Aotearoa Diaries: Re-imagining Sunday

Growing up in church, one of the markers of being a good Christian was if my friends knew to never invite me to do stuff on Sunday mornings because they would know I would be at church.

That was never a problem for me because I didn't have friends. (I wish I was kidding, but it's true. I didn't really learn social skills until I was in uni and living in a foreign land, and it was sink or swim to find social skills. But that's beside the point.)

After moving to Auckland and working in a church full time, I wrestled long and hard with how "Sunday = church" wasn't a norm for so many who considered themselves Christians. It wasn't necessarily that I had a personal issue with those who didn't show up at church faithfully every Sunday--no, for the most part, I understood where they were coming from.

It was more, how am I supposed to do my job and sustain our programme if we didn't have a faithful attendance?

In the first year after I left my full-time job in a traditional congregation, I convinced myself to take a break from the Sunday routine to allow room for healing. And the struggle was real. I missed having a weekly community, but more importantly, I missed the music and the congregational singing. I plugged myself into a congregation a friend pastored, and tried to find fringe ways to get involved so I could feel like I was still being a good Christian.

Then I began to realise the main reason I was doing that was so that if anyone was to ever doubt if I was being a faithful Christian/pastor, I could have an easy answer: "Hey, I AM going to church. Don't ask further questions about my relationship with God or my ministry life or any of that."

But I was drowning in my own inauthenticity. It wasn't that being in a traditional congregation wasn't fulfilling my spiritual need, or whatever the new-age/millenialist term for that is. It was that I knew in my heart of hearts I was created to imagine a different kind of church for the other misfits like me. But I was too busy covering up my insecurities about looking unChristian to venture into this unknown of Church of the Misfits.

And then I met Stephen, who was at basically the same place where I was with regards to our relationship with the traditional Sunday congregation. And it became slightly easier--and slightly not. Being raised in church meant that we had been brainwashed learnt to believe if we were to take our relationship with each other seriously, we needed to do better about our relationship with Church.

So for a while, we tried Sunday evening church. We found somewhere we liked enough, but the question kept coming back: Is this really where we should be, or are we just feeling guilty about not being at church on Sunday?

There was one particular Sunday evening that became a turning point for me. Some friends whom we hadn't seen in a while were popping in for an afternoon coffee. It got closer and closer to the time we were supposed to leave for church, and Stephen and I started getting a little antsy about how to tell them we had to leave shortly. But something prompted us to wait, so we did. The conversation turned a corner and we found ourselves learning about our friends' thoughts on church and why they were no longer a part of a traditional congregation.

When we eventually pulled into the church parking downtown, we both had the same thought. We may be walking in to the church building ten minutes after the service had started, but it was a no-brainer. That last little bit of conversation over coffee was more Church than either of us had experienced in a while.

I don't know for sure if that was when it started, but it wasn't long before we gave ourselves freedom on the weekends for encounters like that. For a while, we still tried to make sure we made it to Sunday evening service, but more often than not, we would have had friends popping in and out all weekend long. Our kitchen would be a complete mess after brunch and pizzas and chips and hot chocolates and dumplings and nachos and rugby that trying to head out the door for Sunday church just became too hard. And I began to understand at a deeper level why I struggled so much with the Sunday programming when I was full-time at a traditional congregation.

So what is the Church of the Misfits going to look like? We're slowly experimenting with a few ideas. But it probably wouldn't all take place on a Sunday.

On Job Descriptions...

I had a sobering realisation recently: I know how to be a Christian in a pre-Christian world, but I don’t know how to be a pastor in a post-Christian world.

Let me begin with a disclaimer that for the purpose of this post, I use the words “Christian,” “pre-Christian world,” “pastor” and “post-Christian world” in the traditional evangelical sense.

Coming back from my month of travels meant it was time to tackle my application for permanent residency in New Zealand. All the paperwork I had been waiting for had arrived, and I didn’t need to use my passport again till August at the earliest. All that was left was a letter from my higher-ups saying that my continued presence at the job is necessary for the religious work in New Zealand to move forward, and a job description.

Ahh… That job description.

As mentioned in previous posts, I created my own job and the higher-ups signed off on it. All that we knew at the very beginning was that there was a need for a Christ community to be present in the city; the rest was up to me to figure out.

Well, great. That’s a great job description to send in to the immigration office, aye?

In the last few weeks I’ve had a bit of anxiety over how to describe my job in a way that, as my friend Baruk says, “checks all the boxes in any application form”. Part of the problem came about when I decided to take Ingress more seriously.

What is Ingress? The simplest way to describe it is that it’s an alternate reality game owned by Google. It’s a little bit like geocaching, a little bit like Risk. As explained by my brother, the story goes that there are a bunch of aliens (the Enlightened) that want to dominate the world through portals around the world. The humans (the Resistance) are trying to stop them by taking over these portals.

The reality is that the way this game plays out, neither of those teams stand a chance at real world domination. It’s kind of like playing Age of Empires with friends who are equal-leveled players on each side. I know, the struggle is real.

Until recently, I mostly played the game by myself even though I knew there was a strong Resistance (Go Smurfs!) community in Auckland. But last Thursday, I took a chance and went to one of their events. I’ll spare you the nerdy game details, but it included dinner at the night market, going to the park to work out our next game play.

Needless to say, I was scared out of my mind because my introvert was screaming, HELP HELP HELP, I don’t know how to deal with new social situations. But my curious anthropologist always wins out in these situations.

How does community play out in this gaming world?

Are they friendly?

Will they judge me if I don’t take their gaming seriously enough?

How will I introduce myself?

By my real name, or by my gamer profile?

And what if they ask me what I did for a living?

Crap. That dastardly job description thing again.

Well, thankfully with gamers (this group anyway), as long as you speak enough gaming, they’ll be friendly to you. We finished what we set out to do, nobody asked too many questions, and thankfully it was a weeknight so I had the excuse that I needed to head home so I didn’t have to engage in too much post-game pleasantries.

The next night, they had another social event in a bar. It made me even more nervous because the introvert doesn’t enjoy the bar scene, and (gasp!) what if the Church people knew I was hanging out at the bar?? But I decided to make an appearance and not stay long.

That was when I learnt about the spirit of the game. Yes, it is competitive. But there are a few things I learnt that make it more fun, and also things that can be quite handy to keep in mind as I continue creating “my job”:

1) Community means team
Friday night’s event began with someone asking if anyone was free to help level up a lower level player. One of the things I love about this game is the ethics of it. If you are level 8 or higher, you are expected to set things up to help those at a lower level to level up faster. Yes, I’m still a social justice nerd even in the gaming world. What? It probably is against the ethics of this game to do an anthropological study of it, but I can’t help myself.
As the new kid on the team strategy block, a few of them sat down with me to share tips and offered a few spots where I can capture the portals and they would keep watch on them for me. Let’s just say, it’s also more fun to do things that way.

