On Being Impatient

The Christmas season brings a lot of waiting…waiting for the Christmas cookies to be done baking, waiting to open all the Christmas presents under the tree, waiting for the first big snowfall, waiting for Christmas vacation to start, waiting for the party guests to arrive, waiting for the big football game to start (and/or waiting for it to end), waiting to eat all the delicious food and the leftovers.

When I was a kid the anticipation of Christmas morning was often more than I could handle.  I remember one Christmas morning when the waiting was especially agonizing.  I remember waking up early and then having to wait and wait for my parents to wake up, go down stairs, and make sure everything was all set before my sister and I could go down and see what Santa had brought us.  My sister and I sat at the top of the stairs calling downstairs to my mom and dad to see if we could come down.  Time went by SO slowly.  Didn’t they understand that I wanted to open those presents?!?  Didn’t they know I had been waiting for weeks to see what Santa brought?!?  How could they make me wait one more minute to enjoy playing with all my new toys???

Then finally my parents called my sister and I, and we rushed down the stairs and went right to the Christmas tree. “Santa” left us a generous pile of toys to unwrap and play with.  And we began examining and opening all the presents.  There was no disappointment.  In fact, I received far more than I had asked for, I unwrapped much more than I expected.  Once all the presents were unwrapped I spent hours playing with those toys.  And the joy didn’t end that day.

It has been many years since I had such excitement for Christmas morning (in fact my parents are so much more eager than I am to open presents this morning), but my Christmas seasons still require a lot of waiting.  We do a lot of things to celebrate Christmas and a lot of those things require waiting, but the Christmas season, Advent, is really all about waiting and preparing for Jesus’ birth.  Advent also reminds me about that better world that we are waiting for, the world of justice and peace that will be when the Reign of God is present on earth.

Lately I’ve become very impatient and frustrated with waiting, specifically I’ve become frustrated with waiting for Jesus to return and establish a world of justice.   I mean, seriously, what is God waiting for?  God can do anything God wants to.  Why do we have to be stuck in this far less than perfect world for so long???

I’m tired of waiting for a world where 18,000 children don’t die everyday from hunger.  I’m tired of waiting for a world where one in four children in the US won’t live in poverty.  I’m tired of waiting for a world where everyone has access to the basics: food, water, sanitation, health care, education, and shelter.  I’m tired of waiting for a world where peace is the norm and war is a concept we only vaguely remember.  I’m tired of waiting for a world where people don’t destroy and overuse the natural resources.  I tired of seeing people and organizations working so hard to make a difference and bring about a better world while change comes so slowly if at all.

But there is so much that I don’t understand, so much that I cannot comprehend.

It’s kind of like that Christmas morning many years ago.  I didn’t understand why I had to wait; I couldn’t comprehend why something so seemingly simple could require so much time to get ready (did Santa leave a mess or WHAT?).  I still don’t know what my parents were doing down stairs to prepare for my sister and I to come down and open presents.  But my parents knew what they were doing.  And when the waiting was finally over, there was only joy and celebration.  Likewise, my human brain cannot understand why God doesn’t just establish the Reign of God on earth right now, but someday in the future there will be joy and celebration many times greater than any Christmas morning.

But that doesn’t make the waiting any easier to bear.

Here’s where Christmas can help.  The martyred archbishop of El Salvador, Oscar Romero, had this to say on Christmas day in 1977:

“With Christ, God has injected himself into history. With the birth of Christ, God’s reign is now inaugurated in human time. On this night, as every year for twenty centuries, we recall that God’s reign is now in this world and that Christ has inaugurated the fullness of time. His birth attests that God is now marching with us in history, that we do not go alone.

Humans long for peace, for justice, for a reign of divine law, for something holy, for what is far from earth’s realities. We can have such a hope, not because we ourselves are able to construct the realm of happiness that God’s holy words proclaim, but because the builder of a reign of justice, of love, and of peace is already in the midst of us.”

The Reign of God isn’t here yet, but it is.  The yearly celebration of Jesus’ birth reminds us that God once lived among us in human form and God continues to be present in each and every person.  God is waiting along with us, God understands the agony of our waiting, and so I must trust that God has a plan much greater than any plan I could ever understand.

And so I wait and watch and work.

Organized Chaos (i.e. my job)

I've been working at lot lately at Feed My Starving Children.  I've been able to pick up a lot of extra hours over the past couple of months which has been a blessing in a number of ways.  After working there for a little more than three months, I feel really good and comfortable with doing everything that is part of my position.  In my extra hours I have learned to do some extra things and I've learned more about the internal workings of FMSC.

Since I first started working at FMSC, it has been much more than just a job.  It has been a welcome source of income, but more than that it has been a way for me to live out my calling while helping to feed thousands of starving children around the world and helping thousands of volunteers make a significant difference in the world.  I have grown in a number of ways by working at FMSC, but perhaps the greatest way I have grown is in my ability to deal with organized chaos.  There are a number of factors that contribute to the organized chaos at my job- there's always something that threatens disorganize the organized chaos: extra large groups, young groups, old groups, volunteers with different abilities, loud volunteers, issues with the ingredients, overflowing toilets, a shortage of staff, and a variety of other situations.  But I love it.  I love not knowing what to expect.  I love being surprised.  I love trying to figure out how to keep things under control and running smoothly all while packing food to keep children alive around the world.    

Sure my job has presented some challenges- times and situations that have tested my patience and my physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual strength.  

