shorts

1.
a woman is a harbor
with a lighthouse at her edge
she says, "here i am. my light is strong"
and invites ships from the high seas
to shelter a while in her sanctum.
a woman is not a ship;
particularly not a rescue ship -
she does not scout out or try to tug in;
she simply shines and
in her shining is an alluring offer.
a wise ship will come home to her light
over and over again.

2.
blundering and foolish i may be
but
i
am
with
Him
having abandoned much (and still abandoning)
to be here at His side
is my greatest hope of
finally
being
like
Him

3.
that licking flame descended
onto bowed and praying heads
cloistered in the holy housing of YHWH
the house was just a building for awaiting
stones to be replaced with flesh
the temple now nomadic
He makes His home in our hearts

Koffi is a father

our friend koffi, who used to live at the Boiler Room, is a father now. today i shot over to his new place and spent some time taking pictures of him with keyona and their little boy. this one is my favorite.

spoiled

i know God's fatherhood especially in those moments when He spoils me. to me, to be spoiled means that someone has accurately noted your desires and then gone out of his/her way to fulfill them. here are two ways that God has spoiled me in the last two weeks:

1) huge bags full of produce from Trillium Haven Farm every week. for free. all season. i didn't have to ask or seek it out. my friend's mom made the initial contact on behalf of the Boiler Room. it is a match made in heaven because the owners had been looking for someone to take the excess for good causes, but someone who knew how to use the type of produce they grow (which is lots of unusual stuff, like Kohlrabi, arugula, chard, and other greens that most people aren't familiar with) so that it wouldn't go to waste. the day we got our first load (4 bags of greens) i was so giddy that i had trouble falling asleep. the veggies are already finding their way into my community cooking adventures and into the bellies of our homeless friends.

2) a "new" vintage Schwinn, a lot like the black one belonging to the Boiler Room, which I have been riding around. but this one is even better because it is just the right size (slightly shorter), the brakes work, the gears shift, and it is brown. with sparkly handles. and i didn't go looking for it, just stumbled upon it in the front yard of a house a few blocks away. it was for sale. for $20. recognizing it immediately as my dream bike, which i had JUST been dreaming about in proceeding days, i promptly bought it. then april and i took a ride up to Creston neighborhood, which was a lovely scenic adventure indeed.

as small as those two things might sound to someone other than me, they are enormous because they are answers to those desires of my heart that i hardly dare pray for because they seem so frivolous. but God apparently delights in a little frivolity here and there. yup, He loves me.

this is how it is here

yesterday there was a mexican man named lupe who came to the front door holding his bloodied shirt to his head because an acquaintance had hurled a rock at his skull for reasons I do not now. it just so happened that our friend who is a nurse was there, so she tended to the wound while the others called 911, cleaned the blood from his arms, and sat by while the police report was filed. and this hardly gave me pause at all. in fact, i went upstairs and had some lunch while most of that went down.

then i realized that somewhere along the line these sorts of things have become unremarkable in their ordinariness. just one more manifestation of a ripped up, broken neighborhood. this is poverty and all that comes attached to it: addiction, violence, despair, hardness, and abuse. that's what we're down on our faces praying for around here every day, for those demons to loose their hold on this neighborhood, and i fully expect this to happen. in the meantime, it's just par for the course. sadly.

like seventeen year-old girl rachel who's prostituting herself out to middle-aged men for just dollars so that she can buy phone cards for her girlfriend, whose name is tattooed on her neck. like dark-skinned antonio with the brooding eyes and the forfeited potential, and who deals crack (maybe even with the aid of our phone and bikes) and just did a stint in jail... again. like the skeletal-framed cindy who looks like she will snap in half if you're too rough with her, but oh is she ever tough and sometimes mean when the crack urges hit. like little david who hangs out at our house when his mom's at work and from whose lips comes a constant stream of smack talk, mostly about himself being ugly and dumb because he doesn't know that he's valuable, so we try to tell him.

these are my neighbors. and i know that what they need is Jesus but sometimes i want to play God for them. i want to get into social worker problem-solving mode, refer them to agencies, plan programs and get them jobs; get them rehabilitated into something that resembles the comfortable and secure life that it seems like we all should be living. then i remember that (a) i am not living that comfortable secure life anymore, either, but there's joy in the stripped down simplicity of that and (b) God's purposes are less about externals and more about rearranged insides and insides can be rearranged no matter what neighborhood we live in or what dumpster we sleep behind.

