Grace and Justice

Looking back on my life, I would have to say that I was a very... interesting child. In some ways, I haven't changed much at all. So, imagine my passion for helping people being played out in a 2 year old. Thankfully, I had a little brother that clearly always needed me to "help" him. The poor kid didn't talk forever because I just decided I knew exactly what he needed all the time and would take care of everything for him!

I was also the "that's not fair kid". I mean, to a ridiculous point. If my parents could explain to me why something was fair, I would totally accept it. However, if they couldn't, well then it wasn't fair and therefore I didn't have to listen to them. How in the world they put up with me... whew...

As I grew older, my passion for justice grew stronger and stronger. (I think it has at least something to do with my dad being a police officer... and an awesome one at that...). I not only wanted things in my life to be fair, I believed strongly that things everyone should always be fair. In 7th grade I got into a very intense discussion (okay, it was close to an argument, haha) with my state representative (he came to visit our school to talk about... I don't remember what...) over the death penalty. Yes, as a 12 year old I was convinced that the death penalty was unfair and therefore should be outlawed (I had statistics, stories of people who were wrongfully executed and even financial data showing how cost ineffective it is... feeling sorry for my parents yet??) and felt that I needed to let my state representative know. I wonder why everyone thought I was going to grow up to be a lawyer...

Okay, cut to 19 years later and I am more than aware that the world is unfair. Working with abused and neglected kids in the inner city for 9 years has more than beaten the "fairness" out of me. I have seen way too many people get away with things and too many children punished for things they have no control over. I get it. My dad was absolutely right (shhh, don't tell him I said that!); life is not fair.

And there is another big difference between now and then (nope, I am actually not any taller now that I was in the 7th grade). Now, I am a Christian. 4 years after arguing (quite impressively for a 12 year old, if I do say so myself) that the death penalty was wrong, I accepted Christ into my heart; becoming a huge beneficiary of the most extreme example of a wrongfully convicted man in the history of the world. I got away with every wrong I have ever committed and fully accepted another man; a completely innocent man, being punished instead. Oh the irony...

This turn of events in my life, however, has not decreased my passion and desire for justice on earth. This is not entirely a bad thing, but it certainly causes me some problems.

I still get angry when I see injustice in the world. The cries of Habbakuk mirror my thoughts:

How long, LORD, must I call for help,
but you do not listen?
Or cry out to you, “Violence!”
but you do not save?
Why do you make me look at injustice?
Why do you tolerate wrongdoing?
Destruction and violence are before me;
there is strife, and conflict abounds.
Therefore the law is paralyzed,
and justice never prevails.
The wicked hem in the righteous,
so that justice is perverted.
~Habakkuk 1: 2-4
And I do fight against injustice, in every way that I can (Isaiah 58:6). Still, no matter how hard I fight or how angry I get, injustice continues. All over the place. All around me.

So, what do I do? I can't ignore injustice, but I also can't live life angry.

How do I go home at night and sleep soundly knowing that injustice continues no matter how hard I fight or how angry I get? And what about that whole; "Love your enemies" thing? How do I fight against injustice yet love those who perpetrate it?

I can't. It is literally impossible. My passion for justice runs so deep, I don't think I could ignore it if I wanted to. I hate injustice. And if I am really honest, I hate those who perpetrate it.

God hates injustice. But, he still loves those who perpetrate it.

I can't stop injustice, but one day He will.

I can't love those who perpetrate injustice, but He does.

So, what do I do?

I look to Him. I ask Him to fill my heart with love, even for my enemies. On my own, I have no compassion. But as Christ works on my heart, I find the anger dissipating and compassion emerging.

I spend time reading the Sermon on the Mount. Help me take the speck out of my own eye Lord, so that I can more clearly see the world with through your eyes.

I meditate on Genesis 1:27 and Psalm 139. Yes, I was knit together in my mother's womb, created for a purpose by the creator of the universe! I was created in the image of God, given life to spend my time on earth reflecting His glory! I wasn't the only one, however. Every single person was created in the image of the Almighty; Lord help me to see you in everyone I meet... and to glorify you because of that.

