Oh Canada!

I love Canada. In that same way I love washed out Bruce Willis in 16 Blocks. Everything reflects greater days gone by but they still manage to impress me. In a refreshing way she is not as flashy as the U.S. (Media and opinions aren’t in your face galore.) Life is slower, the paintballing is fierce and the hiking is insanely gorgeous… and them Canadians are proud of it. Eh!

I had the opportunity to speak at a church retreat just outside of Ottawa this last weekend. With 6 messages in hand I was ready to bring the fire! After the second talk I lost my voice and submitted to the use of a mic. God really challenged me personally as I prepared and shared my small thoughts on His big vision for His Kingdom. I’ve fallen in love afresh with the story of the Good Samaritan. My heart shudders as I hear Christ’s voice say, “Go and do likewise.” As I contemplated this story I was reminded again that our call to Christ goes beyond us… to individuals, yet not only to individuals but to broken systems.

“We are called to play the Good Samaritan on life’s roadside… but one day we must come to see that the whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar. It comes to see that a system that produces beggars needs to be repaved. We are called to be the Good Samaritan, but after you lift so many people out of the ditch you start to ask, maybe the whole road to Jericho needs to be repaved.”
-Dr. Martin Luther King (A Time to Break the Silence, 1967)

“We are not to simply bandage the wounds of victims beneath the wheels of injustice, but we are to drive a spoke into the wheel itself.”
-Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Just a few thoughts worth sharing while I chill out in Canada.


Before and after the retreat I’ve been staying with Gzegorz and Christie Kopczyk. They are by far one of my favorite couples that I respect so very much. Gzegorz was my prayer partner during my time at Grad School. I’ve seen them walk a difficult road so bravely through a troubled pregnancy with many complications to raising little Troy.
Troy is just a curious little explorer of a kid whom I just think God is going to use in an amazing way.
Thanks for having me stay in your howse.

Now owt to Tim Horton’s… mmmhhh…

wake up

I attended a “Wake up to Poverty” event by Nobel Peace Prize nominee and 2007 Kenyan presidential candidate Wahu Kaara. (ironically hosted in a mansion in Wheaton...mmmm) Anyway, Psalters the convictingly radical Christians lead in worship and dance. It was so crazy. Little did I know I would see the face of jesus in these hippie livin' cannibal-like lookin' jesus freaks.

But I’m not writing to tell of this evening, but to tell of a form of radical, seemingly bizarre Christianity that my soul is waking up to through things like this experience. It’s something God has thrown me into over the last few months. I’ve been soaking up Shane Claiborne’s book “The Irresistible Revolution” as well as being with the kids in my neighborhood at the park, pool and fire hydrant, conversations with Annie, and in doing AR with my pastor friends in South Africa. I feel like the gospel has always been calling us to this costly, uncomfortable greater lifestyle than the package I was handed and was told was okay when I unknowingly joined the Walmart Church of the 20th century. (the Church is always at least 30yrs behind… it’s true, just read that magazine; Christianity Yesterday.)

Anyway as my ears unblock I realize that we are called to live such upside down lives… crazy compelling lives that don’t make sense to the patterns and people of this world. Upstream lives that are seen as a revolution against poverty and greed that leads to a greater Kingdom. The thing is; most of us claim we already know this… but c’mon, are you kidding me? We sure aren’t living it. We’ve turned poverty awareness into a fad for an evening and global crisis into a bracelet. And as we “try to figure it out and wait for our calling” we bounce from one cool justice agenda to another. Human Trafficking to Children of War, at risk youth to martyrs in Malaysia, prostitutes in India to orphans in Africa…
Gag, gag.
Yes, I am pointing the finger at myself first… but we end up being partially informed (enough to provide stimulating conversation) but tragically inactive. We take the issues that break God’s heart and turn them into cheap conversation starters or nice reminders that we weren’t called to the mission field. Our tragedy is in the half hearted living and the lack of being and doing. Too much talking perhaps? Argh, so tragic, so uninspiring.
Still thinking…

But there are people like my friends in my community whom show me there are still those few radicals wanting to follow this upside down Way of the cross. They ride the El train late at night with homeless folks and move onto dodgy streets where they befriend gang bangers. They tech English to illegal immigrants and lovingly convert rich folks. They make me believe that another world is possible. They’re tired of the talk and are diving in on the action. They stumble along but they’re beginning to know what it means to give generously and love recklessly. (I love you my River City family.) This is inspiring.
Still thinking…

A sweet quote from Shane, (well worth the read...really.)
“We wrestle to free ourselves from macrocharity and distant acts of charity that serve to legitimize apathetic lifestyles of good intentions but rob us of the gift of community. We preach we prophesy, and dream together about how to awaken the church from her violent slumber. Sometimes we speak to change the world; other times we speak to keep the world from changing us. We are about ending poverty, not simply managing it. We give people fish. We teach them to fish. We tear down the walls that have been built around the fish pond. And we figure out who polluted it.

We fight terrorism- the terrorism within each of us, the terrorism of corporate greed, of American consumerism, of war. We are not pacifist hippies but passionate lovers who abhor passivity and violence. We spend our lives actively resisting everything that destroys life, whether that be terrorism or the war on terrorism. We try to make the world safe, knowing that the world will never be safe as long as millions live in poverty so the few can live as they wish. We believe in another way of life- the kingdom of God- which stands in opposition to the principalities, powers, and rulers of this dark world.”

“Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.” James 1:22

to be the poor

I have never sincerely thought of myself as the poor. And I don’t mean college student poor. I mean pooooor. I always thought it was “them” apart from me. Not in an, “I’m better than you” way, but more as an honest socio economic distinction. Kinda the same way as I viewed the rich. It was “them” apart from me.
But recently I have been feeling my own poverty. Not spiritually or emotionally but straight up penny for penny, financially and materially, practically rocking my personal economic world. It’s been humbling and painfully raw, in a way I never imagined… I taste the bitter tang of desperation, the nagging relentless wishing for something to give and the endless temptation to take things into my own hands. Yes I am broke. Yes I am the poor.

Yet I know it is not the bottom. I know I have stuff I could sell, skills I could use or people who would lovingly take me in. But today I realize I am the poor. With not a dollar at my disposal, God has brought me to a place where I have no other choice than to wait for Him to act. I stand in this desert, parched, with not a cloud in sight.
I am here, I believe, because my heart must know this place. I am here because I must become one of those I desire to serve. In reality I can never fully be like them but together with them I can say that I know what it means to cry out to the Lord for daily provision. I know what it means to be disappointed at how I thought God would and should provide. Today I have reflected that it is easy to declare trust and faith in God’s provision when one has a pay check every two weeks. It is quite another fearful thing when that declaration is tested. I used to sing “Jehovah Jirah My Provider” giving little pause to the words. Now they stick to my tongue as I whisper my worship. I am learning He is greater, He is Able and His concern is where my heart resides. Because where our treasure is, is where our hearts will be also.

I am saddened at the pride my head and heart harbor around money. I am disappointed that something in me craves to use money as a measure of success and economic resources at my disposal as the litmus for ones value. Mmmhhh..
As the bullets whiz by in these trenches I fearfully repeat my instructions to myself,… "Seek first the Kingdom and His righteousness and all these things will be added unto you.”
The battle rages on. I am the poor.