Caring for kids has to be one of the best and worst things for one’s health. For instance, last week a kid’s head was in the clouds and she wandered off during a field trip. That really wasn’t fabulous for my blood pressure. Even so, these children have healed me in ways I didn’t know I needed. They unknowingly have been living examples of Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s vision of ministry in Life Together–to me and to their neighbor. They have profoundly shaped me in my successes and failures of striving to live out this vision of ministry through their love and grace.

The Ministry of Helpfulness

“Nobody is too good for the meanest service” (Bonhoeffer 100).

A couple of time I’ve stayed to scrub the floor of art projects gone rogue or accidental goldfish stampedes. One day one of our campers, a too-cool-for-school skateboarder donning a backwards cap and a big smile, asked to help. A domino effect occurred, and I was soon swarmed by tiny hands begging to be of service. Approximately 30 seconds after I asked them to wash the tables, the floor flooded and tiny shoes turned the water into mud as effectively as Jesus turned water into wine. A five-year old girl from the camp, who is homeless, erupted into her trademark crazed laughter when she saw my muddy bare-feet becoming culprits in the mess. She commanded, “Wait there,” grabbed wet paper towels, and began intently to wash me. With each stroke this tiny, fierce, homeless girl imprinted her love and mercy into me.

Three dirty towels later she squinted at me with her devious eyes, stole my shoes, and ran down the block laughing the whole way.

These children could have been doing anything else, yet their hands proclaimed to me, “God’s message of love and mercy” (Bonhoeffer 100) through their seemingly trivial acts. In this upside-down kingdom, a homeless girl that I was so glad to serve pulled a Jesus and literally washed my feet out of love. We focus so much on teaching children, we forget what they can teach us. They teach us to embrace interruption and to joyfully love through small acts of service that probably mean a lot more than we think.

Art projects that will be used to beautify the community garden

The Ministry of Listening

“The beginning of love for brethren is learning to listen to them” (Bonhoeffer 97)

Narrative is an integrative process. Through sharing personal narrative, we put together the messy pieces of our lives and explain how we are somehow still hanging together. Narratives help us discover what is meaningful in our lives. To honor a narrative, we must cultivate a spirit of listening.

One day in the after hours of camp I was painting a sign: “Community Starts Here!” Ty* approached me, laughed at my horrendous artwork, sat, and began to share his narrative, his own difficult life story, with me. After half an hour he said in a half-joking accusatory voice, “Why are you being so quiet!?”

With probably too much honesty for a 10 year old I slowly replied, “I wish I had the right things to say to make everything better. But I don’t.”

His gaze dropped to the ground.

I was paralyzed by Bonhoeffer’s words, “What can weak human words accomplish for others? Are we like the professionally pious, to “talk away” the other person’s real need?” (Bonhoeffer 104). I couldn’t bring myself to speak false hopes that his absentee parents or his daily bullying would magically become easier if he just accepted Christ. I couldn’t quote a couple of bible verses to make everything alright. God gives us His word and lends us His ear. I forgot that the purpose of listening, “with the ears of God is so we can speak the Word of God” (Bonhoeffer 99).

The Ministry of Proclaiming

“The speaking of God’s word is beset with infinite perils” (Bonhoeffer 104).

But what does it mean to speak the word of God?

“That unique situation in which one person bears witness in human words to another person, bespeaking the whole consolation of God, the admonition, the kindness, and the severity of God” (Bonhoeffer 104). The only thing I could do was look Ty in the eye and tell him what I know with the deepest fiber of my being, “You are loved, so loved; by God, by me, by your friends. You are stronger than you think.”

His eyes lit up, “Me? Strong? Really?!”

This is the beginning of my discerning process of learning when to listen, and when and what to speak. I learned that we must all put to death both the impatient-uninterested listener along with the pious prattler of words.

The Ministry of Bearing

“Bear one another’s burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ” (Gal 6:2).

The second day of camp, the leaders were entrusted with stories of children’s past: a father’s recent murder, escaping the Burmese war, houses that were burned down, a father who tried to drown a mother. When Ty told me his story, my heart was painfully overwhelmed. I saw his kind-hearted, goofy nature was slowly eroding away. Part of me wanted to steal these children away and other part wanted to run away and forget all I’ve seen and heard.

