Back From D.C. - IJM & Other Highlights

"Who do I work for? I work for those who are suffering!" - Gary Haugen, President & CEO, International Justice Mission

This past week I was in Washington, D.C. attending International Justice Mission's (IJM) pre-field orientation week. I have long respected and been fond of IJM, but after this week, I can honestly say "astounding" is an understatement to describe who Amber and I are working for. Hear these words here first, IJM is redefining what Christian work looks like and is setting the standard for future generations. Wrought with professionalism and excellence, IJM is equipped with a powerhouse of well-qualified and experienced staff from all realms of life; be it government, investigators and law enforcement personnel, lawyers, trauma and aftercare specialist, corporate world, or pastoral - IJM is qualified and taking action. This, though, should not be a surprise at all in light of their line of work.

In posts to come, I look forward to sharing more about the foundational values of IJM which motivates their corporate governing structure.

Some Highlights from D.C.

- Becoming adept in IJM and what they do makes us all the more humbled and honored to be a part of what they're doing.

- Getting to ride the Metro. I always enjoyed riding the Metro trains in Chicago. I didn't know D.C. had the same set-up. When I flew in and had to buy a rail card, I was pumped for the adventure!

- Meeting the IJM staff, Fellows, and Interns.

- Spending time with John Ginn. It was great to see and talk with an old friend in person, instead of normally on the phone.

- Meeting Dr. Douglas Elmendorf. Do you know who this is? Perhaps not. Dr. Elmendorf is an American economist and the director of the CBO (Congressional Budget Office). He is overseeing right now with a group of others the priorities in helping our economy recover.

Things I'll be Looking Forward To While In D.C.

This coming Sunday I will be flying to Washington D.C. for the entirety of the upcoming week. While there, I will be attending training week at International Justice Mission's Headquarters. Although I am greatly looking forward to being with IJM's staff and other field workers I will be working alongside of, there are at the same time, some things I will be missing about home. Thus, below are some things I am looking forward to and others I am not:

I am looking forward to:

- Spending a week with world class talent and a world class organization taking action against injustice

- Hopefully stopping by the National Archives and the Lincoln Memorial (I can remember being there when I was younger and have always wanted to return!)

- Receiving complimentary Coca-Cola while flying (Coke is my favorite pop; all the more is it when it's free and served to you!)

- Visiting with the one, the only - John Ginn! (John is one of my closest and most long-term buds. He recently transferred to American Law School, which so happens to be in D.C.)

- Just being in D.C. What an electric place to be! (I've always been a good rhymer)

I am not looking forward to:
- Being away from my dear Am for a week. Except for being in the Philippines while Amber planned our wedding, this will be the longest we've been a part both before and since we've been married.
- Being away from Isaiah! I won't see my little big guy for a whole week! He's already walking. He'll have his license by the time I return!

 
- I'll miss being away from the youth group I oversee at Bethel

- And, I'll miss working on the farm here in Fremont. This job is a blast, but there's no doubt, there will be plenty of work to do upon my return.

Happy Anniversary!

Drew and I celebrated two years of marriage last Sunday, August 7th! And what a wonderful two years it has been! There have been ups and downs, happy times and sad times...and lots and lots of learning experiences. =) I love living life with my very best friend. It has been an amazing ride so far!

In our two short years together we have lived in two different apartments in two different states, started our support raising to move to Uganda, and added an adorable, fun, funny, and incredible blessing of a baby to our family (and we'll soon be adding to our familiy again- yes...we're getting a cat!). Also, Drew graduated from Moody Bible Institute, rode a roller coaster (can I just say that was very difficult to get him to do..but he loved it!), and is loving his job as a youth pastor (and farmer!). I am loving my job as a mom! It is the most rewarding job and there is nothing that can describe a mother's love for her baby! Every day Isaiah makes us laugh and brings so much joy into our home. What a wonderful blessing children are!

Anyways, to celebrate our two year anniversary my always romantic hubby booked a surprise weekend in Machinaw City for us! I had never been there before and have always wanted to go. What a great surprise it was. We had a wonderful time! Just wish we could have stayed longer. =)



We took the ferry over to Mackinac Island for one of the days. Isaiah loved the boat!



