the things we can get away with (done to the ones we love)

I spend the better part of a week in community with a group of lovely people from Chicago who want nothing more than to give of their vacation to love a poor neighborhood south-east of Rosarito , Mexico by building a brand new firehouse in the name of Jesus - and this is how I repay them? Well, one would have to assume after a week of sweating in the Baja summer sun while breathing dust, cement, and suffering through open pit toilets that they would need a little bath, right? Or at least that is how I justify it - that and it makes for a good photo.

30 January, 2007

I wish you all could have been there.
It really gets to me - the dichotomy of it all.
Makes me laugh.
Seriously.
That I need a battery powered device being tracked by multiple satellites directing us to points transferred into the device from a computer equipped with mapping software to find a family living without basic electricity (or running water, or sewer, or garbage collection) is indeed a funny irony. Okay, it’s not exactly ironic. But neither is rain on your wedding day and Alanis Morrisette got away with that. For real, the only thing ironic about that song is that none of her examples are indeed ironic. It’s silly...unless it was intentional...in which case it was clever. I need to think some more about this.

Anyway, when the small glowing box of a GPS unit had guided us to within visible range of a house painted with a project number corresponding with the point in the GPS, we could meet the family for whom we would be building. If members of the family were home, the initial interaction with them was basic and usually went something like this:
We are Jon and Lydia.
We work with the ministry that builds houses.
We will be unloading building materials on these dates.
Can we take a picture of you and your family in front of your house?
Of course it’s fine that your husband is working and can’t be in the photo.
Click.
Thank you. See you in a few weeks.
God bless you.
Any variance of the conversation probably included something like:
How old is your baby?
Will that dog bite me?
It really is unseasonably cold.

Truly, I cherish these moments. Though little is said, much is understood. Mainly what they begin to realize is that we are going to come. Soon. What was a cautious hope begins to take shape in their eyes—starts to show in the corners of their mouth turning into a relieved smile—is heard in a sigh. The picture presented to us at that moment was of God already at work in the lives of the people we are called to serve—already preparing the hearts of each of the participants coming to do His work.

Over President’s day weekend some 1,400 people will travel to Puerto Peñasco to build more than 50 homes. The photos to the right are some of these families. They are still waiting. And after we have presented them with the keys to their new house and they go on to make it a home, there will still be more families. Waiting. And though the irony of my GPS usage is debatable, the desperation of their situation is not. We need groups to build more homes. We need people to give of their income to be able to expand this work to new areas where the need is so great. We need people to pray for us like life depends on it, because it does.

Get involved. Do something for someone in need. Go to Mexico. If you don’t go to Mexico then go somewhere else. Take the opportunity to show Christ to someone because that’s what it means to love.

Peace and thanks.

21 April, 2005

Sitting down to write these Newsletters I sometimes worry about over-romanticizing what our experience is like. With regard to what has taken place this Spring, I don't see this as an issue. In truth I won’t be able to do it justice. Part of the problem lays in Spring still being very much of a blur in my mind. I see glimpses of it in my memory...but even these are more dreamlike than real. The easy way out is to focus on the numbers. 500 homes were built by about 10,000 participants in a 5 week span in 4 cities in Mexico. That is a pretty impressive tag line and I am fairly certain I could stop there and leave a lasting impression of the impact we and our participants have made.

However, I cannot reduce our endeavors, especially our Spring season, to numbers without running the risk of cheapening it. Even if I were to try I would have to include those thousands more from the churches, schools, and communities of our participants who enabled them to come to Mexico through financial support. I would have to mention the thousands who were praying for our ministry and our participants during this busiest of times. To this I would need to add our staff at Amor Ministries and the hundreds of supporters who make it possible for each of us to be here. Aside from this I would mention the host of volunteers who help us coordinate our groups during our peak season. Of course, I could not forget to point out our teams of Mexican Pastors and their families who work tirelessly to bring the love of Christ into their communities everyday. Still there are more. For I must mention that 500 homes means thousands of people now have a sturdy, water-tight house to call their own. I could go on.

