(Disclaimer: I began to write this January 11, 2010, at the beginning of my J-term class, but obviously did not finish writing it until much later.)

This may be a bit premature, but I am just SO INVIGORATED for the next few weeks, months, and years of my life!   I have finally come to a place of decision about the next step of my life – urban ministry and community building with the organization Mission Year.  Here I chronicle my journey to this place of passion…for the city.

Those of you who know me may know that for the past few months or so, I have been grappling with the fact that I do not know what I want to do after I graduate from Spring Arbor University.  I will graduate with a psychology degree, but as counseling has been ruled out for now, I do not know what I want to do with my life, other than help people.  That’s a pretty broad career field…human services, people helping careers.

During fall semester, I often lamented to myself that I had not taken better advantage of all the opportunities afforded to me during my college career.  Oh, what different fields I could have investigated!   The numerous services and organizations I could have volunteered with!   The things I could have tried…but did not.  So I sat, stewed, lamented.  All in my own mind (a dangerous thing to do, by the way.  Just talk it out!).  My future was unknown, and I was anxious, frightened, inwardly stressed about this uncertainty.  My lack of a plan distressed me.

Then, slowly but surely, things began to come together, although I did not understand at the time.  Divine foresight?  Supernaturally orchestrated events?  Looking back, yes, I would say so.

Around the end of October, Tony Campolo came to Spring Arbor University to speak.  I do not remember much of his message during chapel.  What I do remember is that I skipped my first college class in order to listen to him speak more about a book he authored.  He spoke about passion and indispensibility and love and societal systems and poverty and riches and economics…things I identified as classic social-justice focused Tony Campolo.  I was blessed, encouraged, and challenged by what he had to say.  But nothing big changed.  No self-revelation at that point.  I went to lunch with my friend Jen, and as I was leaving afterwards I noticed that Campolo was in the Cougar Den, sitting with a couple of professors.  I desperately wanted to talk to him…mostly just because he was Tony Campolo, whom I had read about, whose books I had read, and whom had inspired people like Shane Claiborne, another social justice leader I admired.  But I also wanted to hear what he had to say about Mission Year, and what he would say about me, little shy suburban girl, wanting to try out working in the city.

So, I psyched myself up to talk to him, figured out what I would say to him…and went for it.  I talked to Tony Campolo…but mostly, he spoke into my life in ways he could not understand and that I did not fully appreciate until later.  He talked about Mission Year, as I asked, but he spoke about deeper topics and realities.  The reality of seasons in life, especially in urban ministry.  The need for rest and settling down, recharging, enjoying life.  God, You are good!

Shortly after this, spring break mission trip applications were released.  I took one, not wanting my last college spring break to be spent sitting at home on my rear.  Furthermore, I noted that one of the destinations was Hamtramck…a site so close to my home, but one I had never taken the time or effort to minister to.  The site itself was culturally as well as geographically significant to me – Hamtramck is home to a large Muslim population, whom my heart is drawn to due to my experiences in Egypt.  These two facts – geographic location and a population I had a distinct interest in – were the main reasons for my application to this trip, as well as my desire to create long term relationships with the people I would be ministering to and the organization we would be working with.  I did not have the first clue as to how to best minister with Muslims, how to reach them for Christ, but I wanted to learn.  And I trusted that the team leaders, Mallary and Steve, and/or the leaders of Acts 29 Ministries, the ministry we will be working with in Hamtramck, would give us students pointers about ministry.  If all else fails, I know that love crosses all boundaries, so I planned to do my best to love whoever I would encounter in Hamtramck.

The next event of great significance occurred during Christmas break.  I had been thinking about my options after graduation, and had settled in my mind that I would be doing Mission Year.  It did not even cross my mind that I had to apply and be accepted – if I decided I was going to do Mission Year, there was no question that I would be accepted.  But I still had one hurdle to clear – parental approval.  I researched the program a bit, and once again presented Mission Year as THE THING I wanted to do after graduation to my Dad.  I even explained to him my progression rationale: I would be ministering for a week in Hamtramck for spring break, then for the summer I planned to work with Habitat for Humanity in Detroit for several days a week.  So, by the time the beginning of Mission Year came around, I would already have a good deal of experience working in the city.  After he posed some questions and I promised to check them out with Mission Year staff, he gave the go ahead!

Relieved and happy, I looked forward to my J-term Urban Ministry class with excitement, but still a little bit of hesitation.  I was concerned about the potential work load (a 50-60 page paper…in three weeks!  Who does that?), and concerned about what I would discover about myself.  What if I found I did not like urban ministry, or even worse, I did like it, but did not have the skills, the personality, the toughness, steadfastness, or the heart to be in urban ministry?  Carrying these, and even more, doubts and fears, I walked to my first class period.

