Hi, sorry I missed last week’s post. If you’ve been keeping up with my posts, you know I missed it because I was on a short-term missions trip working with Kids International Mission (KIM) in Manila. The trip was great. We worked hard every day, mostly shoveling and carrying bags of sand and gravel up multiple flights of stairs, although we also got to do things such as: pass rebar and planks of wood up to the fourth floor of the building, tie pieces of rebar together, mix cement, get sunburned, and be on bucket brigades passing mixed cement to the places it needed to be poured. Thursday morning, we got a break from the work, and during the break, our group went to visit a waterfall in the area where we got to swim, climb up the waterfall, and jump into the water below from about halfway up the waterfall. Our group’s leader was also very intentional about making sure that throughout the week we spent a lot of time with the teenage kids who live at the ministry center full-time.
Having been back from the trip for a few days now, the parts of the trip that keep coming back to my mind most often are not the things we did on the trip, but rather a series of conversations I had throughout the trip. The first was with a man named Pastor Rey. Pastor Rey is a man from a city a few hours north of Manila. He pastors a church there, but his salary is not paid by the church. Because of this, he has to come and do manual labor at KIM about one week a month (hence him being in Manila while we were there) and rely on donations from various churches around the world to help make ends meet. While I was talking with Pastor Rey, he told me that in the area where he lives, there are about 100,000 people. He said that there is nobody to disciple the young people there, and asked if I would be willing to come and spend some time working with them. I told him I would pray about it.
Later in the week, I was talking with Daughin Chan (the leader of our group), Jeff Long (the head of KIM), and Russ Philips (KIM’s guy in charge of short-term teams). At one point in the conversation, either Daughin or I (I don’t remember which) mentioned the fact that I’m still “just an intern.” Jeff—seizing the opportunity—said, “You won’t be an intern if you come and work for us.”I wasn’t sure how serious the comment was, so after Jeff and Daughin left, I talked with Russ for a few minutes about openings they have at KIM. The main one he mentioned was maintaining KIM’s blog, something which sounded a little interesting, but probably not interesting enough to entice me to go work there.
One night during the week, I was talking to one of the boys who was staying in my room. I told him about the offers I had gotten from both Pastor Rey and Jeff to come work in the Philippines, and he responded, “That would be cool, but I couldn’t do it. I’m too comfortable where I am in Hong Kong.” I was struck by his brutal honesty. I was also challenged to not let my comfort level be the determining factor in what I do next year.
Saturday morning, after a long week of work, I was talking with Jeff on the newly poured fourth floor of KIM’s new building (pouring the floor was Friday’s job). I asked him about the position at KIM maintaining the blog, saying that Russ had mentioned it was a possible job I could do if I were to go work at KIM. Jeff responded by asking, “Are you passionate about writing?” I told him it’s not my favorite thing to do in the world, and he told me if I were to come to work at KIM, they would have me do something I was passionate about. He mentioned to me the possibility of discipling the boys at the orphanage KIM runs and the boys in the street gangs that live in KIM’s neighborhood. That got my attention.
When I got back to Hong Kong, my email inbox had the newsletter from Pastor Rey’s church. One line from it caught my attention. As they are asking for anyone who is willing to come spend time with their ministry, the letter says, “We don’t promise comfort while you partner with us but it is a guarantee that you can show the love of Jesus to this lovely people in this part of the world.”
All of that to say: I’m still just as confused (if not more confused) about my future than ever. One thing I do know now is that going to the Philippines full-time is definitely an option. I am praying for wisdom from God concerning direction for next year, and I would love your prayers in this area as well.
(If you want to see pictures from my trip, they are on my Facebook page.)
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Thursday's Thought-Short-Term High
The short-term missions trip. It’s a favorite of Christians everywhere— a chance to see the world, serve the poor, and come home a week later able to sleep better at night because of the feeling that you’ve made a positive difference in the world and the fact that you are once again in your own bed, knowing you can sleep in tomorrow morning.
