A Modern Parable

written by Darren Faber

A Modern Parable

The year was 1968.

While writing a sermon about the Good Samaritan, an evangelical pastor drifted to sleep at his desk.

...

In the dream that followed, Jesus appeared to him, and gave him license to ask any question he desired.

Because the pastor had been reading the story of the good samaritan, he could think of no other question than “Lord, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

Jesus replied, “What is written in the Gospels?”

As if he were following a script, he answered, “ Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself.”

“You have answered Correctly”, Jesus replied, “Do this and you will live.”

But the man already knew this, and felt that, as a pastor, he had fulfilled this duty quite well. So looking for more specific insights, and wishing to establish in his mind that he was on the right track, he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”

In reply Jesus Said: “A Black Evangelical Pastor was driving to a demonstration in Birmingham, when he was set upon by KKK members. They stole his car, stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. A baptist minister happened to be attending a conference in the same town. When he saw the man, he drove his car on the other side. So too, an evangelical pastor came to the place and saw him, and passed by on the other side.

But a secular humanist, as he traveled, came to where the man was, and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds. Then he put the man in his own car, and took him to the hospital. He stayed with the man through the night. The next day, he payed all the man’s medical expenses, and made arrangements for the man to get safely back home.

"Which of these three do you think proved a neighbor to the Pastor who fell into the hands of the KKK?"

The evangelical pastor replied “The one who had mercy on him.”

Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise”.

After saying this, Jesus faded from view. The Pastor slowly opened his eyes. Needing to sort out the meaning of the dream, he rose from his desk, and went to fetch the newspaper.

The headline, blazoned in all capitals, read, “KING MURDERED!”

The Pastor dropped the paper, walked back to his desk, and resumed the writing of his sermon . . .

I am Racist (and you may be too)

written by Darren Faber

A Prayer Attributed to St. Francis

Lord, make us instruments of your peace. Where there is hatred, let us sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is discord, union; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. Grant that we may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? 47 And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? 48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” - Matthew 5:43-48

I am Racist (And you may be too)

No matter where you stand in relation to the political or economic divide, one thing should be clear- inequality is a pervasive problem, both in Greensboro, and throughout the United States. We hear the tag lines, usually coming from the left, about issues of mass incarceration, income inequality, and educational inequality, and we usually have some sort of visceral reaction to these words. Our opinions on the issues come ready formed, finding their source in our ingrained ideological orientation, connected to our emotional state at the time of hearing. This happens regardless of whether we respond favorably or unfavorably to such conversations. But given the current context (Greensboro, NC) that we fellows are in, and the current month (Black History month), I think it is important that we reflect on some possible sources of racial inequality, as it manifests itself first in our community, and what said inequality reveals about the unequal structures in the country at large. Even though we cannot disassociate ourselves from our history of conditioned response, I hope that we might become instruments of God’s peace in the current context- That we might seek to understand the perspective and pain of the poor and marginalized. I hope that we might give them our ears, pardon them their difference, and die to our prerogative to be in the position of ideological control. I pray we might learn, first from an investigation of our own experiences, the roots of racism within our very selves. May this understanding open us up to possible partial solutions to the problems raised in the digging.

Possible Roots of My Racism: Loneliness and Insecurity

I am lonely. I want to escape this loneliness. I am fixated on my own experience of loneliness, and think that by finding people who have much in common with me, and building strong relationships with them - sharing experiences together, and encountering one another in a variety of ways- I will find a cure to my loneliness. I derive a sense of identity from my relationship with those who I find to keep my insecurity at bay. We build a cultural Identity out of our common likes and dislikes, and our differences and similarities push and pull on one another, strengthening the bonds between us.

When I feel alone amidst a sea of strangers, I often start by looking for people who I assume will already accept me. If I cannot find a friend, I look for an acquaintance. If I cannot find an acquaintance, I look for those who have some visible marker that makes me assume that they are safe to approach. This could be a conversation I overhear that is on a topic with which I am familiar . . . However, this often is more conditioned by assumptions I make about their appearance, posture, or the sound of their voice. To use the words of Christ, I rarely do more than seek the love of those who I believe will love me in return.

However, this impulse to seek sameness is narcissism under the guise of community, for it produces passive exclusivism. Everyone becomes focused on themselves, finding ways of satisfying their own need for connection and acceptance.

