Scribble Sessions

My handwriting is celebrated as unsteady, shaky sessions that I call “scribbles”.  My sentences often look like a mixture of crooked upper and lower case letters written by a four-year-old, falling diagonal outside of notebook paper lines.

My scribbles remind me of an art form.   My printing is illegible much of the time due to a mild case of cerebral palsy, therefore I must concentrate, to whittle my words, shaping them to clarity against hands that tremor.  These may appear as imperfect renditions upon a page, but they are expressions of me.

Yet scribbles are no longer just written words I use to characterize my penmanship, they have come to mean more, serving as tangible representations, distinguishing marks in how I want to love others and live out my life wholly devoted to Jesus Christ.  The ill-shapen, jagged letters cause me to reflect upon the sentences of my existence; my scribbles are what those specific pages bookmarked as milestones celebrate; they are the segments in life that string chapters together, pointing me to purpose.  “Scribbles” is a life story of intention that carves out a theme of sanctification.  Scribbles inspire me to live outside of predetermined lines; they are what drive me to hope, making me who I am today, what I will be tomorrow.

Scribbles are not the shaky edges from a scratched life that needs to be erased, rather they are the markings whittled out of our own brokenness that are meant to be lived.  Far too many times we worry about the rewriting, of rounding out our letters more precisely, shaping them to fit within the confines of a manufactured script, some manicured society.  After decades of processing life, I have come to understand that the written beauty of God’s redemption through His pursuit of my individual life is a biography of celebration, declaring a holiness that I haven’t earned, the process by which I want to stand out because of God’s grace shown to me through Jesus Christ.  Scribbles become that expression of His love to those around us; it’s an art form.

In 2010, a staff member from a high school ministry in Noblesville, Indiana noticed how I had written the actual word “scribbles” in my own handwriting.  “Scribble Sessions” became the inspiration behind naming their winter camp weekend, and it was through speaking at this camp when I first realized that God had been using scribbles as a theme of sanctity throughout my entire life to shape me, to alter my perspective in how I viewed the world, to change my heart for those who are marginalized, and to show me how my own story was being used to help those who grapple with the angst of brokenness.

2 Thessalonians 3:17 – “I, Paul, write this greeting in my own hand, which is the distinguishing mark in all my letters.  This is how I write.”

The apostle Paul certainly had imperfect circumstances, and through in his own brokenness, God used him significantly to be an influence in his letters to the various people throughout the New Testament; he empowered the Church how to celebrate life, how to become an authentic expression.  This was how Paul wrote; it was how he lived.  He used his life and its distinguishing markings to ignite a passion.

Scribbles are the representations of brokenness, those shattered pieces of our existence that are not meant to confine nor define us, but rather are to become distinguishing markings that fill us with hope.  They are the symbols of our lives that allow us to run free because we have been redeemed through Jesus Christ to be an authentic expression.  Life is an art form, to whittle with words a process that celebrates.  The way I live my life becomes the pen.  How, then, will I chose to write it?

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Left Field Banter

San Diego, CA / June 5, ’11

I sat in seat 4, section 127, row 28. I was in right field just beyond the yellow foul post in homerun territory. I had an uninhibited view, staring out into left field. Amid the crack of the bats and the cheering fans, my favorite thing about being in the ballpark was looking over that left field wall and seeing the Western Metal Supply Company.

Petco Park is located in downtown and is home to the San Diego Padres. I was fascinated by the design of the ballpark and my attention was diverted the entire game. The Western Metal Supply Company was something that did not seem to belong among these grandstands, a manicured baseball field, or underneath the bright lights, and yet somehow it did. Over that left field wall, this renovated brick building was persevered during the construction of Petco Park and stands as a historic landmark within a stadium, now converted into a restaurant, a memorabilia store, and a couple of luxury suites among other things.

The next day I spoke at The Rock Church and I talked about the foolishness of the world compared to the wisdom of God. “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God” (1 Corinthians 1:18). The apostle Paul was compelled to preach this message, yet not with human wisdom, because he did not want the cross of Christ to “be emptied of its power” (1 Corinthians 1:17).

