Tag Archive - #ymath

The Cycle of Destruction, Praise and Redemption

February 20, 2010 in Uncategorized with 1 Comment

I experienced lots of emotions during our time in Haiti. It felt like a roller coaster ride, and at one moment I was on the mountain top experiencing wonderful feelings of joy, and the next moment I was plummeted to the valley and felt despair.

It was up and down the entire time, and it has felt much that way since I have been home. This trip will take a lifetime to process, and I hope that it will continue to transform me. I hope that I continue to wrestle with what I experienced.

Destruction. Praise. Redemption.

Those are just three adjectives that I have been swirling around in my mind the entire time. Though you could not be physically present with us on the trip, I know many of you were there in spirit, and through your prayers.

I want to leave you with three videos that have resonated with me the most and I hope that they can move you to action.

Destruction

(The Drive through Port au Prince video by Adam McLane)

Praise

(Haitian worship service video by Lars Rood)

Redemption

(Redemption video by Ian Robertson)

Why Haiti? And What You Can Do

February 18, 2010 in Uncategorized with 3 Comments

This last week of my life has been an unbelievable whirlwind of emotions and it’s going to take a long time for me to process everything that I have witnessed.

It was only two and half weeks ago that I received a phone call giving me 12 hours to see if I would be interested in joining an Adventures in Missions team going to Haiti from Februarly 11th—17th. So with the encouragement of my wife, family and friends, I have come full-circle.  And what began as as a time filled with anxiety and worry was transformed into a time of God’s presence to help see me (see us) through what was an exhausting, but life changing experience – and we hope a transformation that will continue to guide our lives.

I will continue to blog about this trip for a great time to come, but I want to leave you with a few key things.

Why did we come?
In hindsight I really look at our trip as fulfilling four basic purposes.

1.  To go out as a scout team and lay out the logistics for what we hope are lots and lots of youth ministry teams that will be heading this direction over the next year and for many years to come.

2.  To use social media to tell stories that could be communicated in real time to people back home — and through the stories hopefully help others to not only give of their financial resources, but to make a heart connection with the people of Haiti.

3.  To serve the people in Haiti, as we had great opportunity to do in tent camps, destroyed homes and crumbled churches.

4.  To be a resource and encourage others to come to Haiti to be God’s hands and feet, both spiritually and physically.

I can look at those four things and say that we were able to accomplish them, but our journey is only the beginning of the many journies we hope you and others take to Haiti.

The Team
I’m so thankful to have been part of an amazing team of servants, and I know that we will all continue to tell our stories, encourage you to come, and we all hope to return here soon as well.

Thanks to….
Anne Jackson, Lars Rood, Adam McLane, Ian Robertson, Jeremy Zach, Tim Schmoyer, Mark Oestreicher, Seth Barnes and Clint Bokelman.

You all were a great source of strength of encouragement, not only to me, but to the people you served in Haiti.  And it was beautiful to watch God work through you and touch so many live.

What You Can Do
If you have connected with the plight of the Haitian people, and you feel that God may be leading you to serve, then I want to encourage you to take action in one of many ways.

There are many things you can do (be creative), but here are a few that come to mind.

1.  You can pray.  Not just every once in a while but unceasingly.  The people of Haiti, and those down there helping need your prayers.

2.  You can support the work of organizations (prayerfully, financially, etc.) there on the ground who are making a difference.  A group like Adventures in Mission who we came down with.  Or people like Water Missions who we had the opportunity of connecting with.  Or YWAM has been serving the Haitian people since.  Or check out the work of Shaun King’s, A Home in Haiti.  Shaun was a great resource while we were in Haiti.  There are many good organizations, but make sure that the resources you provide are getting to the people.

3.  You can encourage someone you may know to come down here and serve by providing a scholarship for them.  What more amazing gift than to send someone down who can act as a servant of Christ, and as an advocate for the people — and return to share the stories and encourage you.

4.  You could come down and serve.  You could be that advocate.

We have been told time and time again by people living in Haiti that what we are witnessing is of huge historical scale – like nothing ever seen before in their country.  Never has there been this much devastation, followed by such a hopeful revival of faith in God.  Haitians who had never stepped foot in church before are now coming in by the 1000′s and there are amazing things happening that could forever change the foundation of Haiti.