we were talking about this one night, us girls, when i was fretting about how we'll know when we've succeeded with these friends/neighbors we're ministering to. it can't be a middle class existence with all its values and rhythms that indicates we've accomplished the goal. no, that doesn't seem likely. it's more likely perhaps that some of these friends will find that their discipleship leads them right back into these streets living in cramped quarters on very little money but shining the light of Jesus on other ragamuffins so that they become disciples, too. see, Jesus' call to follow Him isn't a call into higher income, nicer houses (or houses at all), more clothes, and above-minimum-wage jobs. we get this confused sometimes, don't we? we start acting as though the gospel is not about the state of a soul in relationship with its Creator, but about a particular lifestyle (ours).

the reason it's so great that God is God and I am not is that he sees the end point. He sees what He designed lupe, rachel, antonio, cindy, david and all the rest to be, who they'll be in Christ. That's not for me to determine, which really takes a load off.

unless the Lord builds the house

there is a man who is always
hatching plans for programs
to be a good Samaritan and
walk a stretch of time alongside
those who are downtrodden and down-and-out
i wonder, do we need a program for this?
isn't it just God's way?
out of the wisdom of his mind,
from the safety of his ivory tower
a man hatches his plans
he designs them with precision
and executes them with care but
but
if it isn't God's idea of the honking
of that wild goose i've come to know and love
it will be only superficially successful
he will not come in power or
leave that calling card of miraculous transformation
we are planning too small a thing
to "dialogue" and analyze and garner resources
is all good and fine but
it is not our show and
i'd rather put my raft into
His mighty rushing river than
to dig my own canal

can they feel it?

and i wonder:
can the mail lady feel it hit her --
the soft, fear-defying shalom --
when she steps on the porch
bearing envelopes with a dozen names
the names of so many lost-and-found sheep
who call this temple home?
does she wonder at the quickening in her spirit
when her feet touch the cement of these steps?
does she sense YHWH tabernacle-ing in the yard
as do the burnt-out drunks and latch-key kids
snoozing on the picnic table benches or shooting hoops,
who gravitate here compelled by
some yearning they can't quite touch?
where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is peace
so may they come as they are to this thin place,
in hopes of touching God

"For you will nurse and be satisfied
at her comforting breasts;
you will drink deeply
and delight in her overflowing abundance."
(Isaiah 66:11)

5 Words

5 words for this day (yes, in this order):

1. indulgent
2. cranky
3. melancholy
4. sensual
5. delighted

i've had too much ice cream again (stomach ache to prove it) and i stayed in my pajamas today until 12:30 pm (in bed until 10:45). that's the indulgent part.i attempted West African cooking for tonight's dinner, which meant inhaling aromas of spice combinations as yet unexplored (that's the sensual part). i was delighted when two of our less-privileged friends wandered through the yard at just the time we were seated at our picnic tables to eat it up. it was ron's first meal in 4 or 5 days. his stomach had shrunk; he couldn't eat it all; he had to take it in a to-go container.the beach was a surprise -- one of those wonder-aloud suggestions that gets latched onto with joy because it's just exactly the right thing. so we load up the mini van with our bodies, guitars, cameras, joy, and head out down that long stretch of Lake Michigan Drive that dead ends on that lovely lake shore where the sun was waiting to set for us. then there was worship and snuggling and golden light. this was the delight.

but somewhere in the middle there was something like crankiness ("oh, YOU again?! do i have to deal with you right now?") and melancholy ("i'm alone here, fundamentally alone, and no one understands me. poor me."). i can sit there chopping onions and tomatoes and feel this melancholy setting in like a familiar friend, spewing its i'm-special-because-i-suffer lies again. i chase it out with singing.

now here is where it gets maclusive: though the melancholy and crankiness occasionally make an appearance here, i love my life. i love my jesus. under all those shifting shadows there something unchanging: a stubborn and persistent contentment (peace and joy are its companions). when i rise each morning i am filled with eager anticipation (no dread) and when i lay down to sleep i sleep in peace. i think i'm becoming more beautiful here.

processing kingdom living

I wrote a long email to my supporters about Prayer AS Ministry because I am still trying to beat it through my own thick skull that spending my life in prayer, worship, and study are worthwhile pursuits, that they are indeed the makings of a vocation, which of course it would NOT be in The World. There is that Old Self that is having trouble accepting the shape and form that this New Self is taking in this New Life (Ephesians 4:22-23)... and a part of me that feels as though it has to answer to those who are supporting me, fearing that they may not feel like this is worth giving their hard-earned dollars to. God is having to rewire my paradigms (Psalm 68:13, Matthew 10:10) and I am feeling very humbled. Sarah said that when I was at DBC, loving my job, succeeding at it, getting paid more, etc., I was "at the height of my glory" BUT at what cost? The cost of an unsettled, grasping, self-sufficient spirit full of doubt and pride and all the rest and now, here, He's wiping me clean and reworking my insides. Though I have less and less to boast about, less to show for myself, and no fitting answer to typical social questions, I am becoming more beautiful. More fully His. And really, that's where Life is (1 Timothy 6:17-19).

