Youth Mission Trip Update

This August, I went on a weeklong mission trip to the Edgewater community in Chicago. Since the youth group had gone there a couple times already, we generally knew what to expect from the week. We did work at familiar locations, including when we sorted donations and served food at Cornerstone Community Outreach and when we handed out food at the Care for Real food pantry. We also revisited the men’s shelter we had gone to two years ago and the women’s shelter we served last year. The fact that we had experience with all these locations meant that we were often able to jump right into service, since most of us already knew the routine.

There were a few new locations that we worked at, all of which were more about interacting with people than it was about fulfilling tasks. The first of which was a senior home where we talked with elderly people and played games with them. The second was a facility called Lighthouse, which houses and cares for those who are mentally handicapped. There we sang songs and prayed in what was basically a mini worship session. Lastly, we went to a facility that housed seniors with memory disorders like dementia or Alzheimer’s. The group spent time with them, interacting with them and keeping them company for the afternoon. While we often didn’t stay at these locations for extended periods of time, we did brighten the days of a good number of people.

Since I’m not particularly socially oriented, I often relegated myself to manual labor. And while I don’t mind that, I do wish I had taken more opportunities to do social work. For instance, when we went to the facility for seniors with mental disorders, I ended up doing yard work instead of interacting with the seniors for most of our stay. But looking back, I think it was for the best that I undertook roles like these. Even though the manual labor did feel menial at times, it still had to be done by someone. My fulfillment of that role allowed those who haven’t been on previous mission trips to have a more meaningful experience. 

As a whole, I think the mission trip went well. Yes, there were some areas where I wish I had done more. But our mission was to serve the community and show it God’s love, and I believe we did that in full. I can be satisfied with that.

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Josiah Hsu

Resources on Justice

Below is a list of books and articles on various topics related to justice. These resources will help you learn more about a variety of issues and help frame our responses as Christians, connecting to Fr. Kevin’s sermon on praying for and seeking justice.. Updated 8/20 with YA fiction recommendations.

On Social Justice Generally:

Good News About Injustice: A Witness of Courage in a Hurting World, by Gary Haugen

• The founder of International Justice Mission gives the biblical foundation for God's heart for justice and shows how Christians can seek justice in the world.

Social Justice Handbook: Small Steps for a Better World, by Mae Elise Cannon

• A comprehensive reference that provides research, history, and practical steps on issues from domestic violence and sex trafficking to bioethics and global poverty.

Becoming a Just Church: Cultivating Communities of God's Shalom, by Adam Gustine

• Encourages local congregations to not outsource justice to outside organizations and to be just in how they interact with their communities.

On Immigration and Refugees:

Welcoming the Stranger: Justice, Compassion and Truth in the Immigration Debate, by Matt Soerens and Jenny Yang

• World Relief specialists explain the complexities of immigration policy, debunk misconceptions, and show how churches can care for immigrants and refugees.

You Welcomed Me: Loving Refugees and Immigrants Because God First Loved Us, by Kent Annan

• Director of Wheaton College’s Humanitarian and Disaster Institute suggests concrete and practical ways to live out the welcoming embrace of God without fear, to those around us.

Love Undocumented: Risking Trust in a Fearful World, by Sarah Quezada

The God Who Sees: Immigrants, the Bible, and the Journey to Belong, by Karen Gonzalez

Christians at the Border: Immigration, the Church, and the Bible, by Daniel Carroll

“Christians are on All Sides of the Immigration Debate,” Christianity Today

YA Fiction:

• A Long Walk to Water, by Linda Sue Park

• Inside Out and Back Again, by Thanhha Lai

• Cicada Moon, by Marilyn C. Hilton

• Refugee, by Alan Gratz

On Race in America:

Beyond Colorblind: Redeeming Our Ethnic Journey, by Sarah Shin

• Shows how racial conflict and brokenness requires ethnic identity formation and crosscultural competency.

White Awake: An Honest Look at What It Means to Be White, by Daniel Hill

• A white pastor unpacks issues of cultural identity and discomfort and how whites can be agents of reconciliation in a diverse world.

Black and White: Disrupting Racism One Friendship at a Time, by Teesha Hadra, John Hambrick

• C4SO pastor Hadra and her friend Hambrick show how racism can be disrupted by friendships that challenge our ways of viewing and living in the world.

