Hidden

"Jesus told the crowds all things in parables; without a parable he told them nothing. This was to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet: "I will open my mouth to speak in parables; I will proclaim what has been hidden from the foundation of the world."
- Matthew 13:34-35

people are not an inherently thoughtful creatures
The majority of us are no different than ants
no, we are worse than ants
ants know their role and purpose.
they collaborate and triumph
somehow, humanity can't even manage this
we are too busy striking fear into one each others' hearts
in hopes that our domination will provide security
we have no time for parables
we shall hear without ever listening
just bells and whistles
we shall see without ever understanding
just colors and shapes
Lord
you've wasted your time with your stories
you've doomed us with your hidden truths
they shall be ignored for the eternal circus of amusement
they shall be deconstructed with no moments for pondering
we shall be trapped by our mass momentum,
isolated in our insecure souls
and buried by the rubble we have heaped upon one another

婆婆，家在那裡？

4.1.09 (when grandma almost left)
1.14.10 (while grandma is still here)

"Grandma, where is home?" （婆婆，家在那裡？）

i’ve been so many places
been moved so many times
it doesn’t really matter anymore
what matters
is who I have been
to whom have I given
and how I have served
I haven't any jewels or diamonds
what I have to show, is you.

God took my father away
so I was raised a daughter of God
I’ve drank the waters of the long river
rested in it’s peace, fought against it’s rage
as the waves swallowed my earliest love
as Gospel formed my heart
as fortune tellers whispered my future
as children giggled and recited my verses
I gathered each day simply as it was

i’ve marched west in single file
young boys carried my few belongings
climbed mountains along the basin’s edge
the beginnings of my refuge sojourn
as bombs went off in the distance
as daughters and sisters were lost along the trail
while uncertainties crept along each border and turn
strong melodies of opera filled my weariness
bringing mercy, anger, and strength

i’ve wandered the deserts of ancient cities
swam the great oceans along islands of green
until fortune called me across a narrow strait
to a treasure island of heroes and fiends
another new beginning set in calmer times
with each step, the melodies grew stronger, sweeter
I learned to dance with the rhythm, step with the beats
learned to love and to honor, to nurture and raise
under the shade of peach blossoms and papaya trees

a newly woven set of clothes each year
for newly beloved to keep warm and grow strong
to drown out the rumors of terror and security
to make a safe place amongst the tragedies
I tap the keys of a hundred pianos
a thousand hymns with memories hung on every note
praises for the safe journey thus far
prayers for the long road still ahead
hopes for a greater peace over our harbor-factory town

I’ve watched my children dream their dreams
survive nightmares of broken hearts and promises
chase after riches, chase after God
settle oceans away, in beautiful new lands
each home becomes more foreign than the last
I grew numb, deaf, and mute
but there was always new life set before me
a chance to pour a worn life into a fresh one
blessed opportunities to sow new soil, bear new fruit

I've carried you in my arms
the safest place you had ever known
where tears would cease, wonder re-lit in your eyes
Though I carry no deep wisdom, I seek to simply bless with life
I feed you the heads of lions for strength and the choicest pearls for beauty
I ignore the world's routine chaos, anchor my soul in the ones i love
In those fragile and needy, strong and faithful, distant and young
You are all my children, and I am a child of God
and so are you.

I let go, I'm ready to make my final trip
past the pains and failures of my body and mind
when I go, there will be peace in my heart
with joys of father, mother, sisters that history stole from me
again i shall hear beautiful opera with the faint smell of tobacco
and so I ask only peace, peace, peace
upon the ones I have poured myself out on
Though I can no longer remember these days or months
I shall always remember you

I’ve been so many places
been moved so many times
it doesn’t really matter anymore
what matters
is who I have been
to whom have I given
and how I have served
I haven't any jewels or diamonds
what I have to show, is you.