Daddy and Isaiah went up to the very top of the ferry to feel the wind!



Just landed on the island. Excited for a fun day!




Mackinac Island is beautiful. Lots of fun shops and things to see.



We took a bike ride around the entire island. Isaiah rode in a burley behind our tandom bike.




Drew was in the front of the bike so he did all the hard pedaling and the steering. I got to sit back and relax. =)

No cars are allowed on the island. Only bikes and horse drawn carriages.



Isaiah made himself right at home in the burley and fell asleep within minutes!

It was so fun to ride on a bike yet not have to look where I was going. I took lots of pictures along the way!

Isaiah had fun in the toy store!



On one of the days we went to an indoor water park. Isaiah LOVED the water!



He wasn't too sure about the waterslide though... =)

It was a great weekend with my favorite husband and my favorite son! I am so blessed to have such a great family. =) I can't wait to celebrate many many more anniversaries with Drew!



Compassion's Reaction

Jesus allowed his heart to be the handle which the needs of others turned to open the door of healing.

Mark 1:41
καὶ σπλαγχνισθεὶς ἐκτείνας τὴν χεῖρα αὐτοῦ ἥψατο καὶ λέγει• θέλω, καθαρίσθητι.
“And being filled with compassion, he (Jesus) wholly extended his arm touching him and said, ‘I am willing – be healed.’”

There is much we can glean from this lone verse. We first realize that Jesus first saw the leper and then was filled with compassion.
σπλαγχνισθεὶς (“being filled with compassion”) is in what is called the passive voice. This simply means that it was the physical state of the leper which filled Christ’ heart with compassion.

APPLICATION
1 – If we have our eyes upon others and their needs, we will become burdened for them.
2 – Jesus opened his heart to the world allowing the needs of others to evoke him to take action and do something for them.
3 – Jesus moved toward this leper. The world promotes people coming to you, to serve you. Christ modeled going to others, to serve them.

Next, Jesus wholly extended (ἐκτείνας) his arm out to apply his healing touch to the leper. This word ἐκτείνας can literally mean to extend to full length. This says much of how we are to reach out to those around us. Jesus went against the norm in reaching out to someone who otherwise was overlooked and forgotten by society. Furthermore, he reached out all the way to this person!

APPLICATION
4 – Hold nothing back when it comes to serving others and may we not be afraid to go the extra step and do what we can, whether little or much for others, despite how we look in the eyes of modern culture.
Finally, through Jesus’ touch, this man is healed. Today, we live as God’s healing hand in the world, with him touching lives through us.

For Jesus, helping someone could mean, as it does here, healing them from their disease. God could still do this through someone today, but for the most part, helping others could be anything between faithfully praying for someone or going to help orphans in Africa. The needs of those around us are great and many. However, like Jesus, we must allow those needs to fill us with compassion which in turn, will lead us to do something.
Who is the friend you know who just found out they have cancer? Who do you know who just lost their job or is still looking for one? Who is the young person who is struggling in a home recently ransacked by divorce? A little encouragement, a meal offered, a listening ear, or even something as simple as faithfully praying for them may just be the healing touch of Jesus in their life.

Jesus' Mission Statement

Imagine arriving at church this Sunday, sitting in your favorite pew or seat. As the service begins, you notice one of the junior high students from the youth group walks up to the pulpit. You think for a moment, "Oh, this will be cute, we're having one of the youth do an opening song or the church announcements." To your utter shock, the lone youth begins to rattle off facts regarding the Second Coming of Christ, but then brings it to a awe-striking climatic end by saying this, "Today, these words have been fulfilled in your midst!"

To some extent, that's comparative to what Jesus did in a synagogue in Nazareth. Jesus stood to orally submit his, mission statement:

"The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me

to preach good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners

and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, 

to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." (Luke 4:18-19)

Then he concluded by saying that these words, this prophecy of the Messiah has been fulfilled.

