Neglecting Jerusalem

Growing up, I was surrounded by mission oriented programs and information. I was a GA and an Acteen. I have heard countless of missionaries speak, I have supported the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering, and I spent an entire summer working at an inner city church camp. An awareness of the importance of missions is something that I can't remeber being without.
This being said, in the past couple of years, and especially recently, I have felt an incredible pull in a specific type of mission work. I look around and I see people going on mission trips left and right. I admire these people and I know that they are doing a mighty work for the Lord. However, as wonderful as those things are, I can't help but notice a very obvious need going overlooked. The need for local missions.
It never ceases to amaze me how there are people who do not hesitate to sacrifice their summers, hygiene and often safety to travel to a foreign land for mission work,but then the local single mother, unemployed father, and foster child will go unnoticed. It seems so odd that we will sacrifice countless hours for "church work" but we don't have five minutes to help the elderly woman with her groceries, or 5 bucks for the person behind us in McDs. I don't understand how we can be so blind to the needs around us.
For example, there was a girl who had worked at her local church all day for vbs. When. It was time for her to go home she couldn't find a ride. As a last resort she finally called an outside source who asked why she couldn't find a ride from someone there. The girl responded, "They are in a missions meeting."
To me this says volumes about the church today. I am not devaluing the importance of foreign missions, but trying to express the huge need that every single one of us face on a weekly basis. There is sometimes such a focus on foreign missions being the most important, that when a need-like this girl- is in our midst, we completely overlook it.
ACts 1:8 says, " You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, all over Judea and Samaria, even to the ends of the world."
I can't help but feel that the church as a whole is skipping right over the first part of instructions . Again, I can't stress enough that foreign missions are equally important as local. But that's just it, they are equal and we are, at times, ignoring the local ones completely.
I just pray that we can begin to open our eyes to the pain around us: right next door, down the street or next to you in class or at work.
Isn't it time for us to cease neglecting our very own "Jerusalem"?