The previous night after my previous entry my roommate Ben split his head open on the ceiling fan as he was crawling into bed on the top bunk. There was blood everywhere. Another roommate who's here for a medical internship ran to get the owner of the house, who happens to be a doctor. I gave Ben my bandanna and Adam, our leader, was applying pressure. I won't get into details, but long story short the house owners and the medical interns gave Ben drugs and stitched his head together on the kitchen table. It was pretty cool to watch.-----------------------------------------------
After a short night's sleep, we ate breakfast and went off to the orphanage. We, the men, went to the older boys section of the orphanage and hung out with them. The director of their section cooperated with our intentions and made it easy for us to dialogue with them. Ben gave his testimony and I think they enjoyed it because 1. they connected with it, and 2. it was an insight into a completely different world. Ben was really good at trying to get the boys to speak, as opposed to letting Miguel Angel preaching.
Through this we heard how one boy was living with his family but they couldn't support him and when it got to the point that he was dying from malnutrition and disease, by God's love and grace he was saved from physical death and was given the option to go back with his parents or to go to the orphanage. He chose the orphanage because he felt that he'd be better taken care of there. The orphanage then fed him, gave him an education, community, and faith. The book Blue Like Jazz talks about how Don Miller loved his hippie friends because they were legitimately interested in his life as if every story he told was from a world renowned, famous author. Although, many of these hippies didn't follow Christ, I can connect because when I was listening to the stories of these boys I was legitimately interested, as if they were from a book written by a famous, world renowned author, God Himself.
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We were leaving the orphanage and I finally started to understand. Allow me to explain. A girl on our trip was talking about a theory called Vacation Poop Syndrome. The theory is that when you travel to another place on vacation, or in this case a mission trip, we tend to feel out of our comfort zone and when that happens we become temporarily constipated.
I had been in the DR for four days and I had yet to poop.
This was because I was uncomfortable. I hadn't had this problem since I went camping with the Boy Scouts for the first time. I think it is because this was my first time at an orphanage, my first time intentionally trying to play with kids, and my first time interacting with children from another culture. I went into this trip expecting to be able to use my gift of Spanish to make a huge difference. You know, bring kids to Christ, physically save someone's life, counsel broken hearts, etc. What I learned however, is that especially with kids, it's not so much about our words, but rather our actions. There’s the scene in “Good Will Hunting” when Robin Williams looks at Matt Damon and repeats, “It’s not your fault.” At first it means nothing to Damon, but he keeps saying it, stepping closer and changing his intonation, his rhythm. The words are starting to get to Damon as evidenced by his lack of eye contact, and his attempt to push him away, but it’s not the words that he’s pushing away; it’s love. It's the heart behind the words as a vessel and the intonation like fuel that propels Robin Williams closer to Damon until Damon finally gives in, lets his repressed tears flow and leaves himself open for a hug. Love always wins. You see, I always try to be a clever, funny guy and a philosophical, emotional counselor. But I've neglected how to love in ways other than words; to hug and to play. To connect with out human language but rather our natural language that God created us with. Right before we left the orphanage, I played a fun little game with a couple of kids and with Ben. The game had no rules, and made no sense. I honestly had no idea what I was doing I was just going with the flow, following this kid into his world that makes sense to him but not me. That was when it was finally coming clear to me how to love without words. The game was cut short when we had to get on the bus and leave the orphanage for good. One image that will always be ingrained in my head is the image of the little boy who hung to Ben the entirety of our three days there. We think he really saw Ben as a father figure. As we were leaving he was just staring at Ben, oblivious to everything around him probably wondering where Ben was going. Ben was staring right back at him, walking backwards towards the bus. The moment seemed straight out of a movie and is replayed in slow motion every time I think about it.
------------------------------------------------
We then traveled for a bit in the bus and I think this day, not just for me, but for all of us, brought our team closer together. We were crazy. We were laughing, telling crazy jokes, rejecting flirty pineapple salesmen walking down the streets trying to get kisses from the pretty American women from outside the bus window... you know that kind of stuff.