But again I must stress focusing on even these limits the potential effects our ministry can have. Because: I cannot measure the impact God has on the life of each participant. Multiply that by 10,000. I cannot determine what the reaction of a teenager returning home from a trip with us will have on their family, their friends, their future. Furthermore, I have no idea how to put a figure on the difference those participants will have on their respective communities. Multiply that by 10,000. Indeed, I certainly cannot calculate the generational effect a new home will have on a Mexican family. Whatever it is, multiply it by 500 in a season, or 1,300 a year, or more than 10,000 and counting in total. Here one begins to get the picture that we can never see the whole picture.

For me, therein lies the rub. I am the type of person who likes to see the lasting impact—the full fruit, if you will—of our labor. But I cannot begin to understand how God works within the infinite variables of each of our lives at the same time to bring us closer to him. Honestly, it blows my mind. At the same time, however, I am eternally thankful that God’s willingness to extend his saving grace to me (us) is not dependent on my (our) ability to quantify the works of his hand.

I do know that in the last five weeks lives were changed, hearts were changed, a difference was made. We fought through hot days, frigid nights, ankle deep mud in our camps, rain saturating our tents, and our campsites being destroyed by wind storms in order to serve God and bring hope to our neighbor. And if in a few years this Spring remains a blur in my mind, I will be content in simply remembering that. I love my job.

2 December, 2004

There is a rumor around our office that the autumn and winter months are the slow time of year for those of us who work on the field team in Mexico. However, looking back over the last few months, little seems slow about it. Indeed, fewer groups come during this part of the year, but the slack time is picked up in projects around the office, moving camps around, trying to visit family and supporters, planning and facilitating trips to Puerto Peñasco, and, if there is any time left, taking some vacation to rest. Naturally, all of this is done outside of our work with the groups that do come during this part of the year and the usual preparations for the upcoming spring when we will be “busy” again.

Even in writing down what we have been up to lately has put my mind in busy mode. But I must pause here to reflect on something: I absolutely love my life. But too often I approach whatever task is in front of me, whether it be laying tile in the office bathrooms or preparing for my group next weekend, without remembering why I do it all — without counting my blessings so to speak...and I am very blessed.

I am at a loss to think of another capacity in which I could experience what goes on here. Where else can I experience the joy of seeing a new church built and within a year be a landmark in the community because of the love and hope it shares? Where else can I offer four days, or three, or two of hard work and see a family transformed? Where else can I go to see people communicate the love of Christ better through laughter, tears, handshakes, and hugs than they ever could even if they spoke the same language (which they usually don’t)? What other job can display to me an act of faith so simple and yet so profound as to bring the church, the whole church, together in a singular point of unity? I could go on...and on...and on.

My point? I’m not sure I have one. But I do want to express what an honor it has been for the last three years to wake up every morning, whether it be in Mexico or San Diego, knowing we are changing lives. It is an honor to drive around on bumpy roads, breathe dust and cement, cut, scrape, and scratch my hands, and fall asleep content in knowing that it was all done loving our neighbor and giving glory to God.

I guess I’m trying to make you all feel as much a part of this as I do. You are. This is your ministry. And while I know I could not be here without your support, the truth is I wouldn’t want to be. What has been the hardest part of being involved in this ministry, raising and maintaining my salary, has also become one of the greatest blessings. Truly I am fortunate to be here seeing and doing, but please know I take you all with me.

So, within the craziness of life, which seems compounded during this season, I pause to thank God for all of you—because I easily count you among my blessings. Thank you so much for allowing me to be here. Peace and Merry Christmas.

