a word

it's been two weeks since i've come back from thailand and i slowly feel my old memory losing bits and pieces from the trip. details of the trip are becoming hazy in this old memory. getting back into the life here in seattle keeps demands on my time that makes it hard for me to remember, but i continue to find ways to hold on to the dear people of burma and thailand.

today at quest the service was dedicated to the team that went to thailand to share testimonies of what we'd experienced, heard and seen. one of our team members, rich, put together a short film of the trip. as we were watching the video there were scenes of our time in the refugee camps and immediately my heart felt joy, sadness, peace and goodness and i began to weep out of thanksgiving to be a part of such a blessed thing.

in our travels to different places people would ask the pastors to share, to teach and to preach. i was asked to preach for a church in sangkla buri (on the southern end of thailand/ burma border). immediately i asked myself: who am i to speak into a world i know nothing about? and it is truly only by the grace of god that he gave me the words to speak and teach. the next portion is an excerpt from the teaching. i share it with you in hopes that it'll encourage you, my dear brothers and sisters. i hope that it'll challenge all of us, as we continue to pursue god. i pray that we see unity with all our brothers and sisters of this world: even those we'll never meet or see.
blessings!
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Genesis 32:22-32

Thank you so much for having us today. It is our pleasure to come and to commune with you this Sunday morning. I also want to share that your music, your songs have been a great blessing and have ministered to us during our visit. Your people sing such beautiful songs and we carry those songs close to our hearts. We are humbled to be among you today, as we believe that it is not most imporant that we come teach you, but that it is more important for us to learn in your presence. In fact, this is very much a learning experience for our team. We want to learn more about your stories. We want to hear more about your lives. We want to be challenged more by hearing about your faithfulness to God so that we can learn to trust more deeply in our personal relationships with our Father. Time and time again we have seen God's love in you through your graciousness and hospitality to each of us from Seattle.
We come from a small church in Seattle. We have traveled all along the border to come visit you. I am a pastor at that church. When I was asked to speak and to teach today I wondered what it is I might share. I asked myself how do I speak into your lives when I know so little about what your lives look like each day. I struggled because I knew that as much as I have to teach I have much more to learn. So I am humbled by this opportunity to stand before you today. I don't know what your daily challenges are and it woud be foolish of my to say I know or understand what you face-- what trials you deal with, what struggles you wrestle through, what challenges that meet you each day. It would be dishonest of me to say that I understand your oppression and the persecution you face or the losses you endure, because I do not. I come from a very different context from the western world, but I am assured of two thing. The first is that you and I are brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ our Lord. Because of his grace and mercy he has afforded us through His life, death and resurrection we have an opportunity to be a part of the family of God. And it his love that binds us together. Because of that love and kinship we have a responsibility to each other. We have the responsiblity to care for one another, to love one another and to spur each other on to spiritual growth and maturity. You my friends have the responsibility to teach us and to share with us your faith, your trust, your belief in our maker. And we (from Seattle) have the responsibilty to you to advocate for the freedom and release of your people. We have the responsibility to care for you in your struggle through prayer and by telling our church, our family, our friends in Seattle the struggles that you face. We do not take that responsibility lightly. We will stand with you and join you in your fight for the rights of your people. We will tell our church to join you in prayer, in encouragement and in admonishing each other to the face of Christ.
Secondly, I am reminded that although I do not know all of your struggles what I do know is that both you and I are human. And in the truth of our humanity we share certain commonalities of the human condition. As humans we share in similar feelings, desires and temptations. We all desire to be loved and cared for. We desire to belong and to be known and to be connected to something bigger than ourselves. We desire to have security and a hope of a future. And on the other side of the coin we experience similar feelings of temptation, disobedience and distrust. Sometimes when we face hardships it is very easy for us to lose faith in God. It is easy for us to grow bitter and angry and resentful and in those feelings turn our face from God. Yet, God in His goodness and love continues to extend himself to us even when we are reluctant to give our lives fully over to Him.