Then we arrived at a University that Vision Trust works with to get people out of poverty. We met with students involved in their University's Cru ministry (except in the DR its called VIDA) and we had a typical meeting with worship and a message. Unfortunately, the main guitar player was missing so they asked if anyone else could play the guitar. I timidly raised my hand, considering I do play the guitar but if anyone else could play I would've much rather of had them play because I've only been playing for a couple years and have never played in public before. Turns out only and one other lady raised our hands so we were the worship leaders for the night. She played two songs that I had never heard of before, and I played the one song that I knew all of the words too; How He Loves. It was fun because it's always been a secret desire of mine to lead worship. Again, it was fun, but it was hard. I never really thought that much about it before, but there are about 10,000,000 different versions of that song, and my version was different than everybody else version so at times people would get lost. Also the guitar had nylon strings that were really meant for finger picking and my chord and hammer-on style sounded funny on it. Regardless, I can check off one of my secret desires, and I think God taught me a lot during it. I learned that I'm am indeed not a rockstar by any means even though I like to think it sometimes. Similarly, there's a sign holder on a busy street corner in my town who is crazy good. He jumps and dances and dresses as if he's a famous rapper at a concert, and he'll flip the sign crazy fast, catch it with ease, and then look at individual drivers straight in the eye and wink at them. To prove my point even more, he is so good that several businesses have given him signs to dance with. In fact, every time I hit that red light, and I'm sure other drivers can attest to this, I never pay attention to when the light turns green because I am mesmerized by his skills. However, I am so amused by his skills that I have no idea what his signs are advertising. Now this is where the lesson comes into play (Thank Jimmy Pena for this one), That's how I feel many of us worship, and how I was when I was leading my one song: I was showing off my skills, but nobody could notice what my sign was for. We get so caught up in what we look like or sound like when we worship, either in the band or in the audience, that we forget who we're worshiping... who we're advertising. If some stranger were to come into your church's worship time, would they see a brilliant advertisement for Christ, or would they become mesmerized by a group of people acting strange and dancing funny? However, there'd probably be judgement regardless, and that's another thing I learned during my claim to fame: when worshiping we need to take down our barriers. If there's a giant wall in between you and God, your worship is minimalized. When we take down our barriers God can see all of it, and that's true worship.
---------------------------------------
We returned to the home and had our Debrief and this time I found it very easy to participate. We talked a lot about topics from the book When Helping Hurts, paternalism, and the idea of relief, rehabilitaion, and development in alleviating poverty. Going back to the story of the boy who shared his story of being malnourished and having to choose between his family or the orphanage (or "Grace Home" since he's not really an orphan.), I think the orphanage is his relief. They tools they provide such as the church and the school at first are is the rehabilitation step, and eventually turns into the development step for them. I think us coming to visit them is just another step on the development journey. You see I see development like climbing Mt. Everest. If every step up the mountain was the same, looked exactly the same, felt exactly the same, and weather and wind were exactly the same, I doubt very many people would actually spend all those days attempting to climb this massive undertaking. However, in reality every step is different, some are
easy steps, some are through deep snow, and some require you to literally climb with your hands. The weather and the winds change constantly, and when you finally get to the top you look back on all of the different adventures it took to get there. Us being in the Dominican Republic was like one of those different steps in there development process. I don't think it was a difficult step for them, but it was something different, something to keep them excited as they continue on their journey.