Within the first day and a half I was hooked.

I found myself reading dozens of pages of the textbook without counting how many more I had to go.  The stories our professor, John Weidman told of people who felt loved, who were transformed by his ministry, were spell-binding.  In John was an authentic love for every human being, a pastoral heart if I have ever seen one.  Whether this has always been his personality, or was a result of so many years of urban ministry, I do not know.  I simply know it was in him.  All of these characteristics of the class simply made me fall more in love with urban ministry, and more confident that this was what I wanted to do with the next phase of my life.  I embraced an excitement, a giddiness, a joy for life I had not known in what felt like eons.

God is at work in the city!  God is already present there, in the crack houses and dirty alleys and dilapidated homes and broken people.  He cares for them in remarkable ways, in supernatural and compassionate ways, and He calls us to join Him in loving those most precious to Him!  He calls us through His word, through His prophets, through conviction, through people like Tony Campolo and Shane Claiborne and John Weidman, through His Spirit.  He calls us to have compassion upon those who need it the most, the poor, weak, and needy.  And where are the poor, the weak, the needy to be found but in the cities?  And who better to love them unconditionally than the body of Christ?  Jesus cared for them, and we are to emulate him; yet we are also called to love Christ, and according to Matthew 25:40, we are loving Christ whenever we love “the least of these”:

“Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.”

Following Jesus by going to the city and loving.  That is the plan.  I am filled with energy and passion!  Bring on the city!

I am very bad at posting consistently.  I have some ideas in my head I will get out soon, I promise.

Here is an idea that crossed my mind as I was walking to the apartments today:

Faith consists of both thought and action.  Thoughts without action are basically meaningless.  Thoughts are good and important, but nothing if they are not acted upon.

“The secret to loving Me more is learning to love people more.

Love My people, your brothers and sisters.  Love those who want nothing to do with Christ.  Friends and neighbors.  Strangers and enemies.

Intentionally.  Love.  Love intentionally.”

~ the LORD

Passion.  Drive.  Ambition.  Fire.  Commitment.

Passion – where does it come from?  Can I stir it up?  Can I snuff it out?

What is this thing people call drive?  How do I cultivate it?

What is it about a moment that is so powerful?

In a moment, choices are made.  Boundaries crossed or enforced.  Love demonstrated or withheld.  Connections made or missed.  One moment can change a person’s life.  Sacrifice.  Death.  Pregnancy.  Forgiveness.  A chance for new life.
Mercy.  Vengeance.  Grace.  Salvation.

So many moments seem inconsequential.  Sitting in a dorm room, working on a paper for hours…a paper that will never see the light of day after the professor reviews it.  Mindlessly watching a movie for the fifth time.  Reading a book, any book, just to read it.  Playing a card game with people you barely know, and never seeing those people again.

What is it about a moment that makes it special?  That makes it significant, that makes it count?  Mindfulness.  Mindfulness of what is important, of why you are doing what you do.  It’s when you simply go with the flow, do not think, do not pause to reflect, that trouble sneaks in the back door, or the sacredness of the moment is lost.  Emotion.  Emotions, pleasant, disturbing, or otherwise, make a moment significant, make it stand out.  A feeling of contentment, of affection (brotherly/sisterly or romantic), of love, of hate, of pain, of loss, of sadness, of excitement, of confidence.  Any and all of these make the moments of life worth living.

What is it about being in the moment that is so powerful?  Why are people unable to “say no”?  Why is it our wills can be so weak…or so strong?  Why is intentionally being present in the moment so momentous? (pardon the pun)  I have heard living in the moment described both positively – being present to the people you’re with, giving of yourself to them, paying attention to God’s leading, etc. -  and negatively – letting your emotions and passions and desires rule you, not thinking rationally, etc.  It seems this would be where wisdom and discernment come in handy.

It would seem God would want us to live in the moment more than not.  The name of God in the Old Testament is YHWH, or I AM.  A God of the present.  Jesus said not to worry about tomorrow, about food, clothes, drink, or provision.  He instructed his disciples not to take anything with them when they set out, to rely on others to provide for them.  Our Lord, God, and Savior is with us always, even unto the end of the age…which means he is with us now.  In this moment.  That is what makes each moment powerful and exceptional – Jesus moves in it.

The Church.

Western Christianity.

Contemporary Christendom.

