Euro-trippin'

Hey from Lithuania.

This is the first time I've had internet access the whole time, so if you've been freaking out about me now getting in touch (Moooom), sorry. The Baltic wi-fi connection isn't quite as strong as it is in the States.

I arrived in Riga on Friday afternoon after two very uneventful flights. The transatlantic voyage was about 7.5 hours, with me sleeping somewhere between one and three of those. I'm not exactly sure of the time, but I do know that I fell asleep in the middle-end of He's Just Not that Into You (which is terrible, by the way) and Last Chance Harvey, so interpret that as you feel necessary. Bob met me at the airport in Riga and we drove the two or so hours to Camp Wesley, just outside Leipaja. Friday, Saturday and Sunday consisted of a worship-leading workshop and getting to know the Latvians that we stayed with. I’ll get more in depth with that once I get home, but it went really well.

We slept in tents outside. Yep, just us and the Latvian wilderness. Oh, and also the swarms of gigantic mosquitos. It doesn’t really get dark until after midnight, but we usually stayed up past then, so it wasn’t a problem. It’s weird to be outside in broad “day” light, only to find that it’s ten ‘til eleven. For meals, we ate mostly traditional Latvian fare, which consisted mainly of potatoes and vegetables. I didn’t really realize how much my body depended on protein until this trip. Many of us have come to experience what we’ve dubbed as the “carb crash,” in which your energy level literally bottoms out in what feels like an instant. Luckily last night, as we travelled back in to Riga, we found a steak house where we each did work on various assortments of steak. We left just after the sun went down at ten past midnight and went to bed.

Today we’re in Siauliai, Lithuania (pronounced Sho-lay). It was about a two hour drive here, mostly consumed with Mitchell and Beesh talking in accents that will be documented later. We are now at the Hotel Siauliai after eating lunch. There is a long pedestrian boulevard that is lined with restaurants and shops which was a cool experience. Tomorrow we will visit the Hill of Crosses, a Catholic monument that is well-known across the world. More about that here. The next few days will be spent between Vilnius, also in Lithuania and Riga before flying out of Riga on Friday.

I hope you are all well. Talk to you soon.

Pax

jc

Leavin' on a Jetplane...

I'm sitting in Bhm Int'l. I forgot how I love and hate airports at the same time. Funny. I'll be in Riga, Latvia tomorrow around lunch, local time of course. It's an 8-hour swing, so you do the math. I guess I could use your, my faithful readership's (all 3 of you), prayers for travels and for the workshop we're doing. The Beesh-tastic duo of James and Anna along with Bob and Rachel got to Riga yesterday, so they're safe and vigilantly await my arrival. I'll try to blog again when I get there. Peace to everyone.

jc

I Can Have That?

Well I’m glad that’s over. It was a rough week to say the least. The groups came from Community Church Without Walls, a church in West End started out of Urban, East Lake United Methodist and Trinity UMC in Murfreesboro. Yes, there were times when walking into a room seemed as if you were flashing back into the ‘60s, with a different color dominated a different side of the room. The week went well, considering these factors I suppose. I worked with CCWW/East Lake all week and discovered a few things. Let me explain.

Laziness and Whining Knows No Race, Socio-economic class or anything else. The sloth and desire to avoid work that I struggled with the first week reared its ugly head again. I think I assumed that because these kids were from completely different situations and ways of life than those of the first week that they’d have a refined work ethic and really understand why they were at the houses painting.

Wrong.

It was exactly the same. Granted, it was hot enough to crush even the strongest of wills and spirits, but seriously. It was hot. These words of my mother rang true yet again in the midst of idle paint brushes and scrapers though: “I’m telling you, buddy; they’re just at that age…” Must be. If the planned careers of pharmacists, doctors, lawyers and NBA stars I was told of don’t work out, some of those guys should consider trying their hand in magic. Or maybe I should. All I had to do is say “Hey guys can I get a hand with these ladders” or “Alright guys let’s get back to work…” and they would disappear faster than the Lucille II.