One day a nursing classmate asked our dean, “How do we care for our patients without being too emotionally attached?”

The dean of the nursing school kindly laughed, “That is not possible.”

The Christian has no choice but to bear, to sustain, to suffer the burden of a brother or sister: “It is only when he is a burden that another person is really a brother and not merely an object to be manipulated” (Bonhoeffer 100). God bore with us from the fall, through our unfaithfulness in the desert, to God suffering in the person of Jesus through the cross. A Christian’s life in community can be seen entirely through the framework of seeking to bear the Cross that Christ bore for his brothers and sisters.

I fully admit, I am in no way qualified to supplement Bonhoeffer’s categories of ministry with a my own construction. However, I’m an impetuous undergrad so I’m going to go for it.

The Ministry of Accepting Love

Only when we allow ourselves to be served by others can we look upon them as Jesus– the ultimate servant.

No more of this “individualization” crap.

“Out of place” is a generous descriptor, as I resembled a gangly teenage boy awkwardly asking a pretty girl out when I began canvassing. Thankfully I was with Russell Jeung, my site mentor, who lives in the community and is known and loved here. When the neighbors saw Russell approaching they would smile and eagerly invite us in. Every threshold we crossed, I was privileged to catch a glimpse into a vibrant cultural enclave, intentionally invisible from the public eye. Each home we entered held stories of woe (robbery), joy (green cards), fear (drug lords), tragedy (murders), strength (family), and hope. These narratives were intricately sewn into tapestries draped on the wall; they slowly wafted in like the smell of a traditional Thai dish; they looked like three barefooted grandmothers graced with wrinkles laughing in Burmese. I, a 20-year old white upper-middle class girl, a stranger, a foreigner, was embraced by people of peace; I was given water and invited to sit, rest, take off my shoes, and accept love. In this upside-down kingdom I was accepted as a foreigner by foreigners, and I felt oddly whole.

Accepting love requires humility; one of the highest virtues espoused by the early church fathers. Allowing oneself to be served fosters trust and interdependence; it kills colonizing mentality and the Western god of nirvana through individualization, and allows others the blessing of being the hands and feet and eyes and ears of Jesus.

At the DeYoung Museum in San Francisco, the grand Sphinx was humbled by the nose-picking love of these kids.

My 5’1” person was punted directly into the development worker’s nightmare. While planning for a community event in the Oak Park neighborhood, a fellow worker approached me and innocuously asked why I was helping out. Like a freshly painted old record player I espoused a worn out answer with a bright smile, “Why, to help foster relationships and community engagement!” expecting him to drop it.

He didn’t.

“…Well it sounds nice and all”

I stiffened.

“…but sometimes I just feel like people volunteer to feel good about themselves. I don’t like feeling like somebody’s project. They feel good about themselves then they leave. That’s where I’m coming from.”

Visceral anger overtook my thoughts:I am NOT trying to just “feel good” (cue dramatic air quotes). I read the pop-Christian developer’s-bible, When Helping Hurts like three years ago. I’m way too enlightened for that kind of crap! Who does he think I am?!

Next came the judgment: Why would he presume I find so much self-worth in this project?! Who does he think he is?!

Finally came the developer’s dejection: Oh god. Am I really a colonizer? Should I even be here? People have been hurt enough without me.

After reimagining the conversation about 78 times, and after reading Bryant Myers’ book Walking With the Poor (because that is how I deal with these types of things: by reading 300-page books), I realized that my anger, judgement, and tail-between-legs guilt were merely unproductive defense mechanisms that kept my brother in Christ at arms length. In More than Equals, Perkins points to the proclamation of 1 Corinthians 13:7 that love always perseveres. I cannot back away from a brother or sister when they disappoint me or when they reveal their pent up bitterness. Instead I need to learn empathy for those who have been hurt by temporary do-gooder imports. I need to foster, “a commitment to understanding them on their own terms” (Myers 182).