Trouble I’ve Seen: Changing the Way the Church Views Racism, by Drew Hart

• Challenging both white and black Christians to reconsider ways we view race and the church, while offering practical suggestions for those committed to racial justice in society and the Church.

Rethinking Incarceration: Advocating for Justice That Restores, by Dominique Gilliard

• A focus on the ills of mass incarceration and how we can move from punitive models of justice to more restorative, redemptive ones.

“The American Church’s Complicity in Racism: A Conversation with Jemar Tisby,” Religion & Politics

YA Fiction:

• Brown Girl Dreaming, by Jacqueline Woodson

• Dear Martin, by Nic Stone

• One Crazy Summer, by Rita Williams-Garcia

On Disabilities:

Living Gently in a Violent World: The Prophetic Witness of Weakness, by Stanley Hauerwas and Jean Vanier

• An exploration of how Christian community that includes a recognition of our weakness can provide a counter-cultural witness to a violent world.

Riding on Faith: Keeping Your Balance When the Wheels Fall Off, by Alice Teisan

• Savior member Alice Teisan’s memoir about her spiritual journey with disability. Contact Alice for a free Kindle download between 8/17 and 8/24.

A Good and Perfect Gift: Faith, Expectations and A Little Girl Named Penny, by Amy Julia Becker

• Becker writes about her unexpected journey of hope and grace while walking alongside her daughter, Penny, who has Down’s-Syndrome.

We Need Each Other: Responding to God's Call to Live Together, by Jean Vanier

• Vanier, founder of the L’Arche communities, provides a vision for life lived together as broken children of a loving God, humbled and inspired to love one another, no matter our weakness.

“The Ministry of the Disabled,” Christianity Today

YA Fiction:

• Wonder, by R. J. Palacio

• Fish in a Tree, by Lynda Mullaly Hunt

• El Deafo, by Cece Bell

Staff Update: Sandy Richter

At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who, then, is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?”

He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.

“See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven. 

“What do you think? If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off? And if he finds it, truly I tell you, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off. In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should perish.

Matthew 18:1-5, 10-14

Over the years, I keep coming back to this passage and it’s synoptic twin in Luke 19, marveling and wondering at the connection between owning our childlikeness and receiving the gift of the kingdom of God. I find this reality both irresistible and unbelievable at the same time. While I feel myself drawn in to the simplicity of entering the kingdom as a child, it also seems audacious, impossible, and goes against every success-driven instinct within me. And then I wonder at myself. Is it hard to believe because it seems too easy, or is it that chlidlike faith actually seems like a bridge too far? Is it possible that rather than esteeming childlikeness I have, as the passage suggests, despised it instead?

Yesterday, Pray As You Go (a lectionary-based lectio divina podcast) reflecting on this passage, posed this question:

Jesus insists that God our loving Father wants no [little] one to be lost. Our world is full of ‘little ones’ – people who count for nothing, who are routinely ignored.  We also carry a child inside ourselves – the vulnerable person within. What is Jesus telling us about the way we treat fragility when we meet it?

When I heard that last question it struck me plainly how easy it is for me to despise childlikeness, fragility, especially in myself, rather than to see it as the gift Jesus claims it to be. Fragility, vulnerability, are scary. If I’m honest, I’m ashamed of those places that feel weak, powerless, unsure. But the passage made me wonder, what is Jesus’ invitation in those vulnerable places?

St. Thérèse of Liseux, who lived her short life in late 1800s northern France, described her own complicated relationship with childlike faith. On the one hand, she desperately desired to please God and to experience communion with him. At the same time, she felt her own weakness keenly, and wondered how she could even aspire to the great spiritual heights she so desired. The revelation she received from the Lord, and from that point sought to pass on to others, she described thusly:

...the elevator that would lift me up to Heaven is your arms, O Jesus! To reach perfection, I do not need to grow up. On the contrary, I need to stay little, to become more and more little. O my God, you have surpassed my expectations and I wish to sing of your mercies.

Rather than despise her weakness and limitations, Thérèse found encouragement to be reconciled to her childlikeness as that which would move her towards God and his gracious love. She found this freeing realization:

What pleases him is to see that I love my littleness and my poverty, it is the blind hope that I have in his mercy...That is my only treasure.