I believe this pericope is Christ' mission statement. I also believe it provides a healthy plumb-line for us to answer well whether or not we are living out the gospel. And, if we investigate these texts of scripture a little more elaborately, we find that the gospel is not merely about preaching a message with the goal of saving a soul, but is also about the restoring, redeeming, and rehabilitation of a life. The good news which Christ came to deliver is a complete gospel, what Richard Stearns (author of The Hole In Our Gospel) has come to call the whole gospel. That is to say, the good news Jesus proclaimed was news which was experienced both spiritually as well as tangibly. 

In looking at this passage from Luke 4, we see five hallmarks which make up the aims of this good news Christ came to deliver. 

First, we see a call to preach good news to the poor. It's important that we take note of whom this good news was to be preached to - the poor. It is equally important that we not limit poor to those of a lower economic status. Christ was no doubt referring to the financially destitute of our society, that specifically the poor play a specific role in God's missional plan to in-break his kingdom into our world. Often times the poor are victims of economic oppression in countries, thus making them incapable of being self-sustaining. For example, while in Uganda working with IJM, we will be working amongst victims who have had their property seized illegally, leaving them without any land to grow a crop, have a dwelling area, and or raise some sort of livestock (Read a real property grabbing story). Without land, they have no chance of supplying anything which is in demand, and thus, cannot survive. 

Here in the West, we have a tendency to frown upon the poor of inner cities, being deceived by the notion that they deserve to be poor only because of poor choices. Though there is truth to poor choices which one may have made, thus evoking their financial state, that is not to evoke a judgment from others upon them. Instead, regardless if someone is what society displays as poor because of poor choices or if someone is destitute due to suffering from a form of injustice, as Christians, we are still to be moved to do something. This gospel, the whole gospel, is one which transcends this economic barrier and breaks the dam around our heart allowing to flow freely what needs to be tears of compassion. This compassion is to move us to these individuals, taking action on their behalf.

At the same time, poverty is not merely an economic state. It is also a spiritual one. People become millionaires regularly, and more and more are crossing over to ten figures (making them a billionaire). Whether middle class, millionaires or billionaires, without Christ, you are eternally poor. And thus, we learn another token of this whole gospel: every economic class is an audience for this gospel. This gospel, is good news for all.

2011 Family Pictures

A couple of weeks ago we got some awesome family pictures taken by Kim DeLong of Studio 9 Photography. They turned out great and I wanted to post a few of them on our blog for you to see! There are so many good ones I'm having a hard time deciding which ones to hang up! I love them all! =) By the way, Kim does a great job at a great price. Check her out if you live in the Fremont area!

There's A Hole In Our Gospel

There are several books worthy of reading on the shelves these days (and several not worth reading!), probably too many. Actually, each time I find myself in a bookstore (which use to be often) I would find myself overwhelemed for I wanted to read several of the books I was scimming through, but knew I would be unable to due to time restraints.

Nevertheless, there is one book I read during the week following Isaiah's birth which has left quite the indelible impression upon my life: Richard Stearns' The Hole In Our Gospel.

Stearns' (MBA, Wharton School of Business) was a CEO at 2 premier companies. In light of Stearns' distinctive business career, he had quite the skill set, so much so that God saw him fit to become the current president of World Vision (One of the leading Christian humanitarian organizations).  

This is a dangerous book. Dangerous in a good sort of way. It's dangerous in the sense that in reading it, you may discover that the gospel you may be living your life by is a gospel with a gapping hole in it, and thus, not the complete and true good news Christ exemplifies and calls us to embrace. I no of no one who has read this book who hasn't been moved to take action upon serving others, investing in God's work locally and or around the world in some way, or learning more about what it means to biblically seek justice.

I am now reading through it again for the second time and am hoping to walk through portions of the book through a series of blog posts. Feel free to comment regarding anything I share regarding Stearns' understanding of the gospel and what it means to live and share the whole gospel in our world today.

My hope in discussing some areas of this book will be that we will learn that the good news of Christ Jesus is an ongoing story in which we have a great role to play. Part of our role is magnifying the main character of that story - Jesus - but doing it of course in word, while not forgetting to do it in deed.