Today we will be reading from Genesis 32:22-32. I think there is much to be learned from Jacob and the relationship he establishes with God. In this particular part of the story we see that Jacob has his first physical encounter with God. Up until this point God is more a deity of his family line, of his tradition and it is at this stand off where God meets Jacob. When you look at the story of Jacob you realize that this guy is pretty messed up. In fact, the family blessing and birth right that he has received has been obtained through deceit and lies. He first gives his brother some soup in exhange for his birth right and then later in life with the help of his mother he tricks his father in order to obtain the family blessing. From there he flees his home out of fear for his life. And we see that it is in this encounter that God really chooses Jacob to be the leader of the Israelite people. His leadership and blessing really has nothing to do with his prior obtainment of these traditions (although they do tell us a lot about the cultural implications) but more have to do with this physical encounter of God. This is the first physical encounter with God of this type. When I think of a good leader I think of someone who is honest, strong and wise. When I think of Jacob those characteristics do not come to mind, especially in the first part of this story because he is deceitful in obtaining these rights, he is fearful and flees for his life (as opposed to repenting for his sin) and he is unwise in his dealing with his relationships. Yet, God sees much more in Jacob than you and I see. And the truth is it is a reminder to us that it is through God's strength and power that Israel is led not by Jacob or Abraham or Isaac, but through the divine nature of God.
Also we see that not only is this the moment that God chooses Jacob, but it is the moment that Jacob chooses God. As stated earlier, the worship, belief and adoption of God was very much part of the tradition of the Israelite people and the family line of Abraham. For Jacob's family line God was a very important part of their history, their story, their faith, their survival. So this is a very important part of the story because what we see here is Jacob making God his own-- not only out of tradition and part of his heritage, but out of the desire to know God from a personal persepective.
You see Jacob could have just received God as part of his heritage or tradition, but he chooses to make God his own by not letting go until he was blessed by God. This was probably the most honest act of Jacob. I've found through my work with people that in order for us to get our way we find ways to manipulate those around us or we try to manipulate God to do what we want-- we don't very often speak out directly or honestly about what we want or need or desire. In this account we see Jacob honestly and boldly tell God that he will not let him go until he is blessed. This is a very tense moment in the story because we know that God could have broke Jacob in two. Who was this dishonest, fearful guy telling God what to do? But God honors him by staying. And because God stayed, wrestled and in the end blessed Jacob it is an indication that God not only desires to be our God through tradition and through our histories but he desires to be our God through a personal relationship and encounter with Him.
God desires intimacy with His people. He desires each one of us to come to him not out of obligation, but out of the desire to want to make God our own. I was raised in a Christian home. It was always such an odd thing trying to figure out my faith because in so many ways my faith seemed like it was just an extension of my parents' faith and I have had to learn and acknowledge the fact that God wants my obedience to him because I personally love him-- not just simply because it comes out of the model of my parents (although that is important, too). He met Jacob and honored Jacob's boldness because it was a step in the direction of stating with His actions 'I want you to be my father. In addition to being the God of my father and forefather I want you to be my God and today I make you mine through this struggle of wills-- bless me!' Interestingly enough, God wrestles, He stays, He blesses him and he renames Jacob. God also gives Jacob evidence of this encounter by wrenching his hip. It is evidence that God does meet with us.
Today I encourage you brothers and sisters to wrestle God. I encourage your to struggle with him through your trials and questioning. Do not disengage! It is easy out of our pain and our hardships to move farther from God in isolation, but God wants us to come to him in our hard times. It would be easy to say well our parents, our church, our pastors tell us we must obey, we must trust God so we must adopt this simply out of duty to our faith histories, but God will honor our requests on a personal level (that does not necessarily mean he gives always gives us what we want, but it means that he shows up when we ask him). There is no better time than in our struggles to draw near to God, because as we have seen with Jacob, God will draw near to us. God is a personal, intimate God who longs to not only know us as part of a larger community of believers or family, but he wants to know us and acknowledge us as individuals made in his divine image.
We as brothers and sisters have the responsibility to spur each other on towards the face of Christ. Your brothers and sisters from Seattle do not take that lightly. We will join in your struggle. We will tell our church and our families of your struggle. And we will pray for you through this oppression. Thank you for allowing us to be a part of your service today. We have learned so much about trust and grace through your generosity and hospitality towards each of us.
Let us pray.

