the least of these

Last week I taught Jesus how to knit. We sat on the dirty cement floor of his small, plain, concrete-block house, the sun streaking through the torn flowered material that was his door. I had bought him some brightly-coloured yarn, needles, and a knitting book filled with trendy patterns, and had meekly presented them to him as his five half-clothed children gathered around, curiously rumaging through my bag and playing with its contents - an iPod, a Latin American Spanish phrase book, a camera, a pair of sunglasses, some lip gloss, and lots and lots of yarn. Fumbling through directions in Spanish and Creole, I slowly taught him (with lots of hand gestures to copy me) how to cast on, purl, change colors (he had trouble with this one), cast off, and sew up the finished product - a lime green, teal blue, and chocolate brown-coloured camera case that he could sell at the local fair-trade art co-op. Every hour or so we'd stand up to take a break, and I'd go outside to play with the kids and their friends on the dirt roads of the Haitian community they were apart of on the north shore of the Dominican Republic. Having gone there to visit my friend who works in the community and to do what I could to help, it was my desire to provide him with a skill that would help him put some food into his children's bloated stomachs. Throughout the four days, after I hiked up to his shack on a hill, as he was stitching away, the Spanish phrase book came in handy as I sought to discover a little about his life. As we talked, joked, and listened to music, we became friends. I grew to love the kids, too, as we jumped rope, drew pictures with sidewalk chalk, and played Cats and the Cradle. On the last day, I gave them some clothes, soap, crayons, paper, and other gifts, and as I decended slowly down the hill towards the rest of the village, I realized that I had come to know the Friend of the Poor in a way I never had before.

Now replace Jesus with Romona, a Haitian woman who works at La Tienda, Rachel's fair trade art co-op, and you have what Jesus talked about in Matthew 25:44-46:

Then they also will answer, saying, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?' Then he will answer them, saying, 'Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.' And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.

Through the reading of two very profound books (see below) and my experience with Ramona, I realized what Jesus was really saying here. On the Last Day, the very authenticity of our salvation will be measured not by the soundness of our theology or by what we claim to believe, but by how we treat "the least of these" in our society. By responding in love to the deperate needs of the poor, the lonely, and the rejected, we are literally responding to the God-Incarnate himself. Jesus becomes alive in the eyes of the lowly, and by reaching out to them we are opening ourselves up to a deeper undestanding of the gospel and intimacey with God that we could never know otherwise. Read the Gospels, and you can't miss that Jesus was all about befriending the forgotten, the lonely, the most-gossiped about, and the rejected. Translate that into modern culture and you will get the homeless, the poor (anyone trying to live on a non-living wage), the abused (emotionally, sexually, physically, or economically), the "socially awkard," the "loners," the "sexually loose," the "unfashionable," the "annoying," and the "fill-in-this-blank-with-whomever-you-seek-to-avoid." He sought them out not to patronize them with charity or write them a cheque to ease his conscience, but to befriend them, live among them, and share with them the love and grace of their Creator. This is the radically compassionate character of the God of the Bible. This is the very nature of the Upside-Down Kingdom of Jesus, of which we are all gently beckoned to be a part of.

There are two books that have shone the light so brightly on this urgent message that I was greatly disturbed with my own self-absorption and complacency. They helped me to see that I have been so focussed on my own existence and "issues" that I have not been fully denying myself and radically following this Way of God, that is to look so counter-cultural that it brings hope, love, and justice to a world full of cyclical injustice, cut-throat competiveness for money, power, and popularity, and abandonement of the desperate. They are:

1) The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical by Shane Claiborne

Highly readable, intensely inspiring, and disturbingly challenging, the author of this book is the Founder of The Simple Way, an intential Christian community that lives in the poorest ghettos of Philadephia. Believing firmly that Jesus meant what he said in the Beatitudes (blessed are the poor, meek, lowly, hungry and thirsty for righteousness, etc.) and how he lived his life (seeking out the forgotten, abandoned, and rejected to love and meet their needs), the Simple Way seeks to befriend the poor and homeless, fight against the social injustice against them, and actually meet their needs by sharing with them their food, clothes, and other resources. Having gone from the jail cells in the inner city to the slums of Calcutta to the war-torn neighbourhoods in Iraq (on a peace mission), Shane's semi-autobiographical work will seriously cause you to question why the heck you've been sitting on your butt. If you're comfortable with where your life is now, don't read this book. It may cause you to want to actually follow Jesus, which could, as Shane says, wreck everything.

2) God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It by Jim Wallis

For those who are frustrated with the self-righteousness ignorance of the Religious Right and doubtful still of the cynical Left, this book will help you see that God is not a Republican...or a Democrat, but cares about how we deal with poverty, the environment, war, injustice, and many other issues. He talks about the danger of claiming that the evildoers are "out there" and not within our own actions and policies, and claims that our faith should motivate us to stand in the way of injustice, needless violence, disregard of the environment, tax cuts for the rich, abandonement of the poor, and make our voices heard on every individual issue instead of being loyally partisan, and if God is on one side or the other. A must-read for people like me who love to talk about the two biggest taboo topics out there: religion and politics! Or for those who are simply seeking clarification as to how Christians should be involved in politics in a way that shows the world the love, grace, and justice of God.

If anyone in Korea is interested in starting a book club with either of these books, let me know, I'd LOVE to hear all your prospectives on them and discuss all this more, and then actually go and do something about what we learn. We can have it at my new apartment! Go here to order from within Korea and receive it in 10 days.

To those who are still reading, you deserve a medal. Thanks for reading about what I've been learning. May the God who loves the least of these surround you in all you do this week.




Peace,

Jen

p.s. Click on the flickr badge on the right to see the rest of my pics from the trip, plus some old pics of nepal i took years ago that i just recently came across, which actually just emailed to Shane to have published in his new book, Jesus for President. Check out his website for more details.

Koranglish

Well, its been four days since i landed in the Dominican Republic, and I'm just starting to train my tongue to stop speaking Korean when I know I need to communicate something in Spanish. I´ve been automatically responding with "Ney" (Korean for "yes") instead of "Si" and "Kumsumnida" (Korean for "thankyou") instead of "gracious." People here must think I´m from some crazy little European country whose language they´ve never heard before. haha. Although, I have decided that I am enrolling in Spanish classes as soon as I get back to Korea (how´s that for ironic), because I LOVE the language and have an eerie feeling that I will be needing it one day. I love it here. The people, music, food, and buildings are so full of life. Being with Rachel has been so comforting, rejuvanating, relaxing and inspiring - like simultaneously coming home, going to church, sleeping in, and enrolling in school. Even though much time has passed since we last saw each other, we are still the same together. We really love each other, and its been nice just to rest in that. She has felt blessed by all the gifts, cards, and presnts that have been sent with me, which has been a blessing to me as well to see her feel so loved. And seeing La Tienda has been wonderful. Everything inside of it - the women included - is soooo enchantingly beautiful. We´ve only been into the village once so far, the rest of the time I´ve been helping Rachel get some much needed away/relaxation time, with no complaints from me! So we´ve gone to the beach 3 times, and have just read, knitted, painted, sat in charming little beach-front restaurants, and talked. It´s been wonderful. I´ve been knitting some examples of iPod/camera bags to use to teach our sole knitter tomorrow at la tienda, I´m excited (the bikini idea is out, since Rachel didn´t think it was simple enough, plus it might not sell seeing as alot of the packages to sell are sent to churches/mission organizations...boo!). So, tomorrow will be great to spend real time in the co-op with the women...

Until next time....ciao!

Baby Got Book

freakin' hilarioius. that's all i have to say.