One of the ministries we have here with OM Chile is the skateboarding ministry. They are a small group of guys who have come to know Christ through the ministry. They now join Yerko, the leader, in putting on demonstrations and sharing about the love of Jesus. Two of the young guys had an amazing opportunity about 6 months ago to fly and join Yerko at TeenStreet Germany, where they did skate exhibitions and workshops. The whole group right now has travelled to CIMA where they’ll do the same. It’s been awesome to see this ministry continue to develop and the opportunities God is giving to them to share His love in a unique way.
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I decided to name them Charlie and Sam. They came to an unfortunate (for them, yummy for me) end this morning. At least they lived their whole lives together, though. That has to be some comfort.
I am not big on the Bible-reading style of “Oh Lord, reveal to me what You want to tell me. I’m going to open up my Bible and wherever it falls open to, I’ll know it’s from You.” Not a fan, personally. However, during a night of praying specifically against spiritual attack, I felt a push to read a psalm. I opened the Bible, it fell open to Psalm 16, and it was perfect. I looked later at the other psalms around it and they were not appropriate to the setting, but Psalm 16 was (is) incredible, so I thought I’d share.
Que Dios te bendiga.
God bless you.
Psalm 16
(A special psalm by David.)
The Best Choice
1Protect me, LORD God!
I run to you for safety,
2and I have said,
”Only you are my Lord!
Every good thing I have
is a gift from you.”
3Your people are wonderful,
and they make me happy, [a] 4but worshipers of other gods
will have much sorrow. [b]I refuse to offer sacrifices
of blood to those gods
or worship in their name.
5You, LORD, are all I want!
You are my choice,
and you keep me safe.
6You make my life pleasant,
and my future is bright.
7I praise you, LORD,
for being my guide.
Even in the darkest night,
your teachings fill my mind.
8I will always look to you,
as you stand beside me
and protect me from fear.
9With all my heart,
I will celebrate,
and I can safely rest.
10I am your chosen one.
You won’t leave me in the grave
or let my body decay.
11You have shown me
the path to life,
and you make me glad
by being near to me.
Sitting at your right side, [c] I will always be joyful.
Last night I was reading in John. I came to verse 35 of chapter 12 and was struck by the words, enough so that I wanted to share them with you as well. In John 12:35, Jesus is talking to a crowd of people, and ”so Jesus said to them, “The light is among you for a little while longer. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you. The one who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going. (36) While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light.” (Emphasis mine)
I was struck by the mental image of being a son of light. I am surrounded by so many walking in darkness. When I worked in the prostitute ministry, the presence of darkness was almost palpable. As we prayed with prostitutes, with transvestites, as we walked from street corner to street corner praying for God to rule on those streets, spiritual darkness was a real and present thing, an enemy, a heaviness. As we visit and minister to people on the street, people who are homeless, the darkness is present. As we invest in children’s lives and pray for them at the children’s homes where we work, we pray against the darkness that is trying to or has already entered into their lives. As we connect to and hang out with skaters at the skate parks, darkness tries to maintain distance between us.
I am filled anew with compassion for these people as I read the words of Jesus. Sometimes I get frustrated by the actions of the children or I want to shout at someone, “make different choices!” These are people, though, who are stumbling in darkness, unable to see where they are going. My heart hurts for them, lost and not knowing differently, blind and thinking this is what life is. The first time they experience light, though!
It’s been said that even the smallest light shines in the darkness. Jesus is speaking to the crowd in John 12:35-36, foretelling of His death, when the light would no longer be with them. How humbling and exciting and overwhelming to think that sons of His light have continued spreading the light; that I am a son of light! Lord, that You will use me to shine Your light into the darkness around me; that Your light will touch the lives of those whom You love so much and whom You’ve given to me to love as well. Give me Your heart for them that I might share with them Your light. Thank You, Lord, for allowing me to be a son of light, and that there is no darkness that is stronger than even the smallest light. Amen.
So I’m a little behind because life has been a whirlwind of hectic business here lately, but I wanted to celebrate with you all here that on the 5th of September I completed one year here with Chile! Woot woot! One third of the way done (as the plan is now).