in the presence of greatness

along our trip to thailand we were able to meet many wonderful people. from lawyers working to pursue the rights of children and women exploited in sex trade and human trafficking to noble peace prize nominees. we met pastors, teachers, education administrators, community leaders and missionaries. it was so nice to hear about each ones experiences, perspectives and thoughts on the issues of thailand and burma. it was good to see their deep passion and heavy hearts for the men, women and children who are so vulnerable to this region.

one of the common problems for those who are migrating into thailand is the lack of national id. if you have no id-- you do not exist. this leaves so many vulnerable to human trafficking, especially children and young women. many of the young women who are trafficked into the sex industry come from hill tribes where poverty is so common and the opportunity for economic advancement is non-existent. recruiters from bangkok and chaing mai travel to these regions and convice families that they have work for their daughters. parents believe this to be their only opportunity for security for their daughters, as well as income for their families so they allow their children to go. typically what happens is that these women are taken into the city, raped and groomed for prostitution. and because they have no id, no national identity they have no rights. they are not protected under the law-- in thailand they do not exist. one organization we met with called new life center helps assist women in getting out. upon leaving they move to the center, learn a new trade and are hopefully reunited with their families and villages. some women were taken so young that they can't remember their village name or where exactly their village was located so they never will be able to be re-united with their families. this is the painful reality of so many...

the far-reaching river of life

it's not even been a week since i've come back from thailand. and life just keeps ticking along as if all that i've seen and experienced happened in some far off dream, but it was just a week ago that i was sitting in different refugee camps and praying that i would be a source of encouragement and friendship to the beautiful men, women and children we met a long the way. my deepest fear in coming home is that i would be swept up and under this current of life in the states-- that i would get overwhelmed in the everyday tasks of my life in seattle and would forget the sweetness, the stillness of God's spirit both in and with the refugees, internally displaced people and externally displaced people in burma and thailand. and it would be easy and an enticing temptation to slowly forget-- to get back to life and leave that part of my life as some bad dream in the past. but i vowed to god and myself upon all that i had seen that i would not forget and i could not forget, because in seeing and partaking in this bitter and sweet part of the journey this required much responibility on my part to act on behalf of my brothers and sisters... to speak, to remember, to pray and to share the story... this was not some humanitarian stop off, but god requires more in all he allows us to participate in. we can choose apathy, but i pray that god would press us onward and that we would answer in obedience to follow him-- even when we don't know where he is leading us.

so here i am first day back to work and my mind keeps wandering back to two weeks ago. i'm using my blogs to not only help me remember and document the journey, but also to share these stories with you, as there are so many to tell.

