july

July is running away as fast as it can.

i have been reconciling and asking questions and making meals for friends.

There have been days where it has felt right that they should begin with rain, like the day that i watched friends place a child in the ground and the day that i cried because i do not know what to do.

And there have been days where it has felt right that they should be full of sunshine and new beginnings and should end with meals in the park and with people that i love and with the stories of how God is so very good.

cornerstone, again.

I am taking the last bit of time that I have to myself before leaving for Cornerstone Fest in the morning. I am looking forward to the trip. Although I will admit that I have had moments of wondering why I ever brought this upon myself one more time. I guess that getting over Cornerstone is one of those things I will just never learn. Cornerstone always brings up a lot of memories; I’ve done a whole lot of growing up there. This will be my eighth Cornerstone, I’ve made the trip all but one year since I was 15 years old. My inaugural year was certainly the most memorable. Shooting stars, Over the Rhine, chicken fighting in the lake, mud people, mosh pits, heartbreak. Most of the other years are a blur of dusty roads, sweat, sleeping out under stars, and of the reminder that sometimes people that love Jesus the most are the least likely to look like I would imagine them to.

And sometimes I realized that the ones I assumed did were only putting on a show.

This is the 25^th Cornerstone Festival and its funny that going there always feels a little bit like going home. I do not think it is the hardcore bands playing on generator stages or the porta-johns or even finding old and new friends in the merch tents. I think that it has much more to do with the sky I look up and see at nite, with the guarantee I will see stars flying from one end to the other. I think it has to do with going to see Over the Rhine play at midnite, falling asleep to the melodies and waking to the audience clapping, over and again. And smiling when Karen and Linford always come back and play even after saying goodnite. I feel at home with the familiar Cornerstone smells of straw and sweat and with the feeling that I am getting older and that some things stay the same.

This is the third year that I have taken high schoolers to Cornerstone. I smile because many of them are coming back after that first year, just like I had. I worry because some of the girls seem so young and then I realize they are older, and probably wiser, than I was that first year. I hope that these kids keep coming back, year after year, and find a home for this one week of the year and that they see God in the sky and in the people crowded onto that ground.

trees with roots

I planted a tree. I literally sunk some roots into the ground. I am planning on giving it a few years to grow and cannot wait for it to bear fruit. Cherries.

Had I not won this tree, I would not have planted it. My chances were slim and I won.

It felt good to plant a tree. A kid from the neighborhood was over and he helped me plant the tree. He took over digging the hole. I told him he was great at digging and he told me it was because he buries a lot of cats in his yard for his mom and his aunt.

This planting could be symbolic. These roots finding their home in West side soil.

I may have planted the tree a little too close to the house and to another tree in the yard but this was the best place I could put it for now. I may still need to transplant it someday. But for now this is a good place for it to grow.

sabbath and schedule

I had one of the best sabbath days of my life yesterday. it was actually on a Sunday and i actually did not do any work.
i went to church. after getting home from church, i had lunch. after lunch i hopped on my bike and found two of my dear friends sitting in the grass of rosa park's circle. i joined them. i scanned a newspaper. i read my book. i fell asleep. i conversed. i got an iced soy latte.
hours later dana and i left, me on my bike and her in her car. i told her it was a race back to her house. and i won. we walked to the store and got chips and salsa and fruit and olives and went to john ball park and sat by the pond and had a picnic.

i do not remember the last time i spent that many hours sitting in grass and i did all day and i loved it.

in conversation dana and i realized we were struggling with lots of the same questions about life and purpose and next steps. we decided to start the morning Bible study we have been saying we were going to do for a long time. this led us to my roof, to sit down and schedule.
730 am will see us either walking around the city or discussing Henri Nouwen's book, Spiritual Direction, over coffee. wednesday afternoons we will work on art projects. i am getting back in the habit of writing down a schedule for my often unstructured days.

we started today and i feel good. we had a long walk this morning and when i got home i knew exactly what to do because i had written it down the nite before. i do not feel like i have wasted my day. i do not feel the anxiety i was growing so accustomed to carrying around with me.

i hope that today is the first day of this pattern for my summer weeks. true rest one day. and schedules the rest.

Grandfather Part II

“I just wish I could sit on the dock and cry.”