Synonymous terms, in some people’s minds.  But the Church is so much bigger than our Western way of doing Christianity, so much humbler and servant minded than an empire of the cross.

I am starting to write a paper – “Critical Assessment of Contemporary Christendom in Light of the Reformation.”  This is it’s title on the syllabus.  I have outlined my paper, finished my opening paragraph, and am about to dive headlong into my critique of the Church as I know it today.  This, both an academic and spiritual exercise, gives me an uneasy feeling.  I cringe inwardly…not because I have a heavy blow to give to the Western Church (I do), but because I know how useless critiquing the Western Church is when I make no effort to change it.  In principle, if I am going to critique the Church, I am going to take responsibility for making it better.

I am obligated to improve myself, draw closer in my walk with God, and help others to do the same.

I am obligated to love others outside of the Church and serve them to the best of my ability.

I am obligated to give God my all, even when I do not want to.

In order to prevent the ideas I write in this paper from eating away at my insides, at my very soul, I will have to act.  So act I shall, as the Spirit moves me.  God, I am Yours.  Show me the way.

More and more, I am coming to believe that people are inevitably influenced by their experiences.

My study of psychology at university (that makes me sound important, doesn’t it?) is one of the main reasons I think this.  If nothing else, psychology has taught me to examine and  study the motivations of people, not least of all my own personal motivations.  Psychology has also awakened me to the idea that everyone behaves the way they do for a reason – I highly doubt that anyone’s behavior is completely and utterly spontaneous.  Somewhere, perhaps deep within people or their past, is a reason for their thoughts and actions.  As I study the history of modern psychology, I see that many of the pioneers of the field created their own branch of psychology by generalizing their own ideas and experiences to the lives of others.  Freud was “obsessed” with sex (or perhaps frustrated by his own difficulties with it), and his system ended up having sex as one of the main points.  B. F. Skinner seemed a scientist from an early age, and his behaviorism exhibits this.   Alfred Adler felt intensely inferior to his siblings and schoolmates, worked extremely hard to excel, and developed a psychology in which social forces are prominent, inferiority feelings motivate behavior, and an individual can shape his or her own personality.  Abraham Maslow was deeply affected by the negative behavior of his parents, and driven to improve himself.  These ideas seem to directly relate to his hierarchy of needs, the utmost one being self-actualization.  There are plenty of other examples, I’m sure, but none come to mind at the moment.  I also see that my ideas and perceptions of myself and of others are shaped and defined by my past experiences.  I observe this phenomena in my friends as well.

I think that people can break free of this way of defining their current experience…it just takes a lot of work, a lot of analysis, and a lot of help from other people to examine your experiences in a new light, from a different perspective.  That is why community is so important–by surrounding yourself with other people and allowing them to help you interpret your life experiences, you are not stuck inside one frame of reference, your own head.  You can expand your mind…and your heart.

I love this time of year.

For whatever reason, this Christmas season I have been acutely more aware and appreciative everything I love about this season.  The wind whipping around me and weaseling its way down the slightest crevices and open spaces between my coat and my body…love it!  I love that I have to wear a coat and a scarf to keep warm.  I don’t know why, I simply adore this.  I love (yet, am slightly annoyed) that I will soon need to trade in many of my shoes for more watertight and cold-resistance pairs.  I love listening to Christmas music THE DAY OF Thanksgiving, and having a month to incessantly play it in my dorm room, on my laptop, and in my car.  I adore decorating my house and my dorm room – setting up and decorating Christmas trees, hanging lights, placing the random Christmas paraphernalia throughout the house.  I love watching all the cheesy Christmas movies with my family.  I just love spending quality time with my family – playing games, watching movies, doing holiday things.  At no other time of the year do I get to spend so much time with friends and family I love.  I love Christmas traditions – the Christian ones, and many of the commercial ones.

I love Christmas.  But, to me, it seems for all the wrong reasons.

Happiness is a choice.  Does that make joy – deep, abiding, life-giving joy – a choice as well?

Our mood, our state of mind, is a set of tinted glasses through which we view our world.  Some of these glasses are dark and dull, some are light, bright, and rosy.  State of mind is also like a painter’s palette…we can only use the colors we put on it to paint the picture of our life.

Why would anyone NOT choose the bright colors of joy?

I love my Dad.

Plain and simple.

His patience, his wisdom, his strength, his advice…all of this points me to Someone even greater than he, if that is possible.

And my father, in all his amazing qualities, is only a pale reflection of my heavenly Father. The characteristics I so admire in my daddy are even greater in God.

Whoa.

That is a reality I cannot process, but am content to embrace and rejoice in!