Emancipation: A Surrender to God

You may be hearing news covering Juneteenth, yesterday’s celebration of Emancipation Day in 1865. And how about the 72 Philadelphia police officers placed on administrative duty over thousands of discriminatory social media posts? Some of them will lose their jobs. Thank you, Philly, for setting an example. And thanks to Pennsylvania's governor for designating June 19 as a state holiday. We've got so much more to do.

Two years ago I wrote a post rather apropos. In fact, it's the last one I wrote here. (It's a decree of its own sort. Please do read it.) Then this past weekend, I planned to share similar words to embolden men in particular to conduct themselves distinctively from the seeming throngs across our country. The words below come from Rule for a New Brother, first published in the UK in 1973. Let us dream, friends. That is, let’s prayerfully envision...

Human freedom is being threatened more than ever. Set yourself against everything that oppresses people. Free yourself from a world that seeks pleasures and possessions and bring others to share your freedom. Set yourself against everything that makes people slaves, politically, economically, socially. You have nothing to lose. No doubt you will have noticed that humanity’s bondage is to sin, to our short-sighted attachment to ourselves. Through your radical surrender to God you will be freed from this and become a deliverer of other people, a breath of fresh air for those you meet, a servant of all, a source of life, expectation and hope.

Read across the Scriptures and we find Jesus as the sign of Jubilee - the time of the Lord's favor, the day all of Nature is set free! He gives LIFE. As followers of his way, we will be his kind of deliverers! 

Now
In this earth
May the social, political, economic
Fathers and Mothers in our societies 

Begin again to collectively, palpably and
Humbly portray our call to FREEDOM.
We will see the great JUBILEE.

Amen.

I still believe

As our pastor taught last week from the scriptures on the valley of dry bones (Ezekiel 37), part of me wanted to jump up and cheer while another part ached, weary.  It was more than a year ago in the prayer room when the same verses were spoken over our community.  You shall live . . . Come O Breath . . .  know that I am Lord . . . But we've been bearing burdens of that hope much longer than a year (and baring all at times) to see what's dead here come back to life.
I still believe.

There's a young man from our town who was running from police for weeks.  He's been arraigned, accused of murder.  While he was missing I prayed ardently for him and wrote the poem/lyric below.  At some point in those petitions, my mind went to the disbelief of the sisters of Lazarus when Jesus had failed to save their brother from death.  To them, it was over.  To whom would it not be?  I imagine for some this murder case is a closed one as well.  GUILTY - no matter what the law says about maintaining innocence and not to mention the redemption and new life in which many of us claim to believe.

Jesus' reply to Mary and Martha was to share in their sorrow without leaving the loss as the final word.  He asked the question,

"Did I not tell you that if you believed

you would see the glory of God?"
(John 11:40)

And then he brought Lazarus back from death.  Mary and Martha showed disbelief but there came resurrection anyway!

It is belief in the Risen One, the Conqueror, that is my resolve.  It must be.  When nobody seems to get the Dream.  When everything around me looks a lost cause.  When I've seemed to have lost my own way in the valley.  I'll not let death have the last word.  I'm gonna tell stories of hope. 

May we see Your Glory.
 

On My Mind

Face in the news
Face on my mind
Face in my memory from days before

Of a kid on the run
Of a kid in my mind
A kid I remember who stayed next door

If you're to blame
Or whether you're blameless
Neither will tell the half of the story
The one about children still being brought up
to do nothing less and expect nothing more
Than carry on curses handed on down
in cruelty, dejection, futility, turmoil

Who will speak life
Who will keep hope
Which are the stories we choose to tell

If we breathe hope
If we speak life
We follow the call of Ezekiel

Awaken the stories of children in families
who want nothing less but expect what is more:
To break every curse and snuff out the cruelty
That all see in your face their own son or brother

Face in the news
Kid on the run
Blameless in every mind you become

Heed

When school was closed for MLK Day, we'd just been away without the kids for five days.  A nice winter's day inside was all we had planned.  Then a knock at the door.  More than a year had passed since a visit from LT, our old neighbor.  He wanted a ride into the next town and thought he'd try us.  He didn't need to get there fast, so he stayed for a while.  Over the next couple of hours, we ate together, drank tea and coffee, prayed, talked theology and played with the kids. 