10 September, 2003

As is often the case with a summer of working in Mexico, I am left at the end sifting through the many and varied experiences in an attempt to assign a theme to help define what the season meant for me. As I do so, I am bombarded with memories and images of people, places, and projects all differing as widely in their impact as the circumstances involved in each.
Some are as poignant and indescribable as the joy and anticipation on the face of a mother watching a group of strangers, motivated only by love, build a home for her family. Some are as tangible as seeing a church being built from the ground up and knowing in a few short days people would be worshipping in the space we helped provide. Still other memories involve observing the life-changing effects of a short-term mission experience on the lives of participants in nearly every stage of life.
Many of the memories are as personal as sharing a meal with a family I have come to know and love (which involved some of the best pollo con molé I have ever had), or simply finding time to move with my roommates and get settled in the little time we had between groups during the busy summer (we moved at the beginning of July but couldn’t have the house warming party until September).
On the other hand, many experiences are as shared as a whole community coming together to help us build a school wherein classes would be starting in a few weeks. How incredible it was seeing teachers, mothers, government officials, businessmen, bus drivers, neighbors, and pastors, joining together with a group of sixty youth from the Seattle area to finish a two-classroom building. Yet another such moment was being able to take part in a community outreach in one of the areas where we work a great deal. This involved several of our pastors from different denominations pooling their resources and partnering with a sponsoring church from Los Angeles to provide lunch, music, games, an evangelistic program, and a hilarious puppet show for the hundreds in attendance.
In the end, I know no theme can be attached to a summer that has been so emotionally all-inclusive. But I am left thinking that throughout it all we are all part of a community stretching farther than we normally assume. And though I normally would treat the idea of “global community” as another modern day catch phrase, I am beginning to understand we are really separated only by our decisions to remain separate. Coming to know this has made me suppose we truly have a call as followers of Christ to seek to help those in need despite cultural and geographical division. Indeed, no one forces the more than twenty thousand participants we have yearly to embrace the needs of those less fortunate just as no one forces those of you who cannot be down here full time to partner with me financially and prayerfully in a mission with the propensity to touch so many lives. However, I believe it is through voluntary acts like these we can establish a sense of community defying normal boundaries giving us a chance at changing the world.
Accordingly, I want to ask you to consider being an integral part of the team of people that allow me to continue my ministry here. My position is fully supported, meaning I am responsible to raise the funds necessary to live and work here. Because Amor Ministries is an American organization with its head office in San Diego, I need to raise San Diego living wages even though I spend a majority of the year working in Mexico. As such, I need people to consider contributing to my financial needs on a monthly basis. Additionally, I am always in need of prayer as the demands of my position can be extremely taxing on me physically, spiritually, and socially. For those of you who have already joined me, I thank you from the bottom of my heart and ask you to share this with someone else who may be interested in supporting our ministry. Please let me know if there is anything else you would like to know about Amor Ministries or me. God Bless.

20 May, 2003

We do not do it because it’s fun. We are not here to experience a different culture. We do not search for the self-satisfaction of helping someone else. We do not come to prove we can do it or to see how far we can push ourselves. It is not about us.
There is a need. We are called to serve those in need. Something in our very fiber commands us to obey that call. That is why we line up in caravan after caravan after caravan of vehicles with “Mexico or Bust,” “Jesus Saves,” and “Van 6 rules!” scribbled in the dust of windows while food, tools, camping gear, and passengers test the weight and space limitations of those vehicles. Accordingly, that is why we chomp at the bit to work longer and harder than would normally seem imaginable in weather that can swing from suffocating heat to torrential downpour in a day. It is why we can enjoy braving bone-jarring roads, breathing dust, drinking lukewarm water, and sweating constantly. It is how we can evacuate communities because in ten minutes the roads will be impassable because of rain, return to a weather-destroyed campsite wherein everything is soaked through, fashion a dinner in six inches of standing water, crowd into a box truck for a few songs, and end the day with smiles across our exhausted faces. Indeed, it is why we would do it all again the next day if necessary.
A spring serving the poor of Mexico in the name of Christ has a beauty that transcends normal patterns of thought. Truly, we do push ourselves to see if we can do it. We do feel the rewarding joy of helping those in need. We are blessed to experience a rich and beautiful culture. Undeniably, we are able to observe the determination of people to conquer severe adversity, despite various failures along the way. And we do have an alarming amount of fun. However, the true beauty lays in the fact all of these results come after we have made our agendas secondary to the necessities of others. We are loving someone in need. It is glory to God. The rest is a byproduct.
Thanks from all of us to all of you who continue to make this happen. Our lives are such that we are in a constant position to see people at their best when situations seem at their worst. And I believe seeing people at their absolute best, despite any circumstance, is to briefly look through the eyes of God.

