Fall in(to) Change

What a week! I took this picture last weekend (on the only day of sun we had for a period of about two weeks and that is not an exaggeration). This is the street I live on in Chicago:






















Most of these beautiful golden leaves are gone now, as it rained most of the past week--but today the sun came back, accompanied by friends Wind and Blue Sky.



In addition to turning in a couple of papers (one large, one small), I also participated in our campus Day of Prayer on Tuesday and led my spiritual formation group's discussion on Thursday. Work has been pretty crazy the past couple of weeks--the admission office has been getting dozens of new applications and it is all I can do just to enter them, much less keep up with the other data entry work! All of that was capped off by a costume birthday party for one of my best friends up here (Janni). She is a graduate of Trinity and works there full-time--so she is one of the most popular people around! This of course meant that there were tons of people at her party. It was a wonderful, fun way to end a crazy week.



So today, I have blown off homework in favor of taking it easy, catching up on editing for The Scrawl (http://www.tiu.edu/scrawl), going to the grocery store/bank/cleaners, drinking hot beverages (i.e. cider and tea) and staring at my Greek commentaries, hoping that they will write my paper for me. As nothing seems to be happening, I have put them aside to sort through some thoughts with you here.



Some (but by no means all) of you know that I will be taking next semester off from Trinity with the possibility of having to transfer to a different seminary next Fall; if you want to hear the whole back story let me know and I'll be happy to fill you in. Suffice it to say, I will be moving back in with my parents and working for several months. In many ways, I am very excited about this--I haven't really been with my family for any significant amount of time since I graduated from high school and I have an opportunity to hone a skill-set that (potentially) has potential. There are many reasons I know this is the right decision but admittedly there are days when I have a hard time with it; yesterday = case in point.



Yesterday was hard because it was glorious. That is, Janni's party was rich: filled with laughter and conversation, food and drink, music and banter... in short, it was filled with community. So much so, in fact, that I found myself aching with the beauty of it and asking for the dozenth time in the past couple of months why God would ask me to leave these people and this place when it seems that it is--that they are--home.



This morning, He answered through His words, as recorded by His beloved friend John: "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him." (12:24-26)



Jesus is not being masochistic here. He is being real with the people who would follow Him. It boils down to the fact that to bear fruit, I have to 'die'; to keep my life, I have to 'lose' it; to serve Him, I have to 'follow' Him; and the result of it all is that the Father will honor me. What a hard-core paradox--but the analogy holds. In nature, as Jesus explained here, something must die for new life to come forth. So it is with the human soul, which has been twisted and blackened by self-centered rebellion for thousands of years now--to bring forth new life, to bear fruit, that self-centered rebellion must die. The time of death becomes the time of life, and the servant is enabled to serve someone other than herself. Indeed, she is able to follow the one that she serves!



But I am not only able to follow, I am required to follow. Serving and following are so intimately linked that it is practically impossible to disentangle them in the words Jesus spoke here. Where He goes, His servant goes and serves; where He goes, His servant serves and goes. It sounds so mercenary when I say it like that--but the foundational reality behind the service and the discipleship remains as poignant as the day God first created us in His image, as heart-wrenching as the day He promised salvation would spring from the curse and as passionate as the day He made that salvation possible by giving up His life to redeem us.



He is with us.



The point of following Him is not just to serve Him, not just to keep my life or not even to bear fruit or receive the Father's honor; the point is to be with Him: "And where I am, there my servant will be also."



So, when the questions come (as I know they will), Jesus' promise will still hold true, and I will still follow because dying for Him is infinitely more rich than living for myself.

Beginning, and Bishop John

Once again, my younger siblings have inspired me--this time to pick up yet again the virtual pen and record the thoughts and musings, circumstances and states that are always left simmering on the crowded burners of my brain and never cooked fully enough for anyone's satisfaction. Many of you have perhaps followed my blogs before, when I was living in Mongolia; if so, welcome back! Many of you did not know me when I lived in Mongolia, or before that--if that's the case, I highly recommend that you take a look at that old online journal because it will probably give you a better background of who I am than I could ever actually explain to you now (http://mongoliaminutes.xanga.com/).

