The Colors of God

Our final morning in Vancouver began with a spectacular sunrise. It is a fitting end to a week with many colors.

... They included the happy colors of first birthday candles ...

... They included the warm tones of a dedication to the Lord ...

They included the pure whites of Whistler Mountain, blanketed with a billion diamond points of brilliance ...

... and the liquid version while bobbing in a tiny boat on the Burrard Inlet near English Bay ...

And so we thank God for another year of his technicolor presence with us, and the chance to celebrate it in such a beautiful place filled with the colors of love. De Colores!

Still

Ice chewer on one side

Deal-maker, titan, master-of-his-fate on the other

Public announcements mixed with the jumbled

Chaos of a dozen conversations

Overlaid by the sound of my own questions that will not

Shut up

And you want me to be still and know that you are God

That I am my beloved's

That in quietness and confidence shall be my strength

There is no quiet here, Lord.

Not here.

But there is a corner of my shallow mind

Where the only sound is the far away heart

The only lyric is longing

Where I choose to pay attention to one thing,

The thing,

Where your silence is deafening,

Your presence all that is required.

I go there so seldom

I may not remember the way.

The Dirty Little Secrets of Paradise

Yah, Mon; Jamaica was a kick – a kick in the brain, a kick in the heart. What you won't hear in the travel guides: Jamaica has a dirty little secret. I brought to the iconic city of Kingston, leaders who wanted to learn how a city still recovering from a legacy of colonization and slavery and the resulting poverty could take hold of its destiny to be a “blessing to all nations,” as its national pledge promises. The beach was nice. But Jamaica hides dirty little secrets just ten minutes away from the surf. It was there that we saw God at work.

One Love: We prayer-walked the streets of its most feared enclave, Trench Town, through passageways and alleys that just two years ago would have spelled a violent end to us. Those who led us had established a transformational presence through business development, job placement, a vibrant and visible church, regular prayer walks, and collaborative ministry among church and Christian non-profits. One of our students, Sandra Morgan, is at the heart of this effort – The Agency for Inner-City Renewal – and we explored the aspects of that work that could be replicated in cities across the world. Indeed we did learn the power of “One Love” in the neighborhood that produced Bob Marley.

Tears for “The Disappeared.” In another area of the city we stood in front a monument to the tears of children – the hundreds of them who had died violently in Kingston. Some 150 children go missing every month in this city – the equivalent of three school bus loads every 30 days. Some are known to be trafficked for sex or for servitude, though many are caught up in street-life and just disappear. We exposed our leaders to a variety of solutions and a call for the church to be a voice for these voiceless victims in their own cities.

What’s in a Name? Another of our students, Albert West, is leading an effort in Mountain View, an innocuous sounding section of East Kingston whose violence belies its pretty name. In a one-month period just a few years ago 50 people lost their lives to gang/political ruthlessness. Pastor West works with 25 other pastors on a fragile peace there, and an even more fragile coalition. We studied the complexities of this task in honest dialogue and absorbed the anguished passion of our student for transformation. Again, we walked the streets and felt Albert’s grateful amazement that peace had emerged and was holding. We heard of his efforts working with pregnant Moms, unemployed men, health counseling, and providing educational opportunities, all in the name of Christ, with a full contingent of intercessors for the community. We also absorbed his fatigue and his humility.

Half the leaders we were training were Jamaican, but the other half came from the Philippines, Bahamas and the U.S. These are very gifted people, intent on sharpening their vision and skill sets for the transformation of their cities. I wish you could have been with me as we wrestled over models of ministry and fashioned plans for building or re-shaping their current work back home. Seventeen leaders created 51 actionable items for their own cities as a result.

Distressing Disguise: But even as we focused on the systems of the city, on things that bring transformation to whole areas, for me, the images that I cannot get out of my mind are of our visit to Brothers of the Poor. This Mother Teresa-like group is pledged to take in the most physically and mentally deformed of Kingston’s children and adults and treat them with dignity and love. It is a skilled compassion for the most twisted bodies I have ever seen, from infant to adult. Our leaders learned how to see the image, indeed the fingerprints of God, through exterior deformities that threatened to obliterate it it. “Jesus in the distressing disguise of the poor,” as Mother Teresa said. None of our group will ever see the most physically vulnerable of their own communities the same, nor let them be forgotten. We witnessed the joy of Christ made real in the care-givers and volunteers. And that is so much the point of our work.

Personal: After South Africa, then Jamaica I came home to trees that had turned to the maroons, yellows, and deep orange of fall – the colors that remake Fresno streets into tranquil rivers, with fire on the banks. It’s good to be home. We get to see our Canadian Grand Daughter, Elizabeth, (and Joe and Heidi too) as we travel to Vancouver for Christmas this year. Jameson and Sarah are ankle deep in teaching and ministry responsibilities, and Jameson has nearly completed his first seminary class. Aside from a short trip to Seattle next month and our visit to Vancouver, there is no more required travel until Ghana in January.

Tolerance? Decency vs Expression

Help me out here. Something happened last night that has me thinking about our culture, about the ever changing line of what constitutes decency.

