THE OREGONIAN THURSDAY. MARCH 27.2003
Paying it forward a premise of biblical values
MY TURN
Christina Berry
C
atherine Ryan Hyde's "Pay It Forward" is a story about how the world is changed when a boy does three good deeds and asks the recipients to pay it forward, not pay it back. The premise is great, but not new.
In fact, another book that exhorts humanity to do the same has a much bigger sales record: the Bible.
"Pay It Forward" is the book picked for Washington County READS 2003, the county's inaugural community reading program. Every county resident is encouraged to read Hyde's novel, attend or lead discussion groups, view the movie and meet the author as the grand finale next month.
Most won't realize they are discussing ideas based on biblical themes. "Pay It Forward," it could be argued, illustrates Christianity in all its perfection being lived out through imperfect people.
"Oh, come on!" you might say. "What does the Bible have to do with the book, the movie or the movement?" Plenty, if we believe a recent Gallup Poll in which 46 percent of Americans who responded described themselves as evangelical or born-again Christians.
In Washington County, 75 percent of the population has library cards, according to the Cooperative Library Services. That means many of the targets of Washington County READS are Christian.
How many people are actually participating? According to Anya Doll, a Forest Grove librarian, the response has been fantastic. Copies of the book have been leaping, if not flying, off the shelf. More than a dozen people have signed up for training to lead a group discussion. The leaders range from twentysome-things to 60-year-olds. The book is crossing age boundaries, just as organizers hoped.
How does this lofty plan translate into reality?
Recently, my husband and I were running errands in Forest Grove. As we drove down a busy street, we no-
ticed a man in a wheelchair by the curb with his arm raised. We took a few minutes to circle the block to go back to see if he was OK.
His wheelchair was stuck on the drop-off of a driveway curb. Had we not stopped, who knows how long he might have waited for help.
With that simple act, we changed that man's day and found ourselves wishing that opportunities to help someone fell so easily into our path every day. Then we realized they do, but opportunities are easily overlooked if we aren't paying attention.
So should we follow the example of the boy in Hyde's novel? Maybe, but it is far better to strive to be like me one who invented paying it forward. Jesus gave his life, not to save one or two people, but the entire world. His sacrifice continues to pay forward 2,000 years after his death and Resurrection.
In "Pay It Forward," the boy's plan succeeds exponentially, and the present is "turned into a world where no one goes hungry, no one is cold, no one is without a job or a ride or a loan." Sounds like heaven on Earth. Could we really pay it forward and change the world in this way?
A few weeks ago, more than 40 teenagers from Wapato Valley Church in Gaston participated in the 30-Hour Famine, a nationwide movement to empower young people with the ability to make a difference in the life of a starving child. They went without food for 30 hours while engaging in community service.
With the pledges the students solicited, and donations from the church, more than $3,000 was raised to help famine victims in South Africa. But that's not the most amazing part.
The U.S. government, through a special grant, will match those funds by a factor of 12. That translates to more than $36,000 going to needy children because of a small group of teenagers. In countries where families live on $6 a month, those young adults changed more lives than they will ever know.
The top earner was Weston Addington, a 13-year-old seventh-grader. He is responsible for feeding 24 families from the donations he raised.
"When my stomach started to ask for food, I would pray to God that he would help me through this," Weston said. "This is the longest I have gone without food, and it helped me realize the hunger that many people face all the time."
Visit www.30hourfamine.org or www.worldvision.org to donate or learn of the success those organizations have had in helping developing nations.
All of Washington County has been called to action. What can you do? For information on how you can pay it forward or donate directly, visit www.payitforward-foundation-org.
Christina Berry lives in Forest Grove with her husband and two young children. A graduate of' Pacific University, she and her mother have written a novel and are starting work on a second one. She is active in the Wapato Valley Church.