Enter Church of the Redeemer

I then enter church of the redeemer - a place with a consistently present refugee community. They offer what most churches in the area do not- cultural diversity. Yet, who do I first look for when I arrive? Where do my eyes fall? They rest on the people I already know- the fellows. They are my shelter from the storm of loneliness in the world. I run to them because I know them and they know me. Only rarely do my eyes ever rest upon a refugee. On the times when they do, I feel a sense of guilt at my relational inability to overcome the discomfort of difference long enough to make a new friend.

And this very act of resting my eyes on some people and not others is a root of racism in me. My prerogative to seek similarity in an effort to shore up my sense of self importance makes evident the narcissism that hides behind many of my acts of self-giving.

All the while, those refugees who experience a linguistic/cultural barrier feel loneliness amidst a sea of strangers who, because of their own insecurities, cannot show hospitality to those who feel they do not belong. And unlike me, those on the margins do not feel the cultural power to approach me. If I am to meet them- to make them feel the welcome that I also long for, I must be the one to go through the discomfort of taking the first step.

However, as I have said, I am too focused on assuaging my own sense of loneliness to even think of possibly approaching them. I am self-oriented, even in my most sociable moments. I am focused on meeting my own needs.

This phenomena at play within me also helps explain why particular members of the refugee community stop attending Redeemer on a weekly basis. Refugees, who are passed by every Sunday, eventually stop going to church. They stop going, in part, for this very reason- they feel more alone in the midst of a sea of people that do not see them than they do at home, where they cannot be seen. They would rather not spend time in a place that reveals to them their status as outsiders. How do we begin the practice of hospitality toward those we assume will not assuage our loneliness? How do we become attuned to the emotional state of those who are left out? How do we begin the process of loving those who, for whatever reason, find it difficult to love us in return?

I don’t have a succinct or satisfying answer to this question. No matter how many friends I make from various backgrounds, I cannot envision a future for myself that does not seek a space of acceptance from those I assume will accept me. However,  I think a partial answer lay in the words attributed to Saint Francis of Assisi.

“Grant that we may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.”

If the problem of my racism is rooted in my own insecurity, then maybe the solution lay in finding my security in something other than the community that makes me feel at home. How do I turn my loneliness from something that produces anxiety into something that produces strength? How do I develop a space within myself in which others feel welcome? How do I become one who receives in the giving, is consoled in the act of consoling, and finds security in the process of securing a space for the left out within my world?

The sunday school answer, of course, is Jesus. He is the one who often stands alone without being lonely, and creates an oasis of hospitality within himself in which all are welcome. He did not experience loneliness as insecurity, but as a time in which to commune with his father. When I am secured through spending time with God in solitude, it is easier to approach those I perceive as different. When my Identity is secure in him, acceptance follows. But the Identity cultivated in solitude with God is never a comfortable one. He is always calling us to greater acceptance and expression of love. He is always pushing the boundaries of our world, and this is uncomfortable.

However, this discomfort is a mirror. As long as we only spend time with those who are just like us, although it may assuage our loneliness in the short term, we never really come to know ourselves and our vulnerability.  In our weakness, in the misunderstandings that arise from rubbing shoulders with those that are not us and are not like us, we come to truly know ourselves. That discomfort is what helps us to grow.  It is the soil that spurs us to life. Coming to know oneself in God is something that requires intention, attention, and time staring our sense of fragility in the face. It requires struggle against our feelings of insecurity, and forces us to embrace others.

“Natural” Segregation

If you resonate with my partial account of racism within myself, then the steps that follow make sense. Most churches and communities are cultural clubs, in which we practice love toward those who we know will reciprocate. A facet of Cultural/linguistic/Economic segregation could follow from this basic insecurity/fear. We fool ourselves into thinking that we are not racists because we have a friend that is an ethnic minority, or because we hold no active negative feelings toward others. However, where we go to for support reveals much about our true orientation toward diversity. Beyond this, It explains why our churches are divided along cultural lines. It helps to explain why Businesses’ reflex is to hire those who are a good “cultural” fit for the company. If we find ourselves within the groups with the most cultural power, we no longer even see those who are on the margins, because our time is always spent in the company of those who inform and affirm our identity. We move from one social group to another, passing by the people that do not hold our attention all along the way. One such group that many rarely listen to, and almost never see, and yet have been present in American life from the very beginning, is that of the African American community. Their history runs parallel to our own. Yet, by in large, their perspective on our history is unimportant and unseen by the rest of America. Are we willing to cultivate enough security in God that we begin to build relationships with those who have always been present, but perennially passed over? How do we begin the process of listening to their voices? How do we address their questions and concerns? How would this change our political Identity? How would this change our economic position? How would becoming vulnerable to the concerns of the marginalized in our backyard change our priorities?