How many times have we heard people describing others as being in “left field” due to perhaps the way that they think or the manner in how they perceive the world around them? And what about us? How many times have we tried to function upon our own wisdom, ignoring those things in our lives that according to our own human standards do not belong? We don’t think about renovated brick buildings in stadiums divided among sections, rows, or seats. We don’t notice the “left field” of our existence per se because it does not blend into our preconceived notions in how things should and ought to be for us. While our focus is elsewhere, we could very well be missing out on the wisdom of God speaking in this regard. We keep stereotyping as foolishness those precise things He chooses to use by His creative design, adding to the context of His experience with us.

I have learned over the years through my own battles that God’s message certainly does not pertain to a health-wealth gospel. Sure, He wants to bless us, but He also does not work on our terms, in our wisdom, but instead calls us to trust, acting out faith through obedience. Life is not about us; it never has been, nor will it ever be. In 1 Corinthians, the apostle Paul wrote to those who were “sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be holy” (1 Corinthians 1:2). We have been more than renovated, Christian. We now stand transformed, new, a people to be used multi-purposely who will and “act according to his good purpose” (Philippians 2:13). Paul writes that we have been enriched, that the testimony about Christ has been confirmed, and that we do not lack in our spiritual gifts (1 Corinthians 1:5-7).

And yet so many times our “unwelcome” circumstances cause us to buy into lies that manufacture us into people we were never intended to be. It stops our movement and stifles our progression of change. Those inadequacies about us fester and we put on the façade we think is necessary to hide those blemishes. We fail to look beyond the barricades we construct about our lives when something just over that left field wall is standing in our midst, yet we disregard and consider it to be the “left field” of our existence – it is ugly; it is lonely; it doesn’t fit into the status quo; it becomes foolishness.

We don’t gaze into our “left field” often because we believe it does not belong when measured against a worldly perspective, yet it is the wisdom of God speaking in spite of us. He uses our idea of foolishness – ongoing battles, insecurities, and even unfortunate tragedy – to voice the message of the cross to those around us. Our circumstances may seem foolishness to us, yet it is the power of God at work so that we never have room to boast. It isn’t our wisdom. It is His. The irony? God is perfection and His wisdom is infinite, but He chooses imperfection to declare His praises. He uses you. He uses me. He takes our malfunctions to display His power. It is one of my favorite things about His beauty.

I do not consider myself a baseball fan. I do not follow it, I do not like watching it on television, but I will always enjoy being at a game. If I were to pick a team, I might be partial to the San Diego Padres because God simply spoke to me: I sure enjoyed staring out into left field. He reminded me of His power and the privilege I have to serve Him. What walls do you have to look beyond to start your movement of change?

Metropolis

McKeesport, PA / January 13-17 ’11

I reconnected with a family that I had met about seven years ago in Papua New Guinea when I spoke at a missionary school for New Tribes Missions.  Now back in McKeesport, and ministering in a local church in the suburbs of Pittsburgh, the Ryder family remembered my story and invited me out to speak on three separate occasions: I spoke for an overnight junior high event, for a high school retreat, and then at a Sunday evening church service for the adults.

When we came out of the tunnel on the way back from the airport on that first night, the view of downtown Pittsburgh was a spectacular sight.  I was fascinated by the architecture of the bridges spanning the Three Rivers’ area as well as the center of the metropolis towering in front of us – the city was compacted with its milieu of skyscrapers, its bright lights, and the traffic streaming along the city boulevards.  As I reflected upon my winter season of speaking, I thought about my transient lifestyle much like the mentality of the electricity that hums throughout downtown in any major city.

Life is much like a metropolis.  Our culture embraces this buzzing atmosphere where our immediate circumstances consume us: the bright lights of busy schedules make us appear bigger than life; the hype in the purchase of commodities fill our emptiness; the venues of resources distract us; and the magnificent buildings we construct as prominence identifies our security within the realm of the status quo.  We are engulfed into the dynamics of socialization, this myriad of interaction, that has conditioned us to believe that our lives always have to be popping, loud with the traffic of activity, or we equate its absence and lack thereof as though something were wrong with us.

“But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light” (1 Peter 2:9).  One of my speaking adventures during this long weekend was at a retreat for high school students, which took place two hours north of Pittsburgh in a luxurious 40+ – room mansion deemed “The Castle,” and it was here that we looked at the significance of what it means to be a child of God and the importance of being a participant in His Kingdom.  I discussed with the students how we become so saturated by the messages of our culture that we forget who we are, and yet all the while we still seek out forms of false significance, believing lies and becoming chameleons of a generation that would rather fit in than stand out.