And finally, I remember. I remember that day in 1996 when I accepted the death of an innocent payment for my own wrongs; so that I could go free and escape the punishment that I deserved.

It's a lot easier to love my enemies when I realize that without Christ, I am the enemy.

New Direction

When I first started this blog, the purpose was mainly for my family and my supporters; basically a place for me to update you on all the things that I couldn't write in my newsletter. And for a while, I did a pretty good job of keeping up with it.

Of course, those were the days of kids constantly coming in and out of my house, lots of changes and new things happening in my life and in my ministry; basically things that I wanted to write about so that I could remember them years later. It wasn't difficult for me to sit down and write about Linda and Bonita or recount fun times at the beach or my excitement over the new challenges ahead.

But, life is different for me now. I am living in a home I plan to stay in for a long time (thank you Jesus!!) with two adult roommates and no plans to have kids living here any time soon (with Lindsay living in my 3rd bedroom, there is no room for foster children for the time being. I have always had the mentality that the extra rooms in my house are available for whoever the Lord brings into my home. For now, that is Lindsay and Ashley... and I love that). :) I am pretty settled in my jobs and the things I face day to day are not things that I am motivated to blog about.

At Cornerstone I am spending the majority of my time discipling youth, teaching kids, training leaders and, well honestly, cleaning and organizing rooms within the church. (I'm serious... for the last few months I have worked on cleaning out and organizing the church office, my Kids Club closet, several Sunday School classrooms and I am working on plans for more. I have no idea where this came from, other than possibly the desire to work on a project that not only benefits the church, but also has tangible results; I'm not used to tangible results!).

At CASA I spend my time advocating for kids that face some of the most difficult challenges I have ever seen. It is incredibly challenging, rewarding, and I love every second of it. But, I can't really blog about it.

I am really enjoying life in general and feel fulfilled (not sure if that is the right word, but it's all that is coming to mind right now) in all that I am doing. I truly love all (okay, well almost all, haha) that I am doing. But, it's not really much to blog about. It's just really life.

Because of this, I considered closing down my blog. But, I realized that I still do have something to say. See, as I live my daily life, I am constantly changing; changing because I am learning. I am learning about myself, God, ministry, the world, the Bible, kids and teens... I am learning so much about so much . Sometimes I even learn something, only to learn something else that changes what I thought I learned the day before (does that statement even make sense??).

For a long time, I shied away from sharing too much about my personal walk with Christ because of fear. Fear of making a fool of myself, fear of being wrong... fear of upsetting someone. And there is something to be said for just staying quiet rather than being an idiot on the Internet (Proverbs 17:27-28). However, that doesn't mean that I need to stay silent. I am not afraid to be wrong, never have been. In fact, I want to know when I am wrong so that it can be corrected. And, at almost 31 years old, I don't really care a whole lot about offending people. Not that I want to purposely piss someone off, that is not Godly at all. However, I also can't watch everything I ever say for fear that it might upset someone.

So, I am refocusing my mindset as I think about this blog. I AM going to share more about some of what I am learning. I promise I will not seek to offend anyone and will pray that every word that I type honors the Lord; even in my questions and frustrations. If I ever stray from that, I do have incredible people in my life that will challenge me in that, and if this blog ever becomes simply a place to vent frustrations, I will immediately end it. I want everything in my life to be honoring to the Lord, including the words that I type. However, I can't promise that I won't say something that you disagree with or that may even offend you. In fact, it's likely that I will say something that will make you think twice. Actually, that's kind of what I want. Not to offend, but maybe to challenge as well as encourage. I just want you to be prepared, if you choose to read my blog, to not always love (and maybe even occasionally hate) what you read.

Of course, you will also get occasional updates on life. I still do some fun and interesting things, I like writing about them. :)

Some posts will be serious, and if I know myself (and I think I do, haha), some will just be silly. I am going to take what I say seriously, while also trying not to take myself too seriously (this is going to be an interesting journey!).