But what if we’re missing something? What if there’s something more to Christian service than an artificially induced one-week spiritual high which in the long run leaves you discouraged because you always dream of going back and having it like it was for that week? What if love for our neighbors isn’t supposed to inspire us to just give a week and care enough to take some pictures to show to our friends back home? What if truly loving the poor and oppressed in the world, or just our everyday neighbors, involves actually getting involved in their lives personally? What if rather than traveling far away to serve the people in another part of the world for a week, we got involved with the people in our own neighborhoods, and in such a way that they were able to see that we truly cared about them as individuals and not just as photo-ops?
Yes, there is a reason I am writing this. I have realized that I am as much of a sucker as the next guy for the short-term missions trip movement. And, oh by the way, I’m going on one next week, so maybe I’m just writing this post to myself, but as I have taken time to truly invest in the lives of those around me here in Hong Kong over the past few months, I have noticed something. Living here is not like the short-term missions trips I’ve been on before. When one of my youth come to me and tell me about a problem they’re facing, I don’t have the luxury of telling them, “I’m sorry,” and “I’ll pray for you,” and then packing up and leaving two days later. When one of them comes to me with a problem, I have two options—either I personally step into their lives, into the uncomfortableness and dirtiness of what they’re dealing with and demonstrate to them that I truly love them, or I don’t step in and therefore prove through my actions that I truly don’t care about their problems. There is no easy-exit contingency plan where I can maintain the appearance of caring for the individual without getting involved in their problem. At times it is inconvenient and frustrating, but the experience has taught me something that I never could have learned through a short-term missions trip—true love and true ministry don’t happen over a week’s time, they happen over a lifetime. And while the “spiritual high” of the short-term trip is always exciting as long as it lasts (which is never as long as you’d expect it to), the tough day-in and day-out struggle of truly investing in the lives of those around you leaves a much more satisfying and long-lasting feeling at the end of the day.
So where does this leave me? I’m definitely still going to the Philippines next week. My primary motivation for going, as strange as it may seem, is not a desire to serve the ministry we are going to work with (although that is there as a secondary motivation), but rather to continue investing into the lives of the Hong Kong students who will be going on the trip, because they are the ones I get to live life with. They are the ones that will still be around when we get back to Hong Kong. This means I will work my butt off to serve KIM, both out of a desire to serve KIM and out of a desire to set a godly example for the youth from International Christian School who will be going on the trip as well. But it also means that the trip doesn’t end when we get back to Hong Kong. It will last as long as I’m here.
But what if we’re missing something? What if there’s something more to Christian service than an artificially induced one-week spiritual high which in the long run leaves you discouraged because you always dream of going back and having it like it was for that week? What if love for our neighbors isn’t supposed to inspire us to just give a week and care enough to take some pictures to show to our friends back home? What if truly loving the poor and oppressed in the world, or just our everyday neighbors, involves actually getting involved in their lives personally? What if rather than traveling far away to serve the people in another part of the world for a week, we got involved with the people in our own neighborhoods, and in such a way that they were able to see that we truly cared about them as individuals and not just as photo-ops?
Yes, there is a reason I am writing this. I have realized that I am as much of a sucker as the next guy for the short-term missions trip movement. And, oh by the way, I’m going on one next week, so maybe I’m just writing this post to myself, but as I have taken time to truly invest in the lives of those around me here in Hong Kong over the past few months, I have noticed something. Living here is not like the short-term missions trips I’ve been on before. When one of my youth come to me and tell me about a problem they’re facing, I don’t have the luxury of telling them, “I’m sorry,” and “I’ll pray for you,” and then packing up and leaving two days later. When one of them comes to me with a problem, I have two options—either I personally step into their lives, into the uncomfortableness and dirtiness of what they’re dealing with and demonstrate to them that I truly love them, or I don’t step in and therefore prove through my actions that I truly don’t care about their problems. There is no easy-exit contingency plan where I can maintain the appearance of caring for the individual without getting involved in their problem. At times it is inconvenient and frustrating, but the experience has taught me something that I never could have learned through a short-term missions trip—true love and true ministry don’t happen over a week’s time, they happen over a lifetime. And while the “spiritual high” of the short-term trip is always exciting as long as it lasts (which is never as long as you’d expect it to), the tough day-in and day-out struggle of truly investing in the lives of those around you leaves a much more satisfying and long-lasting feeling at the end of the day.