Baltimore feels like...

row homes stacked
one atop another
boarded, renovated, boarded, new, almost
ghosts sit atop our stoops
spirits hover above our decks
thousands stomping about the town
each with a hundred stories to tell
each feeling unheard
because we think we've heard it all
these streets are haunted
by children gunned down on corners
by philanthropists wandering their mansions
by shipyard workers, forever hauling crates
by doctors experimenting with fortune
her past is mixed with her present
while her future tries to ignore her own doings
hidden behind the big hair no one wears
distracted by pretty things reflected off harbor waters
lights twinkle atop monuments and steeples
warm fires burn under highways and bridges
fragrant steam floats up from the wounded roads
blue lights swirl about the darkest cross streets
surrounded.. .
the neighborhoods wonder
what lies beyond their routines?
a thousand glasses clink in a hundred pubs
celebrating life
simply

happy frogs

(Photo by James Snyder)

consider.. .
a little tree frog
stuck on holiday lights
warmed by their heat,
entranced by their colors,
when was the last time
i felt so comfortable
or alive?

distracted

a word of poetry
for the ones who think
too much
for the one who feel
too much
for all who feel caught
squeezed
in between the best of themselves
and the fearful chills
of what they cannot become
i dream in colors
i live in black and white
i remember too much
forgetting what is most important
doubting what is best
distracted

Reflection on Being a Wesley Seminary Urban Fellow

A call to ministry is one of the greatest tensions a person might experience. It is not just an interest in a job, but a deep seated experience of the entire being called upon by a higher power to live in a capacity beyond what most would find typical or even desirable. Even worse, often the calling is worked out over years, sometimes decades, stretching out an already fragile tension with life long questions and doubts in the same basket as visions and hopes.

Jesus began his ministry with a boom. Matthew (4:12-25) begins the story with triumphant callings in Capernaum, quoting Isaiah and stirring up the hope of a new kingdom coming. He practically proclaims, "Let there be light!" in the same spirit of creation. He hooks a few fishermen in the next chapter with the promise of revolution, a brawl that rugged fishermen would be willing to drop their livelihoods for ("fishers of men" didn't mean what it does to us today). The narrative then moves into a sweeping epic of ministry to great crowds from cities and regions throughout Palestine. Epic.

Since high school and on through college, the call to the city bothered me. You see, I'm a product of the suburbs. For a young, wide-eyed teen looking to make a "difference," the prospects of urban ministry are no less revolutionary and aspiring as Jesus' original call. I worked with urban ministries throughout high school, college, but always at a safe distance: the kind that allowed you a few hours to a few weeks in the inner-city at a time before returning to the comforts of a home or campus in the burbs.

Now, years later, I'm working out my original desires at Wesley Theological Seminary in their new Urban Fellows program. I discovered the possibility an ocean away in China. After college I had put the idea of urban ministry on hold for international teaching and development. Here was that old call dressed up in a new, experimental program that sought a praxis engagement of urban DC, the very city I first felt the tugs of God's alluring whispers. With my wife and I set to return to the DC area, I signed up hoping this seminary and program would be the opportunity to bring together my fractured experiences from youth to today. I wonder if the disciples felt the same tensions and opportunities when they heard Jesus' words? Epic.

Luke (4:14-5:17) gives us a less rosy perspective on the call. Jesus' initial message given to town fellows in Nazareth produced the particular response of riot. The calling of the fishermen by the sea accompanied with the inner conflict of a man ashamed. Before the great crowds gathered on the plains to hear the words of the teacher, a long list of healings, controversies, and conflict had already taken place. Luke paints a journey that, though epic, is fleshed out in the realities of the world's religious, economic, and social systems.

As I complete my first semester of work with the Urban Fellows program, I'm realizing the messiness of the process ahead. In the wholeness of life, the calling to urban ministry is not all consuming. I have to work out the tensions of family life, friendships, and work. I've learned that in order to embody the Gospel, there is a lot of red tape to move through, a lot of study and consideration to be fleshed out in the both typical norms and sweeping changes of downtown DC. It has only been one semester. There are many more to come. I'm getting prepared for a little controversy, a little conflict, and hopefully, a little healing as well.

