Home?

Last week Wednesday my orientation roommates and I dragged our bags around the corner to the next dorm over on a sleepy U of Chicago campus. We left our bags outside with some of the group already there and went to turn in our keys.  This simple task defined my day as the lady at the front desk said, "Have a safe trip home." My breath caught in my chest as I mumbled thanks and hurried outside where we began to laugh, which seems to be the easiest response to all things overwhelming.

We left the country last week for a completely differet home.  Our eighteen hours on a plane did not bring us to the familiar, comfortable known place that formed us in many different ways.  Instead our day of travel brought us to the complete unknown of the North Coast of Borneo.  The past week of orientation has been full of laughter as we navigate the unfamilar: trying to eat rice with chopsticks, learning Malay, handwashing our laundry with a little too much soap,  and chilling at the base of the mountain. Aside from the laughter, we have also started discussing what it means to be associated with the Christian church in a Muslim country, how the Malaysian government interacts and regulates religion, and how that affects the many different ethnic groups who call Malaysia home.

Amongst the deep conversations on our orientation mini-retreat we've also been spending the mornings hiking through the jungle at the base of Mt. Kinabalu, which was an incredible adventure. On our way up to the mountains we stopped for lunch in Tuaran, the town I will be placed in, for the local noodle dish. Catching a brief glimpse of the place I hope to call home for a year allowed me to remember that perhaps home actually is where  the heart is. Maybe my trip home is more of an ongoing search to find myself amoung the others of rich and complex new communities.

Radical Love

I gave the sermon this past week at my home church and a couple of people asked if I would have it somewhere - so here it is!

As you have likely heard I am preparing to spend a full year in Malaysia with the program Young Adults in Global missions, which we call YAGM.  What is YAGM?   Its a group of 57 young adults going out to accompany the local people.  As a pianist I am used to accompanying people.  Whether it be the picky soloist or the sleepy congregation, I have learned much from my musical accompaniment, working to listen attentively, adjust quickly and humble myself completely to the whims and desires of a different person.   Accompaniment as a model of mission focuses on walking alongside the people we are serving.  Similar to musical accompaniment, I will be learning to open my heart and listen fully in a different culture, adjusting and humbling myself to new perspectives and a completely different way of life.    The ELCA's mission model of accompaniment removes the line between "us" and "them" in order to more fully serve the local community exactly where they are...

...  I will be working at Jireh Home.   Jireh home is a children's home for kids from rural and impoverished parts of Malaysia without access to education in their villages.  The kids come to live at Jireh Home and go to school in Tuaran.  My job then is to provide after school mentoring with some conversational english tutoring.  But most importantly my job is to love.  

Saying that my most important job for a year is to love some likely adorable children in tropical Malaysia seems like a pretty good deal.  But I've spent a lot of time this past year thinking about what it means to love as Christ calls us.  The reading from 1 John 4:7 says, "This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his  Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins."   In John 15:13, Jesus says, "No greater love has one than this: to lay down one's life for one's friends."  In order to love we are told to lay down our lives, to give completely of ourselves for someone else's benefit. Basing our concept of love on Jesus' sacrifice  is radical, completely countercultural.  

As I worked to love radically on campus this past year, I found myself consistently drained, constantly frustrated and honestly a little bitter.  How can I keep loving the person who doesn't respond or reciprocate?  The friend who only knows how to complain about every possible thing?   How can I love the people who walk too slow when I'm late, who don't listen to or follow directions, who are just plain annoying seemingly all the time?  As I became more and more exhausted I started to wonder how I could love myself when I apparently couldn't love anybody else.    And it was then, that I read a devotional on Matthew 5: 14-16.  The verses read “You are the light of the world.  A city on a hill cannot be hidden.  Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl.  Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house.  In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.”  And the commentary on the verse reminded me that it is absolutely impossible for a lamp to shine if it is not plugged in. As imperfect humans, we can not shine for Christ without a direct connection.  I cannot shine by loving radically if I am not plugged in to God’s love.  I’ve learned that plugging in for me means spending time with God, in his word.  Without that, I have no energy source, nothing to drive me or refill me.  Without the radical love of the Father, I am useless in loving others.  