You can be a part of that.

Whatever you do…do something.

For stories of our experiences you can continue to check out our blogs and our YMATH Facebook Page.

And if you have any questions or would like to talk to me personally about my experience and about what it would look like for you go down there, please contact me via this post and we can chat.

Haiti Day #4: Displaced People-Displaced God-Displaced Disciples

February 15, 2010 in Uncategorized with 1 Comment

[image by Anne Jackson of tent city of 5000 in Marassa]

Displaced People
About one month ago one of the most horrific disasters in human history struck the small island of Haiti. In the wake of that destruction thousands upon thousands of lives were lost, and thousands upon thousands of people were displaced. We have had the unbelievable opportunity to walk among and pray and worship with these people who were displaced and have now found themselves sleeping in dirt fields, under tarps, in the rubble of former homes, and in open ravines that will be washed away during the rainy season starting next month. Piled into these tents are entire families ranging from five to twenty-five.

Displaced lives.

Displaced families.

In a displaced community.

Displaced God
One of the questions that has been going round and round in my mind is “How can these people who have suffered so greatly, worship and praise God in the midst of picking up the pieces? Because I’m not sure if I could do it. I’m not so sure that if such a tragedy came upon me that I would have even half of the hopeful spirit that the Haitians have displayed to us over and over again during our time here.

This spirit of hope and faith and love is not something that I saw on the news at night. It’s not a story you will read in the papers or online. While the rest of the mainstream media is talking about all of the destruction and mourning, they have failed to see the whole story. There has been no coverage of all the people pouring into churches by the thousands all over the city. Instead of a day of mourning, it has been days and days of hope and praise. A country in transition. In search of change.

How can the Haitians praise God when many of their lives have been destroyed, and they are deprived of basic needs like food, water, shelter, medical care and security?

I believe it’s because they, like us, worship a displaced God.

Immanuel.

God is with us.

God who took on flesh.

God who has experienced our pains.

“The Lord, whose compassion we want to manifest in time and place, is indeed the displaced Lord. Paul describes Jesus as the one who voluntarily displaced himself. ‘His state was divine, yet he did not cling to his equality with God but emptied himself to assume the condition of a slave, and became as we are’ (Phil. 2:6-7). A greater displacement cannot be conceived. The mystery of the incarnation is that God did not remain in the place that was proper for him but moved to the condition of a suffering human being. God gave up his heavenly place and took a humble place among mortal men and women. God displaced himself so that nothing human would be alien to him and he could experience fully the brokenness of our human condition….In the life of Jesus, we see how this divine displacement becomes visible in a human story….Jesus Christ is the displaced Lord in whom God’s compassion becomes flesh. In him, we see a life of displacement lived to the fullest. It is in following our displaced Lord that the Christian community is formed. (Compassion: A Reflection on the Christian Life by Nouwen, McNeill & Morrison, pp. 64-66)

Displaced Disciples
Displaced lives…who worship a displaced God…become a displaced community full of hope and joy.

That is what I believe. Because nothing else, beyond something supernatural can describe what I have seen and experienced these last few days.

This morning we walked into a tent city of approximately 5000 people who were living in a ravine that will be washed out in the next month. We were invited in this morning to pray for healing for these people. It was a humbling experience. We found ourselves walking down a windy dirt trail through tents (which are really torn tarps tied together), while smiling faces peeked out from them. The farther and farther I walked the louder and louder the music became, until finally I came to a make shift house of worship. They had brought in drums, and a keyboard and microphone (which ran on a gasoline powered generator).

In the midst of their displacement, they formed a house of worship in a sea of tents, spread out as far as the eye could see.

For a moment I had a glimpse of what it must have looked like for the LORD to lead the displaced Israelites through the desert.

As the music got louder and louder, more and more people began streaming through the aisles of tents and made their way into their house of worship. It was at that time that our team leader Seth Barnes tapped me and my friend Jeremy Zach on the shoulders and said we were going to be the pastors for the service.