I grew up in the era where a neighbor had the right to spank you or at least wash your mouth out with soap if you uttered a course word. That actually happened in my neighborhood. As kids, it influenced our behavior. I know its hard for some 20 and 30 somethings to believe this -- today you'd be sued -- but it was an era where we actually lived out the belief that it took the whole village to raise a child. There was general consensus about what behavior was appropriate in the community, and what wasn't.

So here's my question: Does our non-judgmental culture require that we just acquiesce to the coarsening of our society -- to it's rudeness, its increasing brazenness, it's shock strategies at getting attention? Do we speak up when personally offended? Or do we just accept this as the way it is, and tolerate it?

This isn't a hypothetical question.

Last night as I was grocery shopping I noticed a young woman who appeared to be about 17 years of age, holding an employment application in her hand talking to a store employee. Her black T-Shirt proclaimed in bright pink letters "I have the pussy, so I make the rules."

Several questions hit me at once, and their likely answers disturbed me to the bone: How could this young girl proclaim something so crude? (Answer: she thinks it's funny, and no one in her world would challenge that.) How could she request an employment application wearing such an offensive shirt? (Answer: because we have come to a point in our culture where she doesn't think it matters.) Have we come to the point where management would even hand an application to someone wearing such a shirt? (Answer: Unfortunately, yes. Apparently they don't think it matters either.)

And my final question, for which I ask your input: Should I have confronted her about how offensive the shirt is? For the sake of holding some line of decency in our culture should I have done the unthinkable -- that is, calmly express my displeasure at her form of expression, and tell management that if they hire someone who thinks that kind of thing is OK, that I won't shop there anymore? (Answer: you tell me)

The fact that we have come to a place in our culture where one can say and do anything with impunity because others will not dare overstep the expectation of "tolerance," means that we are on a slippery road that will take us to a place our parents and grandparents knew would be akin to hell.

I am haunted by the well-used aphorism, "the only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for enough good people to do nothing." Well, I did nothing. What would you have done?

Cape Town, South Africa - Lausanne 2010

Lausanne 2010. On the one hand I couldn’t help but be impressed: More than 4000 leaders from every region of the world, all converging on Cape Town, South Africa for only the third such “congress” in history. Informed, passionate speakers from those same regions gave their best take on where we are in the task of global evangelism, and where we as a global church need to go. A multitude of seminars and dialogue groups explored in great detail every conceivable aspect of mission in an age of globalization. Some of the conversation generated was profound, and some of us made important connections that may lead to very fruitful collaborations for the kingdom. My role was to help delegates build a sustainable spirituality for ministry in the city. That, and invite leaders to consider doing a doctorate in ministry with my school.

But I have many “on the other hands”. There were many gaps in the program – places where the western strings and power levers were revealed, showing that we have a long way before the whole church is valued and trusted enough to take their rightful place in what purports to be such a global event. Leadership of the event did not give full voice to indigenous Christians. The whole church was not invited to be full participants in the event., with Orthodox, Catholic and Chinese Registered Churches not invited. Not one Native American representative was invited; the few that came got there through a back door institution. There was little public dissent. The script was carefully dictated.

I do praise God for the hundreds of volunteers that made this happen, some investing months and even years to the effort. And I am quite sure that the Holy Spirit inhabited all the good intensions, all the prayers and praises, all the discussions both formal and informal. I trust that there will be both eternal and temporal fruit. But I can’t help but hear the frustration in the voices of my Latin American and Native American friends when they reflected on the opportunity missed, and the feeling of not being honored or trusted with full membership in the process.

The picture presented of a world beset by complex evils of child labor, sexual trafficking, ethnic cleansing, civil war, corporate exploitation, the poisening of the environment, and millions dying without knowledge of the one who died to set them free, is a world far too complex to reach without the whole church. The motto of Lausanne, since the first Lausanne Congress that resulted in the benchmark Lausanne Covenant in 1974, has been “Whole Church, Whole Gospel, Whole World.” John Stott, Rene Padilla and Samuel Escobar helped draft it as a result of true and honest conversation. It will not be fulfilled until Whole Church is truly present, as they envisioned.

As I sit in the Cape Town airport, I dread the more than 24 hours it will take to get home. And 12 days later I leave again to teach in Kingston. But I know it was a privilege to be here, and the Lord will carry me on.

They were there for "such a time as this..."

I felt my eyes fill with tears tonight for two men that you have probably never heard of, but who are heros to me. Rene Padilla and Samuel Escobar, both with the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students in Latin America for many years, and beyond that, giants in the Lausanne Movement shared their journey. Lausanne has been used by God for more than three decades to call the church to faithfulness to the whole gospel, for the whole church, in the whole world. Through their low-kuy, faithful, honest, constructive critique and prophetic words and deeds, their contribution to the transformation of the global church is incalculable.

But I doubt you have heard of them. Both are authors and theologians, activists and student ministers -- both have lived sacrificially and simply. Both have brilliant minds, but even here in Cape Town serve humbly with no flash or celebrity.

Knowing full well that you cannot understand how full my heart is toward them, or what it meant to me to see them together on stage tonight singing with a group of fellow Latin Americans -- to see Rene's daughter Ruth Padilla deBorst up there singing her heart out -- it was exactly what I needed. I realized that they lived and are living their lives for an audience of one -- their faithful savior. And they lived and are living their lives in a way that made a contribution to the shalom of others. There is no higher calling.

