I Am

Recently, our church staff saw this together at a local theater. I was touched and moved to watch someone from the secular world bring about such truth. I encourage all of you to see it!

A Chicago take on Matthew 23:27

Oh Chicago, Chicago

You who segregate your neighborhoods and warehouse your poor

How I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings

and you were not willing.

and then, God...

wept.

What is your name?

A few months ago, I got a call from my friend Johanna's office phone. "My purse was stolen - call me." Naturally, I called her back right away. Someone picked up who clearly wasn't her and whose voice I didn't recogniz,e asking me who I was. "Who is THIS?" I asked. "Who is this? I asked you first!" the voice said. I racked my brain...who could be in the office that sounds like this? All the sudden I realized...Johanna's office phone always forwards to her cell..this was the guy that had stolen the purse! My heart raced and my mind sped up. What do I say?? I thought. "Are you talking on a phone that is not yours?" I asked. "It's mine now - I found it!" he said. "You didn't find it - you took it from my friend, and she is really worried about getting it back!" "Well, what is she going to give me for it?" The voice said. I lightheartedly said "You can't sell something that is not yours!" "Well, why don't you meet me and give me some money for it!" I just laughed and said "Now come on! Didn't you hear me? You can't sell something that is not yours! I have a friend who owns a liquor store downtown - can you come leave it here? I will tell you how to get there. You take the green line to Adams and La..." click. No he didn't just hang up on me! I rang and rang and rang until the voice picked up again. "Don't you know that it is rude to hang up on someone who is talking to you!?" I scolded. "You were taking too long!" the voice complained (not the first time I have heard this, mind you!) "Well, I wasn't done. I was telling you how to get to the liquor store to drop off my friend's stuff. Like I said, just take the green line..." then a mumbling...and some other voices and...click. Again - there was no way I was letting him go this easy! I rang and rang and didn't get an answer...so I rang her cell number directly and... "hello?" the voice answered! "I thought I told you before that it is rude to hang up on people who are talking to you!"I, again, scolded. "I thought you heard me say hold on a minute!" the voice said, sounding apologetic. "Ok, but you should have let me finish!" So he did, and actually agreed to return it. Our interaction had brought me to feelings of pity and almost endearment toward him, this nameless voice on the phone. "What is your name?" I gently asked. "Tease" was the only reply that I got. Laughing, I said "Well, Ok "tease", thank you for agreeing to return the stuff."

When I finally got a chance to talk to Johanna, I found out that it wasn't just two kids playing around, it was two guys with a gun, two guys who had been pretty agressive with her. I realized that "Tease" really was teasing...and there was no way that the stuff would be returned.

The interaction was an important one for me, however. Here was a person who went from villan to person, from "voice" to having a name...even if he didn't give me his real one. The mugging happened in broad daylight, right around the area I'm looking to move in only 2 short months. It was a reminder that though broken people do broken things, they have names, they have faces...they have hearts that are broken and in need of God's love.

My dad sent the following email to Johanna only days later:

this is why we go there

this is the darkness
people live there
people don't want to live in darkness but they are trapped
do we leave them to die alone?
no, we go there, to be with them. this is the gospel. this is exactly what God did for us in the darkness- He came to BE with us, and it cost him his life.
like in the reformation, by becoming baptized we are marked men and women- a price on our heads. it is paul, gaining consciousness and marching back into lystra. we are baptized into a "take up your cross and follow me" faith. following jesus meant probably getting killed.
did you read shane where he was asked, "aren't you afraid, living in the inner city?" He replied, "I'm more afraid of the suburbs." where christians can live peaceable lives, unhindered, unchallenged- little risk, and growing comfortable with denying the pain of the world around us.
ask hannah about what julius said, when a girl from the youth group was freaking out as we walked by the crack house. she sensed that she was no longer in her safe existence and he comforted her with these words (a 15 year old black boy from the hood who knew what it all boils down to- the root of all security and insecurity-) "Don't worry- they can only kill your body."

i am so proud of you for who you are and what you stand for and pray that this experience will just grow your compassion for the troubled souls out there who are so desperate. pray daily for the guy who took your stuff. he does not realize that God directed his path to a child of God... God's greatest hope for him is that he would have what you have- pray daily for him.

mostly we don't fear because we have not experienced the horror
it's really not faith, but probabilities
when our car was stolen, we would either learn to be paranoid about locking the car
or learn that we could live fine without a car. we learned that something we feared a little happened to us and we still did fine. and in response to satan, i don't just not curse, not fear, but i do praise. i figure the best way to get back at satan is to respond to anything sent my way that is designed to topple me- i'll just respond with praise.

don't feel bad if you have some ptsd... or need some time to regain your nerve. but just don't refuse to get back on the horse, and for now, surround yourself with people who love you and hold you up and understand why you are working/volunteering there in the first place.

and here is a good theme song for a time like this:
steve camp
living dangerously in the hands of god
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vbmsq1soVio

love you
rusty and mary lou

i hope you learn not to be afraid

and then, God...

broke my heart for what breaks His

clothe yourself with humility

I had dinner with friends last night who raised some good questions about my move. Actually, so many good questions that by then end of our time together it was just a big mess of doubt about the wisdom of it all. This is not the first time that I had come across this scepticsm, but because I love and hold their opinion in very high regard I became discouraged thinking about the impossibility of the task at hand.

