Love your neighbor as yourself…

I think that overall we have a good understanding about loving our neighbors.  Things like blood drives, Habitat for Humanity builds, mission trips to impoverished  areas, Doctors Without Borders, food pantries, and canned food drives have become commonplace not only in the church, but in our neighborhood and community organizations.  We can love our neighbors.  We can hope for the best for their families and children.  We can go to an event or spend a week in mission and then return to our comfortable routines. 
Let’s consider what happens when we love so much we can feel it, when our routines are replaced by the messiness that is loving your neighbor as yourself?  How easily and how often are we doing that?  What does it look like to love someone as I do myself?  This kind of love is hard within the walls of our own homes.  It is you go first love, you take the remote love, and you pick the thermostat temperature love.   As yourself love takes time and energy keeping the ego in check in order to put the needs of others before your own.  As yourself love can be hard to show to those who are easy to love. As yourself love is sacrificial love.  Yet, Jesus keeps gently calling out, love them as yourself, love your spouse, your sibling, your child, your neighbor.  Make sacrifices for them; get into the messiness of life with them.

 So, let us answer this call to love those around us, yes including our neighbors so much that we feel it!

To learn to love a neighbor is a lifetime lesson.  It is not something that is mastered.  The neighbors keep changing.  We keep changing.  Our life circumstances keep changing.  The call to love never changes...

I thought I learned how to love my neighbors during the seven years I was a participant and then a staff member at Mountain T.O.P., a ministry in Tennessee that is truly a “love in action” classroom where the people of the Cumberland Mountains are served by youth and adults in the way of home repair as well as programs for local youth and children.

I made a different discovery when I recently had the opportunity to go home and be present with my parents who are in the middle of the battle that is cancer, one with surgery and the other with chemotherapy.   Going home, I had time to spend with the neighbors I grew up with, neighbors that were stopping over to love and care for my parents, the same neighbors were a part of the “village” that raised me.  Neighbors brought food, weeded flower beds, cleaned the house, tilled the garden, and simply spent time visiting and listening.  Reflecting on this made me realize, I have been learning to love my neighbor my whole life. 

It is easy to love these neighbors.  People I have known my whole life, who also love me.  Our call to love our neighbor as ourselves takes us further down the road to the extra mile.  It urges us to keep climbing higher and love even when it is not easy.  It is hard to love others when you are suffering yourself or when you do not understand someone no matter what the differences are, yet the still small voice will continue to urge us to move in the ways of love even in these circumstances.    It has become clear to me that though it is a good thing to get behind worthy causes and love all God’s people far and near, it is loving the folks whose paths you cross every day in real and tangible ways that make a long and lasting impact. 

Make it Personal

It's nothing personal...." 

Words that are usually not the ones that a person wants to hear.  It makes me wonder, is it really possible to avoid taking things personal? Especially, when nine times out of ten, the statement attached to the disclaimer is usually something about you or that affects you.  I have heard those words in discussions related to the working out of life in a neighborhood in transition.  Things are not like they used to be.  In my eyes it is an exciting difference filled with bright colors and fun new adventures.  Yet, I realize that it is different for me, I chose the neighborhood because I liked the growing diversity and because I have become a part of that transition.  For another, the changing community might symbolize a change of life, or the entrance to the stage of life where it feels like the world is changing around them.  Some may have grown up with certain opinions or ideas that make it difficult to be welcoming of such great changes.  For others it might be a matter of security, of no longer being able to count on things being how they always were and for whatever reason, change is, at this moment in their lives, overwhelming and causing them to feel out of control. 

Whatever your reaction may be, those of us who are living in places that are growing in diversity and ethnicity it is a challenge.  How do we value the roots of this community while also allowing it to grow and flourish in a new way?  How do we challenge life long values that do not account for folks who did not group up with the same custom or dress or speech?  How can we accept those whose opinions differ from our own?  How do we answer these questions as a community of faith? 