I have no idea where this is going to go. As I write this, I have absolutely no idea what to write about. I might post this and then go silent for a while. I am not going to try and write anything, I am simply going to write as I feel that I have something to share.

Please don't expect much from this new direction. Sometimes I feel like I have something important to say, but more often than not I just have rambling thoughts. This new direction of my blog might (and actually will likely) be an epic failure. We'll see. But, for the first time in my life, I am not letting the fear of failure or the fear of others keep me from trying something new. If nothings else, I will at least be able to say I tried. :)

Wait, I have a blog?!?

Yeah... it's been a while. I long while. A really long while. If this blog was public and more than just my dad read it on a regular basis (my mom can never remember my blog address, so she just asks for updates from my dad. Seriously, haha), I would have lost all my readers. I do have a "mid-year" resolution regarding my blog, but I will tell you about that later. For now, here is a short (and abridged... leaving out a ton but hopefully hitting the highlights) update on life.

Wow, 2 months... I actually need to look at a calendar to remember what's been going on! Of course, it's basically been a whole lot of nothing. Well, not nothing; just nothing to really blog about. Mostly, I have been working. I now work 30 hours a week with CASA and I am still loving it. I have also been working hard to prepare for summer ministry at Cornerstone (we have 5 VBS groups this summer!).

In April, I did get to spend a fun weekend in Indianapolis with my friends April and Catherine. I do have a picture from the weekend, but it's not a pretty one, lol. We ran a a half marathon together, and unfortunately I didn't train well for it. So, it was a struggle to finish it but we did!! And we did have a lot of fun together. It was a really great weekend to get away from the city and to be around people that have known me for most of my life. I will never get over how incredible it is for us to still be close, after 18+ years. God is too good to me! :)

I also gained a new roommate! I am SO SO excited to have LINDSAY living with us! She is here until she goes off to college (which will be in about 6 months to a year), and we are loving it!

Just a few days after Lindsay moved in, we got to celebrate her 19th birthday! We decided to go to the Phillies game to celebrate, and it turned out to be quite a night. The Phillies DID win the game... though it took them 19 innings. Yup, the first time we decide to go to a game turns out to be the longest game in major league baseball all year. The game didn't end until almost 2 a.m.! It was long but a ton of fun; and we thought it was really cool that on Lindsay's 19th birthday, the Phillies won their game in 19 innings. :) (We will NOT be going to the Phillies game to celebrate her 20th birthday, haha).



Also, this past weekend Ashley and I traveled to NC for a wedding, and it was wonderful! About 5 years ago, Brooke and Ashley (and another friend, Jenna) lived with me and Brooke served as my intern at Cornerstone. It was a really great summer and Brooke, Ashley and I have all stayed close since then. Brooke lives in Illinois and we haven't seen each other much, but we try to talk/facebook as often as possible!

So, when Ashley and I were invited to Brooke's wedding we jumped at the chance to go! Plus, another friend (Kirsten) lives only about an hour from where the wedding was, so we had a free place to stay and a great excuse to go see Kirsten! At the last minute we decided to invite Melissa along, and it turned out to be a really awesome weekend. Well, other than me missing a crucial turn on the drive down to NC, which took us about 3 hours to correct; making the 9 hour trip into a 12 hour one. Whoops. We still had a really fun car ride!

Ashley, Melissa and I had a really great time catching up with Kirsten; seeing her school and apartment and even getting to meet some of her awesome friends. And of course, the wedding was beautiful. It was very small (only about 40 guests), which made us feel SO honored that we were on the guest list! Brooke even asked me to read scripture during the ceremony, and I only messed up once. (Word of Christ, when said too fast, can easily be misspoken as 'word of Cwiste, lol).

The only real negative over the last few months happened today when I woke up with a cold. It's not horrible, but I have been spending most of the day in bed. Although, now that I think about it, if I wasn't in bed all day I probably would have never found the time to finally update my blog. So, maybe it's not such a bad thing after all!