As we made our way to the front I tried to figure out what I was going to say, but again, words were sparse. I simply told them that I was humbled to be in their midst. And though I have been a Christian my whole life, I have never experienced such an amazing time of worship. Moving out of the tent people streamed to us to pray for their healing and for an hour and half our entire team prayed non-stop for any individual or family that wanted prayer. It was non-stop.

There was tears.

There was laughter.

There was praise.

We — in our weak and vulnerable state, were simply able to be present with a displaced and hurting people. And in that community we came in

[video by Anne Jackson of people worshipping God in Marassa]

Haiti Day #3: Stripped of Everything But God

February 14, 2010 in Uncategorized with 0 Comments

I have always been pretty good about being self-reliant. It’s an inheritenly deep American, Westernized trait that we forge our own paths, and pick ourselves up by our own bootstraps. And if you don’t, then often you are left behind, or looked down upon as if you have some sort of deficiency. And so that’s what I do…I rely on my skills and my gift sets. I use those things to help people. And to a degree, those are the tools that I brought to Haiti with me.

But what does one do when those things are stripped away?

When your ability to continually depend on you…yourself…are stripped away?

You break down and cry.

Okay, maybe not you, but that’s what I found myself doing today in front of a couple hundred Haitians underneath a dirty, makeshift church that was protected by the scorching sun by torn tarps.

It took me about a minute or so to gather myself on stage before I was able to bring forth the words that they had invited me to speak to them. And what’s a minute anyways when I had been asked to speak in the prior thirty seconds. That minute or so seemed uncomfortably long for my translator who was encouragining me to go on. If it was uncomfortable for him (as was the slow painful march to the front of the church) it felt both humiliating and freeing for me. And when I looked in the faces of the Haitians staring up at me, I knew we had connected on a much deeper and personal level than any of the words I could have spoken to them anyway.

In the quiet silence of the church, where only my sobbing could be heard, I was able to identify with their pain in a way that I didn’t think possible…and I believe they were thankful that I could mourn the loss of life with them…and then celebrate the living of life with them.

And now that all my self-reliant gifts and skills had instantly crumbled in front of me, there was only one thing that I could be dependent upon. And that one thing was the person who has always been there, and who I could always depend upon…if I only took the time to lay down my stuff and realize that the things he had given me (the gifts and skills) were to be subservient to him…not to be used in place of him. That one person is…

GOD.

He’s all I had left when I was standing there, when I had nothing to say to a people who have been devastated by one of the worst human tragedies in history.

I have preached in Brazil, India, Mexico, and several other countries. But I have never preached in the midst of such destruction. Never been in a situation where there is almost nothing to say. Up to this point everything I have preached almost seems like lip service (I know it’s not, but that’s how it felt). All one can do is pray, and hope, and love, and be a presence in the midst of people’s pain.

“The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ.”

Those are the words I spoke when they finally broke free from my mouth. Except it was more of a rambling mess…but they must have gotten the idea because they were cheering and clapping and uttering all kinds of praises. These things were not directed at me of course, but to the reality that layed beyond…that I(we), and the Haitians are only parts of the larger body of Christ. And that when we as the members of the body, work together, it is God who brings about the restoration. Not me. Not we. Not us. GOD.

As I walked back to my chair after I finished speaking I sat there looking at all the hopeful Haitian faces in the audience, and I realized that it was THEY who had taught me an important lesson.

That it is GOD who we are dependent upon, and not ourselves. Their jubliant praying and worshipping in churches and streets all over Haiti the last three days taught me that.

And for them I am thankful.

I only hope that in my short time with them, I have been able to transform their lives as much as they have mine. And that GOD will continue to transform us both.

Thank you to my preaching partnersLars Rood, Anne Jackson and Jeremy Zach. Thank you for adding to the work of the body of Christ.

Redemption in Haiti

February 12, 2010 in Uncategorized with 2 Comments

Rudy was a Haitian man that we met today in a field hospital in Jiminia, Dominican Republic. He was recovering from injuries he sustained in Port-au-prince, Haiti during the January 12th earthquake. Sitting next to him is his girlfriend.

Just blew my mind…there wasn’t a dry eye around.