They were there for such a time as this ... over and over again -- the right men for the right times. I want to live my life like that.

Rene Padila and Samuel Escobar, my brothers and my heroes -- thank you.

Jade

"Please sir ... I won't ask you for money ... but if you could buy me some corn flakes I can eat for five days." She was visibly pregnant and on the street. Thrown out by her family. No prospects. It was a typical story, one that I have encountered in many cities around the world, my own included. Here in Cape Town I am getting accosted daily, by men and women and children. I learned from two significant Johns in my life -- John Stott and John Perkins years ago that giving money is seldom the loving thing to do, and my general policy is to rule it out in most cases. But I could not not respond, so I went to the market with her, bought her groceries and then violated my policy -- I let her keep the change. I told her that I would pray that if she sold the food I just bought her or used the change on drugs or alcohol that she would get really sick. I felt bad about that later. But there you have it. In the end he told me she would get a room with the money. Having heard every story in the book I am pretty sensitive to BS, and I didn't sense any from her. I prayed for her. She asked questions about her salvation, unsure that God would accept her as she was. I tried to tell her that when God looked at her he glowed with love and devotion to his daughter, that he thought the world of her. Her brown eyes got a bit wider but she said nothing. The conversation was as fertile as her three-month profile.

Her name was Jade. I wondered as I walked to my hotel whether she could ever come to believe that, like her namesake, she is precious. Can she ever feel treasured, like a precious stone? Could the Lord carve his image deeply into her frame -- smooth away the rough edges created by the street -- so so that everyone could recognize her infinite value?

Will we ever get to the point where she has somewhere to turn, besides a random white man who happened by in this part of town? I didn't care anymore whether she was lying to me. Tonight I pray a tired and pensive prayer for Jade.

The Table: Loving the Strange and Stranger

Ate a plate of Warthog, Antelope and Crocodile tonight at a restaurant here in Cape Town. Loved every strange bit of it. Worthog, worthog, worthog -- it just rolls off my tongue. Like I've been eating it forever. "I think I'll have the worthog tonight," as if I had ordered it a thousand times. I swear it wasn't just the novelty of it, although that's initially what appealed to me. But I'll remember it because the taste spoke to my senses in a way that made my normal diet feel as if I had been eating sand.

As I prepare to serve at the third ever Lausanne World Congress here in South Africa I am asking the Lord to give me new appetites and tastes. I join more than 4,000 delegates from around the world who gather at "the table" (a metaphor referencing the giant plateau known as Table Mountain in Cape Town) of the Lord as His sends the food of his word to his people for the transformation of the world.

But the new menu at this table is definitely strange. And I am convinced that it is not the strangeness that is attractive. There is an aspect of the interaction with a new food that involves risk, and its a little uncomfortable. But the taste is its own reward.

Last night on the street I was approached by a young woman asking for money. I asked her name, and she said "Donna." But after 30 seconds of conversation it began to dawn on me that Donna was a young man. After having spent a late night last year on the streets of San Jose Costa Rica ministering to transvestites, I began to realize Donna's identity and took a moment to pray for her. It was an unusual conversation -- stood out for it's strangeness. But there on the street corner praying with my hand on her/his shoulder, this felt like a new meal. Risk taken. The reward of the risk, a deep satisfaction.

I am not addicted to strangeness. In some sense I do choose it out of a sense that this is often where I find Jesus. I find myself writing about it often because its taste jolts my dulled senses so much. But more often than not, it seems like it is strangeness that chooses me. Perhaps it is a confrontation that I need.

Because the location of a meeting we attended after my dinner of warthog tonight it was not safe to walk alone, so another male delegate and I accompanied two young female delegates to their hotels for safety. It turns out that one of them was the daughter of a Christian leader in Mexico City that I have partnered with over the years. I have been in her home celebrating their amazing ministry among the urban poor of their city. The strange, miraculous circumstances I often find myself in seem to me to be orchestrated by a heavenly chef. And tonight was like desert.

Signs of Hope in The Lemonade

In Guatemala City we took our students to the largest slum of Central America, called La Limonada (literally, The Lemonade), sitting at the feet of two of the most amazing urban leaders in the city, Tita Evertsz and Pastor Erwin Shorty Luna.

Tita has 15 years experience serving La Limonada through specialized children's programs before and after school. She literally had to escort us into the slum due to its level of danger. The respect the community has for her was our protection. We descended down into a ravine via a path leading around slum shacks cobbled together by rusting corrugated tin, rotten wood and concrete, to one of two schools she has built. The ravine flowed with a river of garbage and sewage, but it could not overwhelm the river of hope that flows in this notorious slum.

Just the week prior Tita had received a death threat from gang members who wanted protection money. Yet even the threat served the kingdom because some young gang members she had been loving and serving, upon seeing how shaken Tita was, dropped to their knees in prayer for her, indignant that someone should threaten her. God allowed them to see the impact of such threats on someone they loved -- significant because some of them had demanded protection money of others. I know this is an overused phrase, but she is truly the Mother Teresa of Guatemala.