So where does this leave me? I’m definitely still going to the Philippines next week. My primary motivation for going, as strange as it may seem, is not a desire to serve the ministry we are going to work with (although that is there as a secondary motivation), but rather to continue investing into the lives of the Hong Kong students who will be going on the trip, because they are the ones I get to live life with. They are the ones that will still be around when we get back to Hong Kong. This means I will work my butt off to serve KIM, both out of a desire to serve KIM and out of a desire to set a godly example for the youth from International Christian School who will be going on the trip as well. But it also means that the trip doesn’t end when we get back to Hong Kong. It will last as long as I’m here.
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Thursday’s Thought—Subtraction by Addition
Yesterday, Ash Wednesday, marked the start of Lent on the church calendar. Growing up in a non-liturgical (although in many ways still very traditional) church, the church calendar was not highly emphasized during my youth. In fact, last year was the first time in my life that I actually celebrated Lent. As I celebrated it, I learned a lot about myself, about certain things that I crave (often with no good reason that I should be craving them), and about my relationship with God. As Lent approached this year, I wanted to celebrate again, so I tried to come up with something that I could give up for the 40-day period.
As I thought of possibilities, however, I had real trouble coming up with ideas. I can’t give up Facebook; it’s an important part of my job. Meat? On my missions trip to Manila in a week and a half, I will be doing hard labor all week and my diet will be at the mercy of the missions agency’s cook, who includes meat in pretty much every meal. TV? With the amount of TV I watch in a week, I wouldn’t be giving up too much. Fast food (last year’s choice)? One of my best chances to interact with my students during the entire course of the week is at Burger King on Friday nights; this, like Facebook, is an important part of my job. Call it a lack of creativity, lack of dedication, or whatever else you want, but I could think of nothing to give up that would be realistic (I could give it up), productive (it would help to give it up), and require a sacrifice (it’s something I would notice being gone).
Then the idea hit me: rather than taking something out of my life for 40 days, what if I add something new to my life for 40 days, something productive, something beneficial, and something which would require me to rearrange my schedule so that although I am not giving up any one thing per se for Lent, every day will involve small sacrifices in order to do this something new? For example, what if I set out to memorize the book of Philippians over the next 40 days? It may sound like a daunting task at first, but if taken by small steps, it is not as hard as it sounds. Giving myself 40 days to memorize the book puts me at a pace of memorizing about two and a half verses per day—a goal which is realistic, yet will require sacrifices each day to achieve the goal.
As I think about the idea, I think it is a good one. In the grand scheme of things, the goal of Lent is not simply to give something up for the sake of giving it up, but rather to give it up so during the time you have given it up, you can draw closer to God. By adding this Bible memorization, I will be growing closer to God, and although I will do it by adding something to my life rather than subtracting something from it, my addition will certainly involve some subtraction along the way.
As I thought of possibilities, however, I had real trouble coming up with ideas. I can’t give up Facebook; it’s an important part of my job. Meat? On my missions trip to Manila in a week and a half, I will be doing hard labor all week and my diet will be at the mercy of the missions agency’s cook, who includes meat in pretty much every meal. TV? With the amount of TV I watch in a week, I wouldn’t be giving up too much. Fast food (last year’s choice)? One of my best chances to interact with my students during the entire course of the week is at Burger King on Friday nights; this, like Facebook, is an important part of my job. Call it a lack of creativity, lack of dedication, or whatever else you want, but I could think of nothing to give up that would be realistic (I could give it up), productive (it would help to give it up), and require a sacrifice (it’s something I would notice being gone).
Then the idea hit me: rather than taking something out of my life for 40 days, what if I add something new to my life for 40 days, something productive, something beneficial, and something which would require me to rearrange my schedule so that although I am not giving up any one thing per se for Lent, every day will involve small sacrifices in order to do this something new? For example, what if I set out to memorize the book of Philippians over the next 40 days? It may sound like a daunting task at first, but if taken by small steps, it is not as hard as it sounds. Giving myself 40 days to memorize the book puts me at a pace of memorizing about two and a half verses per day—a goal which is realistic, yet will require sacrifices each day to achieve the goal.