the trip was a whirlwind of activity. the first two days we met with about 10 NGO's, missionaries and other church ministries from there we traveled about 7 days down the thai/burma border. rich, our fearless team leader, set up our contacts along the thai/burma border. our first visit was to cross the border into burma and visit a refugee camp called Lah Ber Hur. lah ber hur has been there for about 4 years and in that time has been burnt down twice. there were 700 people who lived there at the time of our visit and the conditions are very unstable. there is no telling how long the internally displaced people (IDP's) will be able to stay there... they live on a very thin thread of security and are constantly aware of the reality that at any moment the SPDC could come and burn down their camp. Yet, they remain faithful and dedicated to their first and foremost mission to provide education for the future of their children. they were so gracious to us, as they allowed us to stop off and see the children in school. they invited us to sing, share stories and teach. definately the highlight of our trip!! the children sang us a song that translated in english said, 'you on my right you are lovely. you on my left you are lovely. if you love your neighbor you are lovely.' i still have the tune jangling around in my head. they took us around the village and allowed us to visit the medical clinic. we walked around and if you looked closely on the wall there were different educational posters for the villagers. the most disturbing of all was posters to educate parents on the various types of landmines to teach their children about... there were a variety and the children were shown with big, bold x's what could be deadly if touched. amidst all of this, people were smiling and greeting us and allowing us to be a part of the world-- if only for a day. and it felt so wrong. as a mother, i thought of my daughter and the priveledge i have in the states to provide all the security and safety i can afford. i don't have to worry or fear of military weapons geared to harm children or unsuspecting victims in addition to all the 'regular' things you try to do to ensure the safety of your children. i don't have to worry that sometime in the night someone might come burn down my home and my family would be displaced and on the run for our lives in the jungle. i don't have to be afraid of what future i can secure for my child... in fact, i can bank on the fact that she will have opportunities for a bright future in education, employment and to live out her dreams. i don't have to worry that somewhere in the night she will be stolen and sold either for slave or sex labor. all these things are a world a way from you and i. yet, this is what the karen people face everyday. it is not what you will see on their faces or in their attitudes. instead what sticks out in my mind is their singing. every morning from 5 am to late in the night (around 10 pm) there was singing of worship althrough out the camp. can we sing even in the hardships and trials of life? will we sing? there is much to be learned...

His still small voice.

I feel like in some ways i've been coming out of this strange, desolate wilderness. On one hand, I feel excited and out of the woods after a very long time of depression and isolation, but on the other side I feel like i'm some where in the middle of 'coming out' and recovering from the darkness, as well as scratching at the surface to make it beyond that one last clearing. In the latter of these two feelings I realize that the 'coming out' the scratching and the emerging into the light really does imply my reliance in the lie that in order for there to be any reconciliation & healing then I must depend on my own strength and ability rather than on God's. I find myself falling farther and farther a way from His presence the more I rely on myself.

Oswald Chambers writes, "The voice of the Spirit of God is as gentle as a summer breeze-- so gentle that unless you are living in complete fellowship and oneness with God, you will never hear it". I recently read this as part of my devotions and immediately I began to panic, "How can I be in complete fellowship with God? What am I doing wrong"? And my panic, my worry, my concern continues to quench the spirit of God's voice-- yet I find myself on this vicious circle of trying to get his voice to speak to me. Then I read this from Henry Nouwen's book Life of the Beloved, "Aren't you, like me, hoping that some person, thing or event will come along to give you that final feeling of inner well-being you desire? Don't you often hope: 'May this book, idea, course, trip, job, country of relationship fulfill my deepest desire.' But as long as you are waiting for that mysterious moment you will go on running helter-skelter, aways anxious and restless, always lustful and angry, never fully satisfied. You know that this is the compulsiveness that keeps us going and busy, but at the same time makes us wonder whether we are getting anywhere in the long run. This is the way to spiritual exhaustion and burn-out. This is the way to spiritual death".

And this is where I am at: a spiritual crisis. I do not share this out of self pity. It is quite a bit to reveal, but as a hope that in trying to confess my sin--my idol in myself, in my peers, in my family I have come to the end of a very long, tangled web.

God open our eyes to see your face-- open our ears to hear your still, small voice.

A Dream...

Quest is beginning the process of a long, unfulfilled dream i've had of sending a team to Thailand. It is a very exciting time to think together what work can be done in this part of our world. It will be an opportunity to work with refugees from Burma, to work with sexually exploited children and to bring hope and a reminder that there is a God who remembers the people who have long begun this work on behalf of our fellow brothers and sisters.