It is the unfortunate reality that my missionary and development worker predecessors and I have earned suspicion and distrust. We must begin to see and understand this with tenderness–not paternalistic pity, but tenderness. I too would be wary of any asymmetrical power imbalance not in my favor. For the first time, I recognized my whiteness working against me, and I was pigeon-holed as untrustworthy because of my color. (Gee, I wonder what it would be like to live every day in that unjust reality). Even though I believed I was in the right, I had the obligation to genuinely ask God again to “search me and know my heart” (Psalm 139:23). The purity of motivations ebb and flow; it is wise to daily acknowledge that and daily repent. Colonizers, California-Spanish missions, and many normal churches today who ship their members off for a week to Kenya all have convinced themselves of their pure motivations. Even so, their work tragically damages people groups by committing murder, inflicting deep psychological damage, and enslaving–overtly with chains and covertly in fostering unhealthy economic and social dependance. We must become thoughtful, holistically educated, developmental practitioners so that our work is ultimately sustainable, empowering, and life-giving.

The past months of planning Oak Park Community Builders camp have been as tedious, unfamiliar, and frightening as playing a game of Risk with competitive relatives. “What are your goals?” pastor Dan asked me.

That everyone stays alive.

It’s the little things.

Camp began this week as any typical chaotic whirlwind does. This included but was not limited to some injuries, a diagnosis of lice, and a mild occurrence of projectile vomiting. Monday, we worked the community garden and learned about the garden-to-table movement. Tuesday, we focused on maintaining/improving literacy at the public library. Wednesday, we went to an A’s game to encourage pride in the city of Oakland (…and because I really wanted to go to an A’s game). Friday, at the end of a long week, we had a healthy living cooking class.

Planting tomatoes in our community plot

Solidarity was formed due to many unsuccessful attempts of washing off the paint.The residual yellow/green hue suggested a plague of jaundice had stricken our camp.

Making fresh fruit spring rolls with honey lime dressing

As Christians have matured in developmental theology, most find ourselves served by those we intended to serve. We have seen over and over that genuine development is relational development where “everyone is poor in God’s world and everyone is in need of transformation” (Myers 17). I can cognitively ascent to that idea, and reading it can even make my heart beat a little faster. However, in the midst of camp chaos I forget that profound truth and instead begin dreaming of how tantalizing fetal position seems at that moment. Like the opening anecdote to this blog showed, becoming frustrated, emotionally withdrawing, and becoming an army commander is an easy fallback where I assume total control. The problem with total control is that it leaves no room for God’s work of grace and reconciliation; I’ve taken it upon myself to solve the problem in my own familiar way. In the midst of camp chaos and interpersonal discord it is hard to re-imagine both me, the children, and the community worker as broken vessels coming together, listening to and learning from the gifts of the other, and moving towards an understanding of what it means to be reconciled as sister and brother. Only when I have slowed down and begun to build relationships of love and honesty has trust been born. Only within those patient self-giving relationships of trust have I begun to receive healing I didn’t even know I needed from these tiny, 6-10 year old, unassuming wells of life.

I, an outsider, a despised foreigner to some, have been shown the hospitality and saving grace of these little Good Samaritans.

The Exodus

“During the night Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “Up! Leave my people, you and the Israelites!…The Egyptians urged the people to hurry and leave the country. “For otherwise,” they said, “we will all die!” So the people took their dough before the yeast was added, and carried it on their shoulders in kneading troughs wrapped in clothing….. The dough was without yeast because they had been driven out of Egypt and did not have time to prepare food for themselves” (Exodus 12:31-37).

“I was making dinner for my children. I had one child strapped to my back, and one in my stomach. It was then men from Burmese government came. They broke into my house and asked me where my husband was. They wanted to take him for forced labor, to carry their equipment. I would never see him again. I said I didn’t know where he was. They put a gun to my head in front of my children and asked me where he was again. I said I didn’t know where he was. They let me live. I was very lucky. I took my kids and my husband and wrapped up my food… it wasn’t fully cooked because we had to run. We ran for 4 days to the refugee camp on the Thai/Burmese border. They burned down my house when I left. We stayed there for 9 years before leaving for America. This happens to my people every day” (Mrs. Q, a Karen Refugee).