15 March, 2003

During the past couple of months I have had more than a few opportunities to discover and experience what I believe is a foundational necessity to this ministry, and indeed to our everyday lives. It is the issue to respond.
Every person we encounter, every need we see, every crisis that arises in our daily lives requires a response. That response could be as easy as a helping hand, as intense as a protest march, or as quiet as kneeling in prayer. At times we respond simply by turning our heads. Undeniably, we do this forgetting our silence is often a deafening response.
Every person working here at Amor Ministries has recognized a great need in Mexico and come to the conclusion they cannot look the other way while neighbors separated only by a political line in the sand struggle to provide for themselves such basics as food and shelter. We must respond. Indeed, the vision statement for Amor Ministries, which is printed on ever business card we give out, reads, “Amor Ministries is called by God to respond to the spiritual and physical poverty in the world. We respond through: Partnership with the church, Resources for the poor, and Life-changing mission experiences.”
To that end, and by the grace of God, we were recently able to change the lives of countless people in the city of Puerto Peñasco, Sonora. Over President’s Day weekend, I was privileged to help facilitate more than 1,100 people from some twenty-seven groups build thirty-nine houses and a women’s center in what are some of the poorest areas of Mexico. Likewise, we are preparing to receive nearly 7,500 participants in March and April to build nearly four hundred homes, churches, and schools.
Clearly, the issue to respond is something we take very seriously here. We have found a place where God can use our gifts and circumvent our limitations to simply make the world a better place. Thousands have discovered the empowerment and blessing that comes from acting on this need (including many of you), and perennially return to Mexico with a dedication bordering on addiction.
In similar fashion, your continued prayer and support are a response to the needs of this ministry and its staff (like me). Thank you for making what we do here possible.

16 January, 2003

It is nearly impossible to condense the past year into a page and convey with any accuracy the joy, heartbreak, blessings, trials, and growth I have seen and experienced. It seems cliché to say, but words are truly insufficient to show those who have not seen this world any glimpse of the impact you and I have here in Mexico. It is seen in the smile of a Mexican child helping build his new home and the tears of a mother looking out the window of the first home she has ever owned. It is realized in the wonder of youth pastors seeing the lives of teenagers changed forever over the course of four days. What happens here can be recognized in lives of participants who cannot help but take their many comforts less for granted and be more thankful for what they have. It is echoed for years to come in people’s remembrances in recalling the first moment they realized the world is so much bigger than they.

This year has beautifully unfolded into a continuous progression of these moments and many more of like kind. I never grow weary of seeing the gratitude of a Mexican family receiving a house with a roof that won’t leak in the next storm. Likewise, I can never tire of hearing the phrases saying, “as much as I thought I would be giving to the Mexican family, I received far more from them in return,” which seem to regularly permeate the final campfires of our participants. Seeing how God uses the vast array of people who come on Amor trips and works in the lives of the families we serve has reminded me that God in fact does not call the qualified, he qualifies those who respond to His call. And, contrary to what may be our natural direction of thought, He uses those in need as vessels to bless those with plenty.

I was recently able to experience this paradox in a profound way while working with a group of middle school students. This group from Nevada had decided to forfeit their normal holiday routines and spend the turn of the New Year building a home for a very needy family. The Quintero-Tapia family, consisting of Francisco, his wife Enis Yesenia, and their five children ranging in age from two to seventeen, were living in a one-room structure with a tarp as a roof and dirt as a floor. They met us with smiling anticipation as we drove in to begin construction and worked long hours alongside us all of the four days it took to complete the project.