What's my narrative for my Urban Fellows journey? For now, it is the gospels themselves. The story of a rag tag band of men, tricked into following a ring leader full of dreams that, once revealed, seemed less and less like what they had in mind. Following Matthew's epic beginning comes the Sermon on the Mount, a message barely conceivable in the mind and heart much less in action. Where is the place for meekness and peacemaking in revolution? This Kingdom of Heaven is ideal beyond ideal, unrealistic to the core. Likewise, Luke's Sermon on the Plain is a challenge to the high and low to, a great balancing of fates requiring great love and great sacrifice, speaking into the very conflicts that had taken place before.

I believe Jesus' life spoke into the heart of the urban context of his time. As I follow the stories of his followers from a seaside call along the Galilee to a great journey across the Mediterranean to the center of imperial power, I likewise find my own journey from suburban Maryland to China and back. My life, thus far, has been an eclectic mix of experiences and ideas. As the disciples worked out their hopes and visions in conversation with the life of Christ laid out before them, so shall I in my studies at Wesley, DC, Baltimore, and beyond. I believe Christ will reconcile the great diversity at work within and around me during my Urban Fellows engagement. Along the way he'll challenge me with realities and ideals I've never considered or had to face, the same way his own disciples had to process it. These next few years will be anything but planned, smooth, and clear. Maybe... they'll be epic.

Reconciliation

What does it mean to reconcile?

As I ease into seminary studies through this first semester of work and reflection, the question rises as the fundamental problem of my spiritual formation. As I look about my classes, my work, my relationships, I see the question staring me the in face. I’ve tried to ignore it by keeping busy, by offering token sacrifices of convenient action to appease it, by rationalizing my actions or non-actions as dictated by circumstance and season. I feel called to a ministry of reconciliation in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. I state this boldly and unashamedly. Yet, as time moves on, there is a shame that confronts me. My intentions are pure, but I feel a spirit of hypocrisy in my actions. The longer I sit with myself, the heavier the weight.

What does it mean to reconcile?

Dictionaries offer the following definitions: “to win over to friendliness; cause to be amicable,” “to accept or be resigned to something not desired,” “to compose or settle,” “to bring into agreement or harmony; make compatible or consistent,” “to reconsecrate,” “to restore.”

In all of our lives, there are spaces that require reconciliation. Those spaces might be completely personal and internal, or be so large as to encompass entire cultural norms within a greater society. As I write and reflect, I am trying to discover these spaces, to sit in them, and pray fervently for my Lord to speak to me in them.
My wife challenges my sense and desire for reconciliation. She suggests that I seek it out of fear and insecurity rather than holy conviction. I alluded to this in my first reflection; the desire to be okay with all those around me as to not incur wrath or dislike. Indeed, this is true. But at the same time, I am beginning to understand my overall desire to be a positive thing. To have the world reconciled with itself and with God is a holy conviction. But I am divided in my heart between spaces of fear and insecurity. I pray the Lord to heal and fill these spaces with empowering love as to see my desires incarnate in holy concern. In this way, I shall not be reacting to tensions out of fear but engaging them in true love.

To reconcile requires great love and a greater courage to face fears and discomfort.

In my relationships, there are growing chasms in some of my closest friendships. I’ve alluded to those in previous reflections as well. The painful dynamics at work in these friendships feels similar to Howard’s description of “enemy status” within God’s family on page 92. “To love such an enemy requires reconciliation, the will to re-establish a relationship. It involves confession of error and a seeking to be restored to one’s former place.” For all of us, there has been hurt inflicted without full address. I have yet to find a way to voice all of my hurts, and I know my dear friends have not yet either. In our busy lives, the spaces to listen to one another seem few. Complications of growing families and new niches provide further obstacles. Here I am, rationalizing yet again. Where is my will to reconcile? If I cannot reconcile amongst old friends, how ever shall I reconcile with a true enemy?

