When God came to Earth

Today I want to celebrate the day God came to Earth.

The day he decided he loved us too much to see us mucking everything up. He loved us too much to watch us marginalize the poor and the social misfit. He loved us too much to watch us build up our financial, intellectual, and social resources as if they actually mattered. He loved us too much to watch neverending cycles of abuse plague our families. He loved us too much to see us continue to hate those who looked, thought, or acted differently from us. He loved us too much to see us ruining relationships with one another out of self-centeredness. He loved us too much to allow us to be controlled by guilt and shame when we screwed things up.

That day was a little over 2,000 years ago in a backward, Middle Eastern province under Roman occupation.

That day is also today. In Rwanda. In Mumbai. In Juarez. On Skid Row. In Westwood. In Napa. Praise God that he keeps entering into our lives each day. In the brokenness, pain, and suffering throughout the world and throughout all time - God is present.

"To us who cry out from the depth of our brokenness for a hand that will touch us, an arm that can embrace us, lips that will kiss us, a word that speaks to us here and now, and a heart that is not afraid of our fears and tremblings; to us, who feel our own pain as no other human being feels it, has felt it, or ever will feel it, and who are always waiting for someone who dares to come close - to us a man has come who could truly say 'I am with you.'" (Henri Nouwen, Compassion 23)

And what should our response be to this God who chose to be displaced on this earth, who intentionally entered into the suffering of the world, who asked to be called Emmanuel or "God-with-us"? Paul gives us his thoughts: Go and do likewise.

Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love... then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love... Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves ... In your relationships with one another, have the same attitude Christ Jesus had: Who did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a human being, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death-- even death on a cross! (Philippians 2:1-8)

If Jesus who is God humbled himself to the point of becoming human, experiencing pain and death, just so we would know how much he loves us, how much so should we also enter in to places of suffering and discomfort and show those who hurt that God has not forgotten them.

Finding my Self

I'm reading Divine Conspiracy by Dallas Willard right now and feeling inspired to write again, especially on the issues of self-centeredness vs. selflessness. This post follows up on one I wrote a while ago on Compassion by Henri Nouwen. These thoughts are still in formulation, so please forgive any lack of clarity or focus :)

Here's a good quote by Willard which first got me thinking:

"Egotism is pathological self-obsession, a reaction to anxiety about whether one really does count. It is a form of acute self-consciousness and can be prevented and healed only by the experience of being adequately loved. It is, indeed, a desperate response to frustration of the need we all have to count for something, to be held irreplaceable, without price." (15) [emphasis mine]

This thought seems so counterintuitive to me. Usually if someone is so exceedingly self-centered my reactionary desire is to show them that they really aren't all that and a bag of potato chips. Even when dealing with my own selfishness - whether I'm attempting to combat or prevent it - my typical response is that I need to accept that it's not "all about me." But instead, Willard says that I need to realize, and what all those crazy egomaniacs out there need to realize, is how loved, how significant, how important, how valued we all are - that we really are something special. The truth is so refreshing, that we are loved sufficiently, that such fulfillment is not beyond our grasp.

And Willard says that this desire to have meaning, to be significant, in itself is not self-centered. In fact, it is actually outward:

"Unlike egotism, the drive to significance is a simple extension of the creative impulse of God that gave us being. It is not filtered through self-consciousness any more than is our lunge to catch a package falling from someone's hand. It is outwardly directed to the good to be done. We were built to count, as water is made to run downhill. We are placed in a specific context to count in ways no one else does. That is our destiny." (15)

In Compassion, Henri Nouwen seemed to say that to actually have compassion on other people, to really understand the suffering of those who hurt, we need to empty ourselves of the desire for social acceptance. At first I was having a hard time reconciling the arguments of these two authors, but after some thought I can see that they aren't necessarily mutually exclusive. To really have compassion, to mourn with those who mourn, we must let go of this struggle to prove ourselves to others. And perhaps Willard is uncovering that the key to this "letting go" is in the realization that we are already loved, accepted, valued, before we could even prove ourselves.

However, Willard extends this further to say that this desire for significance, to do something good for the world, is how God created us to be.

"Our hunger for significance is a signal of who we are and why we are here, and it also is the basis of humanity's enduring response to Jesus. For he always takes individual human beings as seriously as their shredded dignity demands and he has the resources to carry through with his high estimate of them." (15)

It's so good to know that God has greater purposes for us - he sees us as having greater significance than we could even imagine for ourselves. Think about it: since we only can see our lives as they gradually unfold, we often miss the bigger picture, how we are impacting people and the world. But God sees the whole act. He sees how our work in the past is effecting others now, and how what we do now will continue to bring about meaningful change in the future.