Shorty is one of Joel’s gang chaplains, who grew up a street kid on the streets of Guatemala City and then was a major gang member in L.A. A powerfully built man with a quick smile, he is now working hand in hand with Tita doing some church planting work in the heart of La Limonada. He is a mature Christian who flows with a deep knowledge of Scripture and a spirit of joy.

The whole community loves Shorty and Tita as they have built relationships through Tita’s schools, and Shorty’s fearless mentoring of violent youth.

Then we visited a shack where a severely retarded 16 year old girl lived like a hermit on a rotting mattress in a corner of a dark room. The shack was perched over the ravine. Her mother was overwhelmed, as well as trapped by an abusive husband, who was sexually abusing the three daughters. I felt like throwing him out the window into the ravine, but thankfully Tita is pursuing a wiser approach. During that visit we were able to get the ball rolling to get the girl to a care facility run by an associate. A God-ordained coincidence — a Dios-idence according to Tita — meant the colleague was just a five minute walk from the shack when we called him. He was able to join us right away and get the story. Tita began to ramp up her relationship with the Mom and look for a way out for her and the girls, which are few, given the abject poverty.

Shorty and Tita are signs of hope that the world needs to know about.

We also spent an afternoon and evening in the city of Peronia where a controversial pastor has garnered a peace accord between the two rival gangs in his community. He spent the entire day with us. We met former rival gang members that are now friends. Crime in the whole district has dropped a reported 74%. More hope.

The Scriptures say, "There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God." (Ps 46:5). La Limonada (literally, The Lemonade -- leaves a sour taste) is becoming a city of God. Others see shacks wrapped in misery. Tita and Shorty said they feel that unless you can learn to see joy and beauty in the midst of pain sand suffering you will never last in this call of God. I needed to hear that and see it demonstrated. I see hope and fragrance of sweet lemonade.

Boxes of Bones

You may not want to read this. I promise happier thoughts in the future. But my privilege requires it.

Entering into another country’s open wound – mass murder and genocide – is like standing next to the surgeon as they probe a cancer. It feels personal, and a privilege, though I never met any of the victims. Yet I have heard from their children and grandchildren, have seen their tears, and strangest of all, have touched their very bones. They are stacked in clear bags and cardboard boxes at the Forensic Anthropology Foundation of Guatemala, as they are matched through meticulous DNA testing with the some 50,000 people who were “disappeared” during the Armed Conflict. This is a crucial project for the healing of the nation, not to mention the individual peace of thousands of families. And it is a chance to ask about the role of the church in this healing, about the church’s silence at key points, about the ways the sins of the past reach into the present daily life of Guatemalans. The blood still cries out from the ground.

I’m not sure what to write about this, so can I process my junk for a minute? What relevance could this strange privilege of mine – to glimpse a national agony not my own -- have to my friends? I don’t know the answer to that question; perhaps you can tell me. At least bear with me. At the next table tonight, an American youth group from Michigan is here on a mission project. They are serving Guatemalan kids. Their youth pastor announced to me that Jesus really didn’t call people to end poverty. They are just here to save the street kids of Guatemala City. But I wondered what he would say to the relatives of the victims, or to the custodians of the bones. Did not Zaccheus’ repentance mean justice for those whom he had oppressed in his city? The Youth Pastor’s gospel drives him to acts of compassion, but cannot lead him to imagine, let alone pay the price needed for there to be transformation of evil systems. His message of love, delivered to the grandchildren of the murdered, will be appreciated by them, but does he realize the children on the street are there precisely because generation of Grandfathers was violently removed from their role as provider and model? Did their pain and the agonized cry of the children left to fend for themselves not echo in God’s ears, break God’s heart? As Ray Bakke reminds, did not a political decision by Herod mean that hundreds of kids died for Jesus before he had a chance to die for them? Does the heart of Jesus not long to transform the systems that keep pumping out modern day Herods in every generation? And because our CIA funded the Herods of that generation, do I not bear some responsibility to speak for these bones? Sorry, impolite questions.

I saw it lying on the table at the forensic lab, though I could almost feel as if it saw me. It was the latest skull to be unearthed, found among the murdered. It was slightly larger than my fist. Children have always suffered worst for the sins of adults.

As I passed through rooms stacked to the ceiling with sealed and tagged boxes – the remains of identified victims – my fatigue began to grow. As I listened to our guide, I absent-mindedly leaned against a stack of them, as if a wall. A pillar of bones, some with the unique signatures left by machetes on limbs or gunshots to heads. Thousands of tibia, fibula, clavicles, hip bones, no longer privileged to support their original owners, they now supported me – helped stand me up straight for a little longer. The least I can do is stand up for them. The least I can do is to train leaders to ask the impolite question, imagine a future without need for a place like this, and organize their lives around that quest.

Something Larger than Myself

Standing by the General Grant Tree in Kings Canyon National Park it is easy to feel small -- something that rarely happens to me. I tend to be the tallest thing around, unless my sons are also in the room. The fact that this Giant Sequoia has stood silently since the time of Christ, towering above its companion Lodgepole Pines and Western Red Cedars impresses smallness on everything in its shadow. I love that feeling. I sat, immersed in it, sketching the lower portion and its fire-scar because I was taken by its swirling red and amber texture. But there is no way to sketch the hugeness, the feeling of weight, the dominance, and the soaring height. There is no sketchbook tall enough, no journal with enough pages to explore the contrasts between us.

