Month: April 2018

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In His Abiding Presence

Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me.  I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. John 15:4-5

It seems easy but it is not as easy as it seems. My first encounter with these verses left me with a strange sensation that I had stumbled upon something wonderful and yet I could not grasp its full meaning. I was younger then, in my mid-teens. Maybe I needed more of life experiences to ask the necessary questions when I read this passage. There was another sixteen year old, almost forty years older than me, who struggled with some questions. Unlike me, he grew up in an environment where the Christian faith was dominant. His future was well-defined for him. His grandfather was a Lutheran minister as was his father. He knew what was expected of him. Maybe this is why he grappled with questions that I did not consider at his age. He did not understand these verses but he felt that he could not share his struggles. He was expected to be a pastor with all the answers. He always knew that he had none. I was fortunate in this way. My future then was a mystery. I had the freedom to choose what I wanted to do. I did not have any social pressure to choose a certain vocation. I read these words of abiding in Him and I knew that there was beauty and profound truth in them. Yet, I could not grasp it. I knew that these words are meant to be a comfort for those who struggle. Yet, its meaning was distant from me. I was not alone. My older friend heard these words but did not find any consolation. He felt empty and he carried this emptiness with him as he was ordained as a Lutheran minister.

I met him in Florida. He was a Buddhist monk then, a leader of a small Buddhist congregation. After almost thirty years as Lutheran minister, he finally decided to leave the Christian religion and embrace Buddhism. He fled from one religion to take refuge in another. Unfortunately, he harbored in his heart a subtle anger towards God. He felt that God had never accepted him. Therefore, he rejected God altogether by denying His existence. However, he could not deny the longing in his heart for something greater than himself. Buddhism gave him the freedom to be both an atheist and a believer in something which is undefinable. It sounds like a paradox which is quite consistent with life in itself. Our initial contact was an attempt on his part to instigate a debate. He spent years of theological studies and he was ready to argue against the existence of God. I wasn’t interested. I have never been interested in such things. I am convinced that faith cannot be attained through persuasion. It comes from God. I refused to engage in his debates. He read it as a rejection. Our relationship eventually turned sour. We kept our interactions to a minimum even though we frequently saw each other. I have to admit that I was a little relieved that I did not have to engage him.

One day he had a stroke. He lived alone. He laid on the floor for eight hours waiting for the only person who would notice his absence. It was a neighbor who came by his house daily to check on him. When she came around, his house was already filled with the presence of death. The doctors said that the damage was irreversible. It was a question of time. I heard about his state and went to visit him immediately. I did not know what to expect; perhaps more bitterness and anger towards God. Instead I saw a different man. He smiled as I walked into the room. He said, “I was just thinking about you.” He had a story that he wanted to share desperately with me.

As he laid on the floor waiting and thinking about his imminent death, he said that he recalled the voice of his Sunday school teacher saying these words to him,

“God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them.” 1 John 4:16

For eight hours, this verse kept going through his mind over and over again. Each time he thought about it, everything became clearer to him. He had spent years trying to figure out God. He tried to please the God that religion had created and molded with doctrines and formulas. He found this God of his imagination unsatisfactory. However, now, things became clearer. He saw Jesus in a different light. Jesus came to show us how to abide in God through Love. “We don’t have to figure out God.” His eyes were bright and alive when he told me this, “We just receive His Love and walk in His loving example. It is receiving and participating in Love that opens our eyes to see God.” It is so simple, he added, “and yet I have complicated everything.”

I visited him almost weekly after this and sometimes twice a week. It is funny to think that I used to make an effort to avoid him not too long ago. Now, I knew that I would genuinely miss him. It was a pleasure to talk to him. He discovered the God of Love. He was able to edify everyone around him. He continued to be a Buddhist monk. He shared with his congregation that in a way Buddhism brought him back to Jesus. I am not sure that they understood him but they could sense the change in his heart.

At that time, he wanted to give me something precious. It was a statue of the Resurrected Christ. It was handcrafted out of olive wood in Israel and was given to him by a famous Danish artist. He has carried it with him all his life even though he stopped professing the Christian faith. This statue has brought new meaning to him. He wanted me to have it. It was the first thing that came to my mind when I read the above gospel text.

