Gift x Investment = Strength. Change is in the air....but where is the wind blowing?

It's 60+ degrees in San Francisco. Yesterday i wore sandals and used Christmas money to buy a hippie tunic.  I feel at the edge of change.  Maybe dressing differently (what? no more black and more black?)   I suddenly, after decades of Birkenstock-wearing, want to buy a pair of those hip, cool, and trendy boots.  for crying out loud, I lost 12 pounds and bought a pair of skinny pants (well, sort of skinny....let's not get carried away).

How do we know when it's time for change.  I just GOT here.  I love what I'm doing.  It is the right place for me now. The right focus for my life in this time.

Then, other things start flying by.  The Dean of Students of a ministry school in the area speaks to me about the need for healing ministry with their students.  My church leaders announce a missions trip to thailand - people are needed to do healing prayer and counseling with children and adult survivors of sex trafficking.    I learn that someone I want to mentor me is planning a ministry trip to Uganda.  I want to go!

The possibility of more change is intriguing. And, it leaves me feeling unsettled and a bit anxious.  Like I said, I just got here. I love what I'm doing.  I know this is the right place for this time in my life.  so, why am I feeling at the edge of change? 

I remember hearing stories from exchange students and friends who moved to new locations.  they often said. "About 3 months in I hit a wall. Felt tired. Easily frustrated.  Wanted to go home."
Then, about 6 months in, they started to dream in the new language. Began to wake up knowing they were in their new home - not the old one.  Change.

I sense that kind of change.  A deeper settling.  A clearer focus. Something new. Something's happening.

What I suddenly see is the change that's approaching isn't greater insight about what I'm doing. It isn't a different focus or something new I'm supposed to DO.  it isn't even something else that interests me or strikes my fancy.    it's change in ME.  Something new and deeper happening inside.

Prior to coming to San Francisco I spent a lot of time and energy in self-discovery. Who was I, after decades of taking care of everyone else but myself?  What were my real gifts?  I had spent many years doing what needed to be done and putting the individual (me) aside for the good of the group (church, family, ministry, team....whatever).  This wasn't terrible or wrong. It also wasn't always healthy or balanced.

So, the decision to come to San Francisco and invest in Because Justice matters was a decision to explore and invest in who I am.  Where my real gifts and interests lie.  What really makes my bells ring and brings me closer to the heart of Father God.

During the year prior to this change,  our Madison, Wisconsin leadership team did Strength Finders. We journeyed through the DISC test and read "LEMON Leadership."  I saw that I had been taught, for all my Christian life, that my "job" was to fix my weaknesses.  I focused on weakness-fixing. I was barely aware of my strengths.   Oh, I had taken some Christian-y "gifts" testing (often gender biased and role-oriented.....I didn't find them particularly helpful, to be honest).   I wasn't confident in understanding my own strengths. 

I learned things like "A wounded 'D' (Directive, dominant according to DISC descriptions) often functions as an 'S'  (steadiness, service)."   That helped me understand some of my history and life decisions  Interesting... Did I choose service and steadiness because my directive, dominant woman-self wasn't welcome in the Christian community?  Is that true?  Hmmm.  What does that say about my "steady, serving" self?  Was that real or just a way to cope and please people??????

 I discovered my Individualization strength (seeing people as individuals, valuing diversity, disliking stereotyping, bias, and lumping people into groups based on arbitrary distinctions like gender or age or whatever).  This helped me understand why justice is so important to me.  Why I reject and dislike certain political perspectives. Why I react so strongly when people presume to "speak for" others....assuming they know what others think, need, or experience. Men who presume to speak for women. White people who presume to know what Black people experience. Straight people to presume to explain what it's like to be gay.  

I learned that TalentGifts x Investment = Strength.  I learned that I am a natural networker, connector, communicator and leader.  All this helped me to figure out a bit of the question "Who am I?"  and "What should I be doing?"

In 2010 I finished a masters program in mental health counseling.  Then, in 2012, I was ordained for ministry.  My pastor, Paul - the apostle who ordained me for ministry- said I have spiritual gifts of pastoring, healing, teaching. But my heart and calling is that of an evangelist.  That helped me.  I've spent the past year growing in understanding that.