If there are few living things that can make me feel puny, there are plenty of circumstances that seem to have that power. My work is populated with things larger than myself, and every day the scouts send back reports of giants in the land. It's on days like that when I need go stand in the shadow of real giants. I need the reminder that some things which loom large are large only in my imagination. Being at the foot of something real blows these ghosts away. But there's something else that happens as well, as I crane my neck to take in the top and then let my eye extend past it. I worship the One who made the Sequoia, the One for whom that tallest, heaviest of living things is no more than a matchstick.

That's when smallness becomes a gift.

In praise of all that reaches high

Of all that towers tall

Which in their redness pierces sky

And dwarfs the false gods all

I praise the mind that dreamed of giants

And planted them for me

And pray that I remain compliant

Then join their company

Ya Man

Well, at least I flew over the famed beaches of Jamaica. Waves rolled to shore in layers, just like the photo-shopped pictures in travel magazines. But then the plane also rolled, and all I saw was cloud. I thought to myself, this is getting ridiculous. It’s so typical for me. I can’t count the times I served in New York City at urban projects and have still not seen the Statue of Liberty. Just the basement of some inner-city church. Same with the famous souk in Amman, and the White House or Smithsonian in DC, and many historic churches and sites in the 30 cities in the US I served in. Too busy to see them. Never any time. Too much fatigue by the time I’m done. And now, I can add the beach in the world’s quintessential vacation spot to the list of things missed.

But, I did see something that many won’t because of it’s location. Ya Man, it was random but I saw Bob Marley’s house. I don’t know much about Marley. Reggae. Weed. Dreads. A legacy of music known around the world. Marley came from the rough streets of a slum called Trench Town, which he sang about. Our students will study Trench Town next April, so I was doing an advance trip to scout it out. It is a poor and violent community that happened to bear one of the most internationally known music superstars. Did I go in the house? No. I passed it on the way to a literacy program for children that was on the same street . But I rolled down the window and heard the familiar beat and guitar tumble in. And I thought to myself, this is ridiculous.

My hosts couldn’t believe I spent only two days in country, and all of that in meetings. Typical American; always onto something else. In my case it was a conference in Memphis the following day. Not to say I didn’t see some cool stuff: an NGO specializing in transformational ministry. A micro-lending ministry and , an early childhood program, a reading program, a church plant, a radio ministry providing national commentary on the social conditions of the country, a spectacular view of Kingston Harbor. I ate some traditional Jamaican food, including Ackee and Salt Fish for breakfast. I met the Chick-fil-A guy of Jamaica. And the president of Caribbean Graduate School of Theology and I essentially raced down a restricted corridor in the Jamaican airport to get to a flight we didn’t have tickets for to grab the last two seats as they were closing the door. The bottom line? I didn’t make the beach, but I made some fabulous memories, as well as plans for next year. But when I take my students there, our toes are going in the sand on one day. And Memphis? Probably won’t do Graceland. Typical. Ridiculous.

Update on "Tampa"

This the way "Tampa" spent his last weekend of freedom, before learning the police wanted him in connection with a home invasion robbery. He said "the ocean is much larger than I ever imagined." We couldn't pull him away. I read him that line from the old hymn that said "... for the wideness of God's mercy is like the wideness of the sea ..." and he was moved. He maintains his innocence, and aspects of the victim's testimony seems to suggest its possible. He is attending daily Bible readings in jail, and his Hope Now for Youth staff tell him he can resume his final two days of program when he gets out, and graduate. We have tried to help him see this setback as "an opportunity. Be like Paul and Silas and get used to telling of God's goodness to your cell mates. And let's see how God expands the walls of that place. What matters most is what is ahead, not what is in your past. You have been set on a new path; God loved you too much to let you continue in the direction you had chosen. What do you want your life to be like when you are out?"

His next court appearance is May 12. Pray for God's plan in "Tampa's" life to be revealed, much larger and more beautiful than he ever imagined, and for justice tempered with the wideness of God's mercy.

I am in Miami, en-route to Kingston, Jamaica where I will lay the groundwork for a course in Transformational Leadership there next year. Yes, there are nice beaches. Perhaps I'll see one as I drive. But there is also some of the worst corruption in the world, which operates in the shadow of the highest number of churches per capita anywhere in the world. And dramatic poverty. Figure that one out. Obviously, something's wrong. Appreciate your prayers.

Of Refuge and Tears

Please pray for our young friend "Tampa." I helped him turn himself into the police today. God provided in Numbers 35 that there be "Cities of Refuge," places where someone who committed a crime could run to avoid revenge. We provided safe haven -- refuge -- for Tampa after he initially provided information to the police about a crime, and because of it, was in danger from the gang he implicated. Though some cautioned us against it, it wasn't hard to take him in. We have known Tampa for more than a decade. He and his siblings grew up in our tutoring program. He used to sit on my lap to read. And there was no warrant for his arrest. He was scared, teachable, dependable, meek.