I left for Brazil not long after and this elderly man passed away soon after. He was buried as a Buddhist missionary. It was the faith that helped him meet the Resurrected Christ. He doesn’t belong to any religion. He belongs to the Father. My friend had spent his whole life searching for the Resurrected Christ and when he was lying there thinking all is lost, he found Him. He realized that He has always been with him. Perhaps, this is why he heard the voice from his childhood repeating the verse over and over again. It was a voice that he ignored for many years. However, Jesus spoke to him then and had always been speaking to him. He wasn’t able to hear His voice because he wanted God to be something else. He ended up rejecting God in the process. However, it doesn’t matter. He met the Resurrected Christ. This was not a death bed conversion. It was a life giving encounter. It was an answer to questions he asked. He did not waste his life. I talk about him all the time. This man’s life makes me understand the depth of God’s love.

The statue will go with me wherever God sends me until I can give to someone else to carry this symbolic gift. Jesus is the same today, yesterday and forever and He will meet us where we are spiritually.

Once in a while, not too often, I wonder if people think that we are strange. A middle aged couple sitting on the dirty floor of a square and playing games with homeless children and teens. I wonder if people understand we are doing. Sometimes I wonder if I understand what I am doing. Then one day a man crossed the street to where we were and he was physically disabled and walked with a limp. I noticed him because it seemed like a struggle for him to cross the street. To my surprise, he walked up to us and said that he worked in the building nearby. Everyday he watched us from his window and sees us playing the children and teens. He wanted to say that it meant a lot to him. I felt God’s presence in a rich and abiding way. Abiding in Him is not something we figure but it is something we do through love.

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The Good Shepherd

Jesus said, “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep.” (John 10:11-15)

An image comes to mind. You know it too. It’s ubiquitous; stained glass windows in our chapels or a cheap framed picture of the Good Shepherd cuddling a sweet lamb in a background where everything is peaceful and harmonious. There are no wolves, no careless hirelings, no death. You almost wonder why they need a shepherd. Jesus paints a different picture. He tells of a good Shepherd that leads the sheep through unsavory places where cowards and killers dwell. It is into this world which the Good Shepherd inserts Himself. Chaos and Death is always lurking around waiting for the right moment to devour the sheep. We find the same image in the famous Psalm 23;

“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. “

Often read at funerals, in reality this Psalm addresses living in the real world. In such a world, it is more comfortable to stay put where we are, especially when we feel safe and secure. On the other hand, the Good Shepherd is always thinking about places where the pasture is green and the waters are refreshing. He is opening new doors that lead to all kinds of complications. He upsets our comfortable lives just because He wants us to have better spiritual food. Won’t it be easier if He makes the place we are to flourish and be abundant, then we won’t have to leave our comfort zone. Alas, the Good Shepherd has a mind of His own. He can be quite disagreeable. I have never seen an artistic portrayal of Him as such. I was quite comfortable with the way things are but I heard His voice. It is hard to resist His voice even though I know that we are going to walk in unknown territories. If I insist in remaining where I am, then eventually His voice will become faint and one day vanish altogether.

We obeyed the Shepherd’s voice this week. Consequently, it was a busy week. Unfortunately, we achieved absolutely nothing.

One by one they came up to us. Young adults who have spent their entire childhood in the streets and now, they want something to change for the better. They have been comfortable in the streets most of their lives. Suddenly, they felt something prompting them. They realized that there must be a green pasture out there because where they are presently seems like a desert. Wallace articulated it perfectly. He said that there was no peace in the streets. All the conversations and activities are concerned with violence and crime. He knows that there is something better. Wallace, Dreyson and Felipe were the first to express a desire for change. The first step was getting all their civil documents. Getting documents for any regular person is a dreaded and complicated process. It requires of hours of waiting and waiting until we realize that we have been waiting for the wrong thing at the wrong places. However, it has to be done. It is an important step for our children and teens. They will become like everyone else in society. Having your name registered means that society recognizes that you are an individual. Now, they want to be recognized. It sounds wonderful but it is also very unnerving. They are not like everyone. They are disadvantaged. They lived their whole lives in the streets. There are many in the world who look at them with disdain and prejudice. They have no schooling. They have no skills. They are going to face rejections. They are going to be disappointed. They are going into a world where wolves abide. They want us to walk with them. They are going to look to us for our guidance. It is a time of decision for us. We can be like hirelings or shepherds. However, I am comfortable being a shepherd where I am but the Good Shepherd is calling us to move to greener pastures.