It’s been an amazing experience so far. Daily life feels completely acceptable and normal, and yet it’s so surreal to think I’ve been in Chile serving as a missionary for over a year now! Those worlds (of thought) collide regularly. Our new IT group arrived two weeks ago and on Monday we travelled to a nearby town. I translated a question of an IT girl to some Chileans on the bus. When I turned back to reply to the girl, then back to the Chileans, then back to the girl, she told me I’d just talked to her in Spanish. I wondered then if that meant I’d replied to the Chileans in English? Had it all been Spanish? I couldn’t think back and distinguish what I’d said in which language, and that made my mind whirl.
Some days the majority of my time is spent in English. Other days it’s almost entirely Spanish. A heavy-Spanish day makes it difficult to switch back to English sometimes. When I’m tired I’m not sure what’s going to come out. I love the life I’m living here and it feels completely normal now, and yet it’s still so surreal. How did I get here? How is it that I am living this life? Also, just so it’s clear, what I just wrote has no tones of sadness connected to it, just wonderment.
I’m sitting here feeling very blessed and just wanted to share with you all. Thanks for reading it.
Happy belated Chile’s Independence Day (Sept. 18th)!!! It’s a big deal here. Saturday I went to an outing/party of a church youth group. Saturday evening we had a goodbye party for a friend. Sunday (actual Independence Day) we went to the National Stadium to spend the day together, eating a lot, seeing a circus, and going on a carnival ride. Monday we spent the entire day in the countryside with another church group, eating A LOT, playing soccer, flying kites and playing typical Chilean games.
I need a day off to recover from my days off! It was a lot of fun and made me fall even more in love with Chile and her people. God bless!
::Forewarning: this post is going to be long. I can feel it.::
I have been interested lately in understanding more about the time periods in which the Scriptures were being written. I know that there must be so much that I miss that would have been patently clear to the people of the time, because our daily lives are now so very different. Jesus spoke often about sheep and shepherds. For me it’s kind of like, great, sheep. For the people to whom Jesus was speaking it was entirely connected to the lives they were living. I want to understand more about what was so obvious to them.
I began searching for information, looking at concordances, reading info from Ray Vanderlaan, and reading Rob Bell’s Velvet Elvis. Within the book, Rob writes about the different settings or audiences of some of the books of the Bible, and I found it fascinating! It’s long, but I’ve typed it out here to share with you all (and hopefully I don’t get in trouble with Rob Bell (please, if you copy some of this for your own use, keep it attributed to Rob Bell’s Velvet Elvis 
)).
“For example, the book Deuteronomy is patterned after treaties that were common in its day. The writer essentially took a common legal document and changed the content and the names but kept the form the same.
The end of the book of Mark is arranged according the coronation ceremonies of the Roman emperor. Maybe Mark witnessed one of these ceremonies, because he is very intentional about the order of events leading up to Jesus’ death. His readers would have been familiar with these Roman coronation events. They would have read between the lines right away. Mark wants you to see Jesus as a king like Caesar, but at the same time totally unlike Caesar.
The first three miracles in the book of John are directly related to the three major gods of Asia Minor, the region John writes his gospel to. Dionysus was the god who turned water into wine, Asclepius was the god of healing, and Demeter was the goddess of bread. So how does John begin his story? With Jesus turning water into wine, healing, and then feeding thousands of people. John has an agenda. He wants these people in this place and this time to know that Jesus is better than their gods.
When Paul writes to Timothy about women being saved in childbirth, he is making a direct reference to the goddess Artemis, whose temple was just down the street in Timothy’s hometown of Ephesus. Artemis’s followers believed that Artemis saved women from dying in childbirth, which is significant in a city where one out of two women died giving birth. Paul’s statement here has huge political, social, and religious implications. He is implying that Artemis is a fraud.
