Make America Great Again (DOP #1 2017)

I was born in the United States, and I have spent most of my life here.  In fact, I’ve spent all but a few months of my 33 years on earth, inside of the United States.   Even when I have been gone, the influence of the U.S. was never far away.   I really won the genetic lottery when I was born here, and being a United States citizen has given me so many advantages and privileges that I otherwise may not have had.  These privileges become especially apparent when I travel.

In my life, I have visited Germany, Haiti, and Nicaragua, plus a smattering of airports in still more countries, but it wasn’t until this year that I found my way to Africa.  A friend is working there in a sub-Saharan country, and I had the opportunity to spend a week with him.  It was an incredible experience, at times it reminded me so much of my times in Haiti, and other times our experiences were so outside of the realm of what I was familiar with that I had a hard time adjusting.

One of the things that I found incredibly surprising was how welcoming everyone seemed to be.  If you’ve ever been on a trip with me, you know how ridiculous I look as I wander around with backpack full of gear.  For those of you that haven’t been on a trip with me, imagine a camel walking around on it’s hind 2 legs, and you’ve got a pretty good idea of what it looks like!  I never really know how the locals in any given country will respond to me, but in this part of Africa I felt incredibly welcomed!

Speaking of Camels!

People of all sorts welcomed us into their homes.  We were invited to several meals, and sometimes when we were visiting one person, another would come to invite us to see their home, taking the time to show us all of their favorite parts of the place they lived.  We were given several kinds of snacks in the market by a friend of my friends, and time after time I was struck by just how kind and giving the people we were meeting were.

It didn’t make any sense.  I didn’t speak their language, I could barely communicate with anyone, and if I am ever on your team during a game of charades, I apologize.  It is going to be terrible for both of us. I didn’t look anything like them, in fact, one little girl ran away screaming when she saw us because they see so few white people in the village.  So to be received so well, by such a large percentage of the people we met, was astounding.

Just one of the many people who received us with such grace.

I began to wonder how they would be received in the United States if they came to visit us.

Unfortunately I knew their welcome to the U.S. would not be the same as the one I had received in their country.  I knew this because even as I left court battles were raging over travel bans that were affecting countries just like the one I was in.  We were actively trying to refuse visitors simply because of the majority religion of the area of the world they lived in.

I know what awaits those who come to the U.S. and can’t speak English.  Derision and mocking at the very least, perhaps worse.  There are few in the U.S. who would invite a stranger into their home who could not speak English.

It was a humbling trip.

Even now, in the U.S,. we are openly in conflict with those who are not like us.  Perhaps I am more attuned to it now, but I’ve heard more blatantly racist statements made in the last year than I remember hearing my entire life, previously.

“But” you say, “we are not at peace!  We ARE in open conflict with those others.  They are seeking to destroy us!”

Yes.  I agree.  We are not at peace.  Perhaps it is because we are no longer a people of peace.   We no longer welcome the tired, the poor, the huddled masses, and as a result, we no longer understand what living in peace with our neighbor is truly like.   Instead of reaching out to understand those who have come to us in search of safety or sanctuary, we build walls to keep them out.  We fight to keep ourselves separate, and not equal.  We hold ourselves above them, struggling to protect what is ours.  We take more than our share, while those who seek equality are refused at the gate for being born in the wrong place.  We bomb from above those with ideological differences, and are horrified when they strike back.

I would love for America to be made great again.

We must seek the path of peace, or will never succeed.  

Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it. ~ Hebrews 13:2

Watch 32 (2016-2017)

I wonder what it was like.

33 years ago I was born into the world I live in now.  I passed from the darkness into the light, and saw for the first time that there was more to my life than darkness and indistinct voices.

I wonder what it was like.

I was obviously present at the event in question, but I guess I wasn’t paying too much attention, since I don’t remember any of it.  I guess if my birth was typical at all, I entered the world I now know, and after some coercion, took my first breath.  At various points after my first breath, I was washed and bundled, weighed and observed, and handed to my mother and father so they could meet me face to face for the first time.  I suppose that was an incredible moment for them, one filled with weight and quite possibly terror, but also filled with a deep care that they had probably never before experienced.   I irrevocably changed their lives forever, and things would never be the same for them.

I’m not sure at what point in the process this may have happened, but at some point someone took note of the time, and wrote it down so it could be on my birth certificate.  They jotted down a series of numbers that didn’t mean much to many people, but to my parents, those numbers represented the beginning of a brand new experience, as they walked into the unknown lands of parenthood, together.   For me, it represents the beginning of my journey in this world.

Just a few simple numbers mark the beginning, and one day those same simple numbers will mark the end.

