Seeds, Light and Dancing - A Kids' Club Reflection

Our team here in Venezuela recently finished a five-week kids' club in the neighboring barrio of San Pablito. SP has the reputation of being one of the oldest and most violent barrios in our part of Caracas. Walking into the barrio sometimes feels like you are walking into a cloud of darkness. If you pause long enough to take in the surroundings, you will find the barrio's main businesses, health clinic, primary school, a Catholic chapel, a game of dominoes and motorcycles recklessly zooming up and down the steep hill. You'll also find drunks stooped over on the side of the road, mothers hauling small children and groceries up the steep steps and groups of young men standing guard at strategic spots, watching the cars go by on the highway, ready to receive the next shipment of drugs or let their buddies know which marked man has just passed by as they fight for power in their crazy, twisted game of revenge. When taking us on a tour of the neighborhood, a Venezuelan friend said,

"that guy in the baseball cap you just shook hands with killed my cousin last week."

Everyone is connected in strange, often dangerous ways. Violence has wreaked havoc on every family.

The InnerCHANGE team has worked in San Pablito several times before and we knew what kind of an intense environment we were walking into. As we prayed before the first club, many of us saw visions of light for SP and we were reminded of the opening words in the book of John, speaking of the power of God's light and how the darkness has not and will not overcome it. Strengthened by these words, we ventured into SP twice a week to sing songs, play games, perform dramas, laugh, dance, teach and learn with a group of amazing six to twelve-year-olds. They delighted us with their joy, wore us out with their energy, inspired us with their creativity, dazzled us with their dance skills and gave us hope that another way of living is possible.

We don't know what the future holds for the kids in San Pablito. Looking back on the club, we are encouraged by the seeds that were planted, frustrated by the inconsistent attendance of many of the kids, angered by the violence right outside our door (we saw drug deals right in front of the school and one club had to be canceled because a young man was shot and killed on the highway in front of the barrio right before we arrived) and cautiously hopeful that some of what we taught will stick with these kids and guide them down the path of truth. Twice a week the gunshots ringing off the hills had competition from the laughter bouncing off the walls of the chapel and the light of God's word was brought forth through singing and dancing.

I thank God for your prayers and for the amazing kids in San Pablito. Please continue to pray that the darkness will continue to be pushed back by God's light and the children will keep singing, dancing and laughing God's Kingdom into being.

Just for fun, I've included one of my favorite videos of singer/songwriter/activist Michael Franti dancing in the streets of a favela in Rio de Janeiro. Every time I watch this video, I smile because it reminds me of the streets I'm privileged to walk everyday and reminds me of the good in the midst of the madness. Enjoy!

Spring!

Happy spring, everyone! Here in Detroit, the sun is out, the piles of snow are gone and the sap is making sticky rivers on its way down the trunks of the sugar maple trees.

For me, though, the sure sign that spring is coming is when I see the first crocuses peek their heads above ground and give us some of the year's first color. So in tribute to these very small but very brave flowers, I'll share a reflection I wrote last year about this time on some of my favorite harbingers of hope:

Pick a symbol that represents who you are becoming in Christ;
or
If you could be a flower, what flower would you be?

Winter in Michigan is long and its hold on us is deep. It is bitterly cold, often windy and the sun rarely shines. The snow that blankets our world in white quickly turns brown from the dirt of our lives. Muddy piles of crusty snow accumulate along the roads and ice coats the sidewalks, making a simple stroll around the neighborhood a slippery, inconvenient and sometimes dangerous journey. By early March, we are so hungry and so needy for warmth that we'll roll down the windows in our car and parade around in shorts the first day the temperature goes over fifty degrees. In spite of spring's valient efforts to arrive bringing warmth and color, winter's nails dig deep and it will still snow well into the late part of March making us wonder if spring might forget to come alltogether this year.

But every year as I'm walking along bundled up, I'll see a flash of purple or yellow peeking through the patches of snow on the ground. I'll look closer and see a crocus, the tiny, colorful flowers with grass-like leaves that are the first flowers to bloom in spring. Crocuses are amazingly resilient flowers. They bloom at the first touch of warmth and can withstand the snow, wind and rain even after they've pushed through the ground. I welcome their presence on my late winter walk with a grateful smile and return home with an extra jump in my step, knowing that despite the bitter wind and the cold that lingers, spring is on its way.

I traveled to Staten Island, New York in March of 1999 on a mission trip in college. My favorite picture I took during my stay was a picture of the first crocus I saw that year. We were working at a church that had burned down in a fire, helping to clear away rubble so the construction workers could build a new sanctuary. The crocus I saw was blooming under a broken crate, making its home among the rubble and ash in the side lot of the church. I instinctively new that this flower was symbolic and I am so grateful I took that picture.

I love that picture. And I love the crocus. I love these tiny ambassadors of hope, these little touches of beauty blooming from the ashes, these splashes of color among the grey and the brown.

I have a lot I can learn from crocuses. And I know that as I continue to watch and pray and connect to the Sower of every good seed, I, too, am becoming an ambassador of hope, a sign of beauty growing from the ashes, a splash of color among the grey and the brown.

I hope you find your own "crocus" today and it makes you pause, reflect and smile.

Where did you get the name for this blog?

Last year I took my second mission trip to Honduras. As usually happens with these trips, the transition back into American life was much more difficult than the transition to Latin America. A thousand thoughts and emotions were swirling around my heart and head as I desperately tried to put words to what I had seen, thought and felt on the journey. Last February I reflected:

I flew, stumbled, jumped, sang, kicked, ran, swam and stood, sometimes all at the same time. I saw so many things that make me want to shake my fist at the sky. I heard too much that makes me want to cry. I’m trying to get used to life in the States again. But a huge part of me is still watching orphans jump for joy, still singing silly songs and giggling, still staring at the Caribbean with the breeze in my face, still listening to the Honduran rain drown out the noise in my head. I am still in the bed of a Honduran pickup truck, zooming down the highway in a haze of blue and green, my face to the wind and my back to the world. I am ruined for the ordinary.

This is the mess of the Kingdom. This is the reality of love. Not every story ends with a swelling crescendo of orchestra strings, a kiss and a ride into the sunset. We are hurting, we are bleeding and we are desperately searching for some light. But as we seek, we find glimpses of glory and tiny sparks of joy. When the thunder, lightning and rain stop for a moment, we find ourselves standing knee deep in a pool of grace.

I hope you get a taste of grace today.