Wednesday, July 24, 2013
Hope in the Shadows
As I am reflecting on the ways that I have seen God's name proclaimed around me and the work of his mission going out into all the world, I have to look locally and around me before I look into far-off countries. I am involved in lots of ministry work here at my church in Coquitlam, but something that I am particularly passionate about is a ministry I have been volunteering with since I was in the ninth grade, Potters Place Mission on the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver.
Now, before I pour my heart and tell you about all the wonderful things that God is doing down there, I must first explain the dire situation and need which makes God's work so miraculous. The Downtown Eastside is akin to LA's Skid Row, one of the oldest neighbourhoods in Vancouver and known as Vancouver's "poorest postal code". Hastings St, where Potters Place is located on is the main hub for the homeless community, particularly First Nations, in this area. The DTES is the biggest cesspool of poverty, homelessness, crime, violence, drug use, prostitution, and the sex trade. Bus drivers are scared to drive down there, cops always travel in pairs and no citizen travels in their right mind there at night. The most tragic part of this whole story is that just a few blocks over, business men and students sit in well-lit coffee shops surfing the web on their Mac laptops, voluntarily ignorant of the brokenness just a minute's walk away. Everyone in the Lower Mainland knows this problem exists and many of them are sympathizers, but few take action.There are countless ministries involved in the DTES including Union Gospel Mission, Jacob's Well, Salvation Army, Covenant House, First United Church, Potters Place and many more, all proclaiming God's hope, love and salvation for these desperate and broken people.
The devil has a field day in this community, using lies, substances, greed, pride, darkness and slavery to keep these people from discovering the truth and true freedom in Christ. Fortunate for the DTES community, God had other plans! All the work that the various ministries are tirelessly doing is planting seeds of hope, joy, freedom and life in Christ that countless individuals are reaching out and accepting.
Potters Place Mission founded by a Korean woman named Deborah is a mission, a church, rather than a soup kitchen or homeless shelter. I usually volunteer on Tuesday nights where there is half an hour of worship to God, half an hour of preaching the gospel and then a time of serving the people a well-rounded meal as well as sitting down with them and listening to their stories, but I understand that Potters also has Bible studies during the week and a type of Bible school, educating those who wish to learn about God and the Bible.
I remember the first time I ever went to Potters. I was terrified out of my mind. I came on the arm of my trusted youth pastor, Jon Morrison and at only fourteen years of age and half an hour from my comfortable neighbourhood, I had no idea how to interact with smelly, creepy, drugged up homeless people. I sat there stiff as a board during the service not looking at anyone, serving the food with a faint smile and then busying myself with the clean-up so that I wouldn't have to talk to anyone. After a few weeks, Jon noticed my clever pattern of avoiding contact with homeless people, so he pulled me along to talk to this one man and then after a few minutes he ditched me so that I would be forced to talk to this man by myself!! I wish I could remember his name, but we talked for so long, he told me all about his family, his cocaine addiction and then he gave me a Bible verse in 2 Timothy I think it was, but I cannot remember exactly. This interaction with him broke through my social barrier, and every time after that I tried to talk to as many people as I could! Most times all I would say was "Hi" and they would pour out their life story for me. Sometimes I would pray with them, one lady I even led to Christ. There were many nights when we had too many volunteers and I would be able to go out and do prayer walks in the neighbourhood, just talking to the locals, telling them about the hope we had, praying over the alleys and the ladies shooting up behind dumpsters, asking God to heal this broken community.
I stopped going to Potters during grade twelve and then this past year I was away on Vancouver Island doing the Kaléo Program, but since I've been back, I've regained this passion for spreading God's amazing salvation to a community filled with darkness. The past few weeks have been incredible. I've invited so many of my friends to come out and start serving. Many of them had not even considered the prospect of volunteering on the DTES, although it seems like a world away, it was only a half-hour drive. I've seen them change in their thinking as their eyes are opened to the great brokenness but great potential that God has to use us to change lives simply by extending out our open hands. I've met a transvestite couple called Jennifer & Jamie, an old man called Raymond with two sons Eli and Jonathan, an El Salvadorian named Lionel that I've been able to connect with in Spanish, Chris who loves horseback riding and is separated from her two boys and Germaine all the way from Nova Scotia.
As I come back, week after week, my heart drops when I don't see those familiar faces, wondering where they are that night, are they alive, are they drinking away their paycheck, have they gotten off the streets to see their family? Although there are many disappointments and heartbreaks, God has been showing me again and again about his faithfulness. We had a former homeless man last night called Grant who was preaching and leading worship. There are countless volunteers and workers at Potters who are former or currently homeless, but have been changed by God's work in their lives and want to give back to their community.