A far cry from the primitive tribes found scattered throughout Papua New Guinea, we have somehow abandoned the basics found in preserving a thriving livelihood in exchange for the commerce of a metropolis that affects the economy of our existence.  I reminisced the green hillsides of Papua New Guinea with the Ryder family, the terrain of those dense trees overhanging the pristine landscapes, and I appreciated once again what it was like for me to be in one of the remotest parts of the world seven years ago.  Papua New Guinea was a place that taught me about the essentials in life, opening my eyes as I watched the locals relying on the most basic of necessities to sustain their own livelihood.

I began to process all of this while driving through downtown Pittsburgh.  Reflecting upon my own life, it occurred to me that the imagery of the metropolis before me reiterated a lost significance that makes us long for the essential.  The glamour surrounding a metropolis soon wane, but our hearts are still very much primitive and desires the necessities that matter most; this King we have access to as His children, and the purpose we find from being participants in His Kingdom.

Our true solace is not found from the glitz associated with an electric atmosphere, but rather it is identified in the hush that is frequently missed in a slow-paced world that still remains rural.  May our lives not be engulfed in a metropolis so loud that we forget who we are!

Stick Figures

Crestline, CA / January 7-9, `11

I found myself envious of that innocence that is captured in the heart of a child.  During my first winter camp of the season, I paused to reflect upon those years that seem so long ago.  What ever happened to our stick figures drawn with colorful chalk on the sidewalks?  Where are the forts that we once built?  And what about the trails that kicked up dirt behind us as we raced our bikes upon them?

“I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love…” (Jonah 4:2).  As I taught the book of Jonah to a group of 4^th-6^th grade students, I thought about their perception of God in lieu of their childlike innocence.  Our lives are a narrative held together by the bookends of our existence; we are born, we die.  How we respond to the pages that make up our individual stories in between is the greatest responsibility we have to God and to humanity.  We are people who God doesn’t need, but nonetheless we are a people that He relentlessly pursues.  My sole desire was to speak from this concept, simplifying it into four small lessons that these students could understand.

Whenever the book of Jonah is taught, I oftentimes hear about punishment and the stern consequences for disobeying.  Yet could we also be overlooking the greatest message of all?  Could the book of Jonah really be a message about hope, God’s pursuit of us, and His desire to use everyday common people to carry out His Glory despite our sin?  I want children to appropriately be fearful of the magnitude of God and not be pathologically afraid of who He is.  We worship God who abounds in an unconditional love so that we cease to disobey, instead of making our relationship with God into a religion that is based upon scare tactics.  But do children truly understand the magnificence of such love?

“Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me” (Jonah 1:2).  Jonah ran away from God’s command and ended up being swallowed by a great fish.  I ask the question, why was he swallowed?  Why didn’t he just drown?  God got fed up, end of story.  But whether it is a fish or it is a whale that swallowed Jonah, the debate doesn’t matter because God spared his life in favor of death and He used the sea creature as a vehicle for His pursuit of Jonah.  By God’s grace, He wanted Jonah for a specific purpose, spitting him out of a belly to exemplify compassion to a people who were his enemies.

Jonah was God’s man and God wanted him to understand that.  Jonah got angry because all along he knew God’s character and that the people of Nineveh would be saved.  God did the same thing when Jesus died on the cross for each one of us.  While our deeds deserved death, the severity of His sacrifice brought us life.  It was God’s voice.  It was God’s love.  Our sin cannot stand up to the Holiness of God.  My own filth is the gavel swinging down in judgment upon me declaring my destruction, but instead God’s abounding love in Christ is what sets me free.

“And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else” (Acts 17:25).  God doesn’t need us.  God didn’t need Jonah.  Yet God desires to use us, and for whatever reason, He wants a relationship with us.  The book of Jonah is an example of this because oftentimes we run in the other direction from God, yet instead of the story ending, our narrative continues by showing us God’s Providence.  Like Jonah, may we be spit out of the belly of our own woes so that we can be used for what He has graciously purposed for us.  I thank God that He did not give up on me!