2) Community means acceptance
Well, the event ended up evolving into a celebration for an Enlightened player who had just hit level 16 (the highest level in the game). There were a lot more Resistance players there for the celebration than there were from her own team.
The first person I spotted was a guy that I had ran into while gaming in the CBD about a week ago. I was greeted with a big hug like an old friend, and introduced to the rest of the team. There were no questions asked about life stories or religious or political views, which was a very refreshing change. They had recruited the bar manager to the Resistance side, so our team got tap beers for $5 and the guy who had developed the relationship with the bar manager over time shouted drinks for anyone who wanted one. People simply belonged because they shared that common identity: being a part of the Resistance. And as evidenced by that night, you don’t even have to be a part of the same team for us to be friendly with each other. What a novel concept!

Well, back to what I was saying about my job description…

After the night at the night market, I began to realize I needed to figure out a new way to talk about what I do. In prior experiences, whenever I say I’m a pastor, I get one of four responses:

1) They suddenly treat me with a great deal of respect like I’m some kind of saint. Ask any of the crazy kids who hang out with us at The Bridge. I’m not THAT kind of pastor.
2) They try to engage in some deep theological debate that I feel completely inadequate and uncomfortable doing in a big (more than 2-3 people) social setting because I don’t know the crowd well enough to really speak my mind theologically yet.
3) They ask, “What’s that?” and I don’t really know how to explain that I am affiliated with the Church, but I don’t preach and teach in that traditional sense, and no, I’m not the Sunday morning type of pastor.
4) They awkwardly change the subject or walk away.

That’s when I realized: I’ve known for a long time how to be a Christian in a pre-Christian world, but I don’t know how to be a pastor in a post-Christian world.

Most of my best friends growing up didn’t share my religion or faith and we’ve always gotten along. They celebrated my ordination like they would have for any graduations, job promotions or weddings, and my becoming an ordained pastor doesn’t change anything about our friendship; it’s just something I do as a job (or vocation).

The problem is I live in Auckland. Now that I’ve lived here nearly four years, I’m getting a better understanding of what post-Christianity means in Auckland. It’s weird enough to say I’m a Christian; it gets even weirder when I say I work with a church because there's either no understanding, or a negative experience of church.

But I didn’t want to be that Christian kid in high school who hides that I’m a Christian because I’m afraid I would be teased. Besides, my very clever church health consultant friend, Brett had been encouraging me to find a way to describe what I do that would make sense to both the Christian and post-Christian worlds and not threatening either. I decided that I would start saying I’m a community developer by day (and church planter by night, if they ask).

I tested the waters with that on Friday night. As with most social settings where I’m uncomfortable, “watch and learn” has become a lifelong mantra. The first time the “what do you do?” question came up, I took a deep breath to remind myself I’m learning to speak a different language. It went something like that:

Me: I’m a community developer.
Her: Oh, cool! With what organization?
Me: Umm… (Well, clearly I hadn’t thought this through very well) A church?
Her: Oh. (Turns away long enough for me to start getting super anxious). Well, that guy over there? He’s done some church work too.
Me: Oh, cool.
Her: (Slowly walks away)
Me: (Well, that went REALLY well. Next time this comes up, you better have a better game plan.)

So later that night, the guy who’s done some church work comes over to discuss game strategy. It comes up again…

Me: I’m a community developer.
Him: (I catch a glimpse of a knowing look on his face) Oh, nice. With what organization?
Me: (Trying to be brave) It’s a new organization called The Bridge.
Him: Hmm… That must be a new one. I have a bit of a background in community development, and my last supervisor at uni is like the head of several community development organizations around Auckland.
Me: (Oh crap. Oh crap. He’s going to call me out that The Bridge isn’t a real organization because I have no idea what’s on my job description.) Oh, nice. (Tries to change the subject) So what do you do now?
Him: Well, I used to do community development with a church as well, and somehow I keep finding myself coming back to that. I still do community development, just not with a church anymore. So is The Bridge supported by a church as well?
Me: Well, we get our funding from a few churches, but there is not ONE church that we are attached to.
Him: Oh, so who started The Bridge?
Me: (Oh crap. Oh crap. He’s going to find out this is all kind of a fraud. Well, fake it till you make it then, I guess. At least try to sound confident.) Me.
Him: Oh, nice! So is there expectation that you have to bring people to a church from what you’re doing? Because when I was working with the church, there was always that expectation.
Me: Well, I try not to make that the top of my agenda. To me, the community development part is more important, and if a church is formed out of that, then great. (What I didn’t say was, community development done well WILL eventually lead to a church coming together. What form that church takes on remains to be seen.)
Him: Oh, very nice! That actually sounds brilliant.
Me: Yeah, it is. And it’s actually a lot of fun.

And with that, we very easily transitioned the conversation back to game strategy. No need for awkwardness.

As much as I would like to believe that what I’m doing is cutting-edge ministry and relevant for the context of downtown Auckland that I live in, being raised in traditional evangelical church leaves a deep imprint on the way I still process stuff. And I find myself questioning the orthodoxy of what I’m doing on a regular basis. But I also have to remember I live in a different context from the ones that I grew up in physically, spiritually and theologically.

It is a different day in a different world. It may be a while before I really get comfortable with what this job description looks like. And realistically, what I’m going to turn in with my residency application will not be an accurate of what “work” looks like on a daily basis because that will keep evolving. But for now, this community development/church planter “checks all the boxes in any application form”. More importantly, it sits well with the call God has placed on my life. And that’s good enough for me.

Reimagining Church

This week, I attended Savaira's uncle's funeral service. Because we weren't familiar with the customs of Fijian funerals, we ended up showing up on the evening when the family service was happening. I was admittedly nervous about having shown up on the wrong day because it might have made for a really awkward situation.

But the minute we walked in, Auntie Selina greeted us with hugs and kisses, and thanked us for showing up. Then Savaira came and sat beside us, and proceeded to explain what was happening because a good half of the service was in Fijian.


My mind began to wander back to a conversation I had earlier in the week. At our lunch group, the conversations revolved around whether we should be thinking about a different way of doing Church--a way that would be more welcoming for new people, and particularly whether a 40-minute long sermon made it more overwhelming for someone new.

As the conversation went back and forth, I heard Dr Shively's voice in my head saying, "A sermon should be no longer than 20-minutes. Any longer, and you lose the attention."