Dreyson was the only one who got all his documents. For Wallace and Felipe, after hours of waiting and sometimes enduring humiliating situations and questionings, we learned that we lacked more documents to get what we needed. No one informed us of this when we started the process. We prayed that these young men would not give up. We tried to encourage them but they surprised us. They were smiling and happy that something was happening in their lives even though we seem to hit an obstacle every time. They said that they were going to go forward. However, they wanted us to go with them.

Dreyson got all his documents. Unfortunately, it means absolutely nothing. This is a wolf that stands in our way to the green pasture. He still does not have any prospect of getting a job. However, our eyes should not be on the wolf even though it brandishes the sword of death threateningly at us. He asked about getting a job. I did not have an answer for him. Then I realized that we don’t have to worry about it now. The Good Shepherd has brought us here. His voice will guide us to the next step. I told Dreyson that we will figure out what the next step should be. He smiled. It was the answer he wanted to hear. He said that he wants to take one step at a time towards life. It seems like he heard the Shepherd’s voice as well.

We heard the Shepherd’s voice. It was a busy week and we got a lot done.

I was a little uncomfortable about going to these offices and facing the arrogant and sometimes unhelpful bureaucrats. I would prefer to stay in the streets and teach them how to read and write and talk about God. I did not like to plead with the people to help these teens and young adults because they were homeless. I found the whole process very humiliating for our young people. I did not want to expose their lowly state to everyone. However, the Good Shepherd is calling us to move on to greener pastures. He wants to bring these young men and women to a different place. These young people have heard the voice but they are afraid to proceed alone. They are like sheep. They want an older sheep to walk with them as we follow the Shepherd. It has changed something in our relationship with them. Perhaps, this is in itself the place of green pasture and fresh waters.

I am not sure where we are going. I am sure that it is going to be an uncomfortable journey. There are wolves in every corner. We don’t have to fight them. The Shepherd will take care of them. He is not going to fight them as well. He doesn’t succumb to their ways and means. He will overcome them. We don’t want to imagine a fictitious reality in our minds where all young people will have good jobs and nice homes. It would be great if it was true. However, we don’t know. The Good Shepherd has a different way of looking at life. For now, we just listen to His voice and He will continue to guide us. Perhaps in these offices where people work for a system that is unkind and uncaring we might meet some sheep of the Good Shepherd. Hopefully, together we will discover that the sheep are more prominent in this world than the wolves. Perhaps this is what the Good Shepherd wants to reveal to us. We don’t know but for now, it is enough to know that we have a Good Shepherd leading the way.

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Authentic Witness

“Thus it is written, that the Messiah is to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day,  and that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. “ Luke 24:46-49

There are things I have witnessed and there are situations where I was a mere spectator. The former remain with me always. A distraught mother touching the stain of dried blood which used to sustain the life of her daughter; the gaze of young man about my age as he plunged off a bridge and hit the ground: these are things I witnessed. They are not recent events but they are always fresh in my heart. I think about them, they become things of the present and not mere memory. I can see the face of the young suicide victim seconds before his light was extinguished forever. He looked lost even as he breathed his last breath. We were doing exactly what we do today. We were playing a card game with the children. Everything got disrupted, of course. We decided to leave the scene as soon as the police arrived. One of the young teens asked us why we were leaving. I told her that the suicide disturbed us. She replied, “You’ re leaving just because you witnessed a death?” I thought it was a strange thing to say. Now, I realize she was right. You can’t leave after witnessing something like this. I don’t remember her name. Her words will always be remembered. I witnessed a death and now I am committed. I wasn’t really sure what I was committed to and I am still unclear. Perhaps this was why it was disturbing. I know something needed to change within me but I was afraid of the change.

You may be wondering why am I sharing the negative encounters and not the positive ones. Spectators define life along these lines. A good movie, a good game ….the list goes on. All these things have little influence in our lives except maybe to stir up our sentiments. However, witnessing something is strange. The simplistic boundaries of positive and negative experience get blurred. Something new and strange tries to permeate into your soul. Some try to resist it. I did not. I don’t know why. Perhaps I did not want to forget. The girl, whose mother sat and gazed what was left of her, her name was Rosana. Nobody knows her name in the streets. I do. She is still alive in our souls.