There is hope for the Downtown Eastside. Although the future seems bleak and uncertain, God who began a good work in this community will carry it on to completion until the day that he returns! He is using me as a humble servant to spread his kingdom and he is using those whose lives were broken and helpless to now spread his love and salvation to every homeless, drug dealer, mentally ill, prostitute and sex-trafficked victim and even to every police officer, lawyer, medical response worker and counselor. God is doing more in our day that we realize & so don't lose time, but get in on the opportunity that he is providing you to restore the broken and bring glory to the shamed. To God be the glory!
"It is not by force nor by strength, but by my Spirit', says the Lord Almighty." -Zechariah 4:6
Monday, June 24, 2013
Off the Beaten Path
When I was a little girl I remember begging Mom to buy a plethora of ballerina books and novels about ballerinas. I was determined to be a dancer. I got my first pair of ballet shoes when I was in grade six. Delighted out of my mind i remember wearing them all over the house weeks before my first ballet lesson. Funny, however, that after a year I felt dejected, disappointed and frustrated that I was not as agile as the other dancers in my class. I knew that this was really not where my heart was, and so I abandoned that dream.
Mesmerized by the Ancient Egyptians, the next stage in my quest to my future was archaeology. I longed to be down in the ancient ruins, digging, translating the long-lost hieroglyphics and submersing myself in the dusty history. I read all the National Geographics I could get my hands on, even branching to the Incas and Mayans, just thirsty to know more. I tried teaching myself to read hieroglyphics and even sent a letter to an older cousin in England who was an archaeologist asking for advice. After finally coming to the sad conclusion that it was going to be a pretty boring and frustrating life being an archaeologist, needing to come up with big money for the digs, I abandoned that dream as well.
Along the road came the realization that I actually cared about people and their rights. In grade eight my humanities teacher introduced to the concept of child slavery and child soldiers all over the world by reading us the book "Iqbal" and telling us all about Free the Children and Invisible Children. My inquiry into child soldiers rocked my foundation as my eyes were opened to the great need in the world and the injustice that was so very prevalent. In my young fourteen-year-old mind, I decided the best way for me to be involved in world justice was to become a lawyer. Little did I comprehend that lawyers have no lives, no time for families and there is a lot of politics and corruption they need to wade through if they want to be honest and upright, especially to do pro bono work. Analyzing careers in Planning 10 swayed my mind far far away from law school.
Still passionate about justice and making a difference in the world, I wanted to use some of my gifts and skills as a potential career. I had always been complimented on my writing and I really enjoyed using my words to express my thoughts and emotions, so I started fantasizing about becoming a writer, even a journalist. Still in Planning 10, the cold, hard facts knocked me flat on my butt. Writers do not have a steady income, they get paid royalties on each book they write, people have to like it for one, and there needs to be very good finance budgeting in this case, which I did not have. I did look into journalism, but the thought of writing something that someone else wanted me to write and not something that was on my own heart did not appeal to me. Writing was officially out of the question...or so I thought.
But before I get too far ahead, I still had this huge heart to make a difference in the world, and I was convinced that I would find a career in which this would be fleshed out. I was tired of the myriad of relief organizations offering continual aid, aid that would be continued to be given as long as there was still need of aid. Something in me was convinced that if there was no injustice, there would be no need for aid. I wanted a career in which I would be part of eradicating and healing the wound, not just medicating it. As I continued to research, I was drawn in to crime scene investigation. To be completely honest, I adored shows such as CSI and Criminal Minds, always imagining myself solving these complex crimes, examining the evidence and slamming the perpetrators behind bars whilst rescuing the oppressed victims. This was something that I actually seriously considered for years. I had this huge heart especially for child slavery still, blossomed from my grade eight teacher, but now it had especially grown to a heart for human trafficking and especially the women caught up in the sex trade. I was determined to put an end to this disgusting living tragedy by becoming an crime scene investigator. I had plans to attend a local university to get my degree in Criminology and enter into the RCMP or municipal police force as soon as I got the chance. Well, Perspectives in Mission class and the Mexico missions trip changed all that.
During this past year in the Bible college/leadership training program called the Kaléo Program, I took a class called Perspective in Mission. I started to realize that maybe I had been quite misguided. My driving factor in searching for a future career had been justice and the plight of the oppressed people. This class opened my eyes to the fact I knew all too well - that bringing people to Christ and letting them know about His glory and His saving grace was of much greater purpose than to save them from injustice. In a way, the two are connected, because we show the love and grace of Christ when we free the oppressed from bondage, but that cannot be the only thing we do. Meeting physical needs and rendering justice is vitally important, but it is all useless unless we are bringing Christ into those broken places. People have a far greater need for Christ than for their physical needs to be met. Even if they are well fed, protected, safe and enjoying life, they have nothing if they do not have Christ in their hearts. This concept that I had known especially back when my own family were missionaries in Russia came alive again in bright, brilliant colours.