To reconcile requires discipline.

Then there is the city is live in and the city I study in: Baltimore and Washington, DC. I’ve alluded to these spaces in my earlier reflections as well. In these spaces the division I witness daily is beginning to eat away at my soul. I can hardly go about my daily business without hundreds of visible reminders flooding my soul of the perpetual division, isolation, and hatred that is produced (and often, sanctioned, or even blessed). I’ve intentionally joined a church planting seeking to reconcile divided neighborhoods in southeast Baltimore, seeking to support its ministries as actively as I can, but it doesn’t seem fast enough. I want to throw my entire self into the work now. In my restlessness, I desire to bring together all many churches in Baltimore city of the same reconciling spirit to greater collaboration. The idea keeps bouncing around my head almost to the point of dizziness. In DC at Wesley, my studies as an Urban Fellow keep me ever in tune with the rhythms of Mt Vernon Square neighborhood.

The texts I read, such as Thurman for this very class, provide the wisdom of ages past for understanding how fear, deception, and hate are systematically engrained into our fledgling environments. When one lives in a city like Baltimore and engages in intentional study on the subjects in a context like DC, the words Thurman share are no intellectual exercise anymore. They are realities that confront me with endless questions, chief of which being, “How shall you serve to reconcile?”? I desire to deconstruct the “enemy status” in us all, to preach and act in all manners Howard spoke of in his chapter on Love. I want to love my enemies (be careful what you wish for.) All this of this is both enlightening and paralyzing. I struggle and question daily how ready I am to put my ideas into action. Sometimes I feel like I’m going crazy.

To reconcile requires a great deal of patience, humility, and the keen awareness that God must move, not I.

All these paradigms lend me insight into what it takes to bring reconciliation. But honestly, I have not had much success in envisioning and understanding what reconciliation looks like on any of the levels I’ve written on. The eschatological “already but not yet,” annoys the hell out of me. I’m not satisfied with the degree of inner reconciliation I’ve experienced with my own fears, within my new marriage, under the approaching circumstances of raising a son. I feel broken by the realities of shaky friendships with my best friends and fuzzy relationships in my new contexts. I’m overwhelmed by the challenge of cities, no, a world bent currently bent toward hell but promised to eventually arc toward love, justice, and a beloved community.
Thurman’s chapters on the three horsemen of hell are filled with personal anecdotes and very real examples of fear, deception, and hatred at work. His response is a chapter on love, a great love exemplified by stories of a living Christ at work alongside his neighbors: his skeptical and judgmental Jewish countrymen, traitorous tax collectors and broken women, the powers of Rome, the possessed and the sick. These were his neighbors, and they are also mine.

What does it mean to reconcile?

To love God and to love my neighbor.

Oh, Lord? How shall humanity ever love as you have?

As a Christian, (not just a deist), I believe the answers come in Christ. Does he not promise us to be the Way, the Truth, and the Light? All my anxieties and struggles call me to sit at His feet. Might I find what I need in my search for reconciliation by applying a greater discipline to follow Him?

Oh, Lord! I believe! Help me in my disbelief!

Howard Thurman offers up the Religion of Jesus is such a way that it seems all but impossible to partake of without some form of supernatural infusion. It is not natural to love as Christ calls us to. All of history testifies to this! Yet in between the cracks are also stories of that elusive Beloved Community. These stories that range from the community of the book of Acts to Koinonia Farm community. These stories generated by dreams from Martin Luther King’s America and Ghandi’s India. Even in my own midst of Baltimore, is there not the story of New Song Ministries of Sandtown.

The Kingdom of God is already bursting forth in such small, seemingly insignificant spaces, but not yet in so much of the inner city, the rural poor, the global sex trade, the hunger and disease.

But I still believe it can.

What does it mean to reconcile?

Follow Christ, be Christ.

Oh God, let Thy will be done!

Amen.