While the lack of work was frustrating, it was more the attitude of a select number of the guys that really led me to the breaking point I experienced on Tuesday night. As we finished the house we had been working on, our homeowner gave us the paint she bought to repaint her carport with. The project took no time at all, but the paint she bought just happened to be oil-based, leaving our buckets and brushes marred by that Luciferian substance. (If you’ve never used oil-based paint, don’t.) The day before, a group of three or so had helped me clean the paint brushes, so, along with the three R.G. and I deemed to have worked the hardest that day, they weren’t required to help when we got back. Everyone else, however, was. So, when we got back to the dorm, a group of R.G., Cheryl, and the three instructed not to help went about cleaning everything. My admonishment of “you can sit at the door all you want, but I’m not unlocking it until everybody helps” fell on deaf ears, as most of the group did, in fact, sit at the door. After an hour, with my arms elbow-deep in mineral spirits, I just decided to throw the buckets that I couldn’t clean away. I tried to let those that had helped just go in while keeping the others out. That worked as well as the zone read with Chris Todd. So finally, with my spirit broken and my mood soured, I just said “screw it” and let everybody in. I was frustrated. And mad. And disappointed.

I don’t, as a 22-year old, feel that I deserve much respect from those that are just 9 years younger than I am. I probably wouldn’t take somebody seriously if I was just 13. The thing I was disappointed in myself about was the lack of influenced I seemed to be able to have on these kids. I certainly worked harder than everybody on the worksite, mostly in the hopes that they would see me covered in sweat and paint and follow suit.

Fail.

I was disappointed that some of the things I had said to some of the guys about respect seemed to go one in ear and out the other. After asking one of the kids to just get water because we needed the Kool-Aid for dinner, he proceeded to argue with me and plead to let him have some, while he mixed himself a nice tall glass. Anything I asked them to do, really, was done so either not at all or begrudgingly with an aside remark about not wanting to do it. Everything asked of them was a struggle. As I walked back to my room, I’ve never really felt so helpless in all my life. I was simply broken.

They say you should never pray for patience. Apparently, you should never pray for grace either. That is, however, the only thing I could get out through my clenched teeth as I walked back to my room. I believe that God’s grace gets you to places you couldn’t get on your own, allows you to do things you weren’t able to do without His help and the like. So, I thought, maybe if I prayed for grace, God would give me the gift of patience and I would be able to look at this group of guys without wanting to unleash a flurry of curse words and ideals that would surely set them straight.

Wrong again. (See a pattern?)

The next morning continued with the suck. I was beginning to get sick with some kind of sinus trouble, along with the events from the previous night, and the day was off to a pretty fantastic start. I’d be lying if I said the thoughts of “Did I mishear God?” or “Was I really called here?” didn’t go through my mind. I’d also be lying if I said I didn’t think about where in Appalachia I could be or what ASP-related thing I could’ve been doing at that moment. It was tough. Nothing seemed to be going right or getting better. Throughout that day, though, I began to see a little light break through.

I met our new homeowners, the Longs, and was fortunate enough to talk to them for a minute. The work got better, probably because half of the group went to Highlands, so there wasn’t as much contagious laziness to infect the group. It was only a half-day, as they had Wednesday night off. There were little victories happening and I began to feel better about everything.

Talking to my friends at ASP, I’ve sometimes caught myself wishing I made a different choice. Maybe it’s the familiarity of being on staff. Maybe it’s the long-term relationships you are able to form with the families you work for, rather than the short-term you experience here. I don’t doubt my call here. I just wonder, I guess. Thursday though, gave me a glimmer of hope. One of the worst acting kids of the group talked to me a little bit about faith and why I believed the way I did. He said he hadn’t “given his life to God” yet because he didn’t want to stop doing some things he was doing now and if he did, God would make him stop. I tried, as best I could, to explain how my belief in God, and belief in God in general, wasn’t a list of rules you had to follow; it wasn’t about eliminating all the fun in your life. Rather it was a change of heart, an inward transformation that changed the way you saw people, the way you treated people. It was about shifting your focus. It was about becoming new.

I don’t really think he listened to me. He most likely was just thinking about how he would never get to “run around all night.” I thought about the “Sinner’s prayer” and all the ways of “evangelism” I’d been taught about growing up. How ineffective would that’ve been in that moment? Yeah, I could’ve led Dreek in the prayer where he confesses his sin and “repents” and all that. Would he have been changed? Maybe. I doubt it though.

Most of these kids need an example. I suppose that’s why I’m here. God gives us a lot of opportunities to make a difference for the kingdom. If that five minute conversation made an impression on a guy that most likely hasn’t had a good example made some kind of difference, showed him his place in the Kingdom, set some kind of positive example or anything else, then I’ve filled my place.

Thy kingdom come…on Earth as it is in Heaven…

I’m going to Latvia this week. Sweet.