As I think about the idea, I think it is a good one. In the grand scheme of things, the goal of Lent is not simply to give something up for the sake of giving it up, but rather to give it up so during the time you have given it up, you can draw closer to God. By adding this Bible memorization, I will be growing closer to God, and although I will do it by adding something to my life rather than subtracting something from it, my addition will certainly involve some subtraction along the way.
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Thursday's Thought
Well, after getting caught up on all the latest hysteria about Rob Bell’s new book today, I almost wrote this Thursday’s Thought about Love Wins, but since the book hasn’t actually come out yet, I’ll save all of my—what I expect to be negative—comments about it until a later date…
So, instead, this week’s thought will focus on Inner City Ministries. Over the past few weeks, I have been volunteering at ICM a couple of times per week and trying to get my youth to do the same, with mixed results. ICM is a ministry in Hong Kong that reaches out to ethnic minorities (primarily Pakistanis, Nepalis, and Indians) and tries to create avenues to share the gospel with them through a variety of ways, such as after school tutoring, a cooking school, and more. The saddest part about the need for ICM is that in the city of Hong Kong, where there are more Rolls Royces per capita than anywhere else on earth, there is a section of town where these minorities are all squished together and for the most part ignored by the rest of the city. The city of Hong Kong announced yesterday that it is giving 6,000 HKD ($800 US) checks to all Hong Kong permanent residents over the age of 18 because of a budget surplus last year, yet the children in this part of town are going to schools where even if the kids can stay disciplined enough to graduate high school, most of them won’t have a good enough education to go to college.
As I have gotten to know some of these kids and seen the way they live (like the fact that many of them play in the same parks where numerous drug dealers hang out and run their businesses), it has broken my heart that they are so neglected by the rest of society. This has been a reality check for me, because I know there are similar situations to this happening all over the United States right now, some of them a 5 minute drive from where I went to college, and yet I did so little to help them during my time there. Why was this? And why is it that more Christians don’t get involved in helping out in situations like this? We worship a God who—when we were sinners—did not stay on His throne and say, “Well, that’s too bad, hope they can fix themselves,” but rather got off His throne, came to the earth, and died for us. We have suffering and poverty in our neighborhoods, and we can’t get up, turn off the TV, and go outside to play with children so they don’t have to spend their afternoon hanging out with drug dealers. What is the hope we are proclaiming to the world? Salvation by The Office? I sure hope we’ve got something more than that to offer.
So, instead, this week’s thought will focus on Inner City Ministries. Over the past few weeks, I have been volunteering at ICM a couple of times per week and trying to get my youth to do the same, with mixed results. ICM is a ministry in Hong Kong that reaches out to ethnic minorities (primarily Pakistanis, Nepalis, and Indians) and tries to create avenues to share the gospel with them through a variety of ways, such as after school tutoring, a cooking school, and more. The saddest part about the need for ICM is that in the city of Hong Kong, where there are more Rolls Royces per capita than anywhere else on earth, there is a section of town where these minorities are all squished together and for the most part ignored by the rest of the city. The city of Hong Kong announced yesterday that it is giving 6,000 HKD ($800 US) checks to all Hong Kong permanent residents over the age of 18 because of a budget surplus last year, yet the children in this part of town are going to schools where even if the kids can stay disciplined enough to graduate high school, most of them won’t have a good enough education to go to college.
As I have gotten to know some of these kids and seen the way they live (like the fact that many of them play in the same parks where numerous drug dealers hang out and run their businesses), it has broken my heart that they are so neglected by the rest of society. This has been a reality check for me, because I know there are similar situations to this happening all over the United States right now, some of them a 5 minute drive from where I went to college, and yet I did so little to help them during my time there. Why was this? And why is it that more Christians don’t get involved in helping out in situations like this? We worship a God who—when we were sinners—did not stay on His throne and say, “Well, that’s too bad, hope they can fix themselves,” but rather got off His throne, came to the earth, and died for us. We have suffering and poverty in our neighborhoods, and we can’t get up, turn off the TV, and go outside to play with children so they don’t have to spend their afternoon hanging out with drug dealers. What is the hope we are proclaiming to the world? Salvation by The Office? I sure hope we’ve got something more than that to offer.
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