Well, now I feel like I need to take some medicine again and maybe make a cup of hot chai. (Yes, I am aware that it is 90 degrees outside; tell that to my throat! Of course, I have my air conditioner set at 65, so I think it will be okay, haha). I will blog again later tonight about my new resolution regarding my blog. (I have a sneaking suspicion that I am setting myself up for failure with this, but I am going to try anyway!).

Talk to you again soon!

Support Raising

So, it’s March and I still don’t have a newsletter completed and ready to send out. That is NOT okay, and I AM working on one right now, but it’s taking me some time, which is kind of unusual for me. Usually I can get a newsletter finished pretty quickly if I just sit down and get it done. I am apparently experiencing some sort of writer’s block, however, so for now my poor supporters have to check my facebook to make sure I’m alive, haha. I’m really hoping to have something out by the end of next week at the latest. I am working on it!

I think part of my struggle in doing this newsletter is a result of my overall struggle with support raising. I have no problem with the fact that I have to support raise. Honestly, I don’t. But, I’m not going to lie, as much as I LOVE LOVE LOVE my supporters, the whole support raising process for me often gets overwhelming. Part of the problem might be that I, alone, am responsible for all aspects of my support raising . I am the one writing all the newsletters, thank you notes, making all phone calls, speaking at all churches… all while still balancing life in the city and ministry. Don’t get me wrong, it’s TOTALLY worth it (and not just because it means that I get a paycheck!). I have the most amazing, supportive, encouraging and overall just AWESOME supporters I could ever ask for. But, the whole support raising process is nonetheless overwhelming for me at times.

It’s not just about the amount of physical work involved, though that is hard for me. I have no problem raising money for things that I am passionate about. I am passionate about what God is doing at Cornerstone Community Church and I will talk to people about it all day. I am passionate about CASA and the work being done on behalf of abused and neglected children. I will talk to anyone and everyone about the incredible things going on in either place and I have no problem asking for support so that the work can continue.

The problem I have is in asking for support for ME. Asking people to send money specifically for ME is a HUGE challenge for me. And it’s not a pride thing (at least I don’t think it is…). The problem I have with support raising is that I am constantly in the position of selling myself; trying to convince people that not only is the work that Cornerstone is doing important, but that I am an important part of that work. I have to convince them that I am worthy of their support, but the truth is, I’m not.

I am not qualified to do what I do. I have been stumbling through the last 8+ years in Philly and am only in the position that I am in because others have stepped aside and I was the only one around who could step in.

I LOVE what I do, but sometimes I don’t want to do it. (Be prepared, here comes some possibly uncomfortable honesty!). Sometimes I don’t want to teach Kids Club. Sometimes I try and think of valid excuses to not meet with a teen. Sometimes I get in my car and drive out of the city just to get away. Sometimes I lock myself in my bedroom and immerse myself in a book, pretending that the story that I am reading is my life. Sometimes I cry myself to sleep asking Him why this is the life that He has chosen for me; why I have to be alone in such a dark and hurting place having my heart broken daily. Okay, so let’s me real, sometimes I hate what I do.

It’s really hard and I am really not very good at it. I read a blog (that I LOVE) written by a woman who called herself, “Jamie, the Very Worst Missionary”. I would disagree with her; I am the very worst missionary. I think about myself far more than anyone ever should. I struggle trusting Him when things aren't even that bad, much less when things get really hard. I am incompetent, prideful, selfish, and lazy. There is absolutely no logical reason for me to be chosen by Him to be His hands and feet in Philadelphia. I fall FAR short all the time. All. The. Time.

But if I am really honest (and apparently I am in an honest mood today!), I have to say that God DOES use me in Philly. I can’t explain it (hence my support raising problem), but He does. I believe with all my heart that He has called me to be here and that He works through me in ways that I leave me literally speechless (thus my difficulty in putting things into words for a newsletter). When I teach Kids Club, words come out of my mouth that clearly did not come from me. When I meet with teens, I have words of wisdom that could never have come from my own simple understanding. When I pray, my heart cries out for things that my selfishness would never allow me to care about. I have insight into situations and people that could never come from even the most educated person. NONE of this comes from me and I am absolutely the least worthy of any of it. But, He does it anyway.