The first chapters of the book of Revelation follow the sequence of events of the Domitian games, held in honor of the caesar who was in power at the time Revelation was written. Domitian would address the leaders of the various provinces, then his choir of twenty-four would sing worship songs to him, and then there would be a horse race. John is writing Revelation to people who had seen the Domitian games; they know exactly what he is referring to. He wants them to see that Domitian is a fake and Jesus is the real King.“ – Rob Bell, Velvet Elvis
Isn’t that awesome?!!! Seriously, all the times I’ve read and heard the stories from John about Jesus turning water into wine, healing the official’s son and the invalid by the pool, and feeding the five thousand with five loaves and two fish I never knew the correlation to the gods of Asia Minor. In the very first six chapters John demonstrates to the people he’s writing to that Jesus is better than their gods.
Learning this information is giving me more insight as I read the Bible. Things I’ve read and heard for years now have a new depth to them. One topic that has really been interesting me to learn more information is about Jesus as a rabbi. It’s been fascinating to learn more about what it meant to be a rabbi in the time of Jesus.
(remember, I warned you this will be long. I’ve got plenty to say about rabbis. If you need to take a break and come back, feel free.)
Alright, so, cool stuff (to me, at least):
Each rabbi had a different set of rules they believed in after studying Scripture; rules about what was forbidden and what was allowed. This set of rules was called a “yoke”.
A person would choose to follow a specific rabbi and take on his yoke because he or she thought that how that rabbi was interpreting Scripture was the closest to what God intended.
Jesus is referred to multiple times in the Bible as “rabbi”. People conferred on him the honor of that title based on what he had to say. One of the things that he said, and which now means much more to me, is found in Matthew 11:30 – “For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” Jesus used that wording specifically because the people of the time would have had such an understanding of “yoke”. I just always pictured yoked oxen pulling something, but understanding “yoke” in relation to rabbis, well that makes the Scripture that much cooler.
Some specific wording I learned about of the time is that if a rabbi felt like one of his students had completely missed the point of a Scripture they were studying, he would use the wording, “You have abolished the Torah.” Conversely if, in the rabbi’s opinion, a student was really getting it and understanding God’s intention in a text, he would say, “You have fulfilled Torah.”
We read then in Matthew 5:17, at the Sermon on the Mount, that Jesus says, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them” (emphasis mine). This is huge! Jesus using this wording, so known in that time, to hit home to people that not only does He understand God’s intention, He is God’s intention. He’s making a statement here that, in my context, is very strong, but in the context of the day was incredibly challenging and game changing!
In the lives of the people at that time, it would have been very rare to ever meet a rabbi who claimed new ideas and different interpretations from those before him. A disciple spent every moment trying to become as much like the rabbi he was following as possible. It was a huge honor and accomplishment to become a rabbi, and after following and becoming as much like his rabbi as possible, believing that that rabbi had the truest interpretation of what God was saying in the scripture, well it was possible that people could live their whole lives without ever meeting someone saying they believed something different and new! That’s exactly what Jesus did, though. If a rabbi claimed to have different ideas, in order to cull out the crazies two other rabbis with authority would have to lay hands on this rabbi and validate him, basically saying they supported his new interpretation of the Scripture.
In Matthew 3:13-17, we read of Jesus’ baptism: ” Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he consented. And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and coming to rest on him, and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” “
The people of the day, hearing this account of Jesus’ baptism, would have immediately seen the authority being given to Jesus in this moment by the laying on of hands by John the Baptist and by the Spirit of God, no less! So when Jesus came to them saying His challenging statements, so different from what they’d always heard, those words had power and authority. A rabbi making new ideas might say, “You have heard it said… but I tell you…”, and we see Jesus using that format a lot in the Sermon on the Mount.
About Anger: Matthew 5:21-22 – “You have heard that is was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder, and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment…” (emphasis mine)
About Lust: Matthew 5:27-28 – “You have heard that is was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” (emphasis mine)
About Divorce: Matthew 5:31-32 – “It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery…” (emphasis mine)
About Oaths: Matthew 5:33-34 – “Again you have heard that is was said to those of old, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.’ But I say to you, Do not take an oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God…” (emphasis mine)
About Retaliation: Matthew 5:38-39 – “You have heard that is was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.” (emphasis mine)
About Loving your Enemies: Matthew 5:43-44 – “You have heard that is was said, “You shall love you neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (emphasis mine)
Can you imagine how mind-blowing this must have been?! All of their lives the people had heard what they’d thought to be the closest understanding of God’s intentions, and then this new rabbi, some guy named Jesus, who is doing miracles, has authority from John the Baptist and the Spirit of God, and says that He is the fulfillment of the Law, is telling them that they’ve had it wrong all this time.