But I had another nagging thought. I wasn't ready to throw the baby out with the bath water and say that the sermon was unnecessary. I couldn't quite figure out how to explain myself as the conversation continued. All I could think of was that the sermon time was meant to be a time where, perhaps like at family reunions, there's a lot of other flurry of activity. But at some point, Grandma or Grandpa starts telling the stories of the family traditions and the heritage that has been passed on to us.

So perhaps we need to re-examine the way we preach sermons. Are we just giving a speech each Sunday just for the sake of giving a speech, or are we framing the stories of our Christian heritage in such a way that helps us understand why we make certain lifestyle decisions now?


Then the question was raised: What about the new people? How do they get included in story time?

At Savaira's uncle's funeral, the question was resolved for me. When we as a family truly live out our understanding of hospitality, everyone eventually gets adopted into the family. Perhaps we start with the greeting that we are truly welcomed, even if we showed up on the wrong day. Then maybe the one friend we are connected to sits beside us and translates as the elder is speaking. At the end of the service, we're all sharing a meal together and before long, all the aunties and uncles are trying to adopt us into the family.


Now, that. That is Church.

APCGC Reflections...

"And they'll know we are Christians by our love..."

That's a line from a familiar song. We are one in the Spirit; we are one in the Lord...

Some friends from my time in Anderson and I have had our share of musings over the theological repercussions about that line in the song. When it was sung at the Asia Pacific Church of God Conference last week, I found myself smiling fondly--not because of the discussions of the theological repercussions, but because there was something about the spirit of unity as we were singing that song.

Unity. That's one of the pillars of the Church of God Reformation Movement. And unity was what we saw at the APCGC last week.

As I had shared during the morning devotion time on Friday, I had grown up in the Church of God in Singapore hearing about this APCGC. Uncle Mac and Auntie Jean Johnson were regular visitors at our church, and I would hear about this conference from time to time. So to have been not only present for the first time, but also asked to share during this year's conference was a big honour.

But I digress. Unity.

Growing up in the Church of God in Singapore, I had come to eagerly anticipate church camps and conferences. Yes, I was THAT church kid. As a kid, that was the one time I got to hang out with my church friends for a whole week. But as a teenager exploring my call to ministry, those few days of camp became a time of seeking, of spending time with those whom, upon looking back now, have been mentoring me from the time I was a shy kid hiding away from the crowds. Because of that, church camps and conferences were always special to me. It wasn't till much later that I found out that this Campmeeting thing was a big thing for this wider Church family I came to love dearly.

In my college and seminary years, the Anderson Campmeeting (and the various names it has come to be known by) slowly grew to become a highlight for me each summer. Part of it, admittedly, was because as part of my job while in seminary, I got to meet church leaders and missionaries from all around the world--and hearing the stories of cross-cultural ministry always fascinated me.

But more importantly, it was the spirit of campmeeting.
The spirit of togetherness.
The spirit of unity.

As I sat in each of the conference sessions at the APCGC last week, it became apparent to me that the spirit of unity was so present in our midst. Pastors, ministry leaders, lay leaders, missionaries alike, were all in the same room sharing about what God was doing in our region. Maybe it's because I've felt so distant from the rest of the Church of God family, since the Church of God presence in Aotearoa New Zealand and the South Pacific is young and tiny. Maybe it was the songs that we sang that reminded me of my childhood growing up in the Church of God in Singapore. Whatever it was, it reminded me of the importance of gathering with the brothers and sisters for the very reason of being together.

Unity.
Ah yes, unity.


Two particular highlights for me from our time together:

The first was the privilege of translating for the second half of the conference. It was an unexpected responsibility because I had only mentioned to Pastor Alan on the Wednesday that I would be happy to help if needed. I never thought I would ever serve as a translator because my Mandarin sits in about 10 years of rust, and my spiritual vocabulary exists mostly only in English. But I could tell the translators were struggling, and later found out they had to translate from Mandarin to Cantonese to English in their heads.

My Mandarin may be rusty (and it definitely showed on a few occasions), but there's something about growing up bilingual that I realised I can no longer take for granted. In more than one way, it was also a reminder for me to return to my first clear call to ministry: to the ones living in-between cultures, where translation is more than just about the language barriers--something I'll be unpacking more in the days to come.


The other highlight took place on that same Thursday that I did about 4 hours of translating. At lunch the day before, I had the opportunity to be a part of a brief conversation between our Chinese and Japanese national leaders (identities concealed for security reasons). If you're familiar with the history, these two nations have had a long-standing political enmity towards each other. Our Chinese pastor shared that growing up in China, he had always been taught in school to hate the Japanese, though he had no clear understanding of why. Yet as his understanding of the Gospel grew, he began to understand that for God so loved the world, and the world included Japan and the Japanese. He then requested for a moment of reconciliation between the Chinese and Japanese Church at the end of the China Consultation Day the next day.

That next day was a moment in history I will never forget. (A small piece of personal history here: my first call to ministry was to "return" to China. There are a lot of cultural pieces surrounding this "return" that will be explained at a later time.) Witnessing that moment of reconciliation where the Japanese and Chinese brothers and sisters embraced each other (and also serving as translator for that entire segment) is something that will forever be etched in my heart. There were tears, hugs, words of encouragement to each other. I've studied biblical reconciliation for a while now thanks to my seminary work, but to see it first hand in a moment like that is a completely different experience.

"And they'll know we are Christians by our love..."

Unity.
Ah yes. Sweet unity.

On Young Adults #1: Some thoughts on engaging the Church...

Even though I've officially only been in the role of student ministries pastor for about eight months, the young adult age group is one that I've been quite passionate about for a long time. I haven't written as much as I would have liked, but here are some very initial thoughts.

There's a lot that the Church tries to do to seemingly cater to this group called the "young adults", and especially so since the "millenial" term was made popular. Which, I genuinely applaud their effort for trying, but not all of these attempts have been sucessful. I don't claim at all to be an expert in this field, but these are simply a few observations both from my own journey and from my conversations with some of the finest I've met.

1) Stop simply talking about us and actually talk to us.
Don't talk about us like we are a problem that needs to be solved. Don't generalise our behaviours. Talk to us, and find out that we, just like every generation that has come before us and every generation that will come after us, are all fearfully and wonderfully made individuals who are as traditional and postmodern, conservative and liberal, creative and original, as it gets. And for every continuum there is, you can find one of us on every end of the spectrum and all the in-betweens. We are not one general "millenial" collective. We are individuals who are just trying to find our place in the world. So thank you for talking about us, and trying to create a programme that we can fit into, but no thank you. Ask how we want to be engaged.