Anyway, from there we started talking about how American culture is all about checking things off of our to-do lists and how can are able to connect with people very easily, but we can disconnect just as easily. We then compared it to many Latin cultures, including the Dominican culture, where they are less task oriented and more people oriented, focusing on relationships. We talked about how we can take that knowledge compare it it to the way we respond to crisises, the way we evangelize, our friends, and our work. (And we wonder why we have the highest divorce rate). We only provide relief, hardly any development in crisis situations, we preach the gospel to strangers and never talk to them again; no discipleship, we make friends in school, on mission trips, at work, and then we leave and we'll never talk to them again. There'll be people that we know from high school that we see around town but we pretend like we don't know them, because although we do know them, we haven't talked to them in so long it's almost as if we don't know them. It's interesting because if you think about we in the United States are extremists. We always talk bad about extremist religious groups or extremist politicians but compare that to our social culture. For simplicity sake extremist religious groups and politicains are either very conservative or very liberal. Some countries are either more task-oriented than people-oriented, and some are in the middle. The United States is extremely far on the side of task-oriented which I would consider to be an extremist party.... Just a thought.
"Lord I pray that as we return to our normal lives that they aren't normal, and that we may find an intercultural balance for creating/maintaining relationships. Let us also love with actions, not words, so that they can feel your love as opposed to hearing it. Music, hugs, exercise, games; God, you've tagged me, and now I'm it. Amen"
I had been in the DR for four days and I had yet to poop.
This was because I was uncomfortable. I hadn't had this problem since I went camping with the Boy Scouts for the first time. I think it is because this was my first time at an orphanage, my first time intentionally trying to play with kids, and my first time interacting with children from another culture. I went into this trip expecting to be able to use my gift of Spanish to make a huge difference. You know, bring kids to Christ, physically save someone's life, counsel broken hearts, etc. What I learned however, is that especially with kids, it's not so much about our words, but rather our actions. There’s the scene in “Good Will Hunting” when Robin Williams looks at Matt Damon and repeats, “It’s not your fault.” At first it means nothing to Damon, but he keeps saying it, stepping closer and changing his intonation, his rhythm. The words are starting to get to Damon as evidenced by his lack of eye contact, and his attempt to push him away, but it’s not the words that he’s pushing away; it’s love. It's the heart behind the words as a vessel and the intonation like fuel that propels Robin Williams closer to Damon until Damon finally gives in, lets his repressed tears flow and leaves himself open for a hug. Love always wins. You see, I always try to be a clever, funny guy and a philosophical, emotional counselor. But I've neglected how to love in ways other than words; to hug and to play. To connect with out human language but rather our natural language that God created us with. Right before we left the orphanage, I played a fun little game with a couple of kids and with Ben. The game had no rules, and made no sense. I honestly had no idea what I was doing I was just going with the flow, following this kid into his world that makes sense to him but not me. That was when it was finally coming clear to me how to love without words. The game was cut short when we had to get on the bus and leave the orphanage for good. One image that will always be ingrained in my head is the image of the little boy who hung to Ben the entirety of our three days there. We think he really saw Ben as a father figure. As we were leaving he was just staring at Ben, oblivious to everything around him probably wondering where Ben was going. Ben was staring right back at him, walking backwards towards the bus. The moment seemed straight out of a movie and is replayed in slow motion every time I think about it.
------------------------------------------------
We then traveled for a bit in the bus and I think this day, not just for me, but for all of us, brought our team closer together. We were crazy. We were laughing, telling crazy jokes, rejecting flirty pineapple salesmen walking down the streets trying to get kisses from the pretty American women from outside the bus window... you know that kind of stuff.