When I was on the missions trip to Él Papalote, Mexico for two weeks in February 2013, God took that opportunity almost I want to say like a carrot, giving me a taste of what exactly my life could look like if I finally just shut up and listened to His voice and not my own. I was leaning on the railing of the dorm building that we were staying in on a cool Mexican night, and I almost felt him saying to me, "You could be here." I did a double-take and was like, "What was that, God?" But I knew what he had said. I did not see a calling into missions at all before this trip, but I'm pretty sure I had just been pushing it away, ignoring the tug on my heart. I had fallen in love with Mexico and missions and it was not going away.
I returned back to Canada a confused mess. I was torn. It seemed that God was placing missions on my heart, but I still had such a passion for justice. Was I just supposed to ignore the plight of the trafficked women in my own backyard of Vancouver, or just abandon criminology? I didn't think God was calling me into ministry as a teacher or a youth worker... What was he saying?! While our group had gone to Missions Fest just a month prior, I had felt God stir my heart for missions around the world, as well as proclaiming justice among the nations. There had to be a way that this all fit together.
My last class in the program was Christian Worldviews, in which we had to write a paper of our choice discussing some kind of issue that pertained to worldviews as well as modernity and postmodernity. My professor practically pushed the Christian's role in the arts as a topic that I should write on. Although I was a writer and a photographer, loving creating and making art, I was pretty skeptical about the whole thing. As I was reading one of the research books for the paper, something that the author said stopped me dead in my tracks. I literally stared at the page and read the paragraph over and over until I texted my leader and asked her if we could talk about my future. The author had said that if God had gifted us with artistic talents and we had not been using it for his glory, then we are not stewarding it well and we need to take action and pursue the gifts he has given. I felt super convicted and tried to process what this meant for me. My leader talked to me about the different options in which this path could take me and where God could possibly be leading me, but it all came down to some pure, simple truths.
I need to look at my spiritual gifts, talents and passions/dreams and see where they all line up. God has not given me these to sit on a shelf and never be used, but he has a specific plan and calling on me to use those passions, dreams, gifts and talents for his glory. Where I am right now, I believe that God is pointing me to doing something like freelance photo journalism for mission organizations, capturing lives that God is changing and showing evidences of his grace through my writing and photos while pursuing justice and mission around the globe - in my own community and further away. Ironically enough, the desire of being a writer or a journalist was not something that I had stumbled upon by chance in grade ten, but rather something put there by God, a little seed planted deep in me that now has blossomed and bloomed into this incredible picture of the exciting life God has in store for me! That dream and desire that started primarily in Mexico has never fully gone away, and I know that a Hispanic or Spanish country is in my near future (one of my goals being to become fluent in Spanish). God has a path that he has set before me, and although I don't know what it is quite yet, I know that he has a plan for me and it is up to me to test and put myself out there, seeing where he is leading me.
"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your paths straight." -Proverbs 3:5-6
Mesmerized by the Ancient Egyptians, the next stage in my quest to my future was archaeology. I longed to be down in the ancient ruins, digging, translating the long-lost hieroglyphics and submersing myself in the dusty history. I read all the National Geographics I could get my hands on, even branching to the Incas and Mayans, just thirsty to know more. I tried teaching myself to read hieroglyphics and even sent a letter to an older cousin in England who was an archaeologist asking for advice. After finally coming to the sad conclusion that it was going to be a pretty boring and frustrating life being an archaeologist, needing to come up with big money for the digs, I abandoned that dream as well.
Along the road came the realization that I actually cared about people and their rights. In grade eight my humanities teacher introduced to the concept of child slavery and child soldiers all over the world by reading us the book "Iqbal" and telling us all about Free the Children and Invisible Children. My inquiry into child soldiers rocked my foundation as my eyes were opened to the great need in the world and the injustice that was so very prevalent. In my young fourteen-year-old mind, I decided the best way for me to be involved in world justice was to become a lawyer. Little did I comprehend that lawyers have no lives, no time for families and there is a lot of politics and corruption they need to wade through if they want to be honest and upright, especially to do pro bono work. Analyzing careers in Planning 10 swayed my mind far far away from law school.
Still passionate about justice and making a difference in the world, I wanted to use some of my gifts and skills as a potential career. I had always been complimented on my writing and I really enjoyed using my words to express my thoughts and emotions, so I started fantasizing about becoming a writer, even a journalist. Still in Planning 10, the cold, hard facts knocked me flat on my butt. Writers do not have a steady income, they get paid royalties on each book they write, people have to like it for one, and there needs to be very good finance budgeting in this case, which I did not have. I did look into journalism, but the thought of writing something that someone else wanted me to write and not something that was on my own heart did not appeal to me. Writing was officially out of the question...or so I thought.