The image of the shepherd searching long and tirelessly for the one lost sheep comes to mind here. The Shepherd, does not despise the sheep’s waywardness, shows no signs of exasperation as he begins his search, but diligently seeks the lost sheep, sights set on the joy and happiness that will result when he finds that lost sheep and brings her home. Indeed, Jesus says, our Father in heaven is not willing that any lost sheep, lost child, would perish, but instead that each one should enter his heavenly kingdom, carried in the strong arms of the Great Shepherd of the sheep (Heb. 13:20).

I wonder if you have ever found yourself despising your own fragility.

I wonder what might happen if we admit that we are lost, and allow ourselves to be found.

Little children, lost sheep… the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. What might it mean for us to receive this great grace today?

Quotes from St. Thérèse taken from Jacques Philippe, The Way of Trust and Love, p. 10 and 64.

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Sandy Richter, Savior’s Pastor of Adult Formation, grew up in the Church of God, but gravitated toward 'higher church' settings in college, making her way to the ACNA and Church of the Savior in 2013. Sandy and her husband love the liturgy and tradition they have found in Anglicanism, and the warmth and depth of spirituality at Savior.

Summer Slowing for the Soul

It’s already August, and if you are like me, you may be realizing that your summer has not included as much rest as you hoped it would when it first began. If this describes you, then the booklet Pastor Sandy Richter prepared for Savior’s summer silent retreat may be exactly what you need. Sandy provides us with spiritual exercises that help us move into the rest provided by a savior whose yoke is easy and burden is light.

Click here to access the retreat booklet.

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Image credit: Elizabeth Wang, T-01406-OL, “God the Father greets with delight the briefest whisper of prayer and the briefest moment of our time. In the life of union, He can lift us high in contemplation,” copyright © Radiant Light 2006, www.radiantlight.org.uk

Summer Sermon Series: Wisdom Books and the Outergram

Over the past 5 weeks, our sermons have explored the Bible’s Wisdom Literature – Job, Proverbs, Psalms, Song of Songs, and Ecclesiastes. In these books, some well-known and some rarely read, we have gained wisdom for our lives today. In case your summer travels caused you to miss a week or two, here is a quick summary with links to the audio:

• Job: In our suffering we naturally want answers. God doesn’t give those to Job or to us.But the questions of God prove more satisfying than the solutions of humans. Encounter with God is better than explanations.

• Proverbs: Wisdom is the ability to make good decisions. We develop that ability by fearing the Lord, studying Scripture, and learning from life circumstances.

• Psalms: How honest are we in prayer, really? The Psalms model for us how to be completely honest with God, even to the point of accusing him and venting our hate for others. Yet Jesus “sings a new psalm” of forgiving those who’ve hurt us.

• Song of Songs: What is romantic love? Correcting both the culture and the church, Song of Songs teaches us that love is good, love is powerful, and love is non-ultimate.

• Ecclesiastes: In Ecclesiastes, we see a call to move away from chasing God’s good gifts towards receiving these gifts with gratitude and a sense of mystery.

Now I look forward to a 4-part sermon series I’ve playfully dubbed “The Outergram: how we at Savior can serve our world.” I’m praying that God will give us a bigger picture of the many ways we can love and be present to people around us. The sermons will cover the following topics:

• Live Our Vocations (July 27): Mother Linda kicks off the series by helping us see our daily work as participating in God’s work in the world.

• Create Cultures of Compassion (August 3): Our politics and social media and too often, families and workplaces, have shrill arguments, putdowns, abuse. As Christians, we help to create a counterculture of compassion. I will talk about how.

• Engage Globally (August 10): Longtime Savior missionaries Kim and Collin Sanford will be visiting from France and will answer: “Since most of us live and work near Wheaton, how can we be involved with the work of God around the world?”

• Pray for and Seek Justice (August 17): What does it take to speak out on behalf of those being treated unfairly—refugees, African-Americans, poor people, and more?

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Kevin Miller was editor and vice-president at Christianity Today for 26 years and then associate rector at Church of the Resurrection for 5 years. He has been the rector at Savior since January 2017, and is also the co-founder of PreachingToday.com and CTPastors.com.