The dream for me started four years ago when a co-worker began sharing with me the grim story of IDP's in Burma. And now the dream stands before me, as I anticipate how I might be involved. I hope and pray that I am one of the twelve that gets to be a part of this journey with other Questers and ultimately become a part of the larger story of my brothers and sisters on the other side of the world. Tonight I realized that my dream is just one of many... There are 40,000+ refugees dreaming to have a future. While we safely and quietly tuck ourselves a way into our beds tonight there are men, women and children on the other side of the world waking to a very grim existence... waking to another day praying and hoping that they too can have the security for their future, for their children and the generations to come. My dreams do not stand alone. The moon I sleep under is the same moon that will be on the other side of the world when I awake. And will be the same moon that people kneel under to pray a prayer that the God of this world would free them. And I realize that I do not know this prayer of freedom, because freedom, priviledge surround me while others so desperately fight to attain that peace of mind-- the peace of mind that they can protect themselves and their families. Tonight I pray, "God, hear their cries, stir our hearts and give us the courage to act on your love and grace.". Please join us in this prayer. Amen.

good and evil

it is hard for us in our society to wrap our heads around the idea of good and evil. and when evil resides in the heart of a person it is especially hard for us to call it as it is. we'd like to think that all in all every person is good who sometimes just make bad choices. but how do we respond when a person or a set of people are evil? how do wrap our heads around that reality even in the face of god's grace? dan allendar writes some good stuff on this topic and it was in seminary where i began trying to wrap my mind around this. dan works with sexually abused women and he is not afraid to call it or the perpetrator what it is: evil. i have a hard time with that especially in light of the fact that i'm a counselor. i'm trained to be patient and long suffering even when people refuse to change. don't get me wrong there is a fine line between being a person of depravity, who is scathed by the reality of the fall-- we all are that. but what about the person or persons who submit their heart to evil who choose time and time again that they will use others in degrading, dehumanizing ways to elevate their position and power? how do we reconcile that in our hearts and minds?

today at quest, eugene preached on exodus 10 (the plagues). as you know we are studying the bible together starting from genesis to revelations. if you didn't get a chance i recommend checking out the quest website (www.seattlequest.org) and listening to this particular sermon because if nothing else it really gets you to think-- it gets you to think about your own ideology's, your own question of god's benevolence and the state of our world. it's a difficult text to get your mind around because the question that inevetibly comes up is: is god compassionate? and if he is compassionate how can he allow such horrible things to happen and if his grace is for all why would he harden pharoah's heart? and i find myself time and again in this passage wrestling with those very questions. yet, somehow in the sermon for the first time i was able to see that even in god's predestined plan we all have a choice. we all have a decision to make. we can always, always turn away from evil and turn our face towards god. but then that begs the questions, 'why does god harden pharaoh's heart and how could pharaoh have any other choice in the situation with god's manipulation on his heart? how can predestination and freewill co-exist?' well first of all, i believe it does because i believe that god chooses all (predestination) but in that we have choice to refuse the invitation (freewill). he chooses all, thus sending his son to die brutally on a cross for all yet, allows us to freely accept his grace and relationship with him. i had a woman, who is the only christian in her family, say, 'sometimes i wonder why did god choose me? why do i have this burden? why not someone else in my family?' and i remember sharing i believe that god chose every single member of her family and it is them that will not choose him.

but as we see in exodus god hardened pharoah's heart and so today i had to go back and re-examine the text. i carefully read the passage of the plagues and i realized something. even from the very beginning with the nile turning into blood-- pharoah hardens his heart. with the frogs-- pharaoh's heart becomes unyielding. pharoah's magicians, his officials keep coming to him and saying this is the finger of god: give up your way. yet, pharoah continues to challenge god. it occured to me as i was reading this that if i was in pharoah's shoes and i was given this challenge to let god's people go... maybe i would rebel and harden, but after the power of god's work in the evidence of the water turning into blood i would fall prostrate not only out of the call to repent, but simply out of fear. can you imagine seeing what pharoah saw? can you imagine experiencing the sight of blood in the yakima river? can you imagine seeing frogs in your bed, in your slippers, in your ovens? can you imagine? can you imagine what you might be feeling? well, i know i would be feeling: freaked out... i would be completely and utterly aware that this power could break me. yet, pharoah is unrelenting. which makes me think: who is this pharoah? who does he think he's dealing with? and does he think he is truly going to win? his unyielding heart, his rebellion, his lack of fear and reverence to god's power is evil. a kingdom that functions under the system of genocide for 430 years is evil. a dictator that kills the first born of every son for 80 years is evil. was there any hope for pharoah? had is heart turned to stone years before this confrontation? i believe: yes. and the scary part is that reality is true today.