As Mrs. Q spoke in her native tongue, her words were gently translated to the room. All of us who were gathered—including three other Karen refugees who I was interviewing, and me–fell silent. As her story unfolded, the atmosphere in the office palpably changed. The air felt thick, sorrowful, and sacred. We sat under a holy mist, consecrated by her story, in solidarity with our sister who had experienced too much.

The Karen people are a minority comprising 7% of the total Burmese population. They have been persecuted by the government for their religious (Christian), ethnic, and resulting political status. A 2005 New York Times report by Guy Horton reported, “documented slave labor, systematic rape, the conscription of child soldiers, massacres and the deliberate destruction of villages, food sources and medical service[1]”. BBC has estimated that up to 200,000 Karen have been driven from their homes since the 1950’s, with 160,000 living in refugee camps. The other 40,000 have been resettled to various locations including, of all places, Oakland, California.

It is no surprise that Mrs. Q parallels her experience to the Israelites who God liberated, leading them away from a corrupt political tyrant in Egypt and (…400 years later) into their promised land. She knowingly laughed as she told us that she too was forced to take her half-cooked food on the run. God is the same faithful God even now. As Mrs. Q was honoring us by sharing her story, her love for God was visibly overflowing in her narrative, yet the lines etched on her face and the sadness that occasionally graced her eyes spoke another story and forced me to wonder about questions that she may too have wrestled with:

What about the people who were not as lucky as Mrs. Q?

…Did God’s saving grace not apply to them?

For those still in Burma, who have been internally displaced, who are now foreigners in an alien land, or in a refugee camp, what does liberation look like?

Perhaps dejectedly:

What could I even possibly do about it?

My adrenals are activated knowing how easily these questions can snowball into an existential crisis reminiscent of my first year at university when I found out the Israelites may not have actually crossed the Red Sea.

What does this mean? For them? For me? For the nature of God?

Elsa Tamez, a Latin American liberationist theologian, is all too familiar with these questions and writes in The Bible of the Oppressed, “The Bible does not hesitate to speak of oppression as an action directed against Yahweh Himself” (38). For Tamez, the entire biblical narrative must be read in light of God liberating God’s people from oppression. It should not merely be another easily overlooked theme. From the freeing of the slaves in Egypt to Jesus saving the adulterous woman from death by the religious leaders, God has continually shown God’s hatred of oppression. At every moment in history God has been in solidarity with the oppressed so that they may be assured that love and liberation will be realized.

For Tamez, God of Abraham is not an unfeeling deity that floats around in the sky, that plays with the life of humans like the pantheon of Greek Gods. While I hesitate to quote C.S. Lewis (as I am afraid it may induce an eye roll from a number of academics and disillusioned Protestants), Lewis brings Tamez’s quote to life through an image of God’s grief in light of injustice in The Magician’s Nephew.

“‘But please, please – won’t you – can’t you give me something that will cure Mother?’ 

Up till then he had been looking at the Lion’s great feet and the huge claws on them; now, in his despair, he looked up at its face. What he saw surprised him as much as anything in his whole life. For the tawny face was bent down near his own and (wonder of wonders) great shining tears stood in the Lion’s eyes. They were such big, bright tears compared with Digory’s own that for a moment he felt as if the Lion must really be sorrier about his Mother than he was himself.

‘My son, my son,’ said Aslan. ‘I know. Grief is great.’” 

What if, in an ineffable cosmic algorithm, God is somehow bound?

What if, instead of being sidetracked by passionate anger at God for a perceived lack of saving grace, we put that same passion into enacting Jesus’ call? God is waiting for us to express our faith in God through a public display of love; love which looks like working towards justice for our neighbor.

What would a world look like if we were more like Mrs. Q and truly believed that we are mandated to be the hands and feet of Christ through the Holy Spirit; coupled with the constant hope that Yahweh will do what Yahweh has always done in the biblical narrative, which is to bring justice to the oppressors and liberation to the oppressed?

“Love and truth will meet; justice and peace will kiss each other. Truth will spring up from the ground and justice will look down from the sky. Yea, the Lord will give what is good, and our land will yield its increase. Justice will go before him, and make his footsteps a way” (Psalm 85:11-13).

1. [1]A witness’s plea to end Myanmar abuse‘, by John Macgregor, New York Times, May 19, 2005.