The Rich for the Poor



Adam and I about to be inspired.


Well, I had an absolutely surreal experience this past Tuesday. Somehow, I was invited to a private event at Carnegie Hall.
One.org and Red.com were both celebrating their 10 year anniversaries. One.org is an anti poverty activist organization that lobbies governments and companies to do more to reduce global poverty. Red.com is an organization that encourages well known brands to donate portions of sales of speciality products to the Global Fund - which works towards an AIDS free future.
I have volunteered for One since its very beginnings and have purchased Red products. But, I am still stupefied as to how I managed to get this extremely exclusive invite.

The event honored Bill and Melinda Gates and Michael Bloomberg and a couple of other people I was not familiar with. Some of those who participated were:
Bono
The Edge
Miley Cyrus
Bill Clinton
Joe Biden
Stephen Colbert
Trevor Noah
Sting

It was unbelievable. I had 2 tickets so decided to take my 11 yr. old son, Adam. We got into Manhattan a couple hours early and grabbed a pizza at a nearby restaurant. Then we headed over to Carnegie Hall. There was a lot of security, due to the presence of a former President and a current Vice President.

We settled into our seats which were in the second balcony but had a clear view of the stage. And then the show began. It was interspersed with videos, musical performances and speeches from some of the notable folks. Stephen Colbert was the absolutely funniest performer with his tribute to Bill and Melinda Gates.
Bono and The Edge closed the show out with 4 U2 songs, accompanied by a full orchestra and a choir. It was quite stunning.

I was quite moved that these people who hold on to a disproportionate amount of wealth and power still see altruism as a virtue. "Good people who are doing good", as Miley Cyrus called it. It was a strong apologetic that God's common grace flows through us all. We still have enough of his image stamped on us that we pursue his desires of justice and equity, even if we don't have Him as a priority in our lives.

Another thing that was quite evident is that Bono is quite clearly a prophet raised up "for a time such as this".  Every single celebrity praised Bono's leadership and inspiration with the Vice President himself claiming to be "a disciple in the church of Bono". Thank God that He has raised up such an amazing disciple like Bono! Bono has used his gift of celebrity to do more to raise awareness for these social issues than anyone else on the planet. May his tribe increase.

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