This morning was spent with Chelsea and Sarah over a French Press coffee, holding each other accountable to our vow and mission: to love God, love others, and love the world. We spent some time laying out our dreams and the whispers of the Holy Spirit in us about these areas and found, much to our delight, that the principles of the very Kingdom of God are being stirred in us (Acts 2:42-47). We realize the foolishness, the utter ridiculousness, and the perhaps cult-like appearance some of this may have, but we are hungry for it because it brings us freedom from fear, grasping, and control. It strips us down to Beloved. No roles, no trademarks to make us particular worthy of attention or praise, just three girls who want to lay their lives down for Jesus. And what does this look like? Well, we're starting with pooling our funds and sharing our food, toiletries, and much of our clothing and linens ("All the believers were together and had everything in common"). From there, we're talking about sharing cell phones and getting rid of all but one or two cars, which would be shared.

The Lord has been teaching me humility and contentment. To be satisfied (content) whether I have much or little. To trust that He'll provide and that the provision will sometimes look like abundance and other times will be just enough (1 Timothy 6:6-8, Philippians 4:11-13). I'm learning a lot of my lessons these days through food, men and money. LOL. Three of my idols, you see. Three of the things I have believed I could not be fully satisfied, healthy, or "okay" without. As long as my confidence is in those things, it is very fragile indeed. So He's teaching me to take my trust and my hope OFF of those two things and transfer them onto Himself (Psalm 20:7, Isaiah 31:3). I'm not sure how to express all of this, the layers of teaching and the whispers of His voice, and His perfect leadership... or even how to explain the practical implications of what I'm learning or why it's so significant that I'm not going to have my own personal supply of food anymore, why I might not eat more than two meals a day, why I'd turn down a date from any man right now (unless He's clearly tagged by the Lord for me), or why I hope to be recklessly generous with my money (even when I can't afford it) and forsake insistence on savings accounts (Luke 12:13-34).

Here is what I want: I want a conversational relationship with Jesus. I want to know Him. Intimately. I want to be led by Him, not just to believe in Him or give intellectual consent to His existence and salvation. I want to be His friend (John 15:15).

I don't think there's going to be any turning back. Because on the other side of this obedience is JOY (John 16:23-25).

So I am feeling very close to His heart this morning; very confident in His leadership. I know that there'll be days when I don't sense all that so clearly, when I question my sanity and feel tempted to go back. But "the One who calls me is faithful and He will do it" (1 Thessalonians 5:24). Luckily, it is ultimately HIS job to keep me. My part is to trust Him to do it, as Jenn says. Simple, but difficult.

love song for a savior

i know some people who think it's inappropriate to sing love songs to Jesus
because they fear inappropriateness; say we don't prom-date Jesus
they fear that we will elevate emotional experiences above theological truths
(but where did the word theological come from anyway?)

i know that i know that i know that Jesus is alive and
i know what He feels like, smells like, tastes like (yes, very intimate)
and i've staggered around like one drunk on His love
(my Maker is my Husband; the Lord is His name)

so though I'm not a song writer, I'll sing a new song
and that song will be a love song
you'd better believe it

(painting by Chelsea Gentry)

I want

I want the Word -- read like a child by the flashlight of the Spirit
I want God (a sun in my gut)
I want His words in my mouth and His heart in my heart
I want books, but God as my teacher
I want Africa, India, far away lands and the simplicity and rest they offer
I want musicians and artists in the wings
I want tongues to express what words cannot
I want food from the earth filling my kitchen and the bellies of the hungry
I want to know joy and be haunted by its memory even when i'm sad
I want a stubborn and relentless hope
I want to create photographs that aren't just of physical matter; that reveal essence and soul
I want to be deeply in love with a man who is sunk down deep in Jesus
I want wings and I want roots
I want to be the mother of many children of many colors
I want to know myself as Beloved and lovely
I want friends who are drunks and sinners
I want webs of intimacy, prayer, and grace to fasten me into community
I want the Acts 2 church and to see the Kingdom come
I want that pearl of great price

