5 years at Tierra Nueva!

On June 1st I start my sixth summer at Tierra Nueva.  It’s especially amazing, since I thought that I would just come for the summer of 2008!  Little did I know what God would have in store for me and I’m incredibly grateful for the journey we’ve been on. 

I arrived at TN eager to participate in holistic ministry through entering into relationships with people on the margins of society.  Yet I was also thirsty to be encountered anew by God and within community.  I had seen movements of the Spirit, witnessed God's goodness, and believed in God's love for me and for ALL creation. However realities of social tragedies had been grabbing more of my attention through my social work classes, travel in Latin America, and working with people who are homeless and in detention.  Frustration with 'Christians’ was only increasing. I yearned for Christian to mean more than right belief or right action, for us to be truly 'little Christs' living and loving incarnationally.  I had started the Master’s in Social Work program, believing I needed to become skilled and trained in order to impact others and affect change in this world. I believed God was with me, behind me, but in a sense with hands tied except through me.

How grateful I am that God’s hands are neither tied nor dependent on solely working through our hands and feet!!!

At Tierra Nueva, I began hearing stories of God entering into the muck and grime of people's lives and transforming it in very real ways. TRANSFORMing, CLEANSing, FREEing, HEALing. I saw healings happening and God's presence coming in very real and down-to-earth ways, a bit different than the more frightening experiences of the Spirit that I had previously witnessed.  In the first couple of weeks, during a class on hearing the voice of God, a near stranger saw an image of a dry sponge for me while we were praying.  This person didn’t know how truly thirsty and dry I had been feeling.  This was one of many significant affirmations that God knows me and speaks through people.

One of most influential things I’ve learned these past years is a deeper awareness that: God speaks to us and through us!  The Holy Spirit is not solely the inspirer of Scripture but also speaks to our hearts, through people, music, images, etc. God is alive and active now in the world, and we get to participate in what He is doing. He can speak to us about how He sees us, our identity, as well as give us images and scriptures that can inform our ministry.  I am trying to make this a consistent practice, whether we are visiting families, in the day-in and day-out work of the Family Support Center, or while meeting with people in jail and during jail Bible Studies.

Recently in the jail, as we were praying for three women, I asked God what gift He wanted to give the women.  For one, the image of a rope and Psalm 18 came to my mind. In this Psalm, God breaks through the heavens to come down to earth to rescue one person who had become entangled by 'the cords of death'.  Tears filled her eyes as I shared this.  It turns out she had overdosed on drugs three times...death really had entangled her, and Jesus was offering her a rope to pull her up out of the pit.  We prayed for courage for her to grab the rope and trust Jesus. 

It is so much more fun to participate in what God is doing, hearing and being led by Him, than to just operate on my own and ask God to bless it.

Recognizing that it’s not what I do but what God does, has also led me into greater freedom to rest and receive. I didn’t realize how many false beliefs I had that drove my behavior and nearly drove me into burnout a couple of years ago. For example, if I believe that my worth is in what I do, then I will DO until I am spent, because I need to experience worthiness and purpose.  However, if I begin to hear from my Father how truly, deeply loved I am, no matter what I do, then I am free to receive and to give out of fullness not emptiness. I get to give, to serve, to love only so much as I have received.  I have full permission to receive God’s love for me, to rest, to play, to delight and be delighted in.  How grateful I am, that Jesus came “…that they may have life, and have it to the full. (John 10:9-11).  

May God continue to breathe life in and through me, and apart from me!