something to spend.
Now that we actually have extra cash at the end of the month we sit and think about all the different ways that we could spend it. Different ways that we can get out and 'finally have fun with the kids'. Big vacations, bowling or mini golf, movies at the theatre - not just rentals to watch at home - going out to eat more often, more activities to involve them in (dancing, soccer, base ball, you get the idea), etc. Not wanting their childhood to pass them or us by. Wanting to live every moment to the fullest.
But the simple truth is that we don't need to do those things to be happy even though we have the money to. Carmen's family was happy and they were poor as dirt. Did they go on super awesome vacations? Did they have Nintendos, game cubes, or cell phones? Their Mother gave them the most simple and loving example of happiness that could ever be given aside from Christ. We don't need all of those things to make us happy. Being together - doing whatever, no money required - and being unified creates happiness.
There are still starving children in the United States. What makes me and my family better than them? Because we make more money? Not a chance. The Lord doesn't just require our check of 10% and our fast offerings of two meals. The covenant that I made to live by the Law of Consecration doesn't begin after I've taken my kids on the big vacation of the year or after I have my new 4 wheeler. That is the adversary telling me that worldly things are more important than people.
Don't get the impression that I do all these wonderful things and I'm on my soap box preaching a sermon and calling for repentance. I wouldn't write about it if I didn't have work to do on myself. I struggle every day with things like wishing I had granite counter tops instead of Formica or wishing I had that grand wrap around porch that we intended to add on instead of going the most practical route and just doing the roof to a degree that makes it so we don't have rain in the house. We are trying to fix MANY things on our house before it starts falling down and it is so tempting to just get the brand new sink because it's pretty instead of using the sink that we already have that is sufficient. I have heard so many times "Awe, just get it. You deserve it." Why do I deserve it. What have I done to deserve extra privileges when Johnny down the street just lost his house or because single mom Judy can't really feed her family even though she works all the time. What makes me more special and deserving than them, even if I have the money for it.
I want to be like Carmen. I want to be like the mothers of the 2000 stripling warriors - my four precious warriors - raising them not just on words but by example. An example of benevolence and charity. I want them to recognize just how blessed they are without all those worldly things and learn to be happy with the basics - their family, a garden of roses, their faith, and the memory of those who have gone before.