I ask for:
a heart of worship
a spirit of joy
a loosened tongue
a quieted heart (confidence)
an impulse toward intercession

excavating and painting

this is not an easy time for me. i guess when you pray for your flesh to be mortified you'd better buckle your seatbelt because He usually answers prayers like that. He's in the business of redemption, of making His children and His bride wholehearted. so, He likes those sorts of prayers. i, however, do not always like having them answered because excavating is dirty work. but i also welcome it because He's fathering me into maturity, the image of Jesus, who is the most stunningly gorgeous man i've ever known.
there's so much going on in me these last few weeks and so far very little of it is coming together clearly. i can't see the image that these monet brush strokes are forming because i haven't been able to get the necessary distance between me and it. maybe that's because i - my life - is the painting. here are some of the items being chewed on:

rest vs. productivity
prayer as work
frustrated desires
living intentionally in my neighborhood
being fully myself
offering my gifts
wondering about a husband
the uglies in my heart exposed
taking care of my body
taking jesus literally at His word in the gospels
will i live this way (boiler room style) forever?
desires to travel to Africa again
feeling like a mess
getting back to the heart of prayer
hearing the voice of the Holy Spirit
sharing food and other possessions
God's heart about healing
creativity and worship

and here's the real bummer: i cry out to God with all these "what should i do?" questions, hoping for specific instructions, guidance towards some action that will make it all clearer. and instead He gives pictures. gorgeous pictures in a holy imagination that tell me nothing at all about what to do, they only tell me who i am and where i am in relation to Him, and what His heart is towards me. I feel like screaming, "this isn't answering my questions, God!" and then i realize perhaps i'm asking the wrong questions because all that really matters is that i know who i am - lost and then found - in Jesus and the rest is, as they say, just details. so i'll embrace these revelations from Him and trust that i'll be changed, that the living will flow naturally out of it.

this is not a very tidy or eloquent blog entry. but i just thought i should check in. let ya'll know what's cooking over here. and maybe your spirit, dear reader, will be quickened regarding one of two of these items on my list and then you can take that into your prayer time on my behalf. pray also that this painting He's got going will turn out to be spectacular, that i'll be a cooperative canvas, for His glory.

lessons from a cookbook

Yesterday I stumbled upon and purchased an African cookbook on clearance at Starbucks (of all places), which I purchased. It is exquisite. It's pages are covered with beautiful words, ingredient lists that'll make you drool, and photography that captures the soul of the countries from which each recipe hails. And my heart thumps a little faster, my mind spinning dreams and churning ideas that have been lying dormant a while. Is it the continent or the cuisine that makes it beat this way? Inevitably, both. Both because food is a tangible, sensual, edible manifestation of that continent and its people.

But here is something I did not expect to garner from a cookbook (it was in the forward):

"We say in Africa that a person is a person through other persons. A solitary human being is a contradiction in terms. We are made for togetherness, for friendship, for fellowship... We are created to live in a delicate network of interdependence and we are different precisely in order to know our need of one another." - Desmond Tutu, Archbishop of South Africa

The author of this cookbook also introduces the readers to the word Ubuntu, meaning "I am what I am because of who we are." The word is a Zulu one.

And I am wondering today if some of the reasons I love Africa are some of the same reasons that I love living in this communal way: because "a solitary human being is a contradiction in terms."

hard rain

we painted the rain with nothing more than
a guitar, some word associations, and a holy imagination
and that rain it fell in torrents that left me
drenched with the tears of His pleasure
a collective stream flowing down to
drip from strands of drenched hair, fingertips
to the plants, the roots, the ground, the rivers
and eventually to the sea because
He fills the oceans (and me)

we sat in the prayer garage under the pounding rain
and that flashing blue of lightening mingling
its rhythms and harmonies with the notes picked on her guitar
then this song from when I was ten years younger comes back

Lord, let your love like water
fill every place in me
you’ve not been till now
and like a mighty river
come rush on through my soul
taking all that moves

rain is like that see, because rain is
a mighty waterfall and rushing waters
in a different stage of the life cycle, which means
rain will clean you out, it will leave you naked
which is, of course, exactly what I need here
so that all that remains is that which cannot be shaken