During this month Tampa went everywhere with us. We took him to church. He accepted Christ on my porch. We got him connected to Hope Now for Youth. He had perfect attendance. He volunteered every day at the Leadership Training Center helping with renovations. We took him to see the ocean, a first in his life. He helped me renovate a bathroom. We introduced him to many former gang members who are now in ministry, leading fruitful and beautiful lives. He told me he wanted to be like them. He went to community meetings with me where he saw Christians trying to improve their neighborhoods. Tampa's eyes were wide open this month, opened to a world that he was unfamiliar with. A gracious world, full of love and good will.

So when we woke this morning to the news that the police were seeking him in connection to the crime, we agonized. And we had to tell him that he should turn himself in. The day began with an appointment with an attorney. This is going to cost a lot of money. It continued with negotiations with police about a place to meet them. They could not say if it would be for an interview or an arrest. There was still no warrant. While we waited to hear from them, Tampa wanted to complete another day at Hope Now. He was to graduate on Thursday. So he went, and I paced. Paced, cried, prayed. I wondered if Tampa would have the courage to go through with it. I wondered if he would bolt.

The police set up a neutral ground for the meeting, something they don't normally do. Tampa and I went together. And they were gracious. But they arrested him. He has called me three times from various stages of the process. Just wants to check in, hear my voice as Tina says. He's doing the right thing. He says he feels OK. His mother and sister are in tears. Friends of mine who have surrounded him over these last few weeks have begun to call. Their caring helps. But tonight I end in tears as well. All the hours invested, all the prayers, all the hopes, all the fears we have experienced in these weeks came to a head. Whatever the verdict, I believe Tampa has become a child of God and has a fruitful future. And I think with the right guidance, Tampa will become the Man God intends. But for now, tears, and a sense that I need my own refuge.

We'll Be Right Back After this Message from God

God's country, right?

I don't know where we were. It was pretty. With friends at the wheel, I didn't pay attention. I was distracted by baby-white wildflowers which covered the landscape like a dusting of snow. We got out of the car and started walking a trail that reminded me of Africa -- red earth and green hills. But the horizon was pure Scotland, minus mortarless rock walls or yellow gorse.

Our Friends Chris and Patty provided the guidance and companionship. We hiked to the mesa and looked down at Millerton Lake and the San Joaquin River snaking into it. OK, now with my bearings secured I could imagine myself a Miwok seeing this scene for the first time. This isn't Scotland or Africa -- this is 30 minutes from my house and I have never been here. OK, 30 minutes plus two hours hike up hill.

Tina did really well. Her new hiking shoes worked out, and her sky blue hiking blouse danced up the trails wicking sweat away just as advertised. The afternoon sun illuminated her beauty and she glowed. It started to cool off on our hike back to the car, but the challenge of the trail soon made us stop to rest.

When people say they experience God in the countryside, it often makes us want to scream. God is in the face of an inner-city kid who is learning to read. God is in the alley that has just been cleaned. God is in the house that is being renovated by a hopeful couple. God is in the teacher who prays for her student who has to navigate gang territory to get to school. God is in the tired Dad who still goes to a community meeting because things are being discussed that affect his neighborhood. God is in the Mayor's boardroom, the prostitute's bedroom, the casino's back room. We don't have to go to the countryside, OK? He's in relationships, in suffering, in decision making, in the built environment, not just the created one. OK?

And OK, God is on the Mesa looking down at his handiwork. I needed the reminder. I need to do this more often.

800 Year-Old Words on Grief

Theologian Raymond Brown is famous for saying "All truth is God's Truth." By that he meant that if something is true, it doesn't matter who said it, whether Jesus or someone else. The spirit of Jesus lives in and expresses itself through people who have yet to discover the source of their wisdom. So, while I will always look first to the scriptures for help in dealing with the grief I feel over the untimely and tragic death of my pastor, I also pay attention to those who speak the language of the heart with insight and integrity. Such is the person of Rumi, the 13th century Afghani mystic. He wrote in Persian, often referred to God as his Beloved or Friend, and seemed especially in touch with the human experience. I could share many, many lines from his poetry that have helped me, but for now let me just leave this one short offering, there for any who would say the lines thoughtfully and prayerfully.

My heart, make friends with grief

And if you do, what luck!

Embrace it for your grief

Is the call your Beloved answers.

The Hebrew King David said something similar ...

the Lord is near to the broken-hearted.

So I am grateful for these simple, ancient affirmations, both from eastern cultures. One Inspired and the other Divine. Both consistent with Emmanuel -- God with us, in our time of mourning.

New shoes lead to new destinations

I have never been a backpacker. I did one major trip when I was in high school that nearly killed me, and ended a friendship with one of my buddies when we discovered just how we got on each other's nerves. Of course we were too ambitious -- tried to go too far on the HARDEST trail in Kings Canyon , carrying 65 pound packs.

When we started our family, Tina and I took the boys camping a few times, again in Kings Canyon (got to get back on the horse -- face your fears) but it never took hold as a lifestyle. I did get some good pictures of us frying the tiny fish we caught, and I pull them out occasionally just to remind our sons that I am not just some latte-sipping, art gazing, poetry freak of a dork. I am that, but I can stand by an open fire with the best of them, as long as I have fire-starter.