2) Tell us we no longer need permission.
We no longer have school or teachers, youth groups or youth pastors to tell us what to do. We want to make it on our own, but for our whole lives until now, we've lived under some form of safety net which was incredible for our early developmental years. But if we are to make it on our own, we need to know that we no longer need permission to lead our generation or to be creative, and we need to hear that from you. That doesn't mean you leave us alone completely, because we still need to know we can come to you for wisdom and to know that you will always be our biggest cheerleaders even as we make mistakes, struggle and fail.

3) Remind us we are a part of a bigger community.
As we enter adulthood, we are also beginning to realise more and more that the world really does not revolve around us. It is far easier for us to only mingle with our peer-group than for us to initiate conversations with those who seem to have accomplished much in life, even if we have utmost respect and admiration for them. As people ahead of us in the journey of life, you have stories and legacies to share, and we need to hear those stories to remember that we are a part of something bigger. Tell us what it was like growing up in the part of the world you grew up in, how you came to Aotearoa, or why you chose to be in the vocation you are in. And ask us about our hopes and dreams, not so you can tell us how we'll go wrong even if you know from experience we are simply young and idealistic. But walk with us each step of the way. Because these are the things that keep us in the whanau.

4) We are NOT a singles club.
I once mentioned to a pastor friend I was thinking of doing something with young adults and the response I got was, "Great! We definitely need a singles ministry!" *face-palm*
Not all of us spend our twenties dreaming of meeting the right person, or the perfect wedding, or thinking up names for our yet-unborn kids. Some of us simply want a group of friends who can dream together about what it means to make an impact in our communities and in the world. Don't try to pressure us into creating speed-dating events or turning our young adults gatherings into "singles clubs" where we can meet other young, single people. Working against poverty and advocating for sex workers are as noble causes as getting married and raising children.

There you go. What else would you add on this list? I'd love to hear from you.

Churchless on Holy Week

Every year for the last ten years, the significance of Holy Week became more and more real to me.


Perhaps it was the AU/AUSOT community.
Perhaps it was Park Place Church.
Perhaps it was Doug Berky's Holy Week programme.

Perhaps that's why finding myself churchless on Holy Week this year feels so unsettling.


I've played the role of the good church kid for a long time.
I've played the role of the dutiful minister for not as long, but long enough.

Perhaps that's why finding myself churchless on Holy Week this year feels so unsettling.


Even through the years of worship wars
Even through the years of watching parishioners rip their ministers to shreds
Even through the years of watching religious teachers tear each other apart
Even through the years of rejection
Even through the years of endless meaningless debates with academic theologians
Even through the years of being of the wrong gender, age, nationality and personality type
Even through the years of ridiculous politics
I still came home to church
Even if more wounded and broken than before.

Perhaps that's why finding myself churchless on Holy Week this year feels so unsettling.


Don't get me wrong
I will still be at a church this weekend
(The good church kid and the dutiful minister still lives somewhere inside and need a sense of normality)

Don't get me wrong
I won't be there simply out of duty
(The good church kid and the dutiful minister misses all that is sacred of the rituals way too much)

Don't get me wrong
I'm not there because I haven't thought of leaving
(Even the good church kid and the dutiful minister gets tired of fighting for no real reason)

Don't get me wrong
I simply am searching for my own meaning of Church that isn't bound
By the trappings of the good church kid
Or the dutiful minister
Or the wounds and the brokenness of the years gone by
Or the false pride that the Church never did, and never would be able to hurt me

Perhaps that's why finding myself churchless on Holy Week this year feels so unsettling.


More importantly,
Jael needs to find Church again
Not Jael the good church kid
Or Jael the dutiful minister
Or Jael the wounded and broken
Or Jael the angry church-leaver

Just simply,
Jael


Perhaps that's why, just for a change, it's ok to be churchless on Holy Week this year.

Because sometimes, we all need to be a little unsettled.

(Just for the record:
In case you're concerned, Jesus and I are doing ok. But the church stuff... Yeah, that. I've managed to botch)

"Remember Your Baptism"

11 April 2004

I remembered being immersed in that water, and coming out feeling nothing different. The rational part of me knew that was normal, but a part of me wanted to feel different.

But that was the beginning of everything.

For years before then, I had been thinking about the blessing that came when God changed a person's name in the Bible.

Abram to Abraham.
Sarai to Sarah.
Jacob to Israel.

And I had wanted that blessing, but I felt like there had to be a reason or occasion for that blessing.

Easter Sunday was rolling around that year. My brother and I had decided we wanted to be baptised that Easter Sunday. And I had brought up the name thing, so my mum got involved with the process of looking for a new name.

We wanted names that started with the letter J to keep with our legal names. For some reason, my mum didn't want me to pick the name Jezebel (I wonder why). And so we kept searching.

Then one day she said she stumbled upon the name Jael and told me to look up what it meant. Everything that Google found said it meant "mountain goat" or something along those lines.

So we took it to my pastor, and in his best attempt to parse the Hebrew name, we came up with "Ja" sounding like Yahweh  or Jehovah, and "El" sounding like El Shaddai -- something along the lines of calling out to God.

And then I read the story of Jael in Judges 4. I was impressed by the strength that woman possessed to be a part of Kingdom work, so mountain goat or not, Jael was the name to be. It was short and simple, and I grew to like it more and more.


But... Well, back to that time of immersion in water baptism.

I came out of the water feeling nothing different. What I didn't realise was that that was the beginning of what I now affectionately call "all that crazy".

At the time, I thought it was a momentous occasion because... well, there was that name change thing. And the guy I thought I was going to marry at the time (all grown-up at 18-years-old) was there as well.

More importantly, my BFF was there. She wasn't a church-goer and we didn't share the same faith, but she was there because she knew it was important to me. And to this day, even though she still wouldn't say we share the same faith, she reminds me constantly of that water baptism. That commitment I made, that even if she didn't completely understand, to surrender my life and call to my belief and my faith. Juan, you really are the best.


But even more importantly, that was the beginning of "all that crazy".

You see, I didn't know it at the time, but later that year, I would move to Anderson, Indiana for college.
And Anderson, Indiana was the beginning of "all that crazy".
Good crazy, I should probably add.
And there was no turning back.

10 years, a whirlwind of life experience and a whole collection of passport stamps later, here I am in Auckland, New Zealand, remembering that baptism.

There was nothing special about that water.
And I didn't come out feeling any different.

But things were becoming different.

Remember your baptism

时间会冲淡一切 (Time Will Dilute All Things)

The Chinese saying goes, 时间会冲淡一切, or "time will dilute all things".

