On Belonging

In the silence and solemnity of this holy weekend
I have asked my God
what are the words for this sacred season
Because
I feel the pause, the holding.
The silence.
That makes today's joy all the more pronounced

The answer comes in my soul at rest
Peace
Home

Belonging
Being known
at a house on Pamplona Avenue

Where beauty is Josephine with uneven bangs
And belonging is her between me and Auntie Natalie
Where rhythm is not only Kai's beating on drums
But the shrill of "Auntie!"
And feet on hardwood floor
Coming faster to knock me over
With love

Davis - soft comfort when transition was hard on my soul
Furniture switches rooms but the address stays the same
Painted walls and mounted decor where I found roots
Closets that weren't storing packing boxes for the future

Grace has always abounded in this home
Where I was never expected to be perfect
Broken pieces and held-back tears meant that
only Jesus could make all things whole
Staff worker, daughter, auntie, sister
To be all of them or none at all
The freedom to carry every identity but also just one
One with the Father

The blessing of seeing a real home -
Trivial arguments, imperfect understanding
Mistakes that cannot be hidden
That selfish lashing out
Yet
Hugs and bedtime snuggles
Apologies and love
The messy normal of family life
Daily mistakes causing me to
release my grip on perfection
a little bit
more

Amid the messiah's death overturning order
Is hope not just trickling down
But declaring, loudly - joy, wholeness, redemption
Something right and beautiful knowing that
I have and will always have a home
That this sacred belonging is a gift
My Father promising his daughter
Belonging instead of wandering
Love without working
Joy in mere presence
Comfort in silent and listening
Ceasing to strive

Resurrection Sunday revealing the promise
Of beauty in our broken world
Of love abounding
Of right relationships
Of Jesus lived out in real people
in a house on Pamplona Avenue

Microaggressions: The Gender Edition

I am sharing about what's going on for me this year, next year. And I tell them that my team leader is on paternity leave, so I am leading the team and the fellowship for the first few weeks. "Wait, you are?" Not exactly a tone of excitement. I am suspicious about their hesitation, but I will gloss over it at the moment.

At some point someone points out that all the women, save myself and two other girls at my table, are all sitting together in the other room. I pointedly tell them that this is always the case, I keep telling people our church always self-segregates like so. But he asks me what's really wrong with that, especially if the alternative is the youth groups that are all over each other. "All churches are like that, right?" No, I point out--your sample size of two churches, one being our church and another being a church plant based from our church, does not constitute "all churches". And under a quick breath I murmur that you will miss out on the gifts, perspectives, and life from your fellow sisters but this is not the place for theological arguments, this is not the place to point out how patriarchy in its broken form hurts all of us, and this is not the place to argue for redeemed relationships between men and women, and so we go on.

And they talk about their college fellowships, and one of my friends shares about how it "went downhill" his year. By downhill, he talks about how a guy friend of ours was asked to be admin (which I gather is the leader title of this fellowship) but turned it town, and then asked a girl instead. A girl. "You know this isn't good when they can't raise up leaders," he says.

And they ask me about our fellowship dynamics and I admit we have way more females this year than male and as he shakes his head several times, he says, "That's not good. That's really not good." And he asks me if I lead Bible studies and I can't tell if this is with the women-teaching-in-authority question in mind so like a coward I tell him that this year I sort of co-led one but next year I won't be. Somehow I've lost my confidence and my authority appears to be hiding behind a bush.

And I look around the room that is full of men and a handful of women and I wonder who will have the eyes to see what's going on here. I wonder what it means for relationships between male and female (for He created them both) to be beautiful and co-existing and flourishing. I desperately want a robust grasp on my position on egalitarianism or complementarism yet I fear the stronger I stand, the more I won't fit in here. But I suspect that some already get a hint. And I suspect perhaps that their view of gender--be it in leadership, appropriate distance, assumed dynamics--may impact the fact that few new women have joined the group as I see it. But who am I to say?

In the meantime, I am about to run out of fingers for number of times I hear these comments about women leading ministries spoken in doubt or disagreement. It's like I need a file for them, how to interact with the people who say them, and how to articulate my own convictions, but it's so complicated because it encompasses the emotional, theological, professional, relational realms and much, much more.

And so this advent season I will remember Mary. Mary, who in the gender roles of her time, said yes to an incredulous task with all its associated gossip and presumption and the destiny of never fitting in again. "Let it be to me according to your word," she says. Oh Mary. Did no one expect God to speak through you? No one expected the Messiah to come from you, did they? We can look at Paul and we David and all the men of scripture, but I also won't forget that this woman was a favored one. "And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord."

[edited title: on ferguson]

I hesitate because "speaking up"
cannot be reduced to facebook
or a blog post

On the other hand I admit my silence because
Who can I even speak up to?
Will my social circles care to listen?
What do I say?
What if I've got it wrong?

Is "silence" interpreted by
social media streams devoid of shares
That look just like
"everyone" else's

Is it enough that speaking up
Comes in quiet questions asked in prayer
Consistent thoughts in the back of your mind
Bracing and facing hesitation as you call a friend
Prepared to fumble over words

The truth is:
I have not intertwined my life with theirs
Thus I have to choose hurt.
Before the sin of silence
Is the sin of distance between them and me

When I choose to speak,
Is it because I feel guilty?
Because I choose not to
Is it because I don't feel convicted enough?

In the flurry of
blogs
posts
news
videos
hurt
pain
right
wrong
sadness
silence
expectation
yearning
what part of the deep gray matter and mess
do I choose?