What is amazing about this family is not so much its willingness to work with us, but rather the conditions from which they helped us. Francisco and Enis worked from morning till night with us on every stage of the project, which included hand mixing and pouring a 22’x22’ cement slab. What we later learned was Francisco, at age fifty-five, had seriously injured his back and had been unable to find work for some months as the prospects for a job are few in Mexico to a man in his condition. Additionally, we discovered from neighbors that Enis, aside from raising five children, had to fight bouts of epilepsy without being able to regularly afford medication. Furthermore, in order for us to have sufficient space to build their new home, the family had to tear down the existing house and spend more than one night spread between the shed in which they kept their rabbits and chicken, and whatever accommodations their neighbors could afford them. This willingness to sacrifice out of a necessity-born desperation reminded me of the holy family’s forced beginning in a stable. As we were able to share our resources with them, they shared with us a joyful faith that God would provide for them in all things. It was an honor for us to allow them an opportunity to begin this year in new home with a strong roof, sturdy walls and a cement floor.

Stories like this are not the exception here. They are the norm. One of the most frequent questions I receive is “are we really making a difference?” My answer is always “yes.” We, you and I, are making a difference and changing the world. We are doing it one family at a time.

Mi Tocayo

While in Mexico last Friday taking pictures for our CDA program, I took an opportunity to pay a visit to a family for whom we built a home in the summer of 2004. I stop in and say hi to this particular family whenever I am in the area. Usually, our visits follow a pattern. I walk into their home and am greeted by hugs and handshakes by whatever members of the family are around that day. Then we make sure everyone is well and catch up on life since the last visit. They ask about my family and I ask about theirs. There is much laughing and carrying on. Then, without skipping a beat, the matriarch of the family, Ines, makes me sit down and begins preparing a meal. Now I know what you are thinking. "Oh so that is his real motivation for stopping by there so frequently - free food." My only answer is; GUILTY (or at least partially so). After all, when I say she prepares a meal, I mean she serves up a spread of amazing food. In seventeen months of visits, Ines has yet to cook something that tastes less than incredible.

However, my most recent visit had a different feel to it. The pleasantries were mostly the same. But our conversation was different. As we began to share our lives with one another, Ines told me about the struggles she and her family had been through in the past few months. She spoke with sadness and cried openly in front of me. I didn't know how to react. There was much I wanted to say, but I found my Spanish failing in the moment. So I listened. I listened when she told me how her husband had left the family out of frustration with his own health and lack of ability to provide for everyone. I listened as she told me about her son's problems with the police and the burden that situation had become to his young family. I listened as she told me how she feels imprisoned in her own home because leaving, even for a few hours in the day, would mean her house getting broken into and robbed. I just listened.

Apparently, that was enough. She cried for a moment more. I took her hand and expressed my sympathy. After wiping her eyes and forehead with a small hand towel, she rose and asked if I was hungry. Of course, I said no. Of course, I also know to her that means yes. Let's be realistic; it would be ridiculous to her for me to show up without an appetite. And yes, Ines served up another remarkable plate of food for me. As she did so, she started telling me about the good things in her life. Her youngest daughter is doing very well and has a good job to help fill the void left by her husband. Her oldest daughter just had her second child, a baby boy which she is so proud of. This led to the biggest surprise of the day. I asked what the baby's name was:

"You don't know?" She asked with a surprised look in her eye. "His name is Jonathan."

"Just a second, that's my name!"

"Yes. Erica and her husband named the baby after you." (I swear I am not making this up.)

At this point I started jumping up and down with my arms in the air like the next contestant on the Price is Right - looking pretty much like an idiot - screaming "Mi Tocayo!" (loosely translated to 'my namesake'). Yes, there is a Mexican baby named after me!