It's hard to believe so much time has passed and the tear glands still act up every time that episode gets brought up.

Today I realised I'm struggling to regain my ability to trust that relationships I've given myself to will come through for me.

                            They told me
once upon a time,
                                              if you
            give
                  yourself
               to relationships,
       there comes a time
                      when there's enough trust
            built
that you can depend on those
                                    relationships.

Then you tried to tell me they were wrong.
                               2.5 years wasn't enough...

时间会冲淡一切

I wasn't going to ask for any more favours
           I just wanted to
                    know
               if we could still be
friends.

It didn't hurt because you couldn't help.
or didn't want to, but... technicalities.

It hurt because you didn't want to talk.

时间会冲淡一切

I haven't stopped loving you
I can't stop loving you
You're still family even if my passport tries to tell you otherwise.
I still love you.
I wouldn't be here otherwise.

Today I sat and wept.
They said 时间会冲淡一切
I wish time would hurry up and dilute all this pain from that episode.

It was trivial.
Right?
So why this pain?

The on-lookers are saying that wasn't fair.
But life isn't fair
If it was, there would be a whole lot less suffering in the world.


All those years you've preached at me to not walk the journey alone.
Yet when it became time you said, "We'll walk with you while you're here but we can't do anything once you leave here."


I'm dare not ask for fairness.
But Lord help me, my trust issues from the dark ages threaten to return.

"I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in You through our word; that we may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Jesus and He in You, that we also may be in You, so that the world may believe that You sent Him." - John 17:20-21


时间会冲淡一切
I hope one day we can look back with a smile and say, that wasn't pretty, but it was ok.

"That we may all be one..."

Thank you for the "other" voices from that episode, and the reminder that in spite of the crappy hand I've been dealt, I still had/have quality people in my life.

Becoming Human Together

I'll confess that when it comes to my brothers and sisters who go to a mega-church, I often am less than gracious with them. So when the City Harvest saga broke out, I'll admit that I quickly jumped to conclusions that, of course, they would be guilty.

But that's not the point. The point is that regardless of whether or not they are guilty, there's a part of the Family that is hurting. Regardless of whether they provided the spiritual leadership they should have, there's a part of the Family that is asking questions. Regardless of why they did or didn't do what they were accused of, there's a part of the Family trying to make sense of what has happened.

I'm learning again what it means to stop older-brothering the prodigal. It's so easy for me to jump on the self-righteous bandwagon. And so, in light of the City Harvest saga, I'm reminded again that, mega-church or not, we all belong in the body of Christ. And when one member of the family is hurting, it's only fair that I try to push aside my self-righteous judgement and hurt with them.

It's part of the experience of becoming human together.

The Wax House

She stood watching, with tears streaming down her face. Too many years had passed since the last time she played an active role in the hustle and bustle of activities in that old house.

She visited the old house every year since she left. It had become like a ritual for paying homage to the role the old house played in her life. Some of her old friends had left; others that stuck around noticed the different energy with the new faces that came. Most seemed excited about the different energy, and she hoped it was for the best.

Then one day she noticed the paint starting to peel away. The flowers looked thirsty, and she wondered if she was the only one who noticed. She could water the flowers, but she didn't have enough time to start the paint job. She left and again, she hoped it was for the best.

The next year, the garden was parched, and the paint had become even more splotchy. She wondered again if she was the only one who noticed. Again she watered the garden, and as she did, she began to see an image of what the old house would look like if nothing changed. She shuddered and wondered if their little old house was about to become like the story of the lighthouse that she heard not too long ago. She told a friend of that wax house she saw in that image. It looked like someone had made it into a candle with wax slabbed around rusty iron poles and set the whole thing on fire. Beyond that, she wasn't sure what to do. That old house had been her stomping ground as a child, but there were others running the place now.

Not too long ago, she made another visit. The energy again felt different, and again she hoped for the best. There were new flowers in the garden, and they asked if she would help water the garden. But how could she when she had just given immense amounts of energy starting a different garden from scratch? And besides, it still bothered her that nothing had been done to change the soil or to create a better environment for the flowers to thrive better.

Still she did what she could while she fought to ignore the voice that said, "Change doesn't come with a new garden, or a fresh coat of paint. Remember? Real change never comes from the top down or the bottom up. It comes from the inside out." She found her own way to make a difference, ways they may never recognise as anything of significance, ways they will probably see as rebellious. Not that she really cared anymore what they thought. She had spent too many hours grieving the loss of too many flowers to care.

But still she wept. She wept for the old house that didn't feel like the house she grew up in anymore. She wept for the years gone by and the flowers that faded away. She wept for how the old house was starting to look more and more like the image she saw way back when. She wept for the flowers that told her to leave them alone. She wept for how she had just spent so much of her life in that land elsewhere putting pieces back into place for other old houses that have been down that same road. She wept for her own fears of being sucked back into those dark places when she grieved the other old houses.

And then he came and took her by the hand.

"My child, it's time for you to leave now. You came for rest but you found you had to hide your face. Your heart cannot be broken for so many places and this is not a house for you to grieve over anymore. Let it go. Let the flowers go. I am still in charge. Remember that lesson from way back when? Feed my sheep. But they still are MY sheep."

My "Leaving Church" Story

Years ago when I first started taking blogging more seriously, I gave myself a few rules of things I will not blog about.

1) Political commentary.
As it is, there are enough opinions out there to sway the crowds one way or another. I don't need, or want to, start another heated debate. Words are only of use if they compel people into action.

2) Reactionary posts.
Because the blogosphere is a public forum, I don't need to throw out a passionate reaction to an event or something I came across only to process my thoughts a little further and regret a post a week later.

3) Personal drama.
Again, the blogosphere is a public forum. Unless healing and reconciliation have taken place, dirty linen doesn't have to be aired in public.

Today, I'm breaking rules #2 and #3.
I'm treading carefully with this post today because there are episodes that I'm considering writing about where reconciliation has not taken place, so I'll throw in a disclaimer early on that these stories are only shared to give credibility to the bigger story, and not to turn this blog into a bitch-fest.

So here we go. This is my "Leaving Church" story, a response to the recent frenzy in the blogosphere.

It began in 2005, when I came across Donald Miller's Blue Like Jazz. I was on a student-leadership team in a Christian liberal arts college, and that was the book we were reading on campus that year. Miller's book articulated many of my frustrations with a brand of Christianity that I had been struggling with because it was getting too superficial for my liking, and made me want to apologise to every person whom the church had left a bad after-taste with.