I miss the innocence that comes with being a child.  Looking back, I now have a responsibility as an adult to speak Christ by accurately portraying both God as judge and as God of love.  God’s pursuit of each one of us leaves me dumfounded.  We are stick figures, and no doubt are intricately and wonderfully made, but our Maker does not need us.  We worship God simply because of that abounding love that nobody can fathom.  My hope is that these 4^th-6^th students walked away from winter camp with the ability to experience God in some revolutionary way.  God loves the faith of a child.

Baggage Claim

Concord, NC / January 2, `11

I started the New Year speaking at a place that is close to home.  West Cabarrus Church is located just outside Charlotte, North Carolina and is the church that my family has attended for the past several years.  I felt honored to start the New Year sitting in a row with people I love, who have lived life with me, and who have known the journey that I have been on.  There was nowhere else I’d rather be than to begin 2011 with family.

“Blessed are those whose strength is in you, who have set their hearts on pilgrimage” (Psalm 84:5).  This verse makes me think about baggage claim at an airport.  Travelers stand next to conveyor belts watching various pieces of luggage pass by until they identify their own.  They claim what is theirs and once they arrive at their destination they begin to unpack the contents that make up their baggage.  This image of baggage claim causes me to contemplate the perspective this psalmist must have.  “Who have set their hearts on pilgrimage” is a phrase where I perceive the act of traveling as something that is daunting, but the psalmist references the journey as a blessing.

Psalm 84 is a reflection that recounts where this psalmist has been in comparison to his destination and arrival.  Through his personal journey, he focuses upon his hardships and while it is probably easy for him to celebrate his mountaintop experiences, it is interesting that he takes care to document the desert place of his existence.  It is actually through the importance of him talking about the Valley of Baca where he realizes that such a place is his biggest blessing; it opens his eyes and teaches him about what matters most in this life.  The baggage of his journey sparks the due recognition for just how great God is.  “How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord Almighty.  My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the Lord” (Psalm 84:1-2).  Better is one day than a thousand elsewhere!  (Psalm 84:10)

After praying about what message I could possibly give at West Cabarrus, I was prompted to speak about this psalm of pilgrimage.  This process started to come to fruition a week earlier as I sat on my parents’ front porch on Christmas evening bundled in winter apparel.  I watched the snowflakes settle on rooftops, outline the tree branches, and accumulate on the roadways.  I felt like I was in the midst of a snow globe that somebody had tipped upside down and shaken.  It was a beautiful winter storm and the seasonal change of snow falling became symbolic to me because it generated a sense of expectation: the white landscape was a picture of hope that gave me a fresh start.

“As they pass through the Valley of Baca, they make it a place of springs; the autumn rains also cover it with pools” (Psalm 84:6).  With the journey, there comes responsibility.  What about the baggage we must claim?  We each have our baggage that we drag through life, and depending on the seasonal changes that we weather along the way, there are those times where it feels extra heavy.  My challenge is to claim my baggage as an instrument to be used while the contents within are put where they belong.  Where is my focus?  My weaknesses can actually be seen as a place of springs and a blessing for somebody else.  I do not want to be a desert dweller and let the Valley of Baca consume me, but rather I desire to be one who goes “from strength to strength, till each appears before God in Zion” (Psalm 84:7).  I want my peace in Christ to propel me onward!

My first speaking opportunity of 2011 turned into a sentimental Sunday because I was close to home.  I was so grateful to be surrounded by family because they have helped carry my baggage those times it seemed too heavy for me.  May 2011 become a time we have the courage to claim our baggage and all the while be a blessing for others as we help carry theirs along the way!

The Fence Post

Wichita, KS / November 12-14, ‘10

This picture of a pier shows imperfection, not to mention that it is a long way from Kansas.  The images are shaky and the backdrop is blurred.  This seascape may not seem to offer much in the way of a photograph.  And though it may be out of focus, its quality is not jeopardized.  While others would disagree and try to take another picture in its place, I find beauty in the distortion.  I can’t change any of my physical limitations, but I can make the most of every one of them.  Even from the smallest of things, such as my hands that tremor while taking photographs, this picture is an expression of me.