What does it look like to love the neighbor that one never sees?

Closer and Closer

written by Buddy Hocutt

I once read the creation story in Genesis 1 on top of a mountain. Gazing over God's vast, glorious creation as you read about is incredible. I highly recommend it next time you find yourself a few thousand feet above sea-level.

While reading the story, it was brought to my attention that God is a god of proximity. That is, we serve a god who desires to draw near to us. Perhaps in my head, maybe even in my heart I knew this, but never before had I heard it put to words. It rocked me. Who are we, who am I, that the eternal creator of the universe would want to be anywhere near me? Look at the marvelous mountain I was standing on – surely God would rather draw close to that! I mean, I'm mediocre at best, with a knack for screwing things up. At the very least you'd think God could find a better person than me to hang out with...

Actually, he probably couldn't. We're all pretty screwed up and that's the beauty of it. God loves this group of broken, dirty scrubs called humanity. He tells us as much all through scripture, but it
doesn't really sink in until you realize two things:

1. The (literal) ungodly mess we made of the world.
2. That God dove head-first into that mess to save it and in doing so, kick-started the greatest rescue mission of all time.

Actually, God was in it from the beginning. In Genesis 3, we read that God is walking in the garden with Adam and Eve. Granted, that's where the story goes South, but the fact remains – God engaged in creation alongside His greatest creation. Later, in Exodus 19, God descends from heaven to Mount Sinai and speaks to Moses. He doesn't just come down to hang out, he comes down to be with His people specifically! He even instructs the Israelites on how to build His house. He sends a bunch of laws and rules our way too – laws and rules designed to help us be humans the right way. We don't follow those directions very well, of course, and consequently we're in the lurch for few hundred years... But that's when God decides to get His hands dirty and come to earth again.

In the person of Jesus, the god of the universe has physically come down from heaven to live with his creation as creation. He comes hurling into chest-high muck and struggles right along with us. He is tempted. He is tried. He gets angry and he gets exasperated. But best of all, he gets up close and personal with the worst of the worst. He hurts with us, then He heals us. He experiences life with us, and then he invites us to dinner.

Prostitutes? You bet. Tax collectors? Definitely. The poor, broken, crippled, diseased, prideful, and arrogant? They all have a place at the table. We all have a place at the table, right next to Jesus. All we have to do is show up. Seriously. It's that easy. The hard part is really feeling like we belong; really feeling the presence of God with us.

That's where I'm being shaped and formed right now. At the beginning of Fellows we all chose a one-word prayer for the year. Mine was spirit – as in drawing close to God and feeling His Holy Spirit viscerally. See, my walk with Christ has traditionally featured a lot of Father and a lot of Son, but the Holy Spirit has been a kind of redheaded step-child. The Trinity has always felt like a single line, rather than a three-sided figure. Real “God moments” rarely happen for me and I approach them with a healthy dose of skepticism and a hard heart.

But, reading Genesis on top of a mountain started to chip away at me. Living in true community with my fellow Fellows is softening my heart. As I come to the table with others; as I see Christ in them and witness the Spirit moving in their lives I feel my skepticism melting away. As I advocate for refugees on internship days and see them flourish, the Trinity starts to look like the Trinity again. Ultimately, as I quiet my heart and listen; as I reflect on those two points above, God draws closer and closer. Or rather, I draw closer and closer to God. He stays where he's been all along – in and amongst humanity, everywhere at all times. It's me who moves away – a truth I am only now learning... and relearning... and learning again.

The Light

written by Alyson Arrington

This week at Morning Prayer sweet Kait led us through Scripture centered on John 8:12, The Light of the World:

When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

Darkness represents sin, and it’s opposite, light, represents the forgiveness from sin when your life is filled with the Lord.