So when REI had an amazing sale, and after my sons fooled me into going by saying that REI was an art store called Really Expressive Impressionists, I went. OK, OK, it wasn't that bad. But I could not pass up a pair of hiking boots that were originally $200 on sale for $49.83. Which led me to buy another pair for an equally low price, because it was such a good deal. All for a guy who hasn't hiked in a very long time.

So we went hiking -- OK, walking really, but in the foothills by a stream, which makes it hiking in my book.

Which just goes to show that new shoes can lead to new destinations.

Which made me wonder, as I was rewarding myself with a latte, what new shoes does the church in Fresno need, that might lead to some new destinations for the gospel?

Boys Become the Teachers of the Man

As we all have tried to come to terms with the death of Pastor Jamie Evans, I have so often been at a loss for words. This is embarrassing for someone like me -- who lives by words. Embarrassing for a Dad, who would, eons ago, lay his hand on the shoulders of his sons when they were young, praying silently for just the right thing to say.

Because of this void during these sad, sad days, I find myself latching onto other people's words to stand in for me. A fellow leader says in times like this "we need to care for each other" and I repeat that to people who look to me for guidance. Another friend shares that depression is like a cancer of the mind and can turn a person into someone else at the end. This seems true, and as good an explanation of the tragic decision Pastor Evans made this week as any, and so I put it forth in candid conversations among people trying to make sense of such awfulness. These and many other words have rolled off my tongue like I knew what I was talking about. But in truth, my own mind is numb with the loss. There are no words. And so, I am grateful for those who are able to summon words of power in the midst of crisis. My son Joseph reflected on John Donne's taunting of death in Death be not Proud - -

for, those whom thou think'st, thou dost overthrow, die not

... and I was encouraged. The poet sometimes has an edge over the preacher in that the goal is not explanation, but consolation. That led me to the poet Dylan Thomas who said

though lovers be lost, love shall not; and death shall have no dominion

... and knowing he was referring to the resurrection passage of Romans 6:9 I was consoled. Death is not the end and will not rule. Then through some means which I don't now remember, my son Jameson reminded me somehow of the terrible hope in the midst of tragedy that sets the gospel apart -- that good can one day grow from this seedbed of pain. The right word at the right time.

So I have no words in this time. I guess I am OK with that. While it is true, as Kieth Webb sings,

I am like a mockingbird

I have no new song to sing

I just tell you what I've heard

I'm like a Mockingbird

... at the same time I realize its not always up to me to provide the right word. The words of others will do. But I'm not at a loss for them. Like colorful and soft gifts, they are dropping like blossoms on my shoulders. They have helped me work through my own grief.

The best of them have come from my sons. The boys have become teachers of the man.

Randy's Newest Book at the Presses

I am excited to announce the publication of my new book

Poetic Intercessions: Artful Prayers for a Friend.

This book took shape over a year’s time when I was praying for a friend who had had a stroke. Each week, I wrote prayers in poetic form and sent them to my friend. He was greatly encouraged by my having labored over these, by their creativity, and their potential usefulness for followers of Jesus as they pray for their friends who are sick. He has since fully recovered.

Artist Tiffany Cable did ten, monochromatic watercolors for the book, corresponding to several of the prayers. They are beautiful.

Then, amazingly, celebrated author and poet Luci Shaw caught a vision for this project and wrote a powerful foreword. I was really humbled by her affirmation.

It will be available at Harmon Press as well as Amazon, or through your local bookstore by order. But for those of you in Fresno, I will have a limited supply of both paperback and hardback at a more than 30% discount.

It’s at the press now and should be available soon. You can see a brief description at the following link: http://harmonpress.com/bookstore/poetic-intercessions-artful-prayers-for-a-friend/

Thanks for your friendship and interest,

Randy White

Poppy & EJ

I'm Poppy, I'm your Daddy's Dad

And you are my Grand Daughter

You make me very, very glad

I feel I could walk on water!

Lizzy Joy, you're so fun

Lizzy Joy, a gift of God the Son

Your Poppy loves you, you should know

He prays for you each day

He loves you when you're high or low

And so he'd like to say ...

Lizzy Joy, you're so fun!

Lizzy Joy, a gift of God the Son!