A year later, as a ministry intern, I found myself watching theologians, professors of religious studies and retired ministers bickering amongst themselves about how much time our staff organist should be allowed to rehearse on the organ in the sanctuary. I realised then how broken institutions can be, and decided that if this is what becomes of theologians, professors of religious studies and retired ministers, I would never go to seminary, and never work in a religious institution (never mind that I had already "responded to my call to ministry"). I wasn't ready to completely abandon the institution--the church is family. Just because all the Big Brothers and Sisters screw up or don't play fair doesn't mean you disown them.

So instead, my first real grown-up job was at a para-church organization. Freshly graduated with the conviction that I knew nothing, I thought working at a para-church organization would still keep me involved in the local churches, but at a level where I only need to watch from the peripheries and not get tied up in the politics. That would buy me some time to work through my issues with the local church, find some healing and eventually start seminary feeling less jaded.

Maybe I only have myself to blame for getting overly-involved. But after a couple years of watching policy after policy being implemented that were quick-fixes to a more deeply-rooted problem without thorough thinking through of what long-term implications there might be to those directly affected by these new policies, one cannot help but feel even more jaded by institutions. And then I discovered more and more voices amongst my new-found community in seminary that resonated with my thoughts. Oh, I could tell you of the countless hours we spent dreaming up what Church could be like if we could just start our own church amongst our own circle of friends and not have anyone else join in--most of which happened while we were avoiding writing about sanctification and the likes of it.

But we all knew. We couldn't run away and start our own thing. Most of us who understood the history of our tradition, the Church of God Reformation Movement, started by DS Warner, knew that that was exactly how we started off. As students of Church History, we knew that it had been done before--countless times, even before DS Warner.

The summer of 2010, I had the privilege of spending a few months with a group in Berlin, Germany. This was a group that came together to figure out what Church meant in 21st Century Berlin, a cosmopolitan, global city that had moved on from the days where Luther's reformation had a significant impact on ecclesiology. The group in Berlin wasn't a sensation because they were trying to start a hip 21st-Century style of monastic-living. They were sensational because they were intentionally committed to community and to the spiritual betterment of each one in the group. But even more so, to the reality that engaging in community means engaging in each other's dirt and learning to fight fair when we disagree rather than say, I'm just going to go off and start my own thing.

Kelley Philips, my internship supervisor in Berlin explained to me that the statement, "If we would all just go back to the 1st-Century Church where everyone came together to take care of everyone else, the world would be a better place," had become a popular catch-phrase in church-language these days. But we often ignore the possibility that the 1st-Century Church probably fought all the time too, as they define what "fair share" meant. We paint idealistic pictures of what the Church should be or look like, rather than embrace it for what it is and try to work through those pieces. I could quote you one Bonhoefferian thought after another about the impact of pursuing human idealism instead of pursuing the reality of God, but the reality is, these are only words.

So what IS your leaving church story, you ask. I could tell you of the heartache of trying to find healing after that dark year in undergrad. I could tell you of the 4 years I spent defending an institution even though there were realities I faced everyday in that institution that discouraged me even more. I could tell you of how I beat up a TV in anger when this same institution told me they wanted no part in my involvement with the missio Dei since I wasn't one of them (ask my friends Emily, Ashley, Michael, Yocum and Jason. They witnessed the anger).

You want a leaving church story? I don't have one to tell you because after all this time, I haven't left. And it's not because I haven't wanted to, or haven't had the guts to. But it's because the Church is family. I can dream all day about being born into my ideal family, but it is in digging through the dirt with my real family that I can truly understand "For God so loved the world..."

Beloved Church of God theologian Gil Stafford is known for his words, "Be the Church." As I was ruminating over how to articulate my "leaving church" story, I found it ironic that we're talking about leaving the church when the reality is, we ARE the Church. How can we possibly leave the church if that requires us leaving ourselves?

Or maybe that's what it comes down to. Maybe we need to leave ourselves, our ideals and definitions of what Church should be, and just simply BE the Church.

Sociological Overdose

The new flatmate/landlady had her sister-in-law over for dinner the other night. As it was my first time meeting Rachel, the sister-in-law, she had lots of questions to ask. Here's kinda how the conversation went:

Rachel: So what do you do?
Me: Umm... (Crap. How do I explain what I do without sounding like a total slacker?) I'm a pastor.
Rachel: Oh, cool!
Me: Yeah, I work with kids. I spend most of my time planning lessons and activities, and visiting with kids and their families. And we also do Bible clubs in the schools here. They're not overly-keen about us evangelizing, but they definitely want us to teach good morals and values.
Rachel: Yeah, that makes sense. But doesn't that make it hard for you?
Me: Well, not really. For me it's always easier to talk about everything else except God...

The conversation continued, but that definitely left me thinking.

What do I see my role here as?

If what I'm here to do is to teach good morals and values to the kids, then maybe it would be more fair to say I represent a social service organization than a church, wouldn't it?

I'm hearing MaryAnn Hawkins (in Biblical Foundation of Mission) talk about how the missio Dei includes several areas of study as categorized by academics, including both spirituality and sociology. While I approach the missio Dei more easily through sociology, it doesn't make spirituality any less important.

If I'm to be a pastor and a representative of the church, then it wouldn't be enough to simply do sociology, would it?

If we go according to Maslow's hierarchy of needs, if the sociological needs are not met, we may never get a chance to talk about the spiritual. But I think it's safe to say that for me, because sociological needs are slightly less awkward to deal with, I use that as an excuse to avoid getting into the spiritual.

But I'm not here to represent a social service organization.


As the WCF family continues this journey with the Hub, we'll be trying to meet more sociological needs in the community. I'm thankful that the other hands involved in the Hub have a slightly easier time holding the sociological and the spiritual needs in tension than I do--and even more so that we have this family to hold each other accountable to representing the missio Dei well.

Your Kingdom come,
Your will be done
On earth, as it is in heaven.

Perspektiven on Post-Christianity

Kathrin and I have a lot of conversations. Most days, we agree on most things. Some days, we agree to disagree. Other days, we disagree only to later realise we were both actually saying the same thing but in different ways. She tends to be more optimistic than I am about most things, so even her choice of words reflect that optimism. And it's usually not till later that I realise it was a matter of perspective. We could be talking about something that I've already gotten used to people disagreeing with me about, so my defenses are already up and ready to shoot down anything that could speak against my point. Even if she actually agrees with me, I don't actually hear her agreeing with me until I let my defenses down.

I've been thinking a lot the last few days about Christianity in Auckland. According to sources in American christendom, Auckland apparently falls into the bubble of post-Christianity. At least, that's what I learnt from the papers I've written for seminary that involved research on Maori ethnology and the development of the Christian church here.