I started to think about the times that I am physically in the dark. I personally am not a fan of overhead lighting, I am a lamp kind of woman. Thus, I have a horrible habit of entering home and refusing to flip on the light. More often than not my hands are full with a gym bag, a computer or a stack of books, and a bag of groceries… or all four. My eyes adjust quickly to darkness, and usually I navigate my way perfectly to the couch or table before everything falls into a heap and the grocery bags completely cut off my circulation. But not always. Sometimes I’m almost there and a water bottle falls out or there’s a dog toy that wasn’t there earlier, a running shoe… and you get the picture. I lose my bananas. Literally, the grocery bag busts and bananas and oranges roll all over the place as I trip over the unknown object. Figuratively this unsuccessful attempt through the darkness is a lot like our attempt through the darkness without the light of the world, without Jesus. We find ourselves in said darkness, carrying the heavy load on our shoulders, on our hearts. We are carrying this load thinking “oh yeah I’m almost there I got this” and then comes the dog toy, the running shoe, the hair dryer or the tennis ball and we stub our toe and mouth curse words, maybe step on our small dog, break our computer and then we fall, flat on our faces (or bottoms depending on which way physics wanted to play with us that day).

I will never be 100% successful navigating the dark when I arrive home and we will NEVER be successful navigating darkness with our loads without Jesus. By the time I get my load down, I always seek out one of my lamps. I would have been far safer seeking the light before I made my journey across the living room. We will ALWAYS be safe seeking the light of the world, seeking Jesus, in the journey “across the living room”: through life. The journeys will look different for all of us and different at different times. In transitional periods, deployments, through cancer, through abuse, through mental illness. In relationships and in marriages, the dissolutions of friendships, in heartbreak, in parenthood. In times when you can’t find hope, the list goes on and on. But one thing will remain constant, the light will remain constant if we choose to follow it.

“The light shines in the darkness, the darkness has not overcome it.” John 1:5

“Darkness can’t drive out darkness. Only light can do that” – Martin Luther King Jr.

The light can always shatter the dark, as long as you seek it.

Release

written by Alyson Arrington

So I will start off by saying that I have never written a blog post before, and one might turn to me in response and say something along the lines of: “well why don’t you just read a few posts of a blog and get the feel for it and then write away!” Before I graduated college, before I entered the Fellows program, that is precisely what I would have done. However keeping in tune with my one-word prayer that Papa Tripp stirred within each one of us at our very first family dinner (under the stars I might add, it was very classy): I am going to not read any blog posts nor even ask Jessie what it is I am supposed to be writing here!

Release. Release is my one word prayer. Tripp asked us each to think of one word that we wished to be praying for each other in this season together here in sweet, sweet Greensboro. I know for myself there has been such an enormous shift in being able to release my impatience, fears, disappointments and restlessness to the Lord this semester. When I pass along this blog to the other Fellows each week, I am hoping that each of us will be able to convey to all of us reading this that they too are feeling the prayers and their one word develop in them. For me I first felt my word really developing during our trip to Virginia for our testimony retreat weekend. I wrestled from the moment Tripp sent the email about how to deliver my story; the parts of it that are painful, the parts that could be awkward, even the parts that make my heart smile. I decided not to type it all up and pore over it every two days and edit it until it was perfect like I planned. I decided to RELEASE it to the Lord and the words that were supposed to come out would come out and there wouldn’t be any preparation.

I hope the rest of the Fellows are finding time to explore their words as well, and maybe even beginning to pray some of each other’s words for their own lives. Because while a lot of us Fellows ran around like chickens with our heads cut off the first semester (I believe that is the way Elsa put it) as we settled into new roles and new living situations and new jobs and responsibilities, I was always calmed by the idea that God has put each of us here in this program together for reasons we aren’t supposed to understand yet. We might have looked at each other at one point, and thought, “I have absolutely no idea how they are going to make a difference in my life”. But that’s the beauty of it! The Fellows program is a recipe picked out by the Lord; Tripp and Sarah have done the grocery shopping and dumped us all in one big bowl and now it’s up to the 14 of us to ride the whisk as God mixes the bowl.

“I find you Lord in all Things and in all my fellow creatures, pulsing with your life; as a tiny seed you sleep in what is small, and in the vast you vastly yield yourself.” – The Book of Hours

Fellows Fold International

So it's June.

(I know, I know – how did that happen? No clue.)

But it's June and that means a few things.

First – it means our year as Fellows is coming to an end. There's been a lot of lasts lately – last morning prayer, last family dinner, last day of classes, last day of work. This past weekend was our final retreat. I sat on a porch with my favorite people, listening to rain fall and thinking – how did it go so fast? It feels like just yesterday we were sitting on that same porch, sharing our favorite books and movies and talking about what the next ten months would bring, and now here we are, retelling stories from the past ten months.

