Death: On Time Arrival

Sunday after church I headed to the El to get back home, per the usual. I stepped into the subway car and noticed a disheveled man napping at a strange angle in his seat, but put it out of my mind and settled in the opposite end of the car. I've seen many weird things on SEPTA, so my first instinct is to allow adequate room.
Then a passenger started shouting that the man wasn't breathing. It was as if all the passengers roused themselves at once. Conductors' radios crackled to life and the El, still deep underground at 13th Street, screeched to a halt.
No breathing. No pulse. Totally unresponsive. A few people tried to find a heartbeat, with no success. A conductor ordered us out of the car and onto the platform to catch the next El, and shortly ambulance sirens grew louder overhead as they edged closer to whisk the man away.
I noted fear in some of the passengers' faces. How uncertain life is, that you can board at 69th Street Terminal (this was the rumor about the so-called napping man) and be staring eternity in the face by 15th Street!
I didn't get to confirm that the man passed away, but nevertheless, we have no guarantees in this life. Aside from the usual existential thoughts that tumble around my brain, this past week I've kept being bombarded by Matthew 6:33-34. It's the Kingdom that matters. And someday, despite my worrying and stressing about this side of life, it'll be finished. Lord willing, I just hope they won't have to cart my corpse off the El!

The Re-Unreached and Staying/Going

"I'm a Christian because missionary deaconesses left Germany to evangelize German immigrants (most of whom were already nominally Christian — including my grandparents) in the 'reached' city of Philadelphia in the 1930s."

The text from my friend punctuated a few weeks of mental gnawing about calling. I had been feeling a twinge of guilt that I was called to Spain, a so-called "reached" country. What about the unreached people groups? Does anyone care about them?

God does, of course. And I keep having to remind myself that he will call people to go to those unreached.
As for Spain, the same friend from the text previously told me, "don't feel guilty about being called to a reached country. Anywhere where there are people who haven't heard is unreached." Word. And in any case, Spain is becoming increasingly re-unreached, like most of Europe.

It's disheartening for me when people classify missionaries as "those [weird] people" who go overseas. If you truly believe the gospel, you can't help but share it very naturally through your life. "Leaking Jesus" was what my former campus minister called it. In many cases now, mere geography is the dividing line between missionary (if they're even permitted to be identified as such in their country) and regular old Christian.
What I'm not saying is that everyone should move across the world. Staying, praying, supporting, and reaching out in your own neighborhood is equally critical as moving overseas. The church needs both. But let's make sure we have both.

The Waiting Is The Hardest Part

I'll borrow this post's title from my favorite philosopher, Tom Petty.
I'm deep in year six of figuring out my path to Spain and paying off school debt. My perspective has changed a lot in that time, but the conviction hasn't. I can't explain the gut-twisting rush that I get when I'm faced with Spain. I've mentioned feeling like my heart's being pulled out. Some might describe it as a similar sensation to falling in love. But with that love comes anxiety about the future. How long of a stint should I do? What should it look like? Should I stay in the United States a bit longer to tie up some loose ends? I don't know. I have some time to figure that out.
Task lists and pros/cons charts pile up. Various dreams die hard. Sometimes they don't need to, and their mortification occurs because I've jumped too far ahead in my mind. I'm impatient and yet still nervous.
This past week, I had just nearly gotten over a cold when I got sidelined by the flu. I've been (mostly) resting at home for five days. By day two I wanted to return to work, even though I couldn't sit up. By day three, I was furious. Why couldn't I breathe?! I had so much I wanted to accomplish! Simply waiting for the virus to run its course has showed me how willful I am. Not in a good way.

So I keep being pulled back to today. I'm not good at this. Even when multiple people in a week tell me that I'm in the exact right place for this time.
But I'm learning slowly. This time is just as important. And in that realization there is joy.

Hang Gliding with Jesus

(Note: Artist friends, someone please draw Hang Gliding with Jesus. I would be forever grateful.)

I have a horrid fear of heights. I must constantly challenge it (hello, trying to walk the Ben Franklin Bridge footpath), but still it hangs on. So the idea of hang gliding is about as palatable as being locked in a roller disco with Barry Manilow and being forced to to sing "Copacabana" until I lose consciousness. No, just no.

Enter: the Christian life. The longer I'm in it, the more I desperately grab onto Jesus. Life is nuts. Dreams, work, relationships, calling, dying to self, plans for the future, Spain, logistics...I start to think too hard on any one sector and I get the sensation of falling. But I'm held fast. Jesus is not going to drop me — or you, if you're his. So I grab onto the bar and hold on. It's a scary, thrilling, awesome ride. He will complete his work in us.
So pray as I go on this adventure with God. Let's fly!

When Songs Change

Lil dude Oscar, my 3/4 size acoustic.

I wrote a song called Turmoil in 2002. My friend Benj composed the music for it. It's angsty, sure, but not in the typical teenager sense. At the time I was trying to figure out how to walk with a friend in their suffering. It fit the season, which was gut-wrenching.
I picked up my guitar for the first time in ages last night, tuned it up, and started strumming through old ditties. But when I began the chords for Turmoil, a strange thought hit me. The words and emotions in the song felt foreign. I even toyed with writing new verses because the old ones simply don't fit. There's more to say. Twelve years dramatically alters your grasp of wrestling with your own soul, to say the least.
This week I've been thinking about how God renews our minds. When necessary, he changes our songs. Sometimes he just changes the style. Other times, he completely rewrites a wailing ballad into a jumpy six-count swing.

En Serio

Not many things rip my heart out quite like Spain. After all, I've been beating the topic to death for a little more than six years. But this hits hard.
While I was on vacation I got an email from Miss Ruth's pastor in Barcelona. He specifically asked for the brothers and sisters at Tenth to pray because he's been diagnosed with advanced mesothelioma. Pastor Cerni is the minister at the only reformed church in the city. As I posted previously, he heads a book ministry that equips vast portions of the Hispanic world. And he's been caring for Miss Ruth.
I wish I were more spiritually mature and could say that I totally see God's purpose to build the church in Spain. But I'm sad for my friend. Sad for his family and his flock. Sad, perhaps selfishly, that I'm not back there to help. Whatever that means.
So, pray for this dear man, his family, his congregation. Pray for his treatment. For other nationals to be raised up to support the church there. For Spain.

Entiendes lo que lees?

Newsworks file photo

He sat next to me on the subway, the Spanish tract (some variation on the four laws or the like) pinched between his fingers. He wasn't so much reading it as staring at the paper, as though expecting to burn a hole through it.
I don't like speaking to random strangers on public transit. I'm a big fan of personal safety, for one thing. But I kept feeling convicted to say something before I arrived at my stop.
So I asked him if he understood what he was reading.
His head, bowed toward the tract, now snapped up. "Yeah, I understand it," he responded in English. He twisted around in the seat and peered at me. "You know Spanish? Like, read and write it," he said, almost as a statement of fact. I nodded slightly.
Then the words came tumbling out. "I came to the United States from Puerto Rico when I was three. But when I was fourteen I got a Spanish bible and it (he paused)....it just made sense. All of it."
My stop was coming up fast and the train slowed. So I said the only thing I was thinking.
"I pray you find the truth."
He said he hoped he did too. The subway cars slid away from the station. I didn't get to share the entire gospel. But I don't think I was supposed to. Sometimes it's tiny moments that change everything. I'm praying that God spurs the next person who crosses paths with him to give him a kernel of truth. And so on.