Of all the things that all the people have said to me this week, this line, spoken by one of my family members, is the only thing in my head right now. This funeral process is exhausting. It makes me wonder why we do things the way we do. I have been rushing this week, all week. Every nite has been a late nite and every day has been full. Full of family and visitations and errands and a funeral and finally standing at the place my grandfather’s body now lays. I have been running so hard that I fear the fact has not yet sunk in. The fact is that I no longer have a grandpa. The fact is that I will miss this man very much. The fact is that my children will never have a great-grandpa and that our family will be very different from here on.

This week I have heard a lot of stories and have celebrated my grandpa’s life and have been glad to have an incredible assurance that he is finally home. But it is hard. And I have not had time to grieve. And I too just wish that I could sit on the dock, look up the stars, feel cold water on my toes, and cry big tears because this hurts.

Grandfather

I went to see my Grandpa in the hospital today. He has always been a very healthy man but as of yesterday he is in the hospital and he has leukemia. He looks okay but is very tired and he talked with his eyes closed. We do not know much about his condition; the test results were not yet in. He was talking like he is going to die tomorrow. He spoke with an amazing assurance that he has lived his life well and he talked as one who is so very ready to go home. I do not want to think that my Grandpa is going to die. But I do not want to see him suffer or to fight against that which he is so ready for.

I love the stories that my Grandpa has to tell. He has not exactly lived a conventional life. Never graduated from high school, a farm boy, an Air Force Pilate, a pastor, a missionary, twice a husband, a father and a grandfather to many. Listening to his stories today reminded me of the significance and of the brevity of life. I do not know that my Grandpa is on his deathbed. But if he is, he can say that he has arrived there having lived well, having sucked all the marrow from life, and he has made tremendous impact on this world. I remember a few months ago my Grandpa’s name was mentioned in the paper by a man who sited him as a huge influence on his spiritual journey. My Grandpa had not had any contact with this man in years. Everywhere my Grandpa goes he knows at least five people in the room. His life has not been easy but it has been full and it has been good. And he is leaving a story, a legacy, a testimony behind and the world is a different place because he has lived in it.

Today I was inspired by my Grandpa because he did not mention any regrets but only all the things he was so glad that he could have been a part of during his time here. I cannot imagine having so much peace in the face of death and I want to live my life in order to arrive at the end having lived so full and so well and having so much to leave behind.

politics

I have been thinking a lot about politics lately. About the election, about public policy, about the role of nonprofits and of the church.

This week Barak Obama was in Grand Rapids. I rode my bicycle down to the arena and got in a very long line three hours before he was to speak. I observed people standing in line. Some were buying Obama tshirts and pins. Some were signing petitions to put stem cell research back on the ballot in Michigan. Some were chatting. I was by myself and not buying or signing anything; I just stood there and read my book. I got into the arena two hours before he was to speak. I saved a few seats for some friends that were coming later. I watched the arena fill with people. I thought about how the last time I was inside the arena I was graduating from college. Now, five months later, I was feeling almost the same way I felt on the day I graduated. I was feeling a bit like “life is changing and I do not really know what the future holds”.

My friend Dave found me and sat down. We watched people together. I saw my friends Bryan and Scott and they asked me why I was there. Bryan looked at me in all his sarcastic seriousness and mentioned the possibility of a terrorist attack. I told him that he was ridiculous. But sometimes people do want to kill presidents and people trying to become them. So when I sat back down in my seat, I of course instantly noticed a very well dressed Arab man sitting in the front row of the section next to mine. I would have thought nothing of this except for the fact that Bryan had just made me think of terrorist attacks combined with the fact that this man was busily typing away on a laptop computer, talking on his cell phone, glancing around a lot, and really not paying any attention to the introductory speech or the promotional videos that were being played while we all waited. I thought to myself, “I do not want to die here today. I do not want to die for Obama.” I thought of what my parents would think if I died because I had skipped the prayer meeting I was supposed to go to see Obama speak.

My friend Katie came and took the empty seat on the other side of me. I was still thinking in the back of my mind that I was going to die here. I thought of all the things in my life that were not in order and all of the terrible things that people would find out about me when they went through my stuff and read my journals.

People in the arena were in high spirits, but getting antsy. The wave broke out. It was actually the best wave I had ever been a part of. Near full participation. I glanced down at the man in the front row to see if he was doing the wave. He was not standing or waving his arms, but I noticed a slight smile on his face. And I decided that he was not a terrorist. A few minutes later I noticed the same look on his face as he watched the small children running around on the floor in front of us. The kids were loving the space to run and the thousands of eyes all around the arena that were watching them like they were very tiny celebrities. I decided that surely he was not a terrorist.

