Good News

As of Tuesday of last week, I have a new job. Calvary Church is one of our favorite spots in all Minneapolis, so when they announced an opening for a newly designed administrative and communications role, I did not wait long to apply - the perspective of biking to work at a place with the kind of impact on our community that this church has seemed almost too good to be real! Calvary is not only one of the few truly multi-cultural and multi-ethnic churches in this state where Sunday morning is still the most segregated hour of the week - it is a community of mature, glad-hearted followers of Jesus who strive to be messengers of justice and good news right here in our neighborhood.

One of the perks of my new job, which some half-jokingly call a crucible, is that I get to work alongside of Calvary's pastor. Jeff has served this particular congregation for the last 24 years, ever since his graduation from seminary, and he might just be one of the most outgoing people you've ever met. He is loud, uproarious and passionate for his flock. He can soothe a crying toddler and fix a broken boiler as well as he can preach, and he knows the name of every single person who raises their hand during our weekly ritual of offering God our praise, pain and protest.

On my second or third day on the job, a woman from the neighborhood walked into our office asking for help. Her weary face reflected a lifetime of struggle and much pain, but she did not come in asking for money. A week since deciding to quit smoking, she had just found out that she has lung cancer. What she came for was for someone to soothe her and tell her that not all was lost. As we sat down, she was so choked up with anxiety that she could barely breathe. "I try my best to trust God" - she said between short, shallow breaths - "but I'm afraid this is His punishment."

Just by the time I managed to soothe her enough to breathe normally, Jeff returned to the office from a short errand and sat down with us. I knew he was having a busy day so I expected a quick prayer and a pat on the back - something like "God is in control of everything and you should just trust Him" - but his response to the woman was nothing like that. "This is not the end, sister" - he told her, "This is an invitation to a new beginning." He told her that she is God's beloved daughter - that God does not look at her as a punishing Judge, but as a compassionate Father. He told her that she needs God's people around her to help her through this time, and to help her see herself through God's eyes which are so different than the condemning eyes of this world. He told her that this time was an invitation from God to enter into a deeper relationship with Him where she would find lasting peace. His words carried no hint of shaming or judgment - they sounded like surprisingly Good News.

Good News - that is the literal meaning of the biblical word "Gospel." In the experience of too many, including myself, "Gospel" has come to mean anything but that - it has in fact become news of sin, condemnation, inadequacy and shame. If you're not a Christian, the "Gospel" message is that you're an abomination in God's eyes. If you are, you should be ashamed of yourself for not preaching the "Gospel" to all the lost sinners you know.

Sin, condemnation and shame are all an inevitable part of our reality on this planet - but Jeff's words reminded me that this is precisely the reality that Jesus came to rescue us from. And if that is the Good News of the Gospel, I might actually want to tell someone about it... In fact, I might actually want to hear it myself over and over again!

Auto Therapy

Recently, I started volunteering at a local auto mechanic shop that Marta and I had been taking our cars to. About a month ago I asked the owner of the shop if it would be ok if I came by to just hang out and watch as they fixed cars and possibly learn a thing or two. The mechanics were a little perplexed because this was the first time anyone had ever made such a request but they quizzically agreed to my offer in return for helping out where I could. Their only question was whether my virgin ears could stand the amount of swearing I would encounter, to which I replied that they had been deflowered long ago. The first day I was greeted with the proclamation that "The crazy guy is here" but was fairly quickly introduced to the mechanics and taken under their wing.

I came into the shop letting them know that I knew absolutely nothing about cars or how to fix them and that I was here to learn. I had been sick of being at the mercy of corrupt auto mechanics who could tell me anything they wanted to and I would have to believe them and pay ridiculous amounts of money to them. I also thought that it might be nice to save some money by learning how to do simple repairs on my own aging automobile. My first day at the shop the guys taught me how to do an oil change and fix a break light. (I felt so empowered with a sense of accomplishment!)