I share this with you because it is a reminder to me of the importance of investing in peoples' lives. By this I mean caring about them. What started out as Amor Ministries responding to the need this family had for a home has turned into me feeling like a part of that family. Maybe this is how God would want it. Taking a chance to love others in a close, real, tangible way has a tendency to bring us into communion with those we serve. In each instance we are given a chance to affirm their place beside us in the family of God. And that is the greatest of honors (next to having a baby named after me).

Off Center, Without a Hedge, and Only a Single Portion for Me Please

I have a problem...okay, I have many. But one particular affliction seems to strike me from any side at any moment. Again, I say the problem is mine...so I do not fault the messenger (or more accurately the offender). I've labeled this problem christianese. The most recent occurrence referred to striving to be in the center of God's will (uh, yes we were praying). A worthy goal, to be sure. But what was likely once the theme of an evocative sermon series has now been in circulation long enough in the church to become a catch phrase. Personally, being in "the center of God's will" raises a lot of questions. Do I really want to be there? Is there room to stretch out a little if that is where I'm standing? Is it a personal will, or more corporate? Do I desire for me, or us, to be there? Is there only one center, or multiple? Is the view of the center better from one side or the other? Do democrats habitually reside left of center and republicans right? The only answer I've been able to come up with is I don't care. God's will has never seemed like something one could orient geographically. Either we are there or were not, right? No edges, now middle, no bulls eye. Can't I just thank God for his grace and offer him my life daily to do with as he pleases? Must I reduce God's great design to pinpoint accuracy?

This was just the most recent, so it is fresh in my mind. I have some other favoritos as well. You may have heard of the famous "Hedge of Protection." This usually accompanies "traveling mercies" in prayer for those loved ones about to undertake a journey to a far away place like say, Mexico, where they might be embedding themselves in a potentially dangerous short term mission trip. Now, I've seen hedges, friends...they ain't that menacing. They don't appear to be the protective metaphor I think people are hoping for (Though, one time, when I was four, I rode my motorcycle into a giant blackberry bush, which is sort of like a hedge. It did stop me quite well.). If you pray for protection for me for some reason, which I will definitely need and appreciate, please use something more in line with the Great Wall of China or, better yet, a force field. I just want to give God's ability to protect a little more cred.

This leads me to proportionality. Another piece of christianese that makes me forget whatever is said after it is anything in "double portion." Do I want a double portion of garlic mashed potatoes with my steak? YES! Do I want a double portion of ColdStone ice cream? Bring it on and don't forget the caramel. Do I want a double portion of God's wonderful blessings. I guess I'd have to say no. I'm of the opinion God will give me what I need and his first portion will be sufficient for me. Or in other words, I want my cup to runeth over, but I'll let him decide how much it takes.

I guess my real issue is not the use of the terms amongst Christians. Though, if you say them around me, please know there is a good chance I will snicker. Rather, I fear we get so entrenched in our Christian vocab we become unintelligible to those we want to reach. I just don't want to start interpreting what we say vs. what we mean. People already have a hard enough time understanding us.

But just for discussion's sake: If I am in the center of God's will, am I surrounded by a double portion of a hedge of protection? Hmm...

10.28.05

Poster Children

A very good friend of mine is right now driving to his grandparents house in Daytona, FL from his condo In Ft. Lauderdale. He has had no electricity for several days and has officially run out of food (and the boy is skinny - so this is a problem). But these are the worst of his problems. Many are suffering far worse from the damage of the recent hurricanes, but when I try to be sympathetic to their plights, collectively or individually, I struggle to understand their pain. I don't know what "thousands dead and injured" looks like. The death toll from the earthquake in Pakistan is astronomical, but I can't wrap my head around the numbers. I can't see their faces.

But I can see his. I understand what he is going through because I was able to hear the relief in his voice today as he was driving himself to safety. I was able to compare that with the stress in his voice a few days ago as he sat alone in his small, dark, third-story condo recalling how he had never before been afraid for his life and didn't know what he would do next. I felt deeply for my friend. It was then that it hit me. A small voice from somewhere started asking, "and what about them?" Knowing my friend was in pain, as lucky as his situation is compared with countless others, gave a face to the disaster.