Amidst the craziness and uncertainties of life, it's nice to know that we are highly regarded by an all-loving, all-knowing higher power.

God on Skid Row

Sometimes we hear from God in the least expected places. This Sunday I felt God's encouragement and love through two men on Skid Row. But then again, considering God's identification with the poor, Skid Row probably shouldn't be one of the "least expected places" to hear from God...

First was Frank, a regular at our outreach. After we chatted for a bit, he asked me what I do outside of volunteering at Skid Row on Sundays and I explained my graduate program in history. I'm seeing that I've been thinking/speaking pretty negatively about my experience at UCLA, although it actually hasn't been that bad. I guess I feel like I need to justify why I'm spending five years back in school, why I'm becoming increasingly elite (as if being an upper middle class, college-educated white woman isn't enough!), and probably more to the point, why I'm not doing more directly to help/advocate for/bring justice to people like Frank on Skid Row. This paired with the fears I've had in class - feelings of inadequacy, that I shouldn't be in grad school - make me speak about grad school with a sense of hesitation. Frank noticed this and basically told me, gently, to stop complaining and take advantage of this opportunity given to me - and stop worrying about what my profs and other students think of me. He said, "Don't doubt yourself! You can't let anyone tell you that you're not somebody." This is where God has me for now - I need to own it! Preach it Frank.

As we were putting away the tables and passing out the last of the food I started talking for a little bit with another regular, Chris. I have no clue how we got onto this topic, but he started telling me how beautiful I was (side note: I didn't feel like it was in a creepy or inappropriate way - there aren't very many young, fresh-faced women on Skid Row so its not unusual for us ladies to get this reaction.) He said "Caroline, you are fearfully and wonderfully made. You are a beautiful creation of God." I changed the subject and asked to hear more about his week - but his words stuck with me for some reason. Later as I was reflecting on my time at Skid Row, I felt like God was telling me "Caroline, that is how I see you." But not because of my physical appearance or my personality, but I am beautiful simply because I am his daughter. Sitting in this notion, that his love transcends and surpasses any affirmation or appreciation I could ever receive from any human, has been amazing. I pray that you (whoever is reading this) also feel that deep love and understand how "fearfully and wonderfully" you have been crafted. At church this Sunday we read these words from 1 John "How great is the love the Father has lavished on is, that we should be called his sons and daughters! And that is what we are!"

Listening

I want to become a better listener. Today I was reminded that listening well is an incredibly powerful and meaningful discipline. This afternoon, as I began to make my never-ending reading list for the weekend, my mom called. Not too long before this I had given her an update on my week. But she called back a few minutes later, asking me to tell her more about my US History course. She could tell that I was a bit worried.

Okay, worried is an understatement. I typically consider myself a strong woman. I usually feel grounded in who I am, and who God created me to me. But this class messes me up. I sit there in our discussions and wonder who the heck let me into grad school (and what the freak is a "meta-narrative"??) I can physically feel the fear creeping in on me. This ridiculous urge to prove myself to my classmates and professors paralyzes me.

Yeah. Grad school is crazy. But God is good in helping me deal with all these issues and see where my real value lies. And that's a whole 'nother blog post and not the point of this story.

I'm talking about listening. And that's what my mom did. She asked for me to explain more why I felt this way. I did. She said she'd be praying for me. It was as simple as that.

But if it's so easy, why do we have such a hard time doing it? Henri Nouwen in Compassion lays the smack down on my soul, once again:

"Paying attention to our fellow human beings is far from easy. We tend to be so insecure about our self-worth and so much in need of affirmation that it is very hard not to ask for attention ourselves. Before we are fully aware of it, we are speaking about ourselves, referring to our own experiences, telling our stories, or turning the subject of conversation toward our own territory." (81)

Dude, if you don't act this way around people, let's talk. I want you to disciple me! Because this process of "self-emptying" is so counterintuitive, so radically opposed to my current behavior. It must be from Jesus.

And the benefits of listening, of this "moving away from the center of attention and inviting others into that space" are immense. As Nouwen writes,

"From experience we know how healing such an invitation can be. When someone listens to us with real concentration and expresses sincere care for our struggles and our pains, we feel that something very deep is happening to us. Slowly, fears melt away, tensions dissolve, anxieties retreat, and we discover that we carry within us something we can trust and offer as a gift to others. The simple experience of being valuable and important to someone else has tremendous recreative power." (81)

This self-emptying is not about shaming or mistreating ourselves - rather its about recognizing and helping others to recognize the innate value within THEM.

Wow. It's really not all about me.

Where is the home for the angry?