LIFE. CHANGING.
I’ve really been impressed by what insights I’m finding into some of these Scriptures about Jesus. What has really affected me the most, though, has been in regards to his disciples. For someone to become a disciple of a rabbi, it was a HUGE undertaking. Children would start schooling and, by the age of 10, would have memorized the entire Torah, or the first five books of the old testament. 10 years old! Personally by the age of 10 I probably had The Secret Garden memorized, ’cause I was a bookworm like that, but the entire Torah memorized! Woah.
The best of the 10 year olds, tested on their knowledge, would continue schooling. The rest would stop and return home to learn the family trade or apprentice elsewhere. Those oh-so-smart 10 year olds would continue memorizing and studying, and by 15 or 16 would have memorized everything in the Bible from Genesis until Malachi! Pick up a Bible sometime and look at just how much that is! At that point, only the best of the best would go on to ask a rabbi if they could disciple under him. The rest returned to work in the family business. Even those out-of-this-world 16 year olds might still not be able to become a disciple, though, because a rabbi would quiz the student relentlessly on his knowledge of the Scriptures and only if he felt like the student really understood, would he accept him as his disciple. For all of the others it was ‘no thanks’, and they returned to their families.
Think of what this means, then, in terms of Jesus and His disciples! All of the men were working men. None of them were disciples under another rabbi, which means that all of them, at some point, flunked out. As Rob Bell puts it in his Nooma video, “Dust” (I highly recommend it), they were the “not good-enoughs”. All of the disciple students, after working years and years to study and memorize, might still be turned down when they asked to follow a rabbi. These men, these working men, fishermen, these “not good-enoughs” were asked by a rabbi to follow HIM!
I love this.
Think of what it means for the story of Jesus walking on water! In Matthew 14:22-33, Peter, one of Jesus’ disciples, had devoted his life to doing what his rabbi did, what Jesus did. So when the disciples were out on the boat with high waves around them and he saw Jesus walking towards him on the water, understanding the context of a disciple following a rabbi makes the craziness of Peter asking to walk on the water not seem so crazy anymore. He lived his life trying to be as much like Jesus as possible. If his rabbi was walking on water, Peter wanted to follow.
Understanding more about yokes, abolishing and fulfilling, and rabbis in the time of Jesus has enriched what I’ve already learned from the Bible and am now re-reading with new eyes. Jesus, a respected, honored rabbi with the authority of John the Baptist and the Spirit of God, called to “not good-enoughs” to follow Him, to take on His yoke, and they proceeded to change the world. How amazing is that?!
“May you be covered in the dust of your rabbi.” May you follow so closely behind your rabbi that you will be covered in the residue of his day. May you follow the rabbi, Jesus Christ, who calls YOU to be his disciple.
Amen.
1. When I’m doing the dishes, squish the detergent bottle to get more soap, and little bubbles come out to dance and play.
2. Spontaneous dance parties.
3. A street dog deciding to accompany me on a walk, even waiting outside as I stop to do an errand, then standing up with tail wagging to greet me and continue on our way.
4. Getting and giving rib-cracking hugs with the boys at the children’s home.
5. When I am succesfully funny in Spanish (and not just receiving the “oh-what-a-cute-gringa”-tilt-of-the-head-and-indulgent-smile look)
6. Riding horses with my dad in open fields and through woods, in summers galloping full speed until tears leak out of my eyes, and in winters without saddles, feeling the heat of the horse through my legs and hearing only the sounds of the horse’s breath and its hooves crunching in the snow.