But that's a problem. The resources available in the States were limited, and it was even more difficult to sieve through those resources to find the ones that weren't tainted with bias toward either parties involved in the Treaty of Waitangi. So the question remains: How the heck am I supposed to accurately find out about the history of both Maori and Pakeha, AND an accurate history of the Christian church here? Because if we don't know about where we've come from, how are we to figure out how to move ahead?

The thing is, if Auckland is as post-Christian as sources in the States paint it to be, then our approach to living out Christian faith here will be more complicated than simply presenting the creation story and praying the sinner's prayer. (Seminary friends, remember that conversation after Old Testament?) Because for someone who has either never grown up with a concept of God, or with a tainted perception of God, the creation story is just another narrative, like a literary work or a Shakespearean prose. And for us who grew up in the church, God and the Bible have always had some authority along with our parents, teachers etc. But for someone whose only understanding of an authority figure also has physical, emotional or spiritual abuse attached to it, the idea of an authority that is more concerned with love and grace than with legalism will still be difficult to grapple with.

Then there's the question of, if Auckland IS post-Christian, what happened that led us down this road?
Was it the doing of the well-intentioned (but maybe not so well-informed) British missionaries who, in the perception of the native Maori, were all the same as the other Brits did not keep up their end of the Treaty of Waitangi?
Was it the selfish agendas of church politics that caused division, leading to people leaving the church discouraged by how their idealistic perception of Christianity had just been shaken up and torn apart?
Or what's the story?

A part of me feels horrible that, as much as I've prided myself to be a student of anthropology, I've been in Auckland for over a month but haven't even started to really try to understand the world outside the church walls here. But I'm also realising that just because some aspects of the suburban Te Atatu Peninsula don't actually look too different than Anderson, Indiana, I don't process that the experience of Christianity here (whether you call it a religion, a faith, an experience or whatever the word is) is any different from the Christian bubble of Anderson.

I guess it's all a matter of perspective, eh? We each approach the idea of Christianity with a different perspective, but am I willing to listen to the stories behind why someone's approach is different from mine, or am I going to be defensive, the way I am in some of my conversations with Kathrin?

But there are more and more questions rolling around in my head. It's unsettling, but who's to say it's a bad thing?

UnProfessional Love

Doug asked me about a week ago if being on this side of Seminary was anything like what I expected. I wasn't exactly sure how to answer him because I don't know that I really had any expectations. Or maybe it was that I hadn't really thought it would be too different from the other stuff I was already involved with while in Seminary.

My biggest regret of my undergrad life was that I zipped through it so quickly that I hardly had time for people. I was involved in many things, but I never found the time to simply sit and listen or just be. Yet somewhere in the middle of the chaos of those years, I stumbled upon this idea called Love.

As those years drew to a close, I knew the lessons I learnt came from more places than just my music classes. In fact, I had gotten so tired of the professionalism of those looking for a career in music. All I wanted to do after I was done with college was to find some way to simply love people.

Which was probably why Seminary looked like the biggest joke ever. I didn't need more professionalism to show me how to love people. Besides, all that I had seen professionalism do was set people up against each other and make them compete. Even in music, together sounds better than alone (except when you get a bunch of flautists together--sorry, I just haven't let my music nerd side hang out in a while so I couldn't resist that). Yet we try to outdo each other with our ability to double- or flutter-tongue, or how much control we have over our vibrato or how quickly our fingers can move over the ivories.

But we lose sight of the bigger picture. Music was supposed to be a personal expression--whether it's the composer or the performer, not a show of who's better than who. I finished undergrad thinking, why can't we just flippin' love each other? It really isn't that hard.

The truth is, Love IS that hard. Between the 3 years of seminary and the 5 years of fighting church politics, the idea of Love that was already planted in my head was beat down, thrown around, pieced back together, and then beat down, thrown around and pieced back together all over again. But each time it was beat down, thrown around and pieced back together again, it grew bigger, bolder and scarier. And not because it was intimidating in and of itself, but because it demanded more of me.

Suddenly Love wasn't just about saying the right things at the right time anymore.
Suddenly Love wasn't just about giving all the time anymore.
Suddenly Love wasn't just about doing things anymore.
Suddenly, I realised Love couldn't be a profession.

I'm reminded again of the annoyingness and the pain of rediscovering love this time last year. And as I reflect upon the last couple of weeks of getting ready for this week's holiday program, it hits me again that Love isn't about putting on a uniform and doing things. Love isn't about getting the job done or making sure that programming runs smoothly. Love isn't about plastering a smile on my face as I greet kids that come into the gym at Rutherford Primary School each afternoon this week.

Love is about making room.
Love is about creating space for things to happen.
Love is about intentionality even when we feel like we've been running on empty for way too long.

And then I stumble upon the answer to Doug's question. The reason why life on this side of seminary doesn't seem too unexpected is because Love is still tormenting me with the reality that I still have no idea what I'm actually saying when I tell someone, "I love you".

And I guess for five years now, I have waited for this season where there's much less bookish professionalism and all that's left to do is to let life continue to teach me about Love. Because as it comes down to it, life and creation and all the thing-things (thank you, Phoebe Pether) that loiter around here are simply an expression of the Creator's Love.

Truth be told, I'm well aware that lately my attitude toward life in general hasn't been great. Even if I've just been through a lot of change, even if I've been running on close to nothing, those excuses for bad attitude can only last for so long.

Professional Love says keep putting that smile on your face and act like all is well in your world.
UnProfessional Love says take the time to grieve, then take the time to deal with it. Because you know the source of this Love never runs out.


This morning, I finally took time to go for a walk. Part of me felt guilty that I've been feeling so empty that I wasn't sure I'd have anything to give the ones involved with the holiday program. All month long we've been working toward this, and now that it's here, I'm empty and frustrated--mostly because I've been empty for so long and tried to ignore it. And I've felt the nudging from the Creator to back away for time alone, but I kept coming up with stupid excuses to avoid crashing. When I woke up this morning, something finally snapped. I needed to get away, even if only for a few minutes, or I would crash and burn.

Stefan and Kathrin live close to the boardwalk on the Peninsula where we get a pretty good view of the Auckland skyline. Well, we do most days, but today was not one of those days. Instead the fog had clouded the skyline of the city. After spilling my guts to the Creator for a good few minutes and apologising for being less than sufficient, it finally hit me.

I love cities. Berlin, Portland, Singapore, New York, Atlanta, and maybe soon enough, Auckland. Even on rainy days and cloudy days, I love cities regardless of whether I can see the skyline. I love cities because of its odd mix of people, the clutters of litter and the loudness of it all. But most importantly, wherever there are people, there will always be some kind of a mess or something to be frustrated about. C'mon, we're human. Humans are messy. But I love the mess anyway, because that mess reflects so much of my own imperfection. But even more than that, it reflects the creativity of a God who gives grace for more than I can even think or ask.