So I'm back to Talent/gifts x Investment = Strength.

I wonder whether the change that seems to be on the wind is change I need to foster.  Strength Finder authors wrote that greatest growth comes when we build upon our strengths rather than fix our weaknesses.   What would that even look like?

What would it look like for me to consciously choose situations and experiences that would invest my talent/gifts to increase strengths?   If healing, teaching and pastoral care are among my gifts, how might I consciously invest in them?  How would that develop and increase my Strengths?

So...this collides with years of doing good things because they simply needed to be done. Taking a job coordinating children's ministry because no one truly called to children's ministry was found.  Doing the very best job I could working as a therapist with families because I needed a job that would complete my required hours for licensing as a therapist - all the while knowing my heart wasn't in it and my calling was to bring wounded women to Jesus for healing and wholeness.  Sacrificing career to be home full-time with my kids.

I don't regret those choices.  Yet, what would it look like to change those life-long patterns...not eliminate them, but change them. Let them mature and expand to include investment in my gifts/talents in order to grow and develop my strengths?   To begin to say "I'm doing X....that's good. It needs to happen and I can do it.   AND I need to do Y also....because that's where my gifts and talents lie. That's my spiritual calling."

What does this mean?  I have an evangelist's heart to see every man, woman, and child know Jesus and be transformed by His great, beautiful, healing love.   I long to see people healed...broken bodies, minds, and spirits made Whole.  To see justice done in our communities and, especially, by people who say they follow Jesus.  God has been showing me that His view of justice isn't like ours. He "does justice" with ever-greater acts of ever-more-radical LOVE.

How would I "grow" that strength? How would I consciously give space to that calling and emerging "self"?   How would I invest?  What would that look like?

Change is in the air.  I've decided to find and wear more of the ethnic, "hippie" clothes I used to love and stopped wearing for some reason.   I've set aside some money for those hip, cool, and trendy boots.  Changed my hairstyle a bit, too.  I'm inquiring about that missions trip to Thailand and trying to connect with the amazing woman who leads the healing teams to Uganda and elsewhere.    And, I'm deepening my roots here, with BJM in the Tenderloin.  Asking Dad for more relationships with more women. To show me where I can serve and support what's happening here.  Looking for balance. Investing.

Waiting to see what Father God is going to do. 

Seeking, Finding and Receiving: Jesus in the Tenderloin

Warm and beautiful in San Francisco. Not snowing in Tahoe. Christmas is coming and this girl is ready!
I've been waiting until I could post an "it's Christmas and things are wonderful" blog post.  But things kept getting in the way. 

Every day I see, first hand, a little of how difficult Christmas is for people without homes and distant from family.  M -  has no family and, it seems, may have lost one child to death and some others when she became so depressed she couldn't function and Child Protective Services got involved.  yesterday she hugged me (a rare gift from her) and asked what I was going to do for christmas.  I said I was going to be with my daughters.  "That's good," she said. "Tell them I love them."

K has been on the streets since age 10. That's TEN for those of you who think you misread.  She once said, "I had them all fooled....I was going to school and church and nobody knew [that she was homeless]."  K's parents were addicts. She was molested in a foster home and escaped by running away.

Thursday, we had Art for the Heart. K played favorite songs - I Can Only Imagine and Amazing Grace on a laptop.  We read the Christmas story aloud.  Drank hot cider and prayed blessings over each other.  Afterward, K walked back to the YWAM base with me. Juggling backpacks and a warm coat, we talked about how to know if someone is trustworthy.  She decided a recent "new guy in town" didn't make the trustworthiness grade.  Good insight! We laughed.  She hugged me and said, "See you after Christmas. Have fun with your daughters."

In that moment I wanted to be K's mother. To replace the mom who couldn't love or keep her safe. To make her part of my family.  Yet, I know I can't fix K.  I don't have enough love to fill the empty hole left by all the people who were supposed to love and protect her - and didn't.  I don't know what to do with that longing. Except to trust God to be the Father she never had. And the mother. And to trust God to use my small, imperfect love in K's life.