But through it all and perhaps because of these challenges I love my job…

...even at 7:00 am

...even at 10:00 pm

...even after working for 12 hours

...even when mopping, vacuuming, sweeping, doing dishes, cleaning bathrooms, taking out the garbage, and doing laundry

...even when there are too many or not enough volunteers

...even when there's 50 million things to do (and this is pretty much all the time)

...even when I’m sweaty, hot, and half covered in chicken flavored powder

...even when the toilet overflows…twice in one night

Along with those challenges are the many joys- the little and big things that keep me going and inspire me. 

I love my job...
...especially when kids say things with wisdom far beyond their years
...especially when a volunteer says a moving prayer over the food they have packed
...especially when volunteers make generous donations
...especially when there are really cute little kids volunteering
...especially when I see volunteers who are so excited to come volunteer
...especially when we get to pray over a shipment of food before it leaves our warehouse
...especially when working with all my amazing, adept, and passionate co-workers
...especially when volunteers bring humor, fun, and enthusiasm with them
...especially when I have underestimated what is possible and God proves me wrong (yet again)
...especially after a volunteer session when we pack a lot of boxes of food
...especially when a volunteer takes the time to thank me or tells me that they had a great experience
...especially when I see that volunteers understand the injustice of hunger and are motivated to do something about it
...especially when I clearly see God’s hand working through the volunteers and staff
...especially when I see volunteers come in day after day to give of their time, energy, and resources to feed starving children

You are Beautiful

There was another piece of art in the Nature Unframed exhibit at the Morton Arboretum that really struck me.

Most of the pieces of art were in a centrally located area, so I walked around to see all of them.  This piece of art was, I think, the biggest.  You probably could have seen it from an airplane.

This is a wonderful message.  There are so many people out there who need to hear this message.  But I wasn’t terribly impressed by this piece of art.  It was just some really big letters- although still a good message.

I moved on to look at other art pieces.  And then later I rode my bike past this piece of art from a different route than I had walked past it.  At first I thought it might be a different piece of art because it was so different and striking.

From the other direction the letters were yellow- a beautiful bright, brilliant yellow. The first time I looked at this piece of art, I hadn’t given it enough of a chance- I dismissed the white letters as “nothing special” and hadn’t taken the time to look at it more deeply, to look at it from another perspective.

Sometimes we need to look at something from a different angle (figuratively or literally).  Sometimes we don’t see the beauty in something because we are looking at it the wrong way.  Or sometimes we don’t look at it long enough.  Or maybe we don’t look at it deeply enough.  Sometimes we dismiss people outright because we don’t take the time to look for the good in them or we just let any small fault override any potential good.  Sometimes a situation frustrates us because it seems all bad when we don’t take the time to look for the good.  Perhaps this is about thinking about the glass as being half full rather than half empty.  But in the end I think we all have to give everyone and everything in our lives a chance before we judge, a chance to see the good, a chance to see the beautiful.

Christmas List

Every kid loves making a Christmas list.  Kids love looking through catalogs and store flyers and picking out all the coolest toys.  Maybe they send the list to Santa or maybe they just put the list in their parents' trusted hands.  A Christmas list allows a child to dream, to dream about what he or she might receive and all the fun that will be had with those toys.  But perhaps the most exciting part about the whole Christmas list making extravaganza is waiting for Christmas morning to find out what wishes have been fulfilled.

I'm no longer a kid, but I still make a Christmas list.  The past few years I have struggled to write a Christmas list like I did when I was a child.  I have been blessed with everything I need and most of what I want.  I don't need more "stuff" to clutter my bedroom or my life.  And so I have started writing what we might call an alternative Christmas list.  My Christmas wish list consists of things I want for other people and for the world.

Here's my Christmas List:

1.  A world without hunger, a world where not a single child dies because he or she didn't have anything to eat
2.  Sustainable sources of income and access to credit for people living in poverty
3.  A world where all children have access to education and all people are literate
4.  Clean water for the more than 1 billion people who don't have access to clean water
5.  Meaningful work and dignity for people who are considered "unemployable" by many
6.  A world where people don't die from preventable and treatable diseases like malaria

Yes, I know my list is a little ambitious.  I'm not even sure Santa could pull off a list like this.  I know none of these things will be delivered under my Christmas tree this year, and I'm pretty sure that none of you reading have the resources to make my Christmas wishes come true.  But here's a more concrete list, which includes some possibilities on how to make my list a reality.

1.  A world without hunger: Donate to Feed My Starving Children or to Heifer International (Ducks, bees, or chicks would be nice)
2.  Income and access to credit: Purchase an animal through Heifer International (I really really want a llama) or purchase a gift card through Kiva that will allow me to give a loan to an entrepreneur in need of a microloan
3.  Education and literacy: Support the work Lutheran World Relief is doing to provide education or buy me a gift certificate for Better World Books
4.  Clean water: A gift card for Living Water International 
5.  Meaningful work and dignity: Purchase me a gift card for Goodwill
6.  An end of malaria deaths: Donate to the Lutheran Malaria Initiative.  This initiative is working to educate people about malaria while treating and preventing malaria in Africa.

So, that's my Christmas list.

I encourage you all to make your own alternative Christmas list.  It's a fun and meaningful experience- it will give you a chance to dream about what a wonderful place the world could be and you will have the opportunity to do some research and see if you can figure out some ways to start making your alternative Christmas list a reality.  If you do make an alternative Christmas list, let me know... I'll probably get you something off your list.