For some unknown reason, God has called me here and uses me and all my MANY faults to bring Him glory in this place. As a support raised missionary, I am supposed to be able to explain to you how and why He uses me so that you can feel confident in your support me of me. But I have no answers for you. I should be able to explain why and how He uses me. But I can’t, He just does.

And lest you think that that my life is just one big struggle, let me assure you that God is FAR greater than that! Every time I cry myself to sleep, my bridegroom holds me tight bottling up my tears in almost unbearable anticipation of the day that He will come for me and relieve all my sadness, forever. When I need encouragement, He provides it (often through my supporters! Oh the irony!). When I feel lost, He seeks me and finds me. When I am afraid, He brings peace. Again, please don’t ask me how, I don’t know. He just does.

Still Alive and Busier than Ever!

I know I haven't been around much over the last month, but I promise I have a good reason. I have been working hard at Cornerstone (including preparing for 2 of my own groups and 5 VBS's this summer!), starting a new job, having kids in the house and writing a devotional book for Teen Club. Of course, a lot of these things have not only added to my weekly work hours, but also my emotional stress. I am going to update you on everything (at least as much as I can remember!) today. I will be dating posts from when they actually happened, so hopefully you will be all caught up if you just keep scrolling down.

Thanks for being patient with me, and especially for continuing to pray!!

Shopping!

I HATE shopping! I hate shopping almost as much as I hate camping, which is saying a lot. Hell for me would probably be eternal shopping during the day, camping at night constantly surrounded by people chomping on gum and/or whistling. Oh, and I would probably have the hiccups forever too. (I have a lot of pet peeves, haha). Unfortunately, sometimes shopping is necessary and my new job at CASA has created that need.

Pretty much my entire wardrobe consists of jeans, Cornerstone t-shirts, some Virginia Tech sweatshirts and a few bridesmaid dresses. Not exactly proper courtroom attire, haha. Over the last year as a CASA volunteer I was able to borrow clothes from Ashley whenever I needed to go to court, which was only once every 3-4 months. Now that I have to go to court at least once a week (sometimes more than that), I don't think Ashley would appreciate me borrowing that many outfits, haha. Plus, I do occasionally have meetings at the office as well, so a "professional" wardrobe has become necessary.

My mom (because she is AWESOME!) ordered me several suits on line. Unfortunately, not one of them fit me. So, I decided to take them back to the store and make a shopping day out of it. And thankfully, Ashley and Shera agreed to go with me! (They have great fashion sense! Me.. not so much). So, we loaded up with the suits to return, some President's Day sale fliers, a few coupons and a gift card to Bahama Breeze (so we could have a yummy lunch!) and headed out for a day of horror shopping.

It ended up being a kind of crazy day, but I have to admit that it was pretty fun. We had hoped to eat lunch first, but the restaurant actually lost power just before we got there. We didn't mind, though, because they gave us a $10 gift card and told us to come back later. So, while we waited for their power to come back on, we did some shopping. Thanks to all the sales and clearance racks, I was able to get a lot for very little!

We went back to Bahama Breeze around 2:30 and they said they should be up and running in about 30 minutes. So, we hit another store and found more great deals! We went back to Bahama Breeze at 3:30, and by this time there was a wait. We decided to wait; it was basically free food thanks to our gift cards! We finally got to eat around 4:30, and it was worth the wait! We started with an appetizer, then each ordered fancy drinks and entrees and only spent $1.62 of our own money!

We made one more stop at another store having a great sale before we finally got home around 7:30. It was a LONG, but VERY successful day! Thanks to returning the suits my mom bought and combining that with coupons and sales; and shopping exclusively from clearance racks, I was was able to basically get an entire wardrobe (4 pairs of dress pants, 4 pairs of shoes, 7 new shirts, 3 new sweaters, and several new pairs of earrings and dress socks) while spending only $15 of my own money!!!

I went from a completely empty closet to this:

I'm still not a fan of shopping, at all, But, thanks to today, I won't have to do it again any time soon!