It's been an incredible year, to say the least. I don't know how to accurately describe what the Fellows program does for you, but I can honestly tell you it's been life-changing. It's a community that will last through eternity. It's challenging your theology and learning how to worship the Lord with your mind. It's living out your faith in the workplace. It's getting up before the sun to pray together. It's a perspective on life that keeps Christ in the center.

We're all different people – better people, I believe – because of our time as Fellows. And as we say – once a Fellow, always a Fellow. The program is ending, but our friendship isn't. It's just going to look a little different next year.

But, sappy emotional endings aside – June means something else. June means we're all getting on a place and flying to Rwanda.

We'll be spending two weeks in Rwanda, visiting our sister parish in Karangazi, learning from a Hope International savings group, visiting Compassion School Projects and seeing the work of ICM. Redeemer has a long-standing relationship with the Karangazi Parish, and many of the people going on our trip have visited Karangazi before. That's what makes this trip feel so special – we're stepping into an established relationship with our brothers and sisters. Andrea, a member of the Fellows Class of 2012-2013, is returning with us this year and can't wait to see her friends from her last trip. Many Redeemer families sponsor children through Compassion – in fact, Sarah Moubray and Stacey are co-sponsoring a sweet girl named Phionah and will get to meet her for the first time.

We're all so excited to see what God is doing in Rwanda, to get a wider perspective on the church, and to grow closer as we travel together. But – we need your help.

First: pray for us. We absolutely believe in the power of prayer. So many of you have been praying for the Fellows this year and we would really appreciate if you could just cover us in prayer a little bit longer. Pray for safe travels, pray for eyes to see and ears to hear what God is doing, pray for protection for those who aren't taking malaria medication (no really, pray for that.)

Second: turns out international airfare isn't cheap. Would you prayerfully consider partnering with us financially? As a group, we're trying to raise $3,000 to help cover our trip costs. We've already raised a portion of that (shout-out to anyone who bought a t-shirt!) but there's still a ways to go. If you'd like to support us financially, there are a few ways to do that!

We're running an online auction through Better World Collective to raise money. There are some great things up there for sale – you get an awesome deal and we get funding for our trip! It's a win-win. Check it out and see if anything catches your interest! https://gfp.betterworldcollective.com/

If you'd prefer to just donate directly, you can do that too! Our Donate page has all the information you'll need. You can donate by credit card or check...we like to make your life easy, so do whatever is best for you!

Thank you, thank you, thank you, to everyone who has supported us this year, in everything from praying to opening your home to writing a check to feeding us. This is possible because of you, and we're all incredibly humbled by the knowledge that so many of you believe in the Fellows and believe in God's work through the Fellows enough to invest in us. We have been so blessed through you – thank you for showing us God's love.

Finally, if you want to follow our journey to Rwanda, all our adventures will be documented here on the Redeemer to Rwanda blog. We'll be sharing pictures, stories, and prayer requests from our trip. Follow along as we take the Fellows Fold international!

With much love and thankful hearts,

the Greensboro Fellows Class of 2015

Who I Am & Who God Is

written by Graham Monroe

This semester, during our Monday morning discipleship hour, each Fellow is taking turns leading. This past Monday, Graham invited the Fellows into an exercise that he has been using recently in his quiet times - writing out who God says you are, and who God is. Identity, purpose and guidance can then flow more freely out of that knowledge and encouragement. Here are some of his writings:

Who God Is:
God is a good and trustworthy Father. My guide and protector. A lamp to my feet. God is always near, and never changing. God is the ultimate source of satisfaction. God is kind and victorious, holy, greater and mysterious.

• gracious, loving
• judge
• sustainer
• fountain of blessing
• omnipresent
• healer
• everlasting
• gracious
• merciful
• beautiful
• Abba/daddy
• king of kings
• shelter
• jealous
• infinite
• persister
• consistent

Who God says I am:

I am a child. A son of a royal priest. A son to the King. I am expensive, bought with the highest price of heaven. I am a saint. I am one with Christ Jesus and made new. I have favor with the royal family of heaven for I am a citizen of heaven. I am adopted, redeemed, forgiven, justified and being sanctified. I am loved. I am cared for. I am a friend to Jesus. I am pure, holy and blameless. I am a temple to where Christ's spirit that overcame the grave dwells. I am a branch.

• co-laborer
• ambassador
• reflector of glory
• his bride
• disciple
• sheep
• fearfully and wonderfully made
• adopted
• beloved
• servant
• leader
• teacher
• chosen people