And obviously I lived to tell the story. Even if it is a story that I hate to tell because I want never to be that person; I never want to be guilty of racial profiling or stereotyping.

So I listened to John Edwards and Barak Obama give their speeches. They each talked about the wonders of the Democratic Party and about how it can make the United States, and even the world, a better place. I clapped when I was moved to clapping. Like when they talked about everyone having healthcare and all children having equal opportunities for education. I looked around and saw people with these looks of absolute adoration on their faces. I saw other people sleeping.

A few evenings later some friends stopped over to smoke the hookah. I was feeling aggravated and well, truculent, so I asked these friends what they thought of Barak Obama. I knew that I was picking a fight and I wanted one. In most ways I was so blown away by their responses that I could not even fight back. A very dear friend stopped over on her way home from a very difficult evening and I stepped back from political conversation to listen to her instead. I could hear the guys in the other room, feeding off of each other and only getting stronger in their convictions. I felt weak and defenseless and liberal in the worst way when I went back into the room and I changed the topic of conversation.

My friend Jonathan bought me an iced soy latte on Saturday. Yum. I told him about the lack of direction I feel in my life. He told me to read Psalm 143, which I did later on in the evening, during worship at the Prayer House. Now, I did not really want to be at worship that nite. I had planned all day on going to visit someone our community knows and loves, who is currently in jail. Some plans fell through and I was not able to go. I thought, “Jesus tells us to visit him in prison, how can I possibly sit here and worship him when I have failed to make it to the prison to see him”. Turns out that Jesus likes us to sit and worship him too, but regardless, I did not want to be there that nite. So I looked up Psalm 143. I repeated the phrase “show me the way I should go”. I started thinking about the election, about politics, about how I was probably the most liberal person in the room and about how I felt ostracized for it. (The ostracism was, of course, all in my head, since I do not have my political views tattooed on my forehead or written on my sleeve.) Regardless, I was thinking. My eyes traveled across the pages of my well worn Bible to Psalm 146, specifically where the Psalmist says “do not put your trust in princes, in mortal men, who cannot save”. I thought of the people at the Obama rally who were looking towards this man with faces of adoration, of obsession, of trust. I got scared. The Psalmist goes on to say that it is the LORD who upholds the cause of the oppressed, it is the LORD who gives food to the hungry, who sets prisoners free, gives sight to the blind, uplifts and loves. The Psalmist wrote that it is the LORD’s responsibility to watch over the life of the alien and to sustain the fatherless and the widow.

I remember the day that I realized that I was not a Republican. I remember the way I felt when I considered all of the things that Christians should be doing for the earth and for the poor and the hungry and the old and the sick no matter how undeserving those people may be and when I realized that the Republican Party has failed. I once heard someone say that the local church is the hope of the world. That both inspired me and made me very afraid for the future of the world. I decided that day that because the Republican Party failed and because the church was failing that I would secretly be a Democrat. I told myself and a few select people that I did not want to be a Democrat and that I did not think the government should have to do the job for the poor or for the environment but that I had to be one because the church and the Republicans were doing a terrible job of it all. I blamed the church and I put my trust in mortal men.

Well, I have decided to put my hope back in the LORD. I believe that He really can be trusted to uphold the cause of the oppressed and eliminate hunger and free prisoners and care for immigrants and orphans and widows and to do everything else that he has promised to do. This, in the most beautiful and terrifying way, does make the church the hope of the world. We, the church, really are the hands and feet of Jesus on this earth. If we can trust God to do what he has said and if He can trust us to let Him use our flesh to do so, then just imagine what our communities could look like. Imagine if local churches took the responsibility in each of their own neighborhoods, to put food on every table, to house all of the homeless, to take in the orphans and the old, to adopt all the unwanted babies and to pay for people to get the medical help they need, to clean up trash and plant gardens and love creation.

I do not know who I will vote for in November. All I know is that my hope cannot rest in ANY politician or any “mortal man” (or woman, of course.) I know that it is important to be informed and to vote and I know that putting our trust in God means more than trusting him to put the right people in power, it means trusting him to enable his church to do the dirty work of redeeming this world. I trust Him to enable me to get my hands and my feet dirty in the process.