Then we arrived at a University that Vision Trust works with to get people out of poverty. We met with students involved in their University's Cru ministry (except in the DR its called VIDA) and we had a typical meeting with worship and a message. Unfortunately, the main guitar player was missing so they asked if anyone else could play the guitar. I timidly raised my hand, considering I do play the guitar but if anyone else could play I would've much rather of had them play because I've only been playing for a couple years and have never played in public before. Turns out only and one other lady raised our hands so we were the worship leaders for the night. She played two songs that I had never heard of before, and I played the one song that I knew all of the words too; How He Loves. It was fun because it's always been a secret desire of mine to lead worship. Again, it was fun, but it was hard. I never really thought that much about it before, but there are about 10,000,000 different versions of that song, and my version was different than everybody else version so at times people would get lost. Also the guitar had nylon strings that were really meant for finger picking and my chord and hammer-on style sounded funny on it. Regardless, I can check off one of my secret desires, and I think God taught me a lot during it. I learned that I'm am indeed not a rockstar by any means even though I like to think it sometimes. Similarly, there's a sign holder on a busy street corner in my town who is crazy good. He jumps and dances and dresses as if he's a famous rapper at a concert, and he'll flip the sign crazy fast, catch it with ease, and then look at individual drivers straight in the eye and wink at them. To prove my point even more, he is so good that several businesses have given him signs to dance with. In fact, every time I hit that red light, and I'm sure other drivers can attest to this, I never pay attention to when the light turns green because I am mesmerized by his skills. However, I am so amused by his skills that I have no idea what his signs are advertising. Now this is where the lesson comes into play (Thank Jimmy Pena for this one), That's how I feel many of us worship, and how I was when I was leading my one song: I was showing off my skills, but nobody could notice what my sign was for. We get so caught up in what we look like or sound like when we worship, either in the band or in the audience, that we forget who we're worshiping... who we're advertising. If some stranger were to come into your church's worship time, would they see a brilliant advertisement for Christ, or would they become mesmerized by a group of people acting strange and dancing funny? However, there'd probably be judgement regardless, and that's another thing I learned during my claim to fame: when worshiping we need to take down our barriers. If there's a giant wall in between you and God, your worship is minimalized. When we take down our barriers God can see all of it, and that's true worship.
---------------------------------------
We returned to the home and had our Debrief and this time I found it very easy to participate. We talked a lot about topics from the book When Helping Hurts, paternalism, and the idea of relief, rehabilitaion, and development in alleviating poverty. Going back to the story of the boy who shared his story of being malnourished and having to choose between his family or the orphanage (or "Grace Home" since he's not really an orphan.), I think the orphanage is his relief. They tools they provide such as the church and the school at first are is the rehabilitation step, and eventually turns into the development step for them. I think us coming to visit them is just another step on the development journey. You see I see development like climbing Mt. Everest. If every step up the mountain was the same, looked exactly the same, felt exactly the same, and weather and wind were exactly the same, I doubt very many people would actually spend all those days attempting to climb this massive undertaking. However, in reality every step is different, some are
easy steps, some are through deep snow, and some require you to literally climb with your hands. The weather and the winds change constantly, and when you finally get to the top you look back on all of the different adventures it took to get there. Us being in the Dominican Republic was like one of those different steps in there development process. I don't think it was a difficult step for them, but it was something different, something to keep them excited as they continue on their journey.
Anyway, from there we started talking about how American culture is all about checking things off of our to-do lists and how can are able to connect with people very easily, but we can disconnect just as easily. We then compared it to many Latin cultures, including the Dominican culture, where they are less task oriented and more people oriented, focusing on relationships. We talked about how we can take that knowledge compare it it to the way we respond to crisises, the way we evangelize, our friends, and our work. (And we wonder why we have the highest divorce rate). We only provide relief, hardly any development in crisis situations, we preach the gospel to strangers and never talk to them again; no discipleship, we make friends in school, on mission trips, at work, and then we leave and we'll never talk to them again. There'll be people that we know from high school that we see around town but we pretend like we don't know them, because although we do know them, we haven't talked to them in so long it's almost as if we don't know them. It's interesting because if you think about we in the United States are extremists. We always talk bad about extremist religious groups or extremist politicians but compare that to our social culture. For simplicity sake extremist religious groups and politicains are either very conservative or very liberal. Some countries are either more task-oriented than people-oriented, and some are in the middle. The United States is extremely far on the side of task-oriented which I would consider to be an extremist party.... Just a thought.
"Lord I pray that as we return to our normal lives that they aren't normal, and that we may find an intercultural balance for creating/maintaining relationships. Let us also love with actions, not words, so that they can feel your love as opposed to hearing it. Music, hugs, exercise, games; God, you've tagged me, and now I'm it. Amen"
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