June 1st, 2009
From the Trash Heap
We sat through one of our first spring storms the other day. It wasn’t an Indiana storm where the sky becomes an almost black and where lightning crashes along with thunder and you hold on to your hat. This storm was a typical one for this part of Romania, the sky gets dark, a little rain shower, some thunder, than a lot more rain all at once. Nothing too intense. Then it is all over and the sun might shine soon after. I was sitting in public transportation going to the other side of town, listening to Tracy Chapman’s Fast Car and Joan Osborne’s One of Us playing on the radio when the weather unleashed its weak attempt at a storm. (You never what you will hear on the radio here. Seriously.) Like any storm, this storm along with these two songs too made me reflective and maybe a little melancholy. While I was riding in the maxi taxi (that is what they call the bus taxis here) I was looking at the faces of people walking down the sidewalk or crosswalks, men and women and children on the buses, some laughing, some talking but most staring at nothing or anything out the window. A stranger on the bus trying to make his way home.
Lately I have been reading the book The Principle of Mercy: Taking the Crucified People from the Cross by Jon Sobrino. He addresses the issue of what he calls the “crucified peoples,” that is the majority of people who are “crucified” by external circumstances that are more powerful then they and that end them up in poverty or extreme vulnerability or suffering or even death. He is essentially asking the question of suffering of the innocent and how do we talk about God amidst suffering. Big question, I know. But how does one ask the questions without the answers becoming too trite, too shallow, the easy way out? Or how does one ask these questions without one’s own culture of white Western Christianity informing the issue rather than trying to enter into the lives of the suffering? Sobrino, along with another author from the other book I am reading by Gustavo Gutierrez called On Job: God-Talk and the Suffering of the Innocent, says that these questions about God and the crucified peoples can only be addressed while being among the crucified peoples of the world and not in ivory towers or suburbs. Guitteriez says we should do theology and ask these questions from “the trash heap.” On the trash heap there isn’t an easy way out of the questions.
I am not quite sure what to do with this all but with all of my questions about God and suffering from Galati’s steel-smoke air polluted heap in Romania, I can’t but help to go back to Jesus, not just because I believe He addresses these issues but because when I read the Gospels I see him truly entering into solidarity with these issues and the people that represent these issues, and doing so in Love. I see Jesus sitting on the trash heap, with the lepers, with the sinners, with the scared Nicodemus at night, with the unclean woman washing his feet. I see Jesus sitting on the trash heap with me. Maybe this sounds cheesy, but this is where I am at. With the most intense questions that need to be address of which I am trying to answer from the trash heap, I keep coming back to the question, “God, do you accept me?” Or “God, do you accept Silviu, just as he is?” I am asking a question about presence, not necessarily one of answering the question of suffering. In Jesus, I see, I hear, I feel, I know there is a yes in this acceptance. Then I see, I hear, I feel, I know Him saying to be “the answer” to my neighbor. In other words, my vocation is now informed by my own question flipped on its head. The same question I ask, the strangers on the bus and the people crossing the crosswalk ask the same and in many ways, in very, very small ways, I can speak, show, live out the answer to that question. God where are you present? Do you accept me where I am at?
So I wonder if Christ gives this same call “towards the trash heap” to all of his followers saying that they need to be around the naked one, the thirsty one, the hungry one, the imprisoned one for when they do, they are essentially doing these things to Him himself (Matt. 25). And that means He will be present with us. If we look at the term crucified peoples in this way this means that we can say that the crucified peoples are not just on the southern hemisphere or in the eastern part of the world but that they are everywhere, they are the suffering people everywhere. And Jesus is saying in this passage from the Gospel that as followers of Him, if we want to know Him, we must address the lives and needs of these beautiful peoples, the ones walking home from work or from trying to find work, those on the bus, those looking at nothing and anything out the window, those who in the words of Tracy Chapman, got nothing to lose. I am talking about the suffering ones, the crucified ones.
And maybe when we begin to do this, the wretched becomes beautiful, very beautiful. The broken become whole, in a shalom, peaceful, joyful kind of way. The trash heap becomes a real, organic kingdom of Love in us and in our neighbors.
*****
Spring is fully here and summer is shortly around the blooming cherry tree. It is a wonderful time to visit, which many are doing. We have many visitors in this month of May and are thankful for each of them. W e are excited that two good friends of Robin’s, Megan and Chelsea, are now here with us for eight days.
We had a great week in the mountains on the annual staff retreat. Several WMF staff from Sierra Leone joined us as well. It was a blessed time of connection and transformation and rest.
We were filled with joy to learn that Richard, a young first grader who is new to our program this year, has recently shared that he wants to give his life to Jesus! Pray for Richard as he grows in the love of Jesus, and for our community to be faithful in loving and disciplining him.
We found another apartment! It is less than a five minute walk to the center and it has hot water. We feel like these things will help tremendously once our little boy arrives. We are grateful that we found one so quickly. We will be moving on May 23rd.
Please continue to pray for God to have mercy on the young mothers of this city. Robin and Ana visited one of these mothers a few weeks ago at a center for mothers and children at risk and they were very discouraged by the things they learned and saw there.
July 2nd is quickly approaching. We will be flying in on this date and will begin to prepare to meet and greet our little son who they say we might see around August 15th. We are so ready and excited to meet him and grateful for this next season of our lives. Please be praying for us and our community as we seek discernment on how we can best serve our community as a family.
The Servant Team is in their last few weeks. We have so much enjoyed them being here and will miss them when they leave along with the other staff and the children. They have been encouraging and of great help these past several months.
We still feel grateful and honored to be living and working here in Galati, Romania with Word Made Flesh. We are beginning to love the children more and more and can see this beautiful work of redemption happening in us and in them. And so we are grateful to you to being a part of this work and wanting to sit with us at the table and with our friends.
with love,
Josh and Robin