Archive for August, 2008

If you’re curious about what “it” looks like…

August 22, 2008 at 6:36 pm · Filed under Uncategorized

It is so easy to get lost and confused in making the steps from vision to practice, rhetoric to right thinking and right living.  What is it that we actually DO in our quest to bring God’s vision for us to pass?  When do we go from intention through transition to doing “it”?  Is it in relocation?  Is it in joining a ministry team and getting involved?  Is it in leading people to Christ? Is it in great sacrifices and cultural transformation? I think that it could be all these things, but none of these are the essence of “it.” 

I was talking with Mary Hinkle this week.  She was so excited about things going on in her relationship with some of the older girls from Pearl Lane.  As she shared I was so excited because Mary was describing “it.”

Mary knows the girls from Pearl Lane, but didn’t really know them personally.  She was happy that they were willing to help with VBS.  The girls were leaders over groups of younger kids and did a great job, especially because we were so short handed.  As a thank you she asked them out to dinner.  Mary recalls how awkward and difficult that first outing was.  They stayed close together and were hesitant and critical about the things they weren’t used to.

Mary asked for they’d like to help organize clothes for the garage-sale-like clothing store we do with Cross-Cultrual Ministries at Pearl Lane.  They went by the building to take a look and met Josh and Margaret working on re-cycling some bikes and thought that was really cool.  They said they’d help and came back with Mary the next night.  They sorted all the bag loads and picked out clothes for themselves, but not just for themselves.  They picked some out for other girls who needed some things and for a new baby that was about to be born. Mary was really blessed to see their caring, committed hearts toward others. 

To Mary’s surprise they asked to come to church that Sunday (they’re still coming, btw).  One thing that strikes them about the church is the friendliness of everyone, especially the respectfulness and good humor of the men they see on Sunday. 

Mary regularly askes them to join her in her running about.  They went down to Midtown, met Mary’s son and walked all over Piedmont Park together, and got coffee at a cafe.  They went to a jewelry wholesale place and started do work with beads doing their own jewelry.  They went to the Chamblee centennial celebration together and one Sunday showed mary around Plaza Fiesta.  They’ve prepared meals together and Mary has learned some of their favorites.   

Mary is amazed at how close the community is at Pearl Lane.  How much they know and care for friends and neighbors.  When they go to Mary’s house they ask her about her neighbors, who the are, does she know them.  The contrast is stark and convicting.  They are seeing both the good and the bad of what life is like outside their neighborhood.   

Last Saturday it all of suddenly went very deep very fast.

They were sitting around doing jewelry and talking when the conversation went to relationships, dating, church experiences, family stuff.  They asked deep and penetrating questions.  Mary got to share her life and the Lord’s grace.  To hear Mary describe it there was a joy, a connection, and a vitality to it.  Yet It was all so – natural.  Friendship went deeper and Mary’s love and respect (which was already there) grew exponentially. 

So here are some things I want us to be aware of: 

Mary too a chance and reached out to say thank you (risk tasking).  She invited them into her life, heart, and home (hospitality) and gave/gives the best of her time and attention (generosity).  If it gets difficult she perseveres and works things out (forgiveness).  But these girls are not a project, a target, or an outcome.  They are her friends and she dearly loves them. 

What Mary didn’t do:  start a Bible study (which is usually perceived as wanting get together to demonstrate how ignorant the other person is), start a program, rush/push/demand, share the gospel without know or caring about the person.  It wasn’t a hit-and-run spiritual strafing where Mary dives in and swoopes back out to the suburbs for a safe landing. 

It’s love and friendship.  It’s so simple.  So profoundly, counter-culturally simple.  “It” is love stripped down and basic – spending time together, person-to-person, laughing, sharing, learning, respecting, growing.  All our rhetoric about vision, mission, core practices, reaching the disenfranchised and poor, swimming against culture and incarnating the Kingdom comes down to this – putting yourself in a position to fall in love with people the Lord has directed us to.  Not just because they need him, but because we need them to show us the parts of the gospel we can’t grasp because of where and how we live.  The Lord wants to bring ALL of us alive together.  At least that’s how I see Mary’s story. 

Peace

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What will you do when I call?

