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Lately, I’ve been realizing I might actually be a quality leader of sorts. The reality of being a team leader is becoming more… real. I spent a week alone, made decisions on my own, and started to dream about what I wanted to see happen. I did an activity where students had to learn how to do Godly affirmation to one another (and then do it for their non-christian friends). This conveniently had time where they got to affirm me. One of the students said something really sweet that I want to keep- he said that I was like a light in the darkness, and that any time I talk to him, no matter what state he’s in, he always feels better. I’ll take that. Then I got an email earlier this week telling me that I had been invited for a big position for the Urbana conference. That also helped my self esteem. The more I go through this year, the more I’m realizing that God is preparing me for more and more leadership.
At the same time, in these past 2 or 3 weeks, I’ve been coming to a ridiculous realization that I hate failure. I fear it. It is one of my biggest fears. It is the fear that all will fall apart when I fail. I’ve been facing a lot of things that signify my failure, or at least my lack of perfection. I led 2 horrible bible studies this week. I would have puked at the horrible exegesis if I were one of the participants. Heck. I wish there were more participants. At every bible study, I had perhaps two other students sit out there with me on the tarp (forgetting that it’s midterms week). On Wednesday, I had perhaps 3 students (from ~20 last year) signed up to go to Catalina and 0 dollars in scholarship. I felt like a failure in my recruiting abilities (forgetting the fact that we are in fact in a recession when people can’t pay 225 bucks to go to a camp). Then there’s the other part of me that doesn’t even want to go to Catalina from remembering the supposed failures I had last year teaching Mark. Let’s not forget that I have a fuller class that I haven’t had time to do at all and all the work is due on the 20th. I feel failure creeping up to me with the possibility that I could do mediocre in this class. And then there’s my room, which I have failed to clean for the last 3 weeks. And then, just as I was getting over it all, while I’m finally cleaning my room, I find that something very important that my sister let me borrow has disappeared. I don’t know if it’s misplaced, or if it has been stolen. I feel the weight of failure pressing me down.
I realize that I equate the successes of the Kingdom of God with my own success. I wonder how much God laughs at that assumption. But I really have the audacity to think that.
Last year, after messing up a session at Catalina (students, you probably didn’t know, but I accidentally ended early on one part, leaving my other staff worker with an extra passage to teach that she didn’t prepare), I was apologizing profusely to my co-teacher. Then our leader turned to me and just straight up said, “Stop apologizing. It’s done. Guilt doesn’t make sense right now. God meant for you to end early there. God meant for you to mess up. And He’s going to use it.” That moment has been haunting me for the past year. I’ve been avoiding returning to that moment, because part of me secretly still feels guilty for my “failure”.
Two weeks ago, I had a dream that I was driving in my car. All of a sudden I started feeling water dripping in my eyes. I kept wiping the water away, until I realized that my sunroof had cracked, and I was driving in a wild storm. My team leader interpreted it for me (she took a dream interpretation class at one of those crazy charismatic churches… I’m pretty crazy, but… yeah. That’s crazy.). She said that God was purifying my ministry. She said she was excited. I kind of felt excited, but in the back of my head I was thinking “excited? What is she smoking? Purification is never an exciting thing!”
And… God has been purifying me since. Purifying my motives for leadership. He’s weeding out my desire for success and my tendency to equate it to the success of the Kingdom of God. I’ve been realizing that as I step into higher leadership, I can’t be consumed with my performance and continue to blow up the effects of my failures. Yes, I have to still pursue excellence. But I’m not perfect. God is. And there’s the miracle. Out of the beautiful mess of our failures, God somehow breathes in the success of His Kingdom. We can’t achieve that success. God has mercy on our inability and allows us to witness His success despite and even through our failures.
I sometimes forget that Christianity started out as a failed local movement with its leader brutally nailed to a cross. And out of the ashes of failure, came the resurrection of the Kingdom that was surely of God, which transformed cowardly fishermen into the rock and foundation of a worldwide movement. Right now, I feel like that scared fisherman, wondering why I even joined this movement; wondering if my convictions were misplaced if all I see around me is failure. But perhaps I’m in this place of fear because I have not really realized that after the ultimate failure that I have witnessed, there is resurrection.
These past few weeks, I’ve had to convince myself to get out of bed and face the day, leaving the failures behind me. And you know what? His Kingdom still advances each of those days. My last Bible study, I felt the conviction return to me and had everyone including myself in a quiet awe of the power of the scripture. God has been merciful, and I now have 9 or 10 students going to Catalina with enough scholarships to cover their lack. As I was preparing for Mark next week at Catalina, I felt a strange excitement for what God was going to do with my students, no matter how sucky I performed. I finally got around to cleaning my room. And I have enough money to replace what was lost.
