Hartaku dimana?

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Yesus berkata: “Jadi, janganlah kamu mempersoalkan apa yang akan kamu makan atau apa yang akan kamu minum dan janganlah cemas hatimu. Semua itu dicari bangsa-bangsa di dunia yang tidak mengenal Allah. Akan tetapi Bapamu tahu, bahwa kamu memang memerlukan semuanya itu. Tetapi carilah Kerajaan-Nya, maka semuanya itu akan ditambahkan juga kepadamu. Janganlah takut, hai kamu kawanan kecil! Karena Bapamu telah berkenan memberikan kamu Kerajaan itu. Juallah segala milikmu dan berikanlah sedekah! Buatlah bagimu pundi-pundi yang tidak dapat menjadi tua, suatu harta di sorga yang tidak akan habis, yang tidak dapat didekati pencuri dan yang tidak dirusakkan ngengat. Karena di mana hartamu berada, di situ juga hatimu berada.” (Lukas 12:29-34 TB-LAI)

Apakah Yesus seorang yang naif? Apakah Dia tidak memahami bahwa kita hidup di dunia yang menuntut kita untuk bekerja dengan keras dengan membanting tulang agar bisa memenuhi kebutuhan pokok kita? Ketika Anda membaca bagian Injil ini, Anda akan melihat bahwa Yesus sama sekali tidak naif. Suatu hari Dia berkata kepada para murid-Nya: “Pergilah, sesungguhnya Aku mengutus kamu seperti anak domba ke tengah-tengah serigala. ” (Lukas 10:3).

Dalam teks ini, saat Dia berkata bahwa Allah mengetahui dengan baik segenap kebutuhan anak-anak-Nya, Yesus mengetahui bahwa umat manusia memiliki kebutuhan-kebutuhan. Lantas, apa maksud Yesus saat berkata kepada para murid-Nya dengan nada memerintah: “Jangan kuatir”?

Di dalam dunia yang dikagumkan oleh rasa aman dan kenyamanan, Injil mengajukan sebuah pertanyaan mendasar: dalam hal apa aku meletakkan kepercayaanku sepenuhnya?, hal-hal apa saja yang berharga bagiku? Yesus berkata kepada para murid-Nya, di mana terletak harta mereka, disitulah hati mereka akan berada. Hati, dalam Alkitab, dipahami sebagai pusat dari keberadaan diri seseorang. Pusat di mana segala sesuatunya terangkum bersama—kecerdasan, kehendak, kemampuan kita untuk memutuskan sesuatu dan keinginan-keinginan hati yang terdalam. Dengan mudah kita dapat pula mengatakan bahwa hati dapat melekatkan diri pada harta yang dimilikinya. Itulah sebabnya sangatlah penting bagi kita untuk dapat menentukan pilihan dengan bijaksana dan mengakarkan diri pada apa yang sungguh-sungguh penting bagi kita.

Bagi Yesus, harta baginya adalah Kerajaan Allah. Berbicara tentang Kerajaan Allah berarti berbicara tentang Allah. Melekatkan hati kepada Kerajaan Allah adalah cara untuk mengungkapkan bahwa Allah dapat memberikan rasa aman yang sejati dan memberi arti bagi kehidupan kita.

Seorang murid adalah seseorang yang mencoba untuk menghayati kehidupan secara radikal dan melalui cara yang baru; percaya bahwa Allah, yang disebutkan sebanyak dua kali sebagai seorang “Bapa”, tahu apa yang kita butuhkan. ketika hati kita telah memahami hal ini maka hal-hal yang kita butuhkan untuk bisa hidup tidak lagi menjadi sumber dari kehidupan atau kunci dari kebahagiaan kita. Segala sesuatunya menemukan tempatnya masing-masing. “Bangsa-bangsa di dunia yang tidak mengenal Allah,” sebagaimana sebutan yang dikatakan oleh Yesus, melekatkan hati mereka di tempat yang salah, yaitu pada kekuatiran mereka.

Iman kepercayaan dapat membuka dan mengubah kehidupan seorang murid. “Juallah segala milikmu dan berikanlah sedekah.” Bagi mereka yang mendengarkan perkataan ini dan melaksanakannya, kehidupan mereka “kembali diluruskan”. Kebutuhan-kebutuhan pribadi mereka tidak lagi menjadi hal yang terpenting; mereka memulai kehidupan mereka bagi sesama. Dari yang semula yag berpusat hanya pada diri sendiri, mereka bergerak menuju kehidupan yang saling berbagi. Tentu saja ini merupakan cara hidup dari jemaat Kristen mula-mula (lihat Kis. 2:45; 4:34-37). Mungkin banyak orang mulai percaya bahwa Injil adalah benar-benar Kabar Baik karena mereka melihat bahwa bagi pengikut Kristus, Injil bukanlah hanya sekedar ungkapan kosong.