August 7, 2008 at 2:34 pm · Filed under Adventures, Current Events, Discipleship ·Tagged , , ,

O.K., you’re sitting at home and you get a call from me.  “I’ve just met someone who needs a place to stay tonight.  Can you feed ‘em and give them a place for tonight?”  I tell you what I know about them.  What do you say?  What would you need to know?  What if they’re homeless?  What if they’ve just gotten out of prison or rehab or whatever?

I’m asking because this happened this week.  Someone from the fellowship helped a woman out at a gas station.  He gave her my phone number and she contacted me about getting some help to get out of the heat.  I took a sister along and met with her.  We listened to her story, and checked it out.  Everything checked out.  She got a good word from a former pastor north of Atlanta.  In fact this is the type of situation tailor-made for evangelicals.  The woman had a job and was trying to survive the next week until she started working again.  She wasn’t consistently homeless, just in a tough stretch.  She was organized, articulate, and kind.

While I didn’t have any money to get her a room in a hotel, I did know people who had homes with A/C, so I prayed (I prayed a lot from the moment of the phone call, throughout the initial discussion, and in looking for solutions).  One couple consistently came to my mind because they didn’t have kids at home, and because I had this sense that they could minister to her.  So I called.  This was my first ever call like this.  I essentially asked, “Would you be able to open your home tonight to a stranger?”  Lord bless ‘em, they talked and prayed and said “yes.”  I was so impressed.  They had so much going on.  I mean really BIG stuff going on.  But they felt like they should. 

I’m asking all this about hospitality because I am hoping that you’ll have the conversation now so that you’ll be ready when I do call to know what you want to know, to know your fears, your boundaries, etc.  I would never demand that anyone participate in such a thing.  If it’s not love and a gift of faith to the Lord it’s no good to anyone.  It may be that being hospitable this way is a longing and a desire in you, but at the particular moment it isn’t good for you or your family.  That’s cool.  It may be that there isn’t a snowballs chance in the Sahara that you’d ever do anything like this.  I’d love to talk with you about it.  Regardless of whether any of us actually do open our homes to a stranger, we still need to be sure we know the Lord’s word and will on the matter, that we think through the implications and wisdom for discerning a particular decision, etc.  That’s what this note is intended to inspire.  What would you do?  What would you want to know? 

As it turns out, when I asked the woman what she wanted to do she felt really uncomfortable going into a stranger’s house.  Not because of fear, but because she didn’t want to be under a microscope.  She didn’t want to be interrogated about her life and decisions.  She was tired in every sense of the word. I was amazed, but listened.  I talked about the family, and even told her that I would ask them to give her space.  She was sure and asked if I couldn’t get her a room.  I told her I did get her a room.  She looked so miserable. 

It was fascinating for me to watch because I grudgingly admired the spark of independence and defiance that I saw.  There was some steel inside of her that made me know she wasn’t a broken husk(even though I thought she wasn’t thinking clearly and was making a bad decision).  I changed tack and asked her how we could bless her if not with food, shelter, and safety.  She asked for a tent and a bike.  My eyes got a little big because we hadn’t talked about Communicycle or the re-cycled bike program.  Turns out that Josh and Margaret also had an old, leaky-when-it-rained 2-person tent (she said, “I can get a tarp for the rain”).  Communicycle worked late, late into the morning on Tuesday night/Weds morning to put together a bike for her.  When she saw theh bike for the first time today she cried.  It felt really good to see her ride out withe her new bike and tent.  It felt great to - ultimately – be able to bless her. 

Back to my point:  One of our core practices – the concrete expressions of what it means to love the Lord and other people – is hospitality, especially hospitality to strangers.  If this is to become more than rhetoric on a web site we need to be talking and praying and preparing – talking about our understanding and fears, praying to grow and for praying for opportunities, and preparing our homes should the Lord bring someone to us.  Heather and I talked about it.  In fact we would have let her come to our house the next night if she needed it. 

I’d love to know what you talk about, and how you process all of this.  If not me, please talk with others in the fellowship about all of this.  It’s important.  It’s central to who the Lord is asking us to become.  We are not being called to solve short-term problems only (like a room for a night), or to be professional, or set up systems of care.   All of those can be good they’re just not what the Lord is asking of us.  What he is asking of us is to open our hearts and lives to actually love actual people.  Not theories, problems, theological categories, or good intentions, but people.  Complex, inconvenient, different people. 

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