And no, my failures are not fully undone. But I feel the tendrils of fear and guilt slowly release as I realize that His Kingdom is not dependent on my success. I realize the depth of the statement that is thrown around in evangelical circles- His grace covers us. And wow. His grace does cover me overwhelmingly, and will continue to cover me no matter how successful or how much of a failure I am.
This last week has been treating me well, God has definitely been good. I definitely would not have expected this all, coming from the crappy week we had last week. I really felt the prayers of my community this week… I almost forgot that in my work, as I fundraise, the people who partner with me aren’t just income providers… they lift me up in prayer consistently, and I can be sure that their prayers were at work this week. I won’t share everything that happened here, if you’re on my email list, you’ll probably get a full update of this last week… but just wanted to share a slice of a conversation during one of the funniest GIG’s (Groups investigating God, bible studies with seekers) I’ve had, which happened yesterday.
We were talking about Jesus turning the water into wine, and the guy just didn’t want to believe that Jesus actually did a miracle. The conversation went like this:
“Well, i just don’t see how this could have scientifically happened. Like, what if Jesus had some powdered wine and threw it in the stone jars? Kind of like Koolaid or gatorade?”
“…uh… i’m not sure that they knew how to make juice powder back then.”
“Okay. so what if Jesus was a time traveller with a time machine, and when he was born, there were two of him? perhaps, they travelled back and forth in time, replaced stuff, replaced eachother, went on vactions while the other Jesus was dealing with the disciples? And once in a while, they’d help out each other with a trick that the other Jesus wanted to do, like turn water to wine?”
“…Ferdinand. Your story sounds more ridiculous than the Bible. You have twin Jesuses travelling through time in a time machine.”
“oh. yeah. you’re right… okay. well. then here’s the most logical explanation. Jesus didn’t do anything to the water. The host was just so wasted that when he drank the water, he started shouting hysterically that it was wine.”
Amazingly logical. He smiled and stared at me. We both burst out laughing.
I seriously would go insane if I were not hanging out with people who aren’t Christian. They keep me humble and keep me laughing.
Open Heavens Again
My Latest Painting
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Catalina
I went to a black gospel church today with one of my students (which was really awesome. It struck some chords that have not been struck for a while… but that’s for another entry). A conversation really caught me off guard. I told a guy I was living in Carlsbad. He laughed and told me he got close, but “they” won’t let him live there. I laughed, telling him how guilty I felt (which is usually my comedy line when I tell people where I live). We both agreed I should count my blessings, with plenty of laughter in between.
What’s funny is that as I was driving back home, and crossed highway 78 from Oceanside to Carlsbad, I really did feel guilty. It didn’t feel like a joke tonight. It might actually be reality.
But I remembered what the guy said to me- “count your blessings”.
Just be thankful, and live fully, love fully. Sometimes, though, it’s so hard to live in such a broken yet beautiful world. My dad used to tell me I had to just accept that the world isn’t fair (”The world isn’t fair, Daniel”, as i wondered why my sister got the cooler toy (ha don’t worry, i have no bitterness, charissa)). But sometimes I wonder if it was meant and created to be unfair…
How do I love people on both sides of the unfairness? How do I remain in between and retain my sanity? My identity must rest in God, He is the only one who can empower me to love the rich and the poor at the same time in a community where the rich and the poor live so near one another (almost literally like “across the train tracks…” except it’s a freeway). I feel like I have a rich mask and then a poor mask, depending on which part of the Tricity area I’m in (and it’s ironic my mom came from a rich family and my dad came from a poor family). But God rips apart the masks and reveals that my identity (and the members of this community’s identities) is not rested upon social standing, but upon his passionate and unrelenting love for all of them- rich or poor.
The sunset over the ocean that I can see from our giant windows… is so beautiful, but so broken, because only the priveleged can view it from where I live. I know I must not be swallowed by guilt, but the question still haunts me… Is this sunset worth it? How can I share it?
This is a video I made for our divisional fundraiser, Everyday World Changers.
It’s a great summary of what God has been doing not just in MiraCosta but in the entire San Diego county. It’s really exciting, and making the video kind of reminded me of how exciting it actually is to be working with IV in San Diego at this time. Anyways, enjoy!