I felt Grace move so freely that morning.  (Oh, when we let it do so!)  The kids were in and out of conversation and back and forth in play.  Cooking, clean-up and dishes just flowed along with the chatter and jokes and childhood stories.  Nothing out of place.  More than once in recent days had the bunch of us remarked how we'd missed LT.  He fit back in like we'd seen him just yesterday, like he's one of the family. 

I was bent down, getting some paper for A when she whispered to me in deep satisfaction, "I knew he was coming.  I thought he was coming, and he came."  I understood completely.  It happens to me and has for as long as I remember.  With joy, I whispered back something about connection, about the Spirit knowing her heart and speaking to her inside.  She smiled wide.

Not much later, LT was talking when I re-entered the kitchen.  He was saying that he'd started out that morning prepared to scrounge up change along the train tracks and out of shopping carts as he's always done.  "Something told me to stop," he noted his uncertainty.  He confessed he kept on course, ignoring it, but it kept on until pointing him to us.  He didn't want to come, not to ask for help.  But he couldn't shake it.  "I don't know what it was..." he wondered but spoke with jittery gladness for heeding.

You bet I let him know about A's encounter!  Plus I shared a thought on the Voice inside him, too.  I've no doubt both of them sensed that pull at precisely the same time that morning.  What untold prayers were answered that day, I can and do imagine.

harmony in day nine

monday, a sweet friend brought dinner and dessert to us. help for this bed rest stretch. not only were we fed, but the prepared meal freed kenn to play with our kids before we ate.  he had them outside, riding bikes on the sidewalk, shooting hoops by the window where i sat watching.  before long, a bunch of children of all ages gathered, mingling in game and chatter. 

when my friend arrived, one of her first comments was something like, "i see you've got my peoples up in these parts!" we agreed that we do but didn't really express how deeply we enjoy that fact.  i've been thinking about it since, about a certain balance "her people" bring as one minority among others on our street.  it's a privilege to be living where it's so colorful (in more ways than one), and it's in "mixed" company that i've always been more at home.

there's harmony in the motley.  the Creator delights in it.  he alone fashioned it.  and this life is so rich because of the diversity of beauty in him and all he has made.  i wish we'd all purpose to hold firmly to these glimpses of Paradise restored, and confess: our differences reflect the perfection of heaven.

the golden rule

our stroller went missing recently. it was in pretty poor condition, but it was a double-seater for jogging and we used it a lot. our oldest noticed it was gone one day while a few kids from around the corner were out back. he said he'd seen a couple of them with it, so i told them all to go retrieve it. pretty brazen, i thought, to let themselves into our backyard and then take something. they barely know us.

after a couple of minutes and no sign of the kids, i decided to see what happened. i rounded the corner to find them looking a bit bewildered. no stroller. as i crossed the street asking where it was, they all began their tales. I wasn't outside, SHE was . . . NO! I was in the bathtub . . . NO, I WAS in the tub. . . well actually, I WAS the only one inside . . . then i realized the stroller wasn't taken that hour nor that day but the night before. they had removed it from our yard, left it somewhere on the sidewalk, and now it was gone.

let's just say, i was not pleased.

rewind to the night before. these same kids were racing back and forth with streams of tape pulled from a video they'd broken. our son was riding his scooter as they played and it seems at some point they started chasing him with the tape. he probably thought it was fun, until one boy wrapped the tape around his neck and wouldn't let go. our son hit him in the side to get the boy to release him. then he came home, clearly shaken.

after getting the story, kenn took our oldest back outside and made him apologize. kenn also gave a good talk to the crew of them about playing nicely. i saw from the window that it took some repeating and added sternness for the other kids to even give an ear. then, on his own, the boy who had hurt ours decided to apologize, too. breakthrough! his sister (a second-grader, mind you) actually got mad at kenn, thinking he'd forced her brother to say sorry. kenn calmly set her straight.

back to the day of the stroller. knowing it was taken in the night and i could do nothing about its whereabouts, i took a breath. what do i do now? i almost went to the kids' house to report their crime. i asked who was watching them and one said it was their mom. she was sleeping. sleeping!? i thought. her kids are running the streets and she sleeps? then something happened in me. i know now it was the Spirit within showing me what i almost missed. three precious children.