i just finished watching, 'invisible children'. it's a documentary on the children of northern uganda who travel every night from their homes to sleep in hospitals and buses out of fear that if they do not leave they will be abducted and killed. for 17 years a civil war has insued. the leader of the rebel army: The Lord's Resistence Army (LRA) employs children as young as 5 years old to fight on the front lines of this civil war. these children are brain washed, their trained to kill their familes, their neighbors, their friends. how will we deal with this evil? how will god intervene?

in burma where the dictatorship has been at several peace tables with u.n. diplomats, peace activists such as aung san su kyi and others when will they free the people? when will they cease fire? when will they stop killing and destroying other ethnic groups? when will they stop using children for slave labor? when will they stop raping the women in their plan to 'burmanize' the nation? when? and if they will not even after coming to the peace table, even after saying, 'yes, we'll submit to peace.' then when? and what should we do? how will god intervene?

that is what i pray for every day... god how will you intervene? how do you call us to intervene? when talks of peace are no longer working and people are being slaughtered and destroyed everyday-- then what should we do? how can we continue to sit aside waiting for evil to peacefully relent? what is our call?

you see we have modern day pharoah's among us in the joseph kone's (leader of the LRA in northern uganda), ne win's (lead general of the military regime in burma), hitlers and the list goes on... how does god deal with this evil?

and today we learned that god is waiting. he's waiting for every heart to come to him even those who have turned toward evil. but he will not wait forever. so what do we do in the in between? my pacifist friends would say, 'you peacefully protest and voice the human rights for all'. yet in that peaceful engagement people are in the middle of the streets being shot down and murdered, children are being sold into sex slavery, families are being pulled from their homes at night... can we afford to peacefully protest? human lives depend on change today, because with out it tomorrow they will die.

my final thought is this: even in all of this jumbled up mess i have faith that god is good. i don't understand. i can't comprehend. but i just know, because i know, because i know that god is gracious. i know that god is compassionate. i know that he loves all people. i cannot explain it. but i just know that god is god and he gives grace to all people.

praise be to god!

the day after... (a re-post)


the day after easter... here i am in my blue bathrobe with my daughter playing in the background and i am reflecting on the remnants of easter day. this weekend wasn't one of those hallmark easter moments for me or my family-- i found myself more awkward, more out of my skin then ever before. i found myself insensitive and moody and snappy and irritable and then i went to church at 9 am. i felt god's rebuke on my life, as i have quite a bit recently. his rebuke reminded me that there is hope, there is a way and either i can trust and believe it or i can reject it and wallow in my self-pity. because you know that is what it is in so many of our lives any more-- self pity. things don't go our way, things don't turn out as we expected them to, relationships take drastic shifts and what do we do-- we feel sorry for ourselves. maybe the pity doesn't start til after a healthy dose of grieving and offering our pain to god, but somewhere in the mix we feel bad for ourselves-- we feel like we deserve to have that space to ourselves which only perpetuates our desire to stay in that place. i think of christ and if anyone had the right to feel sorry for himself it was he. after all, the disappointments of humanity turning their back on god and himself lay on his shoulders. he constantly was rejected, misunderstood-- he was called a fraud, a sham. yet, he didn't languish in self pity-- he went to a cross to die a horrible, shame-filled death of ridicule & mockery so that you and i could be here today (me writing this entry, you reading it). yet, we still languish in our self pity, our self defeat.

i feel god's call to reject that idol. the idol of self defeat where we think that we are entitled to sit around until someone picks us up and puts us on our feet. enough is enough. easter is a reminder that evil has been dealt with-- three times over through the life, the death, the resurrection of christ. it is time to rejoice, to pick up our crosses and follow him.