7. Making my mom laugh so hard that she cries.
8. Having a dog look at you like you’re the absolute best thing ever.
9. Smelling freshly-turned dirt and wiggling my toes in it
10. Wide-open space, a clear sky full of stars, and night-filled silence.
I got on the bus this afternoon and noticed something slightly different from normal:
- glad it’s not rush hour
I’m pretty sure this passenger didn’t pay, and that’s against the law. tsk, tsk. I don’t think his conscience is bothering him, though.
- so comfy
(just so it’s clear, he’s sleeping. not dead.)
A friend shared a letter with our group the other day in the devotional he led. He got the letter from the website www.wayofthemaster.com, an evangelism resource website. There they posted a letter that one of the head guys received from a man who is an atheist. The letter calls Ray, the head guy, to task and points out the disparity found so so often between what we as Christians talk and what we truly walk. I wanted to share it with you all here:
Ray,
You are really convinced that you’ve got all the answers. You’ve really got yourself tricked into believing that you’re 100% right. Well, let me tell you just one thing. Do you consider yourself to be compassionate of other humans? If you’re right, as you say you are, and believe that, then how can you sleep at night? When you speak with me you are speaking with someone who you believe is walking directly into eternal damnation into an endless onslaught of horrendous pain which your ‘loving’ god created, yet you stand by and do nothing.
If you believe one bit that thousands every day were falling into an eternal and unreacheable fate, you should be running the streets mad with rage at their blindness. That’s equivalent to standing on a street corner and watching every person that passes you walk blindly directly into the path of a bus and die, yet you stand idly by and do nothing. You’re just twiddling your thumbs, happy in the knowledge that one day that ‘walk’ signal will shine your way across the road.
Think about it. Imagine the horrors Hell must have in store if the bible is true. You’re just going to allow that to happen and not care about saving anyone but yourself? If you’re right then you’re an uncaring, unemotional and purely selfish (expletive) that has no right to talk about subjects such as love and caring.
James Franz
This letter convicted me. How many times and how many people have I let slip by without sharing the Truth, without sharing the Greatest Gift? Is it because I don’t want to offend, don’t want them to shut me out, don’t want a stigma attached to me as being a bible-thumping, close-minded, crazy Christian? How dare I allow there to be an embarrassment connected to sharing the Greatest Love they will ever experience? If I believe that Jesus Christ is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, that the only way to the Father is through Him, and that Hell is real and an eternal separation from God, from Love (all of which I do), then I am guilty over and over of missed opportunities to share that belief. Father, please forgive me for allowing how I am perceived in the eyes of others to matter more than how they will spend eternity, forever apart from You or forever held in the embrace of Perfect Love. Give me Your courage and Your eyes to see Your broken and hurting people and to share about Your love, Your heart with them.
The Friday before Good Friday a group of people showed up to the largest plaza in Santiago. To the casual observer they probably looked lost, confused, excited, and for the foreigners in the group, like tourists. They were gathered together with a purpose, though. They were there to do the first ever (for them) FLASH MOB! They grouped to get an idea of their numbers, to pass out lyric sheets, and to go over last-minute details. A few minutes before 7pm the group broke up and melded into the crowd.
At exactly three minutes before 7, passersby suddenly noticed a large square of about 75 people frozen in place. As the bells of the cathedral rang out the hour, one girl in the corner of the square un-froze. She began to sing at the top of her lungs a song by the Christian group, Hillsong, called “Only Jesus”, or in Spanish, “Solo Cristo.” As her two neighbors on each side of her heard her start to sing, they un-froze and joined her in the song. Their neighbors then did the same. Slowly the song made its way around the large square of people until everyone was singing at full volume and praising God. At the final chorus everyone raised their hands and basked in the love of our Lord who died on the cross for us. When the song ended, the participants in the flash mob, who were from many different churches, separated to speak to people in the plaza who had observed us, and to invite them to their churches for Easter Sunday.
The flash mob, though smaller than we had loftily dreamed of, was a wonderful experience. People were touched by it,many different conversations and prayer happened with people in the plaza, and there’s an excitement to try it again next year. Praise God, and thank you for your prayers.