with my anger dissolving, i told them it didn't matter who took it and addressed the behavior instead. the older ones stared blankly when i asked them how they'd feel if i walked into their house and took something of theirs. so i posed the same to the youngest, who can't be more than 5. with a lisp he said, "sad!" and my heart broke a little more. then i laid down the rule. from now on, if they'd like to go in the backyard or use something of ours, they just need permission. immediately, they asked to use our basketball hoop - the one they'd already pulled from the yard moments before i had them searching for the stroller.

what else could i do? i said okay, and they skipped across the street with me in tow. i let them in our yard. i let them use the toys. and i felt really free.

that night at dinner, kenn read these upside-down commands of Jesus from Luke 6:

but i tell you who hear me: love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. if someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also. if someone takes your cloak, do not stop him from taking your tunic. give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. do to others as you would have them do to you.

oh, for such a time as this!

not far from the borders of vermont and new hampshire, a little massachusetts river town has been our home for the last week. we're in northfield. though small by population, it is colossally rich with stories old and new.

here dwight l. moody was born. and here in july of 1886, moody held a month-long Bible conference with over 200 students from 89 colleges and universities. that meeting birthed the student volunteer movement, which came to send out thousands upon thousands of students into foreign mission in just one generation.

while here, we get to play a privileged part - through prayer and physical labor with our campus america family - in the reviving of the old mount hermon school campus. founded by moody himself, this spectacular property was recently acquired for the establishment of c. s. lewis college. the story of how our new friends at the c. s. lewis foundation obtained this land is a miraculous one as well!

we came here to deepen our friendships with our brothers and sisters from campus america, to envision how 24-7 prayer will carry on through our colleges and universities, across our nation, and around the globe. our days have been full of song and study, good food and conversation, playing, praying, and exploring these grounds, all the while soaking in more and more of Jesus. we want his heart alone for our lives and this world. and just as in those days of moody, each one here truly believes the Spirit is weaving this july gathering into another legacy for generations to foretell . . .

how does your garden grow?

i may have inherited a green thumb from the dear gardeners in my family. i'm surely no expert, but i have learned how much effort, time, patience and carefulness it takes. and don't forget ingenuity! yet even with the best sweat, the process can be downright disappointing sometimes.

for example, take efforts thwarted by insects and other animals. you choose a tiny seed, dig in dirt and position it just so, water and watch and water some more. a small stem starts to show sweet little leaves and excitement begins to build. the care continues and the dreams of a lush garden light your whole day . . . until those leaves are chewed right down to nothing!

living life as a Kingdom servant can be likened to this. you pour yourself into others, dreaming of the beauty they could enjoy some day. you sacrifice time and share your belongings, open your heart and help carry theirs. you push yourself to give and stretch your ability to commit. then you start seeing changes in how they treat others or in the kinds of choices they make. excitement builds and it's easier to imagine healing, restored faith, a transformed family and sometimes even a holy city!

until a neighbor disappears for awhile. or one who claimed his need for change, proving grateful for support, finds it easier to stay stuck in old patterns. or a family who seemed headed toward reconciliation falls into turmoil again. or a period of peace in the neighborhood is upset by another rash of violence.

our lives are teeming with "pests" that interrupt growth. maybe it's addiction. maybe fear, or denial, selfishness, anger, greed. some we choose ourselves and others are inflicted upon us, but the list that tears and destroys is endless. when it seems no green could appear and never a blossom would show, we need to trust the Master Gardener. the One who plants life in us will continue to tend to what's begun. and recognize this: when we serve others in the love of Jesus, pour out our time in prayer for them, willingly invite them into our families and become a shining light in their midst through our faithfulness, something of life gets rooted in their hearts and in ours.

which seeds will take root for good, we may not know. just keep going back to the garden. water, prune, and address those irksome pests. and picture the garden full and vibrant one day, flowing over with beauty.

paul and us, for you

"now i rejoice in what was suffered for you, and i fill up in my flesh what is still lacking in regard to Christ's afflictions, for the sake of his body, which is the church. i have become its servant by the commission God gave me to present to you the word of God in its fullness -- the mystery that has been kept hidden for ages and generations, but is now disclosed to the saints. to them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. we proclaim him, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone perfect in Christ. to this end i labor, struggling with all his energy, which so powerfully works in me."