In order to explain why I've been reinspired to publicize what really amounts, paradoxically, to a currently-in-progress memoir, I need to explain a little of this past week. This past week I turned 25. After being reminded several times of my quarter-century status, as well as falling prey to my own admittedly-low threshold of turning dreams into expectations, I could (nor can) not easily forget that life is really but a breath and that its significance can be cheapened by my pride more easily than I would like to acknowledge.

But yesterday, after I cleaned my apartment and set my birthday cards prominently on display I took a step back and caught my breath. Dozens of cards came over the course of the week. It was so gradual I hadn't even noticed! There were cards from the people who have always been in my life and loved me before I was born: parents, grandparents, and other family. There were cards from the people who knew me when I was a painfully awkward junior-high/less painfully awkward high-school nerd. There were cards from those who knew me in college, the place where I started delving into the questions of faith and eternity. There were cards from those who ministered with me in Mongolia, who taught me what it means to lay down your life for your friend (and your enemy). And there were cards from those who have journeyed with me in seminary, a time more tumultous, rich and transformative than any of us had expected.

Even when I deplore the transience that is my life; even when I rage in my heart against having to say good-bye, again; even when I do not understand my calling, or why God is asking me to do something, He has repeatedly given me something more precious than predictibility or security. He has given me community and He has given me love. For heavens' sake--! My life is literally overgrown with people that He has planted from my birth until now, this 25th year of life. These people, many of whom I do not see or talk to regularly, have shown or are showing me who God is and who I am in God. And because their impact on me has been and is becoming a breathtaking landscape of kindness, honesty, humility, devotion and sacrifice for the glory of Jesus Christ, it is the very least I can do to use this space as a tool to proclaim His Word and dedicate this blog to them--to you--and to the One who wrote my life into existence. It is my hope and prayer that this blog will be a space to share with all those who have journeyed with me on the way, and a cord that unites the strands of our lives.

So, that's the Beginning.
Now, on to Bishop John.

This past Thursday, my spiritual formation group (which meets weekly) had the privilege of hosting Bishop John Rucyahana, of the Shyira Diocese, Rwandan Anglican Church. This man, though soft-spoken and unassuming in his carriage, spoke words of wisdom and truth that were like a trumpet, calling for action; or maybe more like a sledgehammer, breaking down the walls of my hard and oft-impenetrable heart. Bishop John, originally from Uganda, answered the call to preside over the Shyira Diocese in 1997, just a few short years after the Rwandan genocide. Shyira Diocese is in an area of Rwanda that was particularly devasted; in fact, it was still suffering violence after the Bishop moved there until 1998 when insurgents were routed away from the area. You can read more about Bishop John and his ministry here: http://www.mustardseedproject.org/section.asp?secID=4.

Although I was impressed by all that he has done (just a scan of his ministry website will impress anyone!), and by the opportunities that God has given him for service AND his faithfulness to God in the midst of those opportunities, I was particularly moved by four issues that he highlighted.
1. To be an effective minister of God and of His good news, that good news must be contextualized.
2. In answer to a question about women in Rwanda's government, he first said that Rwandans are required constitutionally to work for their nation. This of course includes women, who hold 55% of the seats in Rwanda's parliament. The story is the same in the church, he said; "we don't like to waste talent."
3. Illiteracy feeds into the (inevitable) cycle of exploitation.
4. Reconciliation is made up of forgiveness that is necessary for the well-being of individuals within themselves, within their communal relationships and within their relationship to God.

Bishop John will be retiring next Fall. But with fire in his eyes and years of experiencing the pains and joys of being God's minister under his belt, he told us that we, as missioners of the Body of Jesus, are responsible to continue the work of sowing grace and reconciliation wherever we go.

Let it be so.