Friday I sat down with MG, a woman who has just recently started to show up at Nail Day.  She told me a rambling, often repeated story of traveling here by Greyhound from Miami. Of family strung out along the East coast.  Of decisions to come to California....arriving in San Francisco and wondering where were the "guys with muscles and sunglasses...palm trees and surfers" she'd expected.

"You want San Diego!" I said. "Well, I got San Francisco," she replied. "So I guess I gotta stay 'til I decide to go back to Miami."

We talked about family. Missing those far away. She spoke of estrangement and having lost contact with siblings altogether.  
MG wished me a Merry Christmas.  Said she'd be sure to come to Nail Day in January.  Her plans? Just lay low on Christmas...maybe Glide (a local ministry that serves meals every day, 365 days a year) will have something...I don't know."  She said she was going to dance at a club on New Years Eve. I'm afraid I don't expect this to be something I'd wish for her....I'm not sure what to say. But, she lets me pray for her and  I bumble through....

So, Christmas comes. We move through advent...waiting for what hasn't yet arrived. Waiting for what we hope for and some things we know will come.  Our hope isn't in systems or people. It isn't even in good people who try hard. To place our hope in humans would be to heap a burden on their shoulders they can't carry.  Instead, Our hope is in God. In His provision and the steadiness of His love. 

This Christmas, I'm receiving kindness from people who have little.  I'm receiving blessings and the gift of personal stories from people who will spend Christmas alone or eat dinner at one of the many ministries, churches and programs offering meals for people without homes.

I've received Jesus in unexpected ways. He sent the BJM staff to a corner where we found a woman under the influence of drugs, barely dressed, and vulnerable to anyone who might use or abuse her. Instead, Father sent us to tie a shawl around her, pray for her, and call the Homeless Outreach team.  He sent us to the corner just as a man came seeking a police officer. "There's a woman passed out between cars," he said. "I'm afraid she's going to get run over."

Father sent us....and then some kind but firm police officers.  This addict evidently has fallen asleep on a manhole cover in the parking lane of a nearby street before.  The cover is warm.  Fragments of Crack cocaine might be found along the curb.  She crawls there and passes out.

So Father sent us.  To find Him.  And, in each situation, we received Him. 

Mother Teresa used to speak of "Jesus in a most distressing disguise."  She was right.  The people on the streets are Jesus - coming to meet us.  Sometimes Jesus is in the heart of someone in pain. Someone in need. And, we GET to be here. To find Him. And receive Him.

We have the privilege of seeing "the least of these" - of whom Jesus said, "when you love - or give, or care for, or feed, or wrap your scarf around.....you do it to me."  

Jesus has given himself to me. In the form of kindness. In the words of precious people who give generously out of their few resources.  In the love of woman who don't appear to have anything together. Yet, they get it together to show love and kindness to me.

Tomorrow I leave for Lake Tahoe where I get to hang out with Becky, Alex and Alex's family (also Ean Kemp!!!  One of my adopted sons who is now doing cool stuff in L.A.).  Christmas eve I'll take the bus and train to Davis where Beth and Casey will pick me up. Christmas day with Casey's mom, aunt and her wonderful partner Joey, sister Alyssa and Grandma Marjorie.   We'll eat and play table games. Open gifts and tell stories.  We'll laugh. There will be moments of missing Rich, Casey's funny, kind, father-heart step father who died this past May.

and I will receive Jesus. there, too  Jesus disguised as family. Jesus disguised as people who have welcomed me into their family circles with generosity and love. 

I am fortunate beyond words.   

My wish for all of you is to find Jesus in your Christmas. to see Him waiting for you in a family member. Looking through the eyes of the Salvation Army bell ringer or a homeless man asking for money. To hear His voice in the kind words of others - or your own kind words to others.  Jesus is waiting. 

Blessing and love.   Merry Christmas.

Living in the School of I Can't....Continued....

will all of you freezing in the midwest or New York or Washington or???  hate me if I whine that it's cold in San Francisco?

The temp hovers around 40 at night.  I watched the folks across the street or in front of the YWAM base move around all day on the concrete, following "warm spots" where the sun shines. Then, one night  rained, and I woke in the middle of the night thinking "hypothermia."  A few people who are especially vulnerable crowded into my mind and prayers.  I lay awake worrying and praying.  I fixed on images like hot soup and blankets and cried out to God to help women I'll call Anna and Wanda, Adrienne and Danae. 