Excuse Me, But You're in My Pew

If you received my weekly emails last summer, you read that Week 1 was hellacious and Week 2, comparably, was just the opposite. I’d say that held true again this year. We had three groups this week, two from Huntsville and one from Dyersburg, TN. It was nice to finally get some Methodists in here. Just kidding. But seriously…it was nice. I was fortunate enough to work with the group from Dyersburg all week on the house we started last week. I wasn’t exactly excited to continue on this house, mainly because it was so big and so inaccessible with the number of ladders we had. This group, though, worked twice as hard as the last group with half the number of kids. This week, I was actually able to have fun and enjoy the work, as well as develop a great relationship with most all of the kids and leaders in my group. It was so much better than last week, where I spent the whole week simply maintaining a group and strenuously concentrating on not committing a form of child abuse.

The groups painted all Monday, half of Tuesday and half of Wednesday, and all of Thursday. Aside from the 20-foot high section of the house only accessible by a mostly rotten roof, those kids got the whole thing finished. It was really great to see kids work so hard for somebody they didn’t even know. They even sprung for some extra paint to redo the porch.

Tuesday morning was spent at Highlands UMC in Five Points working in their Community Ministries. Rev. Emily, an associate at Highlands, spent a long time talking us through the history of the ministries and the church’s influence and presence on Birmingham’s south side. If you’ve ever been to Five Points, you know that it’s a bustling entertainment district, with many restaurants, bars, clubs, shops and boutiques. It’s also a large gathering place for many of the homeless in Birmingham. The church has been very intentional about staying in the community, much to the ire of some local businesses. Emily talked about the dialogue that they’ve taken up with local businesses about what they feel they’re called to do and how they want people to come to Five Points, but also that the church has a charge to care for those marginalized and homeless that have become as much of a part of that community as anything or anyone. It was very neat and inspiring to hear the stories of the church; members lost, community disputes, and even stories of local business owners re-examining themselves because of the ministries of Highlands.

Six days a week, the church serves breakfast for people off the street, provides a place for homeless people to get a load of clothes washed per week, a place they can have mail delivered, and a clothes closet where they can get clothes and shoes. Some days, the church provides a program called Project ID, where they provide assistance to people who need state IDs and birth certificates, as most places require one or the other, or both, to enter rehab facilities, missions, or get jobs. The kids from Dyersberg spent Tuesday morning sorting shoes, serving breakfast and sorting mail. All morning, I went through two stacks of mail marking “Return to Sender” on the envelope. Highlands will only keep mail for six months, so once that time is up, the mail is sent back. It was really sad, actually. Almost every single piece of mail that I went through was from UAB or some other medical billing service. It got me to thinking about healthcare and the medical “business” for lack of a better term. That, however, is another rant for another day. Maybe I’ll write about it when I have something intelligent to say. For now, though, my heart just breaks for those who are oppressed by the system, whose lives are destroyed because of circumstances beyond their control and those who are even made homeless because of any and all of it.

It was nice to see so many people, many who weren’t even members of Highlands, coming out to volunteer. Many were older people and most were so happy to see all these young kids coming in to help. Some though, namely those in charge, welcomed us, then commenced to complaining about not having enough jobs for everyone. It was baffling, really. Ten kids come from five hours away to serve and give of themselves, and instead of being welcomed with love, they get indirectly insulted by some old lady complaining about the excess of volunteers.

The last sentence was probably a misrepresentation of the group. Most people there welcomed us with a smile on their face. It was those that didn’t that ruined the perception for me. It took me back to several different conversations I’ve had with friends and mentors about the state of the church right now. Those that can look straight past what Jesus said about love and service because it messes up the “routine.” Those that put signs outside their church that say “No Trespassing.” The “I’m sorry but you’re sitting in my pew” crowd. Somewhere along the line, we’ve become A church instead of THE Church. A church that worships routine instead of serving and loving in the name of Jesus. We’ve become an institution instead of a body. An institution that do things “because we’re supposed to” instead of because we are “clothed in Christ.” It was sad to see, in the midst of such selfless service, attitudes like that.

When I think about my perception of people, I sometimes laugh. It is so much easier for me to look at a homeless man who is probably addicted to something and see the face of Christ than it is for me to see Jesus in an old woman who barks at 13-year old kids because there isn’t enough work to go around. I suppose that’s a testament against my ability to see Christ in everyone, but nonetheless it happens. But what happened to loving your neighbor? It’s not a secret that some are easier to love than others. Some require more grace to love. But all require love.