I have always had this dream of getting so heated up during a sermon that i’d throw a bible off the podium. Yes, it’s ridiculous, but it was the goal of my preaching. In my head, it would shock the congregation into weeping confession and passionate action. Yeah i know. Ridiculously conceited. It was the goal… but I always stopped myself. It just seemed to gratuitous, and I felt if I needed to throw the Bible, it had better be important.
Today I threw a bible while preaching today. I blame it on not having enough coffee to maintain self-control. I just got a little… heated. And before you know it, a black, leather bound book was leaving my hands at speeds probably near 45 miles per hour. And then it hit somebody. Good thing it was a high schooler. And for some reason, it didn’t have the rush I imagined it would have. However, I believe the high schooler the bible hit had quite a rush 
.
haha. I’ll have to work on my throwing bible move. And think of a better move than throwing a bible for dramatic effect. I wonder what my next gratuitous preaching move will be. Perhaps it will involve a hammer, a bucket and a glass of water (If you’re from my SYS 1 class from NISET, you’ll know what i mean by that). Upon reflecting on that moment, I have been thinking about over-using illustrations or over-stimulating people in a sermon. I’d rather God hit somebody, not my Bible. But deep inside, I enjoyed catching that attention. God was perhaps shaking his head in amusement at my horrible attempt at imitating his wrath… with a book thrown at a high schooler. Hopefully Jesus will forgive me for my meddlings.
In more serious matters, I spoke at a chinese church today (Lord’s Grace Church San Diego). This was the first time I had the oppurtunity to publicly articulate the journey God has been taking me on to a Chinese audience. It was really good to publicly talk about it in front of an audience. Not only was it a good time of preaching, it was a good oppurtunity to think about where God has taken me this past year… and perhaps my life.
When I think about how God took me from wanting be a missionary at 5… and then my ethnic journey of me dreaming of being a missionary in any place of the world but China–> God humbling me on a missions trip to actually care about Chinese people as my own people–>wanting to see chinese people transform the world (back to jerusalem, baby!)–>realizing that meant I had to change it right here at my front doorstep, and it’d be a shame if i could not love my neighbor if I wanted to see entire nations transformed.
Strange windy path that somehow makes sense. It felt good to put it out there. It’s sometimes hard to explain it, because I just haven’t had the chance to. It’s worse when somebody is expecting an answer on why I’m at MiraCosta in perhaps 3 minutes, when I really need 35 minutes to explain it. And it has nothing to do with my long-windedness. It’s just that I really did not make a rash decision. It was an elaborate, methodological, strategic and heartfelt journey that God has taken me on and is still taking me on.
I feel like i’ve gone so far. And just like my silly throwing of bibles, I’m realizing my original goals were just too far, because God can achieve them in an instant. What i thought were goals were just trailhead markers for a trail towards an ominous but beautiful mountain. It’s time to tighten those laces, check my Northface camel back (how i wish I actually had a northface backpack) for water and start walking forward. Because that little ridge was just a precursor for something far greater and more glorious.
I’m usually cynical of people having spiritual experiences online. I’ve heard of people doing IM counselling sessions with their friends, or somebody reading a blog that completely changes their entire life… those ones, okay. I’ve seen it kind of work. But these days, there’s online churches, online communion, online confessionals… Call me a traditionalist, but I’d rather talk to a person instead of a digital projection of a person.
This weekend, though, I had the best spiritual moment I’ve had online with a student. This was his message:
man. this was such a breath of fresh air for me after a long week. And a good pre-birthday present .
I called him and asked him what he meant just to make sure (I’ve been talking to him for a few weeks about what it means to be a Christian) and prayed with him for Jesus to come into his life. I said amen, told him I was going to meet up with him sometime in the next week. He excitedly said “alright man! i mean, AMEN man!”
heh. new christians are full of surprises.
I’ve been reading a lot, so forgive me for all the quotes. They just keep coming.
I’ve been revisiting Henri Nouwen’s Compassion again. This book has destroyed me over and over again. Every 5 pages, I need to put the book down and fight the urge to publicly weep in the coffee shop. What’s crazy is that all the systematic theology I’ve been taking has made these words deeper and more powerful instead of more distant and abstract. Last night, Barth was talking about God’s simultaneous love and freedom- His nature of constantly giving love, and His all powerful freedom in that love. All of a sudden, the compassion revealed to us in Jesus makes sense to me in new powerful ways. meh. anyways, just needed to write down some of these quotes before I forget them.
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Through compassion our humanity grows into its fullness.
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When Jesus was moved to compassion, the source of all life trembled, the ground of all love burst open, and the abyss of God’s immense, inexhaustible and unfathomable tenderness revealed itself.