Help me
I am not avoiding
I just don't know what to say

Flourishing

Power, resources, flourishing. Two days ago, my roommate and I successfully hosted a dinner that brought together a couple different circles of church friends as well as two new friends who moved to Sacramento within the past six months. In the 48 hours since that successful hamburger night and while I try to finish Crouch's Playing God (yes, another reference), I've been mulling over those three words and how they played out in our evening of cheeseburgers and dessert.

Crouch defines power as "the ability to make something of the world" - to transform your environment, and the ability to interpret and make meaning from the world. And as I think about why Ro and I threw together this dinner party, we wanted to make community happen. I saw new friends in positions where I was not too long ago: showing up at group-hosted events but otherwise having little to do on weekends. Slowly finding their life in this new city but still a-ways from having a home. These two years in Sacramento have made me incredibly sympathetic to newcomers, re-locators, and transplants. I remember being there. And I hope they will find a home here sooner than later. In that sense, we had the power and used it to create connections, relationships, and communities among our newer friends and our church regulars.

Our other undercover, personal mission has been to bridge gaps between our young adult and career adult groups. Both of us have dabbled in both and have recently been churning thoughts about their similarities and differences, for better or for worse, as they both reflect God and also our broken human selves. While there is no need for the groups to merge, this summer I've found myself wanted to erase the lines that unnecessarily separate the groups. So here I am -- about a year and a half into knowing these church friends and already mixing up social groups and guests lists. Transforming the environment indeed.

But what a dinner party it was. The word resources is included above because prior to moving into this home, I wouldn't have the space to host a dinner where 11 of us could sit around a table. I think of the power we used to create a space for people to flourish through our hospitality: as resident and host of this home, I made the choice to put two tables together so all of us could sit around and face each other. Even that choice versus the paired-off seating of group parties was meant to communicate come, join our family. Tablecloths and set placements said, We're ready for you. And in really cheesy, practical ways (no pun intended), we allowed for creation. We had gaps in our planning that made it so Joe and David were at the stove during all of prep time. We picked a menu so that everyone could contribute and together we created our dinner.

There is no perfect community on this side of heaven, but as I play my part in a kingdom-like community here, maybe this is a new start: using my power and resources to have mealtimes where people sit around a table with a whole group, where old friends meet new people, where people are invited to participate and contribute something to the table, where I create space for joy, laughter, communion, and fellowship. And may it be a place where people and communities may flourish.

turns out i'm not supergirl

Well my dear friends, it has been awhile, but I got hurt today. It's funny how a long streak of good health and fast recoveries make you forget that you are not invincible. But after this afternoon's bike accident, I sit here with a sore jaw and swollen lip, skinned hands and a bruised leg, and a dull headache on the left side of my head where I hit the trail. I'm glad I wore a helmet.

Fortunately the roommate Rosanne and I were together, and I had my phone (which is another thing I don't always take with me, but today may have me convinced otherwise).  She called down the list of all our church friends who were nearby, and it was another one of those moments that I realized...times have changed in Sacramento. There was a time a year and a half ago when an injury or accident felt a lot more isolating and lonely, when I had only so many phone numbers within a 10 mile radius.

The boyfriend would laugh at my how I make dramatic conclusions or life lessons out of small things, but here we are: as I sit here with my head hurting and my body tired, I remember that some things take time and I can't control how fast my body heals. That I am made human and humans get hurt. And I am thankful that God gave friends and people to care for you.

On other notes, I put on the socks Jane gave me from Korea because they make me happy on this slow, tired night. It's the small things, guys.

On Idolatry

I think it's an obvious fact that many Asian American students and families have an academic idolatry. But tonight was the first time in awhile that I remembered how alive it is in our churches. At the high school senior Grad Seminar, a handful of questions were asked about balancing life, how to handle academics, where to put your time. There was a variety of answers: figure out your goals, choose your priorities, put God first. etc.

It wasn't till I drove home that I realized what was bothering me about our panel responses: when we talked about grades, we talked about it like it would be our choice. If I failed, it's because I didn't prioritize it enough, I didn't manage my time, or I didn't care enough about it. Nowhere did we say, "The Lord gave, and the Lord takes.." Nowhere did anyone say, "You might study all you can and still fail."

We are still in the grip of the idol, thinking we can control it. I'm churning thoughts off of Andy Crouch's Playing God as he talks about idolatry, how it "embodies a false claim about the world's ultimate meaning." And we think that the world will work right and in our favor if we study correctly. Nowhere does our Chinese Church narrative tell us that following God will leads us to an F.

Now, there are a lot of idols our churches have, a lot of things that are in the Bible that are missing in our teachings. But tonight this whole thing about good grades and academic success leads me to success. Because idols (again, borrowing from Crouch) will ask for more and more, while giving less and less, until eventually they demand everything and give nothing.

I remember this in undergrad. I remember when a low result on a midterm drove classmates to give more and more for their time, but to no avail. Individual classes or semester loads that demanded friends to give everything--all their time, energy, emotion--to their grades, and then gave nothing. In one case, the "nothing" turned out to be failure still: not passing, not making it, not understanding material regardless of hours put in. In others, that "nothing" came in other forms: withered relationships, tired people, purposelessness and depression.

In all honesty, it is the first case of "nothing" that I irked me: as I started this post, I wished that these incoming college freshmen knew that academics and grades were not in their control. They are not guaranteed success no matter how they put in. Try as they might, they may get an F. But as I write, I am convinced that that second "nothing" is all the more terrifying yet invisible: that they could walk out with the grades after they put in and not realize that it will demand more of them. We've seen it: the bigger idolatry of success transfers easily from academics to career and position.

These thoughts are incomplete. It's been awhile since I've paid attention to this idol in my community. But tonight the language and our illusion of control over this has given light to it yet again.

finding contentment in limits