The creativity of a God with very unprofessional Love.

Dear Keren #3 - Becky and the Church Part 2

Dear Keren,

My first conversation on campus with anyone this week (this being finals week) was with none other than Dr. Robert Nicholson himself. As much as I've rubbed shoulders with all the Church of God giants in my time here, I still get star-struck. This was, after all, Dr. Robert Nicholson, the one who has a building--one of my second homes, nonetheless--named after him. So the conversation went something like that:

Me: Good morning, sir.
Dr. Nicholson: Well, it is Jael! You're about done, aren't you? How does it feel?
Me: (What the ..... he knows my name??) Well, I have one more week... If I get through this week, I'll be ok, I think.
Dr. N: And how many other times have you said that of the weeks that have passed?
Me: Umm... A lot?
Dr. N: And you got through those?
Me: Well, I guess so...
Dr. N: Well, atta girl! You'll be able to get through this one as well. Not that you're a girl, more like a lady, but that's just an expression I use, you know?

Me: (What in the world just happened??)

I guess I should explain that Dr Nicholson is a part of that family/institution that contributed to that dark, dark year of my life. I don't know how much he knows about my story from that year, but the fact that he, Dr. Robert Nicholson, knew my name... That blew me away.

Ok, ok. So I've talked about "that year" for a while now. I guess I should explain what happened in that year huh?

Remember those times when you were unable to get a ride to The Mercy House on Sundays so you would end up showing up in that building because it was within walking distance? And after service was over, a bunch of us will head out to lunch together and it was always fun? Well, that didn't last for too long. Change happened, as always does and always will. A lot was happening within the walls of that building that was causing some amount of disgruntlement, unhappiness and division. Eventually, a big part of that after-lunch group stopped coming. I remembered at one point asking Pastor Randy if I could do my undergrad Church Music internship with him. We both ham-hawed for a bit and neither of us followed up on that so that was kind of dropped.

A year went by, and within that year, he and his wife were gone. It wasn't anyone's fault, really, except that change happens, and growth hurts, I guess. I was pretty upset because he and his wife were after all, amongst the first people to welcome me to Anderson when his son, Ryan, decided to borrow their car to take a bunch of us international kids to Walmart. You remember those days when going to the grocery store was a pain, don't you? We weren't sure who to ask for a ride so a lot of times we'll eventually end up walking to CVS to get the few things we needed. Then eventually one of the international upperclassmen would spot us walking and yell at us for walking and insisted on giving us their phone number so that we could call one of them.

Anyhow, Randy and his wife Rhonda (not to be mixed up with other Rhonda who got me involved in the worship team as I was telling you about in the last episode) and Ryan were amongst the people who made me feel most at home in that building. Granted it didn't really feel like "home" yet because I was still trying to figure out how to get into the traditional style of worship. But between them, and the Rhonda who got me involved with the worship team, I couldn't find enough reason to leave. Especially since, during the summers, Rhonda would always have me over to watch their son Victor so she could get things done around the house. She also got me involved with a bunch of different things that made me work with kids and children.

Now you have to know that it was only a few years ago that I actually started enjoying being around kids. For the most part, I felt like that awkward neither-grown-up-nor-kid person who never really had a childhood so I didn't really know what it meant to talk to kids. And I was still coming out of my "hide-behind-my-mother's-skirt" phase, so I was just REALLY awkward (not that I'm not still awkward now, but compared to a few years ago... oh boy...)

It's funny, you know, thinking about those years. Because those kids that I always felt awkward around, are the same kids that I would consider my BFFs now. A couple months ago when I was still debating about whether or not I should move forward with the New Zealand stuff, these were the kids that surrounded my table and taught me about the book that involved the 39 clues. (I don't remember the title). These were the same kids that, last Sunday at church, when they had prayer for all the graduates, stood behind me and prayed for me. I honestly didn't think I left that much of an impact on them, but perhaps it was me just being me, showing up at the summer musical rehearsals, going to their soccer games and hanging out with their parents that left an impression? And I'll be honest, I didn't show up to all these things so much because of them as much as... Heidi kind of talked me into it. Apparently I let Heidi talk me into a lot of things huh...

I guess I'm just realising that I didn't keep showing up to that building because it was convenient anymore. But people kept me coming and after a while, it didn't seem so bad anymore. I guess this was why the dark year seemed so dark. I know I'm still ham-hawing around that, but that's because I don't really know how to talk about it since that dark year seemed so long ago. At the same time, recent stuff that's been happening has been reminding me again that I should probably share more of my experience from that year than I do now.

But that will have to be for another time. The parentals are here for graduation (hey, as are yours!) and this house needs to be cleaned before I get to the chiropractor tonight.

Hugs,
Jael

Dear Keren #2 - Becky and the Church

Dear Keren,

Over dinner tonight, some Seminary friends and I were talking about how we've changed since our high school years and how even though we all still profess to be in relationship with Christ, some of our lifestyle habits have changed and people who have known as from back then may not think that we still believe in God.

Which got me thinking. There was one very, very dark year in the last seven that I've spent in Anderson that I haven't really processed much until more recently. I hardly told anyone until fairly recently how much that hurt, or how much that has changed my perspective of the institution, and how the institution had become the family that I needed a break from to help keep my sanity. And just because I don't talk about it or act too differently on the surface doesn't mean that underneath my attitudes have changed and I'm no longer the Becky in the Chris Rice song that I was seven years ago.

It all began the same weekend that I met you for the first time. Since I didn't know my way around the city of Anderson yet, I didn't know what other church options I had available. So I show up at this big church that I remembered attending a few months back when I was first in Anderson for my equivalent of visit day. The sanctuary itself was almost as big as the entire church building I grew up in. And I show up there again the following week. Right after service was over, I was approached by this spunky lady who introduced herself as Rhonda. She said she heard that I was a musician and that if I was interested, she could start putting me on their worship schedule. I got plugged in right away, and even though the very traditional worship style made me really uncomfortable, I was connected, and the ten-minute walk from my dorm room to the church was much more convenient than trying to find people to take me church-shopping.

Things were great the first couple years. Sunday after Sunday, the international kids who found no other church home would gather together at the back of the sanctuary to head out to lunch together. Sometimes it was Indian, sometimes it was the Chinese buffet place in town. Community came easy, and even though I wasn't exactly looking for it, it was there.

But that was all years ago now. Funny how much can change in seven years huh?

To be continued...


Miss you,
Me