As I look at my own journey, I realized my first few steps towards answering these questions internally came when I allowed things to get personal when I met brothers and sisters in Christ while on a mission trip in Central America.  I not only made new acquaintances, I made friends, friends that inspired me to take a look into my own heart and a take a look around my own neighborhood.  There was some discomfort and even fear, but after I came home, I decided to pursue more friends from other places.  The friends I had made helped me to get a glimpse of the God who created all people and I wanted to see more.  I am not saying that seeking to be in relationship with God's people outside of those whom we are most comfortable is the answer, or even the one answer, learning to live together is a complicated and messy task.  I am saying that it is worthwhile, and it will change your life and hopefully your heart and maybe your path.  I do feel confident in saying that stepping closer to someone that has differences from you-no matter what they are and yet is made in the image of God might just help you see more of the God you are striving to serve. 

Lift Them Up

“Lift them up,” that is the statement that was used when I was doing my work with the Department of Children's Services with families in the foster care system.  When I reflect upon the fact that this statement is what drives the work of a state agency, I am amazed.  I am amazed that a system that is not faith based could have such a faith filled statement. Lift them up.  In this season of lent, I think of fasting and the passage in Isaiah about true fasting, ...to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free...to share your bread with the hungry...bring the homeless poor into your house...(Isaiah 58:6,7).  This sounds like lifting people up.    

As a community of faith, how much more should we be faithful to living out our life as the church by carrying out the love of Christ and lifting people up.  The Bridging Ministries Team at Hillcrest, formerly known as Multicultural Ministries, has decided that as a way of growing our ESL ministry, we would like to lift up the children of our ESL students and those living in our surrounding community by providing homework help.  Imagine the challenge it would be to try to assist your child with homework that was taught and explained in another language.  What an opportunity we have to lift them up and bring light to the darkness of feeling helpless to meet your child’s needs! If you are interested in assisting with this new mission, please contact Rocio Martinez or Keri Lopez. 

I pray in this season of lent you would prayerfully consider picking up something new, something that would lift up someone around you, or even better, get into the habit of lifting up and encouraging all those in your path. 

Peace, Keri

Encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing. -I Thessalonians 5:11

What if the neighbors are weird....

"Why don't they just learn English?"  I hear it, I use to say it.  That is until I started teaching English as a Second Language.  And maybe it was challenging because I had an hour training session and was given a class to teach!  Baptism by fire is what I believe it is called.  It ended up being the adventure of at least this part of my lifetime, an adventure that changed my heart and my footsteps.  An adventure I never intended to take, but was drawn by the desire to walk where Jesus walked.  To walk in faith that Jesus was with me and to walk in the love Jesus desires us to have for our neighbors. 

I discovered a few things, the first thing was how difficult learning English really is.  I was taking a foreign language class at the same time I was teaching English.  The foreign language has rules that it follows.  If you can read it, you can pronounce it.  English is full of exceptions and silent letters.  It takes a child, whose minds are like sponges, four years to be textbook fluent in another language.  English is hard.  As I have entered adulthood I have recognized that my mind is less like a sponge and learning and retaining something new is difficult, and at five years of studying this language, I am still not textbook fluent. 

The other thing that hit me was that maybe the neighbors were not so weird after all.  Language barrier seemed to be the biggest fear and the biggest obstacle.  I was surprised to find that it is overcome-able.  That, yes, there were moments where I had to take a deep breath and dive into the unknown, but smiles, laughter, and large hand gestures can be very effective.  Now, I might not have been able to discuss politics, but maybe that is for the best.  I also discovered that I had far more things in common with my students than I would have ever considered.  And they were the important things.  Love of family.  Faith in God.  Hope for a better future.  The best for their children.  A job to work at.  Food to eat.  Clothes to wear.  The love of laughter.  Curiosity.  The love of music.  All the things that make us human.  I began to appreciate more and more the fact that my neighbors and I were all created in the image of God as the fear melted away and I began to love my students and experience my students loving me through kind words and acts of kindness.   

Let's call it like it is.  Jesus told us to do it.   "Love your neighbor as yourself."  As with his parable of the Good Samaritan, we do not actually get to choose our neighbors.  This is difficult for us in a world of neighborhood associations and gated communities.  Who is my neighbor?  That is the questions we continue to ask, trying to stall and get some leverage or control.  But, like a shepherd he wants to lead us, away from what is less than God's best intentions for us and into experiencing the decadent love of God for us and through us. 

Facing Nineveh.