But just because I feel God’s love the most while spending quiet time with Him, doesn’t mean that is how you experience God and are most effectively in relationship with Him.  And I challenge you to think about when you feel most connected with God and make that thing a priority at least once this week.  Perhaps it is going for a run, allowing your thoughts and prayers to drive your feet.  It could be listening to or playing music that resonates deeply, talking  with a friend or family member who knows your heart, or reading the Bible or a thought provoking book.  And if what you try doesn’t work, pick something else for the next time, whether it be the next day or the next week.   I truely believe it’s important to understand how you feel the closest to God, to be plugged into His powerful love in order to love radically as we are called.  

In the process of becoming plugged into God’s love, It took me quite a while to realize how much He actually loves me, a fact I’ve known since I was tiny.  Jesus loves me was probably the first song I could sing.  However, it is one thing to know you are loved and another to comprehend and feel that love.  But once you do, there is nothing more to do than to shine, sharing it with every person you encounter.  When I started to understand that the of the creator of the world loved me because of the things I considered my fears, failures and insecurities, I began to understand how to love others for exactly who they were. Understanding and accepting where others are in their lives made it easier for me to love them radically.  As I began to walk deeper into real and honest relationships, I realized it was much harder for me to receive love than to share love.  It is so much easier for me to notice when other people need encouragement or care than it is for me to be completely vulnerable.  And as I spend the year accompanying the Malaysian people, I expect I will learn exactly what it means to be loved in places of vulnerability.   

I am leaving a a week for a country I know very little about.  I know one phrase in Malay from emails from my country coordinator, but I don’t know what it actually means.  I am certain I am going to need a lot of help from my team, the staff at the Jireh Home, and likely the children I am serving in order to function in Malaysia.  But in order to get help, I will have to ask.  As I learn the language and various cultural and societal norms, I have to be open in vulnerability and joyful in humility, realizing that growth happens exponentially when you are uncomfortable.

I am going to Malaysia for the year to love radically.  But you don’t have to travel to a developing country to shine with God’s radical love. There are people everywhere, likely many in your life that need radical love more than ever.

I wasn’t planning on going abroad to serve. Taking a year off was not in my plans. Living or studying abroad was something I would have liked to do, but not high priority.  It was a something completely in God’s hands that came up last fall, after finishing the grad school application process. It was something I ignored until God had put so many things in my way I couldn’t ignore it anymore.  Then there were so many reasons not to go – to miss a year seems like so long, with so many things happening in my family and friend’s lives.  Despite all of the reasons to not go, I knew it was where I was supposed to be, something I had to do.  At that point, I was excited to feel so passionately called to something.  However, when I started hearing back from grad schools about interviews and offers, the once intense pull I felt towards serving abroad decreased significantly.   After all, I had a plan, it was working out and I knew I could serve by loving at any of the grad schools I was interviewing at.  Was it necessary to go abroad when I am certain there are plenty of people doing nerdy science that have never experienced radical love?    But in my prayer time, I realized I needed to completely accept God's love and learn learn to be vulnerable and accept love from other people.   And it is in service and vulnerability that we learn to humble ourselves, letting God open and mold our hearts to the needs of a community.  It is in that relationship with new communities we are stretched and changed and grown to be more like the person God created us to be.  It is in loving radically that we see God in others and shine brightly for him.  For me, without taking the risk of the complete unknown, I could have maintained a lot fo control in my life.  But surrendering that control has already been an amazing process.

So my challenge for you is to be constantly plugged in.  Then love radically.  Love radically in your home.  Love radically at work.  Love radically at church, in your neighborhood and to those people who seem more annoying than describable.   I am spending a year in Malaysia, living to love radically and to be loved in vulnerability.  I pray you are able to spend your year plugged in, loving radically in your communities because He first loved us.