What must I do?

We are in the middle of Lectureship here at Abilene Christian. Our theme verse is Micah 6:8:

"He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God."

I went to one of the lectures today entitled "Micah's Call to Justice." The speaker's name was Leah Cypert, and she works with World Concern, an organization that works with at risk children all over the world. More specifically, Leah works to prevent human trafficking and sexual exploitation of children in Thailand and the surrounding countries. Her presentation touched the core of who I am and made me question everything. I went to a quiet room after talking with her and began to record some of my thoughts and feelings. As you will see, they are by no means very clear, well-developed, or even necessarily correct; but they are from my heart, and I don't want them to be wasted or forgotten. Here are some things I wrote down:

I often discard my emotional reaction to social justice issues simply because there are so many issues that would evoke those same emotions. I never let these emotions spur me to action saying, "Then every single one would cause me to act for a different cause, and how wuold I be following God's will for my life?". Maybe God has more than one road that would be acceptable for me to take. I think now that certainly any road that I embark on for the sake of His Kingdom would be better than sitting at the crossroads, frozen with indecision.

I face so much doubt every day. everything I encounter seems to attack my faith. I remember a time when I believed and acted, but it seems so far away now.

BY THE TIME I'M DONE WITH COLLEGE, FOUR MILLION MORE THAI GIRLS WILL HAVE BEEN TRAFFICKED AND SEXUALLY EXPLOITED.

How can I sit by and do nothing? Is a degree in ministry or even missions going to best prepare me for a life of servitude to Jesus Christ in the fight against social injustice?

All through history people have been spurred to action by a feeling in their soul that SOMETHING MUST BE DONE.

What must be done?

I must do justice. I must love mercy. I must walk humbly before my God.

As always, I welcome your comments and reactions.

Gethesemane Streaker

In my Life and Teachings of Jesus class we are going through the book of Mark and trying to look at it from a new perspective. Our professor is encouraging us to have a real curiosity about the reason Mark writes what he writes in the order and way that he writes it. Our homework was to actively wonder about a passage of scripture. To my mind it is the weirdest passage in the gospels, and since it is bothering me a good deal, I thought I'd share it with all of you so you can also ponder it.

Just as he was speaking, Judas, one of the Twelve, appeared. With him was a crowd armed with swords and clubs, sent from the chief priests, the teachers of the law, and the elders.
44Now the betrayer had arranged a signal with them: “The one I kiss is the man; arrest him and lead him away under guard.”
45Going at once to Jesus, Judas said, “Rabbi!” and kissed him.
46The men seized Jesus and arrested him.
47Then one of those standing near drew his sword and struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his ear.
48“Am I leading a rebellion,” said Jesus, “that you have come out with swords and clubs to capture me?
49Every day I was with you, teaching in the temple courts, and you did not arrest me. But the Scriptures must be fulfilled.”
50Then everyone deserted him and fled.
51A young man, wearing nothing but a linen garment, was following Jesus. When they seized him,52he fled naked, leaving his garment behind.

What do you all think of this? What do you think Mark is doing? Do you think this is as weird as I do? I hope you are all puzzling over this for the next few days - I will be.

Blessings,

Wes

Pics of the dorm room

Here are some pics of the new arrangement in our dorm room. We just bunked our beds and got a recliner, so now we are living the good life!

Monkeys are to us as we are to God....not really, but go with me for a second.

This post will begin in a very awkward way, but let me assure it isn't crude or crass. Stick with me and I'll share with you some encouraging truth that the Lord shared with me.

It all began after church on Sunday. I went to Beltway Park, and the sermon was challenging and inspiring. After service I told my friends to wait up so I could use the restroom. Here we go (stick with me!). I was standing in one of the stalls (yes, standing) and I had my Bible under one arm. All of a sudden it occured to me how disappointed and angry at myself I would be if something slipped and my Bible fell into the toilet. This is not the only time something like this has happened to me. There are often times when I realize what the drastic consequences would be if I wasn't able to do very simple things. Now, here come the monkeys.

A monkey might indeed consider it very complicated and risky to stick a Bible under his arm while he relieved himself (suspend reality with me for a moment). However, if he knew me, he would consider it no big deal because my level of thinking, understanding, problem-solving, coordination, and dexterity is so much greater than his. With this in mind, and in light of the fact that I had done the very same action many times before without ever dropping my Bible in the toilet, he would be able to rest assured that my Bible was safe.

Isn't this a lot like our spiritual life? I know you're saying, "Where on earth is he going with this?" but here comes the good stuff. We often live in fear of actions or ideas that are essential to living life for God. These ideas and actions can be different for every person, although there are certain ones that we all struggle with. Some examples are food, clothing, relationships, safety, and reputation. You fill in the blank for you. What if we drop these Bibles in the toilet? For us this is a viable concern, just as is the monkey's concern that he might drop his Bible in the toilet.

What if we turned all our little "bibles" over to one who has never dropped a bible in the toilet? One whose "ways our higher than our ways" and whose "thoughts are higher than our thoughts"? What if we got past the fear we have over the little things and trust everything to the God of monkeys, bibles, and toilets?

Feeling somewhat silly after writing that but trying to live out the principle,

Wes

Life at College

Well, I've been at college for three weeks now, but it seems like much longer. I saw a friend's blog and decided that it would be a good idea to start my own for several different reasons. First, it will help me to chronicle some of my thoughts. Second, it will keep those who care to read in the loop about my life and experiences at college. Third, it will provide an outlet for me to share the things that the Lord teaches me so that they will not stagnate in my heart.

I am definitely missing all my friends and family, but I am really enjoying college. The first week at college was Welcome Week, so instead of classes there were various "welcome to college" activities that were optional. I chose to go to as many of them as possible. I was on crutches for that whole week, so I got a great workout walking all over campus. I decided to be a part of the welcome week choir, so each day we had a practice in the fine arts center, which is on the opposite side of campus from my dorm. Whew! By the time I got to rehearsal I was ready for a nap.

I am proud to say that despite being in a cast I still participated in the world's largest game of twister with hundreds of other freshman. Welcome Week was full of many crazy activites like this.

Classes began the following Monday, August 27. I won't go into the details of all my classes, but I will spend a moment talking about my favorite which is my freshman Bible class, the Life and Teachings of Jesus.

My teacher's name is Randy Harris, and he is a pretty awesome guy. From what I can tell he lives a radical life for Jesus Christ, and since this is what I want to do, I'm looking forward to getting to know him more and learning a lot in his class. The first day of class, as he was telling us what the class would be all about, he said this, "Jesus can't be whoever you want him to be. He already is somebody."

I'm going through a time of intense questioning of my own beliefs, Christianity's accepted truths, and our society's norms. The statement seemed like a ray of hope in the midst of my cloudy, confused thoughts, and I am greatly looking forward to more clearly discovering who Jesus really is and how his teachings should really affect my life.

I know this post was long and boring, but I assure you that I wrote only a fraction of the many experiences over these three weeks. In the future my posts will be less narrative and more reflective.

Grace and Peace,

Wes