The call to love our neighbor sometimes tests us to what we perceive to be our very limits.  Jesus has other dreams for our potential in furthering His Kingdom.  Love God and love your neighbor as yourself, he says.  This is the greatest commandment.  Everything hangs on this He says.  Jonah is a story of someone God called to love some neighbors that he did not believe deserved the mercy of his God.  God had another opinion of this group of people he created in His very own image.  And even though it was the One True God who had invited him on this mission to Nineveh, Our friend Jonah did not change his mind. He chose to go his own way.  Apparently it is not always a matter of saying no to God and walking away.  On this occasion, God just let him go.  No, he continued to pursue Jonah, to “persuade” him, if you will, to go and speak truth and extend mercy on these people Jonah decided were undeserving.   After three unpleasant days, Jonah, by all accounts a man of God, a prophet even, grudgingly decided to go and do what God had called him to do.  And to his dismay, the people repented and turned to God and were shown mercy. 

I believe we all have our Ninevites.  I certainly was faced with neighbors that were hard to love in my tenure as a Social Worker.  Some of the people in my Nineveh were adults and youth who sexually abused others, who abused children, who had given up on their children, who exploited their children for the sake of gaining ground in an ugly custody battle.  Sometimes, through the grace of God I was able to overcome my rage over the evil that one person had inflicted on another with compassion that was able to recognize the brokenness that motivated their actions.  Sometimes, I grudgingly gave them fair treatment solely for the sake of “doing my job.” 

The truth here is that it is not our determination of a person’s worthiness or value, not as someone who has decided to follow Jesus.  He has placed a value of priceless on every last one of us.  Each one is someone to pursue and welcome into His Kingdom.  It is we who create the barriers and the distance between one another.  We allow education, income level, race, language, profession, and even appearance to create miles between us when the truth is we are cut from the same cloth.  The same threads of the canvas have been woven together with great thought and intention to create a beautiful masterpiece for the Creator to enjoy.  Love, laughter, and our sacred relationships supercede culture and are the common thread of who we were created to be.  This is the power of the gospel, of living in the Kingdom Way. This is what has historically gotten people killed.  The way of the Kingdom turns everything upside down, the first shall be last, and the last shall be first.  The security we had in moving up any sort of ladder to increase our status is meaningless.  In the Kingdom we are all on the level.  Broken, yet loved, confident, but with nothing to boast about, for we are in the Kingdom by the same mercy and grace we have all received from our One Savior. 

What my neighbor said about Jesus.

Wednesday night was registration night for ESL classes.  We are approaching five years of holding these classes and the last year has been quite different.  Last year we went from a 3% non-Hispanic group of students to a 30% group of non-Hispanic students, and on Wednesday, the students that registered were a pretty even mix of folks from Nepal, Iraq, Iran, Mexico, and Central America.  One of our new students had a lot to say while we were testing to see which level would be most appropriate for him. 

His English was quite advanced for someone who had been in the country for a mere four months as a refugee from Bhutan.  He talked about being born in Nepal and living there until the government started persecuting the people who were practicing Buddhist rather than the Hindu religion.  At that time his family was relocated to a refugee camp, where he spent the next twenty years of his life, and where he met Jesus.  He talked about having to meet in secret and having to hide his Bible when he carried it with him.  And he talked about how Jesus is the reason to live. 

His passion brought me to tears, as I thought of him taking risks so he could grow in his knowledge of Christ, and meet with his fellow believers.  I thought of all the seemingly trivial excuses I had come up with over the years to put off reading a Bible that I have never had to hide to ensure my physical safety.  I thought about the times I just didn't feel like driving over to church and gave up opportunities to be a part of the community of faith, a community that is like a family to me even.  There has been no cost for me to be a Christian in the United States and I have missed so many opportunities to sit at Jesus' feet and be challenged by my brothers and sisters in the faith.  And here sitting in front of me was someone who was 100%.  It is all about Jesus, he kept saying.  His actions screamed, Jesus is worth taking risks. 

I thank God that I had an opportunity to spend time with a neighbor who loves Jesus enough that he shined that light into my heart and life.  I pray that I will have the courage to do the same inside and outside of the doors of the church building I walk into every day.