Comfort and Joy

Tonight we headed downtown to catch the symphony. Great show. We saw our friend Jason play the bass. I thought he looked like the consummate classical muscian up there. The show was titled "Comfort and Joy" and ironically we managed to sit one row away from a screaming baby. Let's take an inventory, shall we? Yep. Comfort and Joy took a lunch break when Temper-Tantrum took center stage. Thankfully, this did not last long.

Then I came home, wasted some time on facebook, and my friend Josh posted the following video, which brought me tremendous comfort and joy....



What the heck?! Dude. I'm mildly disturbed. Highly entertained. Good feelings restored.

Powell's Books

Powell's is my favorite bookstore in Portland -- three levels of wall to wall books, which take up an entire city block. Powell's boasts of being the largest new/used bookstore in the world. And it's opened until 11pm and that includes the coffee shop (cue: ann's happy dance).

Fun Facts about Powell's (facts taken from: http://www.powells.com/):

- roughly 6000 people visit every day
- Powell's parking garage only has 40 spaces (what the heck?!). There are other parking options. And when all else fails, use thine legs.
- 122 subject areas and over 3,000 subsections
- there's a seperate building for the technical stuff (you won't find me here -- unless I'm with Bruce, in which case, you still won't find me here).

Excellent coffee. Great people-watching. Elvis was performing outside on the sidewalk the last time I went. And he was tone deaf. Who knew? Powell's, you and I will get better acquianted soon....really soon.


(video from www.youtube.com)

Korean Proverbs and Klingons

Dr. Kon is renown at our seminary for his Korean proverbs, of which my favorite two are:

1) “When the whales are fighting, the shrimp’s backs are broken open” (translation: when the big dogs are fighting, the little guys suffer. And I'm not sure if that's a threat to the big dogs or a consolation to the common folk).

2) “When in tiger’s teeth, don’t move. And you will stay alive.” (This gem is my favorite and it was given during Hebrew studies, of which I was frustrated over translating a word which, in the end, amounted to "he.")

This week I have clocked about 60 hours of study. That’s right. Work. Sleep. Eat. In that order. What has taken me 80 hours to accomplish could have been completed in 40 or less hours. That’s really sad. I’m tempted to blame it on Tony Furtado and his wicked guitar/banjo skills, which call out to me, “Take another break. Behold the awesomeness of a brilliant musician.”

Or I could blame the scent of our undecorated Christmas tree in the living room, which I swore I would not decorate until finishing my two big projects. Epic failure there. At precisely 1am last night, I popped in a xmas movie and basked in the glory of tree sap and ornaments. So desperate was I that I even made room for Bruce’s Star Trek ornaments. Nothing says “peace on earth” like seeing a Klingon ornament hang two branches away from baby Jesus. Unfortunately, I couldn't find a branch strong enough to hold up the Borg.

This morning another Dr. Kon proverb came to me, “Wherever you are, be all there.” Today I’m resolved to focus on my remaining projects. No more distractions. No more facebook, ipod revamping, youtube watching, Furtado groovin’. Time to focus ... after I rearrange my study area. Again. (Does it count if I listen to Furtado while I rearrange stuff and eat lunch?)

Sifted

(I wrote the following after emerging from a very dark season of my life littered with personal tragedy and grief...)

God, you find me in a dark room
Where unknowns taunt deepest wounds

This season of waiting you grant me dwell
Where ears come to life and eyes fail

Your voice's rhythm bids me step
And learn to trust what you detect

I stand. I step. I move as you lead
Till step turns to walk and walk turns to speed

Together we weather and storm the storm
By faith I move; my eyes reborn

You in me and I in you
Old things pass; all things new

This season of waiting nears its end
As darkness fades with Spirit’s wind

Eyes can now see and ears can hear
Things I never at once could bear

You illuminate the mysteries that filled
A season of darkness where old things were killed

Together we run, in freedom I yield
To your every move; in you I am healed

I survey the expanse of a once dark room
Light revealing your grace on each wound

My heart it swells as hands are lifted
Freedom mine from all you have sifted

Narrow is the path that leads to life
Yet large is the venue of mercy in Christ

Old things pass; all things new
Joy's fullness I find in you

Transference

I lived in China during three of my college summers. While there I volunteered a couple of times in an orphanage located just outside the city limits of Shenyang, which is located in the Liaoning Province in the northeast, about a day's train ride from the North Korean border.

One of the orphanages I volunteered at was situated in the middle of rice fields as far as the eye could see. This photo was taken not too far from the orphanage. This couple was excited to see two foreigners in their neck of the woods.


One particular morning I was to bathe a small boy who couldn't have been more than a couple of months old and who lay in a crib surrounded by his own waste. His eyes were dried shut by layers of dried mucus, and his whole body was rigid and trembling terribly. He was dying, and he had not been attended to in quite some time. Unfortunately, limited resources breed a survival of the fittest mentality in such situations. The resources are portioned to the strong while the dying often die without dignity. I hated how this sight made me feel. Helpless. Desperate. Heartbroken. Angry. I wanted to leave.

As I began to bathe him, he wailed a raspy cry that sent chills down my spine, and this only increased as I had to scrape off all the layers of dried mucus from his eyes. It was one of the worst experiences I had while in China. I cried the whole time.

I couldn't understand how a loving God would allow such things to exist. Why would he even put me in a situation that I actually had very little impact on? Sure, I bathed a dying baby. Kudos to Ann. But what difference was I really making? I left that day feeling so thoroughly defeated. While there, I heard God whisper to me, "If you've done it unto the least of them, you've done it unto Me," to which I initially replied, "Ok. I have no idea what that really means, and it doesn't make me feel any better. Why would you say that?"

Of all the things God could have said, why that? Years later I've come to a few conclusions. God intentionally placed me in a situation I would never recover from to create in me a capacity for mercy manufactured by unnatural means. I learned perhaps the most important lesson of my life: to follow Jesus necessitates a willingness to touch the wounds of others. God was trying to teach me that change will never take place in isolation. The change God is adamant for requires more than just passion. It requires intentionality, sacrifice, and engagement -- a willingness to be scarred with the pain of others.

I am still haunted by a dying child and his grotesque condition. Yet in him I saw a vision of myself. That infant's physical condition mirrored my own spiritual and emotional condition. I had been drowning and was drowning still in years of depression and inner pain. I had wounds that would not heal no matter what I did or who I turned to. My eyes were dried shut with the mucus of lesser gods and destructive habits, which ultimately became a breeding ground for an ever increasing craving for an ever diminishing pleasure, as C.S. Lewis says. I was never strong enough to face my own pain though I pretended otherwise. There can possibly be no greater misery than suffering alone.

Yet somewhere in all this, I discovered a God who stores up resources for those who admit they are unfit for survival apart from his grace. Unlike me God is never afraid to touch our wounds or hear our ragged confessions. In this way God makes the weak strong and transforms those unfit for anything good into those who stand to stoop down and embrace others who are hurting.

When God said, "you've done it unto Me," he wasn't trying to make me feel better. In fact, when it comes to doing the right thing, my comfort level has never been his priority. Here I discovered a profound observation and irony. God rendered my own healing incomplete until I reached out to touch the wounds of a dying orphan (Isaiah 58:10-11). I wasn't at that orphanage that day to transform an institution. I was there to make an invisible God tangible to someone in excruciating pain and this transference would both scar and heal me simultaneously.

There is a good God. And though he gets misrepresented and his message and mysteries reduced to sound-bite preaching and cheap gospel peddling, he is unchanged and his mission remains (Luke 4:18-19). And this is a mission and a God I will gladly orient my life around.