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In our modern society with its increasing mobility and pluriformity, we have become the subjects and often the victims of so many displacements that it is very hard to keep a sense of rootedness, and we are constantly tempted to become bitter and resentful. Our first and often most difficult task, therefore, is to allow these actual displacements to become places where we can hear God’s call. It often seems easier to initiate a displacement that we ourselves can control than freely to accept and affirm a displacement that is totally out of our hands…
Henri Nouwen, Compassion
This past weekend, I have been in the celebratory cheeriness of a wedding, the somber remembrance of a funeral and a birthday celebration of the ongoing journey of life.
It’s strange to say, but it’s in these moments, rhythms and seasons that I feel closest to God. It is in the summits of celebration and the depths of mourning that the presence of God is exposed the most. These moments aren’t just boring ritual anymore. They point to a richness. There is a richness in the rhythms of life that are undeniably from God.
If only my heart was always aware of that richness…
And then I realize my personal context. In this next year, I may very well be entering into a season of desert. It hasn’t occurred to me until the last few weeks that I am scared to the bone. I am afraid. I am afraid of not being able to find roommates. I am afraid of living alone. I am afraid of going to a new church. I am afraid of being forgotten. I am afraid I am in the wrong place. Everyone looks at me skeptically. They know the prospects in North County may very well kill me. They keep reminding me of this, as if I myself do not know this prospect of social death to the very core of who I am. It is hard to hide it, but right behind this thinly veiled attempt at faith, I am scared.
Will that fear blind me from seeing the richness of God’s presence? Or will it drive me to search for it even harder? Could it really be that God’s call for me to be in North County is not a call of obligation, but really an invitation to know Him? Is it really true that the price to pay for knowing Him is to join Him in His death? And that I could actually join in His sufferings joyfully?
She did. She suffered in ways I cannot fathom, but somehow was joyful, and somehow managed to bless so many people that they kept streaming up to the microphone, refusing to let the emcee close up the sermon(, with jars and jars of garlic. Who ever knew garlic could be so significant?). She knew her life was not her own, but was poured out as an offering to all those around her. (you know a stranger was a good person when you wish you had met her just from watching your friends mourn her absence)
I want to be that. It’s what my students deserve. It’s what North County deserves. I don’t know if my soul will survive this forced (temporary, for sure, and perhaps slightly illusional) solitude and displacement. It feels like death to me. But perhaps it should be that my soul will perish if it is not constantly brought into those very places of displacement and desert, where I am reminded that true life comes from above. It comes from above, and plentifully, to the point where I no longer have to hold onto it with a scarcity mentality and can give it away freely.
This question of survival keeps echoing in my head. Will you come out alive after these next few years, Daniel? Everyone asks me that. I ask myself that. I ask myself if it is worth it.
It is. Only one year of this half-way life of working in North county, but not living there has been worth it already. Seeing followers realize they are leaders. Seeing hearts transformed. Hearing somebody say “we’re not a club, we’re a movement”. Being challenged to pray by the very people I should be challenging to pray. Being called out. Raising up evangelists. Speaking truth. Making some students stop saying “I’m sorry”. Making other students begin to say “I’m sorry”. Witnessing a community partner with God to bring our friends to Christ. Letting God change me.
If I come out alive or dead (in a very shallow and hollow use of that word), I think the risk of not just working, but living here will be worth it. If I learned so much living half-way, how much more would I gain if I fully lived in North County?
love. death. life. The wedding, funeral and birthday seem to all be blurring into this beautiful, rich and redeemed picture of God’s grace. May my eyes be ever open so that I may never lose sight of that picture.
I’ve been sick this week, and it has not been fun. I’ve realized how much I love MiraCosta. If it had been in the fall, my honest confession is that I would have loved to have been sick. I could just sit in bed and avoid driving 30 miles north, then 30 miles south again. However, I think I might actually miss my commuting. ha. No it’s not the commuting I miss. It’s the students. It’s the relationships. It’s throwing frisbees at people, but intentionally missing them so that I hit a stranger and can meet them.
Being sick, though, has its advantages. I had to prepare a talk for Mesa College’s (Which for some reason, people keep calling “MiraCosta” “Mesa”…) Intervarsity Ignite gathering on Thursday (which was interesting preparing for sick… I think it went well, but it’s hard to tell when you are sick how well you actually do on things), but in my spare time, I got to reflect on what God has done this semester. And it’s been A LOT. It also gave me some time to work on a long overdue newsletter. And you can see it here. Read it! God’s done some amazing things this year! go! read!
^CLICK IT!^