I traveled to Wichita and had the privilege to speak about the uniqueness that resounds in each of us.  I challenged high school students on a theme entitled, “Uncommon,” which encouraged them to live out their lives as expressions of God’s love to the world around them.  As I stood in the auditorium, I couldn’t help but notice the bright green and white plastic cups stuffed in the holes of a chain-link fence hanging over the stage.  They spelled out the word, Uncommon, and not only did it give the students a visual for the weekend, but it also provided them with an opportunity for introspection.

When I was asked to speak at this conference for the southern district of Mennonite Churches, I jumped at the invitation.  I have not only wrestled with feeling uncommon throughout my lifetime, but now I was sharing about these personal experiences with the hope that God would have His way and show Himself to each one of us.  If these students ever questioned their place in the world, I could relate.  I saw myself peering through the holes of a chain-link fence because I was fascinated by what I saw on the other side.  I shared that as a teenager I struggled trying to make sense of a world when my entire life changed the day I woke up with a disease.  I wanted to be on the other side of the fence because there I would fit in and the loneliness in being different would not be the chains linking me to isolation.

God grabbed my attention when I stumbled upon 1 Corinthians 1:27-29.  “But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.  He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things – and the things that are not – to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him.”  These verses shifted my perspective: they eventually began leading me to a life of peace; and they became my mission as a speaker.  Those things I once considered foolish; weak; lowly; and despised were seen by God as beautiful expressions.  I was shown that my life wasn’t about me, but rather allowing God to use me to celebrate His glory.  If I lived out life knowing this, there was an undeniable rest and freedom to be me.

I hope God mobilizes each one of us towards experiencing a life of peace.  My picture of this pier is a compilation of shaky images that captures beauty for me, an expression.  We may not feel as though we have anything to give in comparison to others, but we will never know the impact one can have until we discover the art that is found in living.  Whatever picture we instill to others, however small, just might paint a thousand words to describe Jesus Christ for somebody else!  I choose to pick up the brush.

From Kids to Kings

Calaveras County, CA / September 9-14, `10

“Am I pretty?”  Her dad asked while four-year-old Fern was busy pretending to put makeup on his face.  Without batting an eye and in an innocence that comes only from a child, she responded with impeccable timing.  “I don’t see it yet.”  I wanted to fall out of my chair laughing.

I spent five days in Calaveras County which is situated in the rolling foothills of the Sierra-Nevada Mountains.  It is made up of communities such as Angels Camp, Murphys, and Copperopolis, which sound either angelic, like a trendy name for a restaurant, or the perfect setting for a novel.  I was caught up in my surroundings as though time had stood still and my life at home was somehow forgotten.  I spoke on five different occasions to people of all ages ranging from those who were in kindergarten to those who were in their eighties.  The overall theme originated from the mouth of this four-year-old child and on Sunday morning the congregation howled upon hearing the story of Fern and her dad.

From kids to kings and everyone in between, God uses us in ways we may never realize.  Sometimes we may wonder how our personal trials make sense in the larger scheme of things.  We don’t see the purpose of those trials yet, but maybe we are not supposed to see anything because God often demonstrates beauty in the obscure places people find themselves in, reiterating that life is not about us, but rather how we can worship God through the lives that we lead.  Do we trust Him?

In 2 Kings 20, King Hezekiah experienced an illness and Isaiah prophesized that it was going to take his life.  Hezekiah wept bitterly and began to pray for his life to be spared.  While in the waiting period, Hezekiah did not see the purpose of his illness as the outcome wasn’t looking pretty.  God ended up adding fifteen more years to his life, and in Isaiah 38, King Hezekiah writes: “But what can I say?  He has spoken to me, and he himself has done this.  I will walk humbly all my years because of this anguish of my soul.  Lord, by such things men live; and my spirit finds life in them too.  You restored me to health and let me live” Isaiah 38:15, 16.

“Am I pretty?”  I asked the church to consider where their hearts lie.  “I don’t see it yet” becomes the common response when evaluating the soul.  I wonder if King Hezekiah was proclaiming that through his brokenness he actually found what it means to live.  From kids to kings and everyone in between, God whispers to and through each one of us.  It was paradise to hear God’s voice through His people amid scenery that was fit for a king, but I realized that true beauty was found in the background of His kids displaying contagious faith.  It reminded me, just be still.

When the plane touched back down in Phoenix I thought, what would I do with fifteen more years?