Did I realize that my whole life would change? They asked. Did I realize that I would never fit in by the simple fact that I had a job and would be going in and out of the neighborhood each day? I did. Did I realize that I would have to forsake most friendships and time out of the neighborhood, and even then, would have to wait years before forming significant friendships? I had. Did I realize that my job at the salon would not last, because of the simple fact about how I dressed there, not fitting with how people dressed in the neighborhood, or perhaps even making me a target?

As I was warming up the car to go home, very much overwhelmed, I heard a small whisper.

Clothe yourself with humility...

I had to smile. Colossians 3:12 says:

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.

I can try to dress like them, talk like them, dye my hair back brown instead of barbie-blond, but in the end, that is not what will win them over.

and then, God...

reminded me that I am His chosen, and I am holy and dearly loved.

Ain't my kind of God

Taken from "Reaching up for Manhood" by Goeffrey Canada. (This book and "Fist Stick Knife Gun" were two that I recenty read and couldn't put down)

"Okay. You really want to know what I think? All right, you serious so I'll be serious. If there was a God would he let things be done like this? Look at this shit, man. People killing one another, kids selling drugs, mothers leaving their babies to get high. Look how people living - like roaches. Garbage everwhere. And why God pick on us? I didn't do anything to God. Why he make my life so miserable? Naw, man, ain't no God. Any God would let people without nothing always get fucked over, while those with money don't give a fuck, aint my kind of God. If there is a God he is on the side of rich people. Rich people invented that God thing so they can keep fucking over the poor and poor people won't fight for a piece of the pie. That's what I think." (Reaching up for Manhood, page 94.)

Well, it's not my kind of God, either. John 1 by the message said that "The Word became Flesh and Blood and moved into the neighborhood." Then, it became a Spirit who dwelled in us and...we stayed away from the neighborhood.

Why?

and then, God...

prompted me to ask myself...

If not me, then who? If not now, then when?

Courage is not the absence of fear...

December was a month of celebration! God did some amazing things to show me that the doors were indeed closing in my current place and that it was out with the old, in with the new! What new, you may ask? No clue! But I celebrated the decision to move to East Garfield Park next year. It is so like God to clearly close doors while not showing you the open ones. I believe that God does this because he knows how human we are, and how easily we take control and forget all about Him! By not knowing the future, we cling in an even greater way to Him and the unknown plans yet to be unveiled before us!.

January I start volunteering in my new neighborhood on a regular basis as well as the month to start looking for places to rent. In a surprise move, a house became available that seemed cheap and reasonably fixable.

Now the next crisis isn't what neighborhood but the question- buy? not buy? In walking to it the first day I was surrounded by several men who seemed to think my name was either "snow white" or "sexy" as I was refered to as both. When the first one approached me, he asked if I wanted to buy some really good weed. I just laughted and said no, and kept walking.

Two things struck me here. First, sadness. The only time a white woman walks down this street is when she is looking for good weed? We blast the "ghettos" for being full of drugs, but who is really keeping that business alive? Them, or the people who drive in from their "nice safe neighborhoods" to buy it and leave again?

The second, was how the same situation was being viewed two different ways. I am called snow white and feel danger, while the young man might have just been curious about why I was there in the first place. I am called sexy and inform the man that "I don't talk to people who call me that" and he informes ME that it was a compliment. Oh. So what I take as threatening, he takes as giving a compliment.

and then, God...showed me I have SO much to learn.

When processing the event, and finding out that the block has the highest crime in the whole neighborhood, I had to come to terms with my frustration over my own fear. My prayer up to this point had been to not be afraid. But then I was reminded that Jesus was so fearful that he sweat BLOOD. But courage trumped fear, and the greater purpose trumped courage. For courage alone would lead you to fight, but courage that leads to a greater prupose leads to peace and a calm resolve to walk through the cup God has set before you.

and then, God...showed me to pray for courage, greater purpose, and not a lack of fear.

Adventure, not fear!

Lots of thoughts these days about future - especially in regards to my next neighborhood. I decided to do a sweets fast for a few months as an extra prayer for God to use me and lead me in this new direction.

I have always felt that the good needs to run to the bad, or the bad just gets worse. But has my life reflected it? Not so much. It is to a point of urgency that I don't feel like I'll TRULY be living my beliefs until I am fully immersed in the complexity of poverty and all that comes with it.

Scared?

Oh yeah.

But do I live by fear, or by adventure? When Luke and Kat left for South America, I prayed that they be "not safe, but smart." How often to we confuse these two, and keep ourselves from a situation that God really needed us for? The Bible says to not love our lives so much as to flee from death, and to not fear that that can harm the body. Why don't we see people live this more often?

I want to live by adventure, not fear. I want to grow my faith and run where no one will go - reach those that no one will reach. I want to be the hands and feet of Jesus in the darkest places, and I want to hound other Christ followers until they do it with me.

A few weeks ago a few of the girls from my salon came with me to the shelter I go to each week. In only a half hour, their whole perspective on those guys, and homelessness in general was completely changed. They were telling me about how touched they were by the experience, and I told them that if my life didn't reflect the things I talk about, what credibility to I even have? What credibility does God have, for that matter, if I'm suppose to be representing him here on earth?

So I will choose adventure, and not fear, and I will run the race marked out for me before time began. I will not love my life so much as to flee from death, or discomfort, or poverty. I will risk all for the sake of the one who seeks to reconcile all people - even the worst of the worst - to Himself.

and then, God...

who knows? but i hope :)