“open wide your mouth and I will fill it” (Ps 81:10),
that mighty river of a God once said to His people
so we stand or sit or lay or bow before him
but our mouths, they are wide open
to receive this rain falling heavy and fresh on us all

my friend steve

earlier this week i had a nice bike ride with steve -- steve who just got out of jail after turning himself in. you see, he wanted to pay his debts so that he could hold his head high in public and not feel the knot of fear in his stomach every time a police officer was nearby. his countenance has changed, he seems lighter. there's no more hiding.

so we rode --
he on his mountain bike, me on the black vintage schwinn
he a 53 year-old Indian guy, me a 28 year-old white girl
he having lived the life of a "street rat" and criminal, me a live of suburbs and university

we rode across the 6th street bridge and along the river, cutting through downtown to get down to wealthy, where the buildings are industrial and factories and in various stages of decay, then back up seward on the west side, chatting amiably the whole time and feeling the pleasure of a little burn in thigh muscles peddling up inclines. and this time he rode fearlessly, head high, no longer on hyper-alert.

i am conscious this whole time of what a study in opposites we are; what an unlikely pair. but how awfully fond we are of one another. steve: my gentle-hearted, hard-working, crossword-puzzle-vocabulary-wielding, cheerful friend. steve is the friend who tells me daily that i'm great (and means it) and when i leave the room yells after me, "don't go!". steve is the one who hung my vegetable basket and my stained glass window; who carried sofas and dressers and boxes up and down stairs for me when i moved. steve is the one who prays to God as though he's just having a conversation with a [respected] buddy. so if what it takes to meet a person like steve and enjoy a friendship with someone i otherwise never would have crossed paths with is living this crazy little missional life on the west side, I'll take it. it's one of the sweet spots.

this is grace

a significant thing occurred on the back roof of the house last night with sarah,
a thing that left me stunned and snotty-nosed with weeping --

it was that godly sorrow that brings repentance and leaves no regrets (2 Cor 7:10)

and this is entirely different from self-pity or shame:
knowing - not just intellectually - the depth of my sinfulness
yet knowing myself as one held by love and grace
(God's and sarah's, both)

ironic

the Lord gave me a word from three different people. and the word was strength.

"the joy of the Lord is my strength" - Nehemiah 8:10
"those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength" - Isaiah 40:31

then this note from a friend (you know who you are):
"I really think the word He has for you is strength and strong... most verses [containing this word] are about fighting an enemy, like David, and those who go in by faith putting themselves in danger. you are walking by faith, you're walking in strength you don't have on your own... so stay strong and He is going to bless you through it."

seems like yet another person said something to me about this this week too. i'm receiving all this encouragement about the Lord doing good work in me, maturing me and strengthening me...

and yet...

I say, "well, Lord, that is indeed an ironic word to have given to me, knowing that i feel about as far away from strong as i possibly could be right now."

i feel the weakness of my stubborn heart, my disappointment in God, my laziness in daily disciplines, my mood swinging low, my body feeling heavy and toxic, my headaches and stubborn cold, my feeble attempts at breaking addictions, my strained relationships, my uncertainty in my work/purpose here, and my sputtering prayer life. i am weak.

and then that over-used verse about His power [strength] being perfected in our weakness comes to mind and i am tempted to brush it off as the cliche it has become.

and yet...

maybe that's a scripture for me to camp out on for a while. maybe if i sit with it -- lectio divina style -- it will become a crystal refracting light into the dark corners where it's most needed. far from mere cliche, it could become a light to my path.

so...

2 Corinthians 12:9-10
hope in the lord
joy of the lord

these are my meditative keys

here's some to chew on

and if by chance the darkness manages to slip in through the cracks of this temple of Yours
we will crowd it out with the singing of praises to You (the one true God)
at the sound of your Name the darkness tries to hide so
even though i haven't even got a voice to sing with this evening
i will raise it as loudly as i can anyway (i'll sign if i have to) and
we watch as those false spirits jump to their feet and
flee the scene

-----

"you're a beautiful creation of God," he said to me
and there were no strings attached
because this one speaks from a child's heart and
what flows from his mouth is as refreshing as
pure water

-----

there were two intoxicated men in prayer tonight
i had to remind myself that they are not interruptions but
they are the reason we are here

----

"you'll be a better wife for this," he said
"because husbands and wives fight about things" and
i am in a fight with Jesus at the moment
and just as much as He is my husband
I am His wife (i'm "married to someone cool")
so what would it look like to be a good wife to Jesus?