It was the same with the tsunami. My mind drew a blank on "100,000 dead." But it ever so clearly saw Ellen, my friend who survived in Thailand and who carries the experience with her every day. I tried to picture a hundred thousand Ellens, and it made me sick at the loss of life.

Not that there needs to be a point to this (I think you all get it), but it put into perspective for me again how skewed my sense of neighbor is. I need to keep reminding myself a neighbor is anyone I have an opportunity to love - anyone who has need around me. For me, they just need a face. What does Jesus look like again?

10/28/05

a little something of sacrifice

If you’ve spent much time at church, you know the story. The rich guys put large wads of cash in the offering plate while the poor widow gave the only two pennies two her name. Jesus then tells his disciples that while the rich guys easily gave large sums out of their wealth, the widow gave more because it was all she had to live on. The theme is, of course, about giving sacrificially and proportionally. Or, as King David put it, “Why would I give my God something which has cost me nothing?” (Jon Wilson paraphrase) I, throughout my life, have heard this principal mostly in reference to church offerings and charitable donations. However, a recent experience gave me a new insight into this story. Allow me to share.

This summer, had the privilege of working with a group of twelve high school students from inner city San Diego. The group comprised mostly of kids from very rough backgrounds who had only recently invited Christ into their lives. Each of these kids had amazing stories of hardship and survival that were difficult even to hear. For example, one boy showed me the scar from a bullet wound to his knee. He is fifteen years old. Another student told how he had seen more people get killed than he had fingers to count. He also is fifteen years old.

Thus, when they arrived as participants on an Amor Ministries house-building trip to Tijuana, I understood why most of them were choosing to go out of their way to serve others for the first time in their young lives. Until the point they met Christ for the first time, their primary concern had been survival, not service. In that light, it was a joy to see them wade into uncharted waters and truly find the joy in helping those in need in the name of Jesus Christ. Indeed, within a few short hours of arriving to the work site, the students were laughing, singing, and loving the family they were helping. As the work days passed, the group made every effort to be involved in the life of that family to the point of playing with the children, sharing meals, and attending multiple evening church services. s is usually the case, most of this was accomplished with little verbal communication between the group and the family.

For me, I delighted in seeing young people take a step in faith and then in seeing them so rewarded. I was blessed to watch kids who for most of their lives had been told what they would never be or do understand for the first time what they really can accomplish in Christ. It was like watching twelve candles being lit in a dark room.

But now I get to tie this in with my first paragraph: What spoke loudest in the actions of those students was not their joy to serve, but in the manner in which they did so. Truly they gave sacrificially even to come on the trip. As stated earlier, they are younger high school students, most without jobs, from poor families and rough neighborhoods. They had to find a way to raise the participation fee to come on the mission trip when no doubt there were other areas of their lives where the money could have been used. As cool as that is, it is not the remarkable part of the story. As hard as giving of their resources must have been, this group of students had to give up who they were to God to allow themselves to serve. They had to put their overriding sense of self preservation, at times the only thing they felt they could depend on , aside in complete trust in God. They all did, and they all flourished.

The lesson for me was that giving of my time and my resources, though important, should not be my goal in service. It should be the byproduct. If I claim Christ in my life, haven't I already recognized that all I "own" is actually his? My goal should be to truly give of who I am. The things I have always used to define my are what I should be offering to God to do with as he chooses. If I tell someone I am a friend, brother, son, redhead, Seahawks fan, surfer, or Christian, shouldn't that already be filtered through who I am recreated to be in Christ? And because this is a blog and blogs are often subject to digression...Based on that question, isn't the will of God in my life not so much a specific bullet point on God's agenda as it is the decision I have every morning to wake up and choose Him?

So maybe the lessons are questions, but I found them worthy to share. Have a great day and God Bless.

9.9.05