Wednesday, W hauled her two shopping carts into the women's center. Someone had stolen the blue painters' tarp she uses to cover her things.  The cardboard she uses to shield herself from the cold concrete had been left behind in a sodden pile somewhere.  She had wrapped herself in clothes and a dirty piece of cloth.

Her body was cold to the touch and trembling.  But, as is the case with many women who have survived ongoing, violent trauma, her body and mind are disconnected. The cold and trembling didn't register at all. W. smiled and chatted. "Not too bad," she said. 'I found a restaurant where they let me sit for a couple of hours. But they stole my tarp."  The sweater she often wore was also nowhere to be seen.  Her arms and hands were filthy. We gathered her into the women's center and concern showed on every face.

W continued to chat as we peeled layers of wet clothing away and helped her put on a thick, hooded sweatshirt, warm socks, and thermal leggings.  We wrapped her in a blanket.  In minutes, she fell asleep....sitting up. 

She slept through much of Breaking Free - a dvd bible study some women have been doing since fall.  She woke to drink some hot tea and dozed off again.

When the study was over, she woke to drink some more tea.  "Can we go with you to the shelter next door?" we asked. "It's getting colder and looks like more rain tonight."  W. changed the subject.
"Please. We're concerned about you," we said. "Just for tonight. Just to keep out of the rain...."
She shook her head and began a convoluted story about some sick friend whom she had "promised to check in on."

In the end, W. said No.  She wouldn't be sleeping inside that night.  It was both painful to hear and hard to understand.

W. lives with mental illness. She is sometimes clear=minded and creative. Sometimes paranoid or grandious. It's not clear whether her stories of competitive ice skating or pursuing professional dance are lies, fantasy or long-past truth of a life before drugs, poverty and homelessness.  W says she has "lived outside" for nearly a decade. She doesn't like the word "homeless."  We believe her when she speaks of emotional and physical abuse and about losing children to drugs and foster care.  We listen to her creative ideas about cooking and her dream of feeding homeless people healthy, delicious food. We are filled with love and frustration. Worry and respect.

How do we love her well?  We can't fix her. We can't solve the complexity of her mental illness and trauma-based paranoia.  We can't force her to sleep inside on a cold, rainy night.

Yesterday, two therapist-friends from Illinois and California respectively visited the BJM staff, spending the morning with us at The Well.  They spoke about calling out, affirming, naming, and declaring God's love over a person's spirit.  My heart beat faster.  Counseling is helpful stuff....it helps people think more clearly, choose more wisely, and understand, experience, and manage real, honest and life-giving emotions.  Yeah!   But Margaret and Kara spoke about the spirit.  Each individual's spirit.  And how our spirits were made to be filled with and alive in God's love.

W's ability to think, choose and feel is damaged by mental illness and years of trauma and abuse.  But,  the deeper hurt lies is her spirit - her identity, worth and true self.  Her spirit has been crushed and wounded.  Her spirit has gone into hiding, like a frightened child slipping under the bed, hoping to escape chaos and violence.  Her spirit has separated from her body and disconnected from her soul - her mind, will, and emotions.  Perhaps her spirit is sleeping or unable to hear, see or speak.  Perhaps she has forgotten that she even has a spirit and lives only in the raw emotions, thoughts, and choices of each moment. 

So, on Monday when W. pulls her carts into the Nail Day Christmas party, my eyes and heart will be on her spirit.  On her identity.  The true, beautiful, beloved self that God himself breathed into her at conception.  When she became a living being. Beloved and worthy of love.  

I can't fix her.  Only God can heal her wounded spirit.

  So, I will call to her spirit. Affirm and bless her spirit.  I'm asking Father God to give me words to say that will slip under the protective wall she hides behind and touch her true self - her spirit - with love.

Would you join me?  Would you declare over W. that "God loves you.  God is calling you home. To himself.  Wake, beautiful spirit.  Rise up. Open your eyes.  It is safe to come home. Father God is in the house, and it's safe to come home."