Wow. I'm really in the writing mood. We'll see how long this lasts once I start writing papers for school again. But for now I guess I have a lot to say :)

I've been volunteering at a maternity shelter, which provides housing for women who are pregnant and homeless. The goal of the program is to cure homelessness in these women, giving them the opportunity to start school, find a job, and learn how to be good mothers. It's a pretty remarkable and necessary program considering emergency shelters can be unsafe, unsanitary, and unstable places to be pregnant.

Anyway, I have many roles at this shelter - they are constantly in need of another set of hands, another gentle voice (haha) to answer the phone. One of the most challenging tasks for me has been conducting telephone interviews with women who are in need of housing. And this week's interviews were particularly difficult.

I had to turn down two women in a row because they had anger problems. Since this shelter offers housing, education, food, counseling, and opportunities for spiritual growth at no cost to the residents, it naturally receives many calls each week from women in need. There are enough applicants without anger problems that the staff will quickly reject one if they see even the hint of an "attitude."

But I can see why these two women were angry. Both had been abandoned by their boyfriends, fathers, and most male figures in their lives; they had grown up in poverty and likely experienced racism both overtly and indirectly. All of the sudden they find themselves pregnant and responsible for another life without any support from family or the father of the baby; oftentimes they fought parents who had encouraged them to get an abortion. After jumping around from a friend's house, to a run-down motel, to a homeless shelter, to the streets they are pretty frustrated, desperate for a safe, nurturing home for their child. Not to mention all the crazy hormonal things that go on for women when they're pregnant.

No wonder these women were so angry at me when I told them that the program wouldn't be a good fit for them. No wonder they demanded to know why. No wonder they became even more elated when I explained to them that their self-proclaimed anger problem would not do well in our intrusive group setting. One woman cried "well, don't you guys have counseling or something?" Yes, of course we do. And she could probably benefit from it - maybe even more than some of the women we are accepting in the program. But I didn't tell her that. I told her that that didn't matter anymore, she had already eliminated herself from the pool of applicants. I asked her if I could give her a referral to another maternity shelter.

Of course, we all knew that no other maternity shelter would take her for the same reasons we wouldn't. So I don't know if she will ever have the opportunity for counseling to work through her anger. I don't know if she will find a safe place to have her baby. I don't know how her baby could grow to be a healthy adult, who can learn to love him/herself and care for others.

We need something more.

Compassion

This morning I woke up early and drove to the beach, just north of Will Rogers. The fog was still resting on the surface of the blue-gray water, as I watched a sea lion bob across the shore. I jumped into the chilly water and let the cold soak into my skin.

I'm re-reading the book Compassion by Henri Nouwen and, once again, blown away by the intense and challenging call of Jesus as explained by Nouwen.

It seems that in today's culture we are constantly trying to prove to one another and to ourselves that we are valuable - that we are worthy, interesting, important, intelligent, funny, precious, beautiful, lovable. I find myself doing this all the time: in my interactions with my professors, when I meet new people, when I justify my actions and beliefs, when I update my facebook profile. I am fighting to prove that I am an interesting person, that I am unique, that you should want to get to know me.

Henri Nouwen, who left his professorship at Yale Divinity to live among the mentally disabled, reminds us:

"As long as our primary concern in life is to be interesting and thus worthy of special attention, compassion cannot manifest itself" (67).

This yearning for social acceptance (or recognition) gives us the sense that we have control over our lives, that everything improper and uncomfortable "can be kept outside the walls of our self-created fortress" (63). But from within this controlled atmosphere, how can we have compassion on those who are suffering? How can we realize solidarity with someone's pains when we are so focused on maintaining our own comfort?

The Gospels call us to a life of voluntary displacement - living intentionally in places of discomfort. Not because God wants us to suffer. Not because we want to be all non-comformist and "stick it to the man." But because Jesus lived in compassion with (translated literally from the Latin "suffering with") those in pain. It is only when we step outside ourselves, beyond our comfort zones, can we truly experience and express God's compassion.

Nouwen writes that "in voluntary displacement, we cast off the illusion of 'having it together' and thus begin to experience our true condition, which is that we, like everyone else, are pilgrims on the way, sinners in need of grace" (64).

So now I'm wondering, what does this mean for me and my life right now as a UCLA grad student. As Nouwen posits, this doesn't mean that we all need to give up our jobs and families and live among the poor, but rather ask ourselves "How can I come to understand and experience God's caring actions in the concrete situation in which I find myself?" (72)

Where do I feel displaced, alone, abandoned, out-of-touch?

How is God calling me into these places, and how do I experience his love more deeply there?

This passage is very challenging to me...