I recently had the opportunity to join the folks at ReImagine in San Francisco for a Learning Lab. I’d had the privilege of hearing Mark Scandrette speak to my Perspectives class earlier in the course and he extended this invitation to any who were interested in joining them for this event. I took him up on the offer and joined the group for this Saint Patrick’s day walk through the City. It was a beautiful day and an amazing experience. Part of the experience involved writing about what we were discovering through the walk and the people we encountered. At the end of the day we were asked to share what we had written, a poetry slam of sorts.
I must here admit, I had become loathe to going to San Francisco because of the depravity and licentiousness! I didn’t want to go there anymore, because it offended me and my delicate sensibilities. Or rather, “my self-righteous” senibilities, because that was what they were. I was caught up in my self-righteous and morally superior delusions again. Interesting how God so gracefully reveals and breaks them. He is faithful.
I shared a rather bare bones version with the group that afternoon and since then have been able to add some flesh to the form. The five statements in parentheses are prayers that we were given at the beginning of the day and that we were encouraged to pray as we trekked through the communities. My first drafts documenting the day didn’t include them. It wasn’t until I had written most of my reflections down that I decided to see if I could somehow incorporate the prayers into the work. I was quite suprised to see how well they correlated to my writing. Well, they seem to correlate to me… 🙂 They shouldn’t be read consecutively with the rest, but concurrently, a sort of interwoven dialogue. I added 1 Corinthians 13 last of all. It seemed… appropriate.
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(1. Creator, show me where your glory is already displayed in this place and among these people.)
Your love is a lie.
The words were written on the sidewalk by the house where the journey began. Actually, they were stenciled on the sidewalk. Inscribed on my conscience, now.
Vivid murals defined this Third World of sorts, the newly arrived rubbing shoulders with the not-so-newly arrived; immigrants that look like… me. Memories emerge to remind me of other worlds from ages past. My ages… my past. Third World sights and sounds and smells assailed as that phrase ricochets in my mind…
(2. We want to see your kingdom come and your will be done here and now as it is in heaven.)
Your love is a lie.
Mercados and immigrants gave way to markets and bistros and Third World wannabes, dressed in their best second-hand-store-acquired threads. Princes posing as paupers. And I wondered which am I… a prince pretending to be a pauper or a pauper posturing to appear a prince? I guess it depends on which world I’m exploring.
(3. We come against the spirit of darkness in this place in the name of Jesus.)
Your love is a lie!
Wending our way down the streets, turning here and there, talking to him or her, listening to this or that, wondering what to wonder as the blocks gave way under our feet. Where did all those rainbows come from? Those posters and billboards? Those… people? We walk, our steps beating in rhythm with the street sounds and the refrain…
(4. May your peace and prosperity be on this place and these people.)
Your love is a lie!!
We kept walking… watching… wondering… talking, listening, wondering some more. I am awed by the sights and sounds of this urbanity but I keep my distance, I keep myself distinct from these masses. I’m in this world, but not of this world. I suddenly wonder, what does that mean? What does that actually look like? What have I believed?!
We walked some more and talked. We sat and talked… of simplicity, austerity… surrounded by excess… excessive green in a concrete labyrinth. (What would Patrick think?)
We wound our way back to another Third World and waited for dinner with our cup of chai, blank paper before us. Collecting random thoughts, we retreat… to refresh, renew… recuperate. My feet hurt… so does my heart.
(5. Creator, help me to think your thoughts and feel your feelings for the people and places that I see.)
My love is a lie!
How can I speak into this cosm? The very sidewalk condemns me. What can I say that would be heard? “God loves you and so do I”? A noisy gong would sound better.
And so I am silent. And I listen. And what do I hear? A still, small voice… telling me to care; …telling me to love.
And so I am broken. And in brokenness I behold the glory for which I had earlier asked. It was here all along. His kingdom is coming and the darkness is giving way to light and peace rests upon this place and this people… If I let it. If I, as an earthen bearer of that light and that peace… let it.
And so I am comforted. And with that comfort, I can comfort others. With that comfort, I can love… without guile. I can love… without agenda. I can love… without judgment.
“If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.
If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude.
It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends.
As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.
When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.
So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” (1Cor13)
All Things Elda 