Jesus told His disciples to be witnesses. We assume that this is the mandate given to all disciples. However, there is question we need to ask as modern Christians. We need to ask ourselves what are we witnessing. The first disciples saw firsthand the suffering of Jesus and His resurrection from the dead. They saw the hopelessness and desperation of the Cross and then the foundation of everything they knew was shaken at the Resurrection. These were concrete and palpable events for them and not doctrines like in our case. Except perhaps, when we prayerfully read their accounts through their writings. We can sense the intensity and transformation they felt through their writings. It is real because they witnessed it. However, this is exclusively their privilege. We cannot witness the way they did because we did not witness the whole event. We have to discover what it means for us to be a witness in this time and age.

When I first came to this ministry, I was young and naive. I thought that if I told them the story of Jesus, the homeless will see the Light and be transformed. I did and I felt a little awkward sharing the story. It was then I realized that it wasn’t my story. I never completed what I started. I decided that I need to share something real and not some doctrine. I did not how to go about doing it. Therefore, I learned to be quiet and wait.
Then the Holy Spirit opened our eyes and hearts to see how we are to be witnesses in this world.

There was a group of university students at the steps of the Cathedral. They were on a tour of the historical sites of the city. It was time for a photo shoot. There was a homeless man sitting behind them. We know him but not his name. He likes to sit outside the church and beg for money. He stood and addressed the students. We expected some bit for money. Instead, he pointed out that everyone in group was “white’’ whereas Brazil has population has a fifty percent of Afro-Brazilians. In fact, Brazil has the second largest population of people of Afro-descent after Nigeria. He himself was black. He asked them why there was not even one person of his skin tone represented among them. It was a good question. They ignored him. Maybe because they did not have the answer. He waited and then he said, “Okay, maybe you can give some change.” Then returned back to his usual place and sat there. I wondered how many of his questions have gone unanswered. Always instantly, the biblical image of Job came to my mind. The steps of the Cathedral are filled with homeless adults and children and all them have unanswered questions. These are the “Jobs” of our modern society. They waited for an answer from anyone and have become tired of being ignored. Drugs and alcohol are the best consolation. They have long lost interest in the arguments of Job’s friends who always seem to be in abundance everywhere. They never have the answer these “Jobs” are searching for. I imagine that these students, in their classes, have heard some answers that Job’s friends would provide to answer the problem of society. However, when they were confronted with someone in a real life, they could not answer him. I understand how they feel. I felt that way too.

In the Book of Job, he never got the answer that he was looking for but he witnessed God. It is not about having the right answers. It is knowing that someone is listening to your questions. Job wanted to know if God was willing to listen to his questions. Even though the answer he received basically put him in his place, it did not matter. Job was satisfied. The homeless man asked the students why he was born into poverty and not wealth like them. They did not have an answer. He wasn’t expecting one. He perhaps wanted to know if there was anyone who cared enough to listen to his questions. He wanted to know if his appearances and social status have determined a life of misery forever. These are hard questions. Everyone of the homeless including our children are asking similar questions. Of course, I want to tell them that God will answer these questions like He did to Job. However, this would be just words. I have to be a genuine witness. I have to ask these questions myself and hear God’s voice for myself before I can testify to others.

Dreyson asked us a question. He wanted to know if he could ever be a bus driver. It is his dream. It seems like a simple question. One that conventional courtesy expects to answer with a resounding, “Yes”. However, we know him. He wants to know if we believe that he can do it. He wants a genuine answer. He wants to know if he has what it takes to overcome all the obstacles that life has thrown at him. We said that he has all the potential to become one, as long as he has patience and perseverance. We believed that he could if he kept his eyes on God and not on the words of men. However, Dreyson was not ready for a religious answer. He asked if we will accompany him to take all the necessary steps. We said, “yes.” It was an answer to God as well. Yes, we will be the witnesses of His faithfulness to those who are not ready to listen to His answers yet. We can only do this because God has answered all our questions and has brought to be with these children in the streets.

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