But before I get too far ahead, I still had this huge heart to make a difference in the world, and I was convinced that I would find a career in which this would be fleshed out. I was tired of the myriad of relief organizations offering continual aid, aid that would be continued to be given as long as there was still need of aid. Something in me was convinced that if there was no injustice, there would be no need for aid. I wanted a career in which I would be part of eradicating and healing the wound, not just medicating it. As I continued to research, I was drawn in to crime scene investigation. To be completely honest, I adored shows such as CSI and Criminal Minds, always imagining myself solving these complex crimes, examining the evidence and slamming the perpetrators behind bars whilst rescuing the oppressed victims. This was something that I actually seriously considered for years. I had this huge heart especially for child slavery still, blossomed from my grade eight teacher, but now it had especially grown to a heart for human trafficking and especially the women caught up in the sex trade. I was determined to put an end to this disgusting living tragedy by becoming an crime scene investigator. I had plans to attend a local university to get my degree in Criminology and enter into the RCMP or municipal police force as soon as I got the chance. Well, Perspectives in Mission class and the Mexico missions trip changed all that.
During this past year in the Bible college/leadership training program called the Kaléo Program, I took a class called Perspective in Mission. I started to realize that maybe I had been quite misguided. My driving factor in searching for a future career had been justice and the plight of the oppressed people. This class opened my eyes to the fact I knew all too well - that bringing people to Christ and letting them know about His glory and His saving grace was of much greater purpose than to save them from injustice. In a way, the two are connected, because we show the love and grace of Christ when we free the oppressed from bondage, but that cannot be the only thing we do. Meeting physical needs and rendering justice is vitally important, but it is all useless unless we are bringing Christ into those broken places. People have a far greater need for Christ than for their physical needs to be met. Even if they are well fed, protected, safe and enjoying life, they have nothing if they do not have Christ in their hearts. This concept that I had known especially back when my own family were missionaries in Russia came alive again in bright, brilliant colours.
When I was on the missions trip to Él Papalote, Mexico for two weeks in February 2013, God took that opportunity almost I want to say like a carrot, giving me a taste of what exactly my life could look like if I finally just shut up and listened to His voice and not my own. I was leaning on the railing of the dorm building that we were staying in on a cool Mexican night, and I almost felt him saying to me, "You could be here." I did a double-take and was like, "What was that, God?" But I knew what he had said. I did not see a calling into missions at all before this trip, but I'm pretty sure I had just been pushing it away, ignoring the tug on my heart. I had fallen in love with Mexico and missions and it was not going away.
I returned back to Canada a confused mess. I was torn. It seemed that God was placing missions on my heart, but I still had such a passion for justice. Was I just supposed to ignore the plight of the trafficked women in my own backyard of Vancouver, or just abandon criminology? I didn't think God was calling me into ministry as a teacher or a youth worker... What was he saying?! While our group had gone to Missions Fest just a month prior, I had felt God stir my heart for missions around the world, as well as proclaiming justice among the nations. There had to be a way that this all fit together.
My last class in the program was Christian Worldviews, in which we had to write a paper of our choice discussing some kind of issue that pertained to worldviews as well as modernity and postmodernity. My professor practically pushed the Christian's role in the arts as a topic that I should write on. Although I was a writer and a photographer, loving creating and making art, I was pretty skeptical about the whole thing. As I was reading one of the research books for the paper, something that the author said stopped me dead in my tracks. I literally stared at the page and read the paragraph over and over until I texted my leader and asked her if we could talk about my future. The author had said that if God had gifted us with artistic talents and we had not been using it for his glory, then we are not stewarding it well and we need to take action and pursue the gifts he has given. I felt super convicted and tried to process what this meant for me. My leader talked to me about the different options in which this path could take me and where God could possibly be leading me, but it all came down to some pure, simple truths.
I need to look at my spiritual gifts, talents and passions/dreams and see where they all line up. God has not given me these to sit on a shelf and never be used, but he has a specific plan and calling on me to use those passions, dreams, gifts and talents for his glory. Where I am right now, I believe that God is pointing me to doing something like freelance photo journalism for mission organizations, capturing lives that God is changing and showing evidences of his grace through my writing and photos while pursuing justice and mission around the globe - in my own community and further away. Ironically enough, the desire of being a writer or a journalist was not something that I had stumbled upon by chance in grade ten, but rather something put there by God, a little seed planted deep in me that now has blossomed and bloomed into this incredible picture of the exciting life God has in store for me! That dream and desire that started primarily in Mexico has never fully gone away, and I know that a Hispanic or Spanish country is in my near future (one of my goals being to become fluent in Spanish). God has a path that he has set before me, and although I don't know what it is quite yet, I know that he has a plan for me and it is up to me to test and put myself out there, seeing where he is leading me.
"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your paths straight." -Proverbs 3:5-6
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