What I Can Do

I lay awake at midnight on my box-spring-of-a-bed in a Ghana hotel room, wondering whether the experience I had orchestrated was accomplishing its purpose. Because no one can be an expert on all cultures, all cities, all urban strategies for mobilizing God's people for transformational influence, I was overwhelmed with the complexity of the task. The task: leading three non-english-speaking students from China, a student from post civil-war Sierra Leone, a French speaking African from Niger, an Americanized Nigerian, a Tanzanian, a tri-lingual Canadian and five students from the U.S. in a dialogue where they would learn from site visits, from me and each other how to focus their ministries on transforming their cities. They were all so different, all coming from various degrees of ministry experience and theological training. With our Ghanaian hosts I had crafted a daily diet of teaching, dialogue and site visits to NGOs and churches making a difference in the city of Accra. I knew that I had done my best, but the goal seemed elusive at midnight, and sleep deprivation proved detrimental to faith at that moment. There in the quiet of my hotel room I kind of lost it. I wish I had remembered then what I recall now -- that is, the time I tried to have a serious manuscript Bible study on Habakkuk involving a gang member, a college freshman girl, a man convicted of murder but recently released from prison on a technicality, and a gray-haired member of a presbyterian church mission committee. "What the heck am I doing?" I asked myself at the front end. "There's no way this is going to work." But it did. Everyone learned something. In the end, it was also true for the group in Ghana, though it had its own challenges. Students have begun to make plans in their own cities. It's fun to see these emerge, even in their initial stages. It's fun to consider that these emerge from a dialogue I set up, rather than primarily from expertise I pass along. I know that my experience in Urban Ministry and Christian Community Development plays a role. But there's something else that is going on -- something that happens in the dynamic of a dramatic urban environment, the interaction of committed practitioners, and the prayers of saints from around the world that are laying the spiritual foundation for this kind of learning. I just need that perspective when I am staring at the ceiling at midnight. So I do what I can do, and pray that God accepts that offering and makes it more than it is.

He Could Have Been Dead

He could have been dead

But at 40 miles per hour

I couldn’t tell as our class sped past

His shirt the color of dust

Lay draped over his thin frame

In the gully beside the road

The cloud of debris kicked up by our bus

Settled over him

A burial in stages

One thin layer

One disinterested car at a time

But I did notice

His hand formed a pillow

A mat kept him from

Dissolving into the brown African soil

Resting, not dead.

Homeless Lord

You who had nowhere to lay your head

Should he rise tomorrow and

Shake off his earthen blanket

May he roll up his mat with hope

And find a new bed among the loved.

I give myself to a world where he can.

Help! I Cry Help from Ghana.

Help! I cry HELP from Ghana. If you can read this, HELP me celebrate an amazing day. I don’t want to let it be lost or just reflect on it alone. We took our 16 doctoral students from China, Europe, Africa and the U.S. to visit a micro lending institution in Accra that is taking lending to the poor to a new level. They provide loans to the very poor by taking the banking process to them, often in their shanty towns and mega slums. Mobile bankers establish daily visits to individuals to help them save in a very liquid, informal economy. Though savings amounts are small, they accumulate and provide a base for getting micro loans – enough for a sewing machine or a storage unit or a small stall in a market. Portable deposit machines record their savings and issues receipts. These loans, like most micro loans in the world, are made mostly to women, and the mobile bankers are mostly women. The repayment rate is 95%. Lives are being improved physically, and meanwhile, the staff of the bank has daily prayers with each other and their customers. Next week we will meet with a similar organization, this one more of a ministry, and spend time with one of the recipients of a loan. Our students are getting all sorts of ideas for their contexts.

But that’s not all. The morning began with Stephan de Beer of the Tshwane Leadership Foundation (TLF) in Pretoria, South Africa, who walked us through the essential disciplines of becoming Reflective Practitioners of Transformational Leadership. I can’t possibly do it justice! Stephan helped us become “imagineers” – those who can envision characteristics of a new reality for each of our cities around the world, and outline initial steps to fostering some of those components. Stephan called us to cry more for and shout less at our cities, and then called us to laugh with those among the poor who laugh – laugh, in the words of Cox, as the “last weapon of hope.” He helped us deconstruct the narratives that are told about our cities – Fresno is an armpit, Fresno will always be uneducated, Fresno is a nothing town, Fresno is dangerous – and construct an alternative godly vision that can give us practical guidance as to how we apply ourselves. Then he demonstrated what he had said by sharing what is happening in Pretoria through TLF.

There is so much more, but for now, just celebrate with me, won’t you? God has done something very fine today. And cities around the world will be different in the future because of it.

Randy's Twilight Zone

This is just too strange. Something in the Universe has shifted. Tina is reading and I am cleaning. OK I lied about the cleaning, but I needed that image to show you how the universe has shifted. Because Tina is sitting there where I normally sit, doing what I normally do. Except that she's added a nice twist by having popcorn at her side and is now making all sorts of annoying crunching sounds as she soils the pages of Mortenson's Three Cups of Tea with salty, buttery fingers. Makes me want to have four shots of whiskey.

Meanwhile all I can do is think of my little E.J. White, all 7+ lbs of her. I think that with initials like that she will eventually be writing children's books like Five, Fully Loaded Diapers or, what's sure to be a hit in Canada, No, Don't Take Me Ice Climbing.

Today I trimmed trees and vines (Tina tells me this is what normal people do on weekends), attended a funeral, bought some shoes for me and a frame for a picture of Elizabeth imitating Joseph's "yes, I swallowed the canary" look, re-polyurethaned my fireplace and mantle, took my first wife to dinner, ate cake at a neighbor's, watched another man trim a much larger tree, called my Dad on his 92 birthday, heard my 89 year old Mother tell me she loves me, bought a hat for my trip to Ghana next Friday, and listened to my first wife crunch. I don't get that many weekends home, so I packed a lot in. This was a good one, even if the universe has shifted. I could use a few more of these.