I have found, however, that after a month of volunteering the greater reason I go is for my own therapy. I have found that in working with people change is often a painstakingly slow process if it happens at all. As a therapist one cannot simply "fix" people. Even if change is accomplished there is no guarantee that your work will not unravel with the next week's stressor. With cars, if you see a problem, you can fix it and the job is done. There comes a real sense of accomplishment that does not easily come with working with people. This is my therapy. I have found that it is balancing for me to be involved with something that progresses and can be easily judged as "accomplished".

Even on the days when I do not do much at the shop, it still feels healing to be there. I take in deep breathes of oil fumes and listen to stories of how the mechanics have burned their eyebrows off or been injured in the war. I feel that I have retreated from the world of pain and chronic family dysfunction for at least a few hours during my week.

Ripples

A long time ago there was a man who lost a great deal of money in the stock market. He became depressed and started to drink, neglecting his own family and treating his children as worthless. The man's son grows older and marries, seeing himself as worthless and in turn treating his wife as he feels, degrading her as often as he can. One day the wife cheats on her husband because she finds someone who treats her with desire and admiration. The man in his sadness and hurt turns to alcohol to soothe his pain, just as he had seen his father do. One day as he is driving while intoxicated, he crashes into a van carrying a family, killing a mother and her two children, but leaving the father alive. This father, destroyed by the loss of what was most precious to him lashes out in rage and jealousy at those who still have children, to the point of kidnapping another's child and killing it. The parents of the kidnapped child sink into despair and numb their pain with Methanphetamines. The drug takes control of their reasoning, they become oversexualized and begin neglecting and sexually abusing their other children. One of their boys grows to be 14 and in his pain and battle against powerlessness rapes a neighbor child for offending him. The neighbor boy's mother cannot handle the guilt that she was unable to protect her son and turns to drugs herself. The boy is removed from the home, placed in foster care and ends up in a session with me.

I ask myself, who is to blame for this? Who should pay for the injustice done to my client? Is it the boy who raped him? Or the boys' parents who abused him? Or the kidnapper? How far back do we go? In an amazing session, my client's mother was talking about how she felt tremendous anger over what happened and wanted to kill the boy who raped her son, but then she softened, and said that she also felt compassion on him because she knew that in order to do this, some incredible hurt must have been done to him.

Recently, I was driving home with a strong hatred in my heart for those who have done evil to my clients and the many victims in the world. The hatred was so strong that I wanted to take justice into my own hands and kill those responsible for evil. Two recent and unexpected sources have opened my eyes to the place of hurt in the evils of this world; the book, "The Shack" and the children's book/movie "The Tale of Despereaux". Both struggle with the problem of evil from a creative and empathetic stance, realizing the complexities of the human heart. The frightening truth is that none of us are immune to deep hurt or beyond the possibility of making unloving choices as a result of this hurt.

While I believe that at each stage of the story I have described, each individual had a choice to make, I cannot help but feel more compassion and understanding for the hurt driving the decisions made. I only hope that there is a light more powerful than this strain of darkness, a redemption more glorious than the fall. I know that within my client lies the opportunity to end the darkness, and with God's help maybe someday...

My client grows to forgive the boy who hurt him and chooses to end the cycle of gaining power over others or being stepped on by others, but learns a third way of giving power to others in wisdom and trust and caring for power given. Maybe he will even become a counselor one day and help other children who have been abused. A child that he counsels learns that she is not worthless or permanently stained, goes on to marry and have children, giving her children the childhood and the love that she never experienced. Her children grow up safe and with compassion towards others. Her son travels across the world to work in a refugee camp in a war torn country. He brings healing to those who have been raped, sold into slavery, and have witnessed terrible atrocities. One boy that he rescues from slavery grows up to commit his life to freeing others from slavery and leads a movement of people to crack down on slave traders. An article is written about this man in a newspaper far away, and it is read by another man who recently lost a large sum in the stock market, causing him to put down his glass of whiskey.