Dimanakah hartaku? Bagaimana kata-kata Yesus ini dapat mengubah caraku melihat prioritas-prioritas yang ada?

Jika aku harus menyederhanakan kehidupanku, baik secara material maupun spiritual, apa yang harus aku kesampingkan? Dan apa yang harus aku pertahankan?

Burma monks…

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Burma monks remove a roof damaged by Cyclone Nargis on the outskirt of Rangoon, Burma.

AP

Rangoon travel agent Chin Chin used to take tourists to a nearby Irrawaddy delta town famous for its pottery. But the vast waterworld of rivers and rice fields that stretched beyond it was a foreign land to her until Cyclone Nargis and its horrific aftermath. On Thursday, Chin Chin and her friends bought rice and water, loaded it on a truck, and drove deep into the delta. She was shocked by what she saw: roads lined with hundreds of cold and hungry villagers, disregarded by their own government, who had walked for an hour from their broken villages to beg from passing motorists.

“They were mostly housewives,” recalls Chin Chin, who goes by the nickname. “They told me, ‘Rice is a must, so it’s worth standing in the rain for three or four hours to get some.’ They didn’t even have a change of clothes.” Fighting back her tears, Chin Chin gave out rice and listened to stories of families torn apart and villages destroyed. “It was piteous,” she says. “I really sympathized with them. We didn’t see any aid from government or foreign groups.”

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Chin Chin belongs to a burgeoning homegrown relief effort which is capturing Burmese from all walks of life. Students and shopkeepers, medics and models — thousands of people have now donated money, food or services to Nargis victims. Hundreds like Chin Chin are delivering aid themselves, while privately run local charities are reorienting their operations around cyclone relief.

While they continue to make it difficult for foreigners to offer aid, Burma’s generals welcome the help of their own people — at least officially. “Myanmar people’s generosity is amazing,” marvels a recent article in The New Light of Myanmar, a state-run newspaper.* Privately, however, they must be getting nervous. Ordinary Burmese are horrified by the suffering of their compatriots and angry at the junta’s inadequate attempts to alleviate it. Their humanitarian efforts could well spark a political one, especially as it also involves Buddhist monks, who last September led the biggest anti-government protests Burma had seen for nearly 20 years.

Private donors have faced some government restrictions. Those who arrive in the towns have been asked to hand over their relief supplies to local authorities for distribution. Instead, many are reportedly storing the goods with sympathetic locals and secretly distributing them by themselves. The junta doesn’t want foreigners distributing aid in the delta, but neither does it feel comfortable with Burmese distributing it. “The government is scared that relief workers will get involved in politics,” says a co-founder of one Burmese relief group.

Some are involved already. Celebrated actor Kyaw Thu, who was jailed for a month for joining last September’s demonstrations, runs the Free Funeral Services Society, a private charity offering free cremations for the poor. It is now operating its own relief effort, with volunteers at its Rangoon headquarters loading up delta-bound trucks with donated goods.

Another anti-junta stalwart is comedian Zaganar (the name means “Tweezers”), also briefly jailed for his role in last year’s protests. Zaganar and his celebrity friends have bought food and medical supplies for Nargis victims and are using their names to raise more funds. Both the disaster and the grassroots response to it are unprecedented in Burma. “I think there will be political consequences,” he says. “People are very angry with the government.”

The monks are also on the move again. Buddhist temples and monasteries have always played a central role in helping the needy in Burma (as, in this religiously and ethnically diverse country, have churches, mosques and Hindu temples). After the cyclone, monks led small-scale relief efforts into the delta, the distinctive multicolored flags of their faith fluttering from cars and small trucks. Monks from well-known monasteries in Mandalay and elsewhere in Burma are either in the delta or heading there, while in Pakkoku — the Irrawaddy town near Mandalay where last year’s protests originated — their brethren are reportedly soliciting donations for cyclone victims. Shwe Pyi Hein Monastery, which already runs a free clinic in Rangoon, has dispatched five volunteer doctors to the disaster area, who are treating more than 100 people every day.

Despite the participation of thousands of Burmese, the impact of this homegrown relief effort will always limited, admits Zaganar. “We deliver our supplies by road because we cannot afford a boat,” he says. “But most victims live close to the water. We cannot get through to them.” He says Burma desperately needs more boats and helicopters from abroad. Not even the nation’s richest private donors — who include junta cronies like tycoon Tay Za, who was put on a U.S. sanctions list last year — have the means or expertise to meet even a fraction of the needs in far-flung delta areas.

*The junta that rules the country unilaterally decreed changes in place names, including Myanmar for Burma and Yangon for the former capital Rangoon. The U.S. State Department has not recognized these changes. TIME has chosen to retain the name Burma.

the doors of problem…

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