Except those, apparently, that sit in your pew on Sunday or bring too many volunteers to help.

We're Going to Phoenix

Michael: “And the best part is, in Phoenix, we won’t have anything to do with that family.”

George Michael: “But…don’t you always say family first?”

Michael: “Yes I do, but that is not a family. It’s a bunch of greedy, selfish people who have our nose. And Aunt Lindsay.”

George Michael: “She’s not my real aunt?”

Michael: “Not her real nose. I’ve got a picture of her when she was 14 in a swimming cap. Looks like a falcon.”

Welp, Week 1 is done. A success, I would say. Two houses were completely painted while the other was scraped and mostly primed, waiting on its color next week. The groups worked for three days and then took a trip Friday up 59 to Alabama Adventure. This job is still a bit of an adjustment for me. While I still have a great deal of responsibility, making sure groups get to where they need to be with the supplies they need and the like, I still don’t have near the responsibility that I did last summer, especially this week. The groups provided their own programs, so aside from a few nights of leading worship, Tori and I just hung around at night.

The house that I was responsible for was the house that could not be finished this week. The homeowner is an elderly woman who is quite ill and lives with her son, for now at least. Because of her condition, the kids were not able to interact with her hardly at all. That is unfortunate, seeing as I believe it would’ve made the experience richer for this ‘particular’ set of volunteers. I was, however, able to have a few, albeit, short conversations with her son, who occupied a chair on the front porch. I’ve got a blog in the works on what painting a house does for a family, but that should be looked forward to at a later date. He is a great guy and was thrilled to see us pull up everyday.

It’s tough to tell a van full of 13 and 14 year old kids who’ve come to Birmingham to paint a house to hold off on the brushes and grab a scraper. That’s what I had to do, though. I’d be lying if I said there wasn’t some whining. But, they did a great job. After, of course, they asked me some form of the question, “Can we paint yet?” as many times as Nick Saban says “aight” and bumps into a prospective student athlete.

One thing this week has given me is a newfound respect for those youth leaders and parents who work with junior high age kids. They have a special gift. The problem with trying to relate to 13 and 14 year old boys is that in order for me to do so, I must treat them like my friends, which involves joking around with them, which involves them losing any respect for my position, which involves them acting like 13 and 14 year old boys and causing me to be irritable beyond belief.

I hope you enjoyed my Arrested Development reference at the beginning of this post. One thing I realized throughout this week in dealing with a lot of these…we’ll call them ‘privileged’ kids…is how connected we really are. In this particular episode of Arrested Development, Michael finally gets fed up with the shenanigans of the Bluth family and leaves. He does, however, come back with the theme of that episode becoming how much the family needs each other. It’s a little like this with our family, it seems. Not my actual family though. Mitchell has never tried to steal every girl I’ve ever dated, Meredith rarely takes up charity work on a whim, Mom is not a manipulating alcoholic and Pops isn’t in prison for building houses for Sadaam.

**Note: If you’re not an avid follower of Arrested Development, the preceding references will most likely sound ridiculous and not make any sense. Apologies.

The “family” I’m talking about is this priesthood we all share in the faith we all seem to proclaim. Reading Ephesians lately, I’ve pondered what “unity in the Spirit” actually means. We certainly don’t all get along. There were times this week when I certainly didn’t feel a lot of love for some of those kids. For example:

Text from JC to Tori: “I almost ended my 22-year streak of not striking a child a second ago…”

The point that I came to realize is this. God calls us to unity. Unity not in absolute agreement. Unity not even in “liking” people. The unity we are called to, in my opinion, is when so much grace is given to us that we begin to see our attitudes towards each other, each child of God, as such, and not as the annoying character traits, bad attitudes and whining. When we are changed, when we repent, when we allow grace to take over, we turn around from wherever it is we’re going (Oh man I wish you hadn’t said Phoenix…), and turn into the priesthood that God has ordained, and whether we know it or not, love wins, grace prevails, and the Kingdom comes.

In the coming weeks, pray for us. That we would build relationships with the kids that will come, the families and homeowners we will serve, and the people we work with. Don’t, however, pray for patience. I’m not quite ready to deal with that yet. If you’re reading this, odds are I know you and love you, but if I don’t, I love you anyway.

pax

jc