I wear a new watch tonight, as I always do on my birthday, having retired the previous years watch.  I note the numbers, realizing with each passing second that I have just a bit less time here in this world.  I filled my year in the best ways I could, deciding that I didn’t want to focus on what I didn’t have, but rather make the most of what I did.  I’ve covered a lot of ground in the last year, and I am going to take a moment to reflect on it, to remember what life was like when I was 32.

It has been a crazy year.

During one hectic and incredible week, I bought a school bus at auction, flew to D.C. to pick it up, and more importantly went on my first date with the woman I hope to someday soon call my wife.  I had met her in June, at a CD release event, and I had done my best to catch her eye that night at a group dinner.  I’ll leave the full story for another day, but I left dinner that night convinced that she wasn’t interested, and that she wasn’t going to be.  4 months and one birthday later, we met at a stone quarry to admire the view.  I eventually invited her out for coffee, and I have grown to not only love her, but understand more fully what love is as our relationship has continued.  I’ve never done anything to deserve this love, but I am so glad that I have finally found what I was searching for.  In December I asked her to be my girlfriend, and now I am waiting anxiously to ask her another very important question.

I’ve found in her a helper, a helper in times of trouble, which have been in some abundance this year.  I’ve wrestled with a lot of my demons this year, exposing them to the light so that others can see the victory God has brought, so they can find hope for themselves.  I’ve found myself tossed about, as relationships to people and organizations I expected to always be there, have been broken.   Slow times at work have made interesting financial arrangements necessary, and while things are looking up financially, I’m still catching up at times.

In June, I had the privilege of visiting my friends Joel and Deborah in their new home, a small country in Sub-Saharan Africa.  I wrestled with separation in ways I never have, and experienced a life I knew nothing about.  I was humbled by the kindness of a man who drove us around the beautiful countryside, who refused desperately needed money so that he could serve his brothers in Christ.  That man was hurt the next day in a motorcycle accident, and left unable to work for several weeks, but in his poverty and brokenness, he invited us into his home for a humble meal outside under a darkening sky.  I worshiped with brothers and sisters who I may never meet again in this world, and I found acceptance and grace in all of our interactions.

I witnessed the marvels of a full solar eclipse, and I was awe-struck.  I was surprised on my birthday by my girlfriend, and my good friend who drove 3 hours to see me and celebrate with me.   I love them both.

You see, I’m happy to continue living this life here, happy to watch the moments tick by on my new watch, because I now see so many good possibilities for my time here.  I couldn’t see any of those moments from where I was a year ago.  So now, I will do my best to enjoy each moment I have left, hoping to make as big of an impact as I can.  But in all of this hoping for the future, I return again to the moment I was born.

On that day 33 years ago, I didn’t know what the world I was entering held for me.  I only knew that I was leaving behind everything I had known from before.  When my time runs out, I certainly don’t know exactly what awaits me, but I know that on that day I will see in full, that which I know only see in part.  I’ll be born again, born into another world, where I’ll meet the faithful motorcycle driver, and I’ll speak to him, and invite him in for dinner.  I’ll be in a place that makes my current home seem like darkness, as I step into the light.

I wonder what it will be like.

Be sure to check out the other people on the journey with me at 254peace.org, or on our Facebook page.  There are some awesome people participating this year, and they all have something important to say.  




Empty

We are always trying to live full lives.  Everyone is fighting to fill their wallet, to fill their stomachs, to fill their homes.  Everyone I know tries to fill their time with as much as they possibly can, racing from one activity to another, making sure to squeeze in as many episodes of their favorite TV show, or spend just one more hour at work.  Many people like to fill their life with experiences or new adventures.  Everyone wants everything to be full.  FULL.  FULL.

I must admit that I am constantly pursuing a state of fullness as well.  I want to have a full relationship, filled with adventures and excitement.  I want to be full of feelings, until they are gushing out from my lips because I can’t possibly hold them in.  I want to have access to whatever I need to fully fill myself.  So I fill my days with work so I can buy new toys, I fill my time off with social media so I can feel loved.  I fill my quiet moments with news so I can be well informed.  I fill my stomach with food so I can feel safe from famine.

I’m always trying to fill myself up.

TheQuarry

The Fort Wayne Quarry on Ardmore. Canon 5dMKIII and Rokinon 14mm. Copyright Joshua Stairhime 2017

There is a concept in art known as negative space.  Negative space is space that is not filled by the subject of the art, but is essentially the nothing that something exists in.  Good graphic design demands that you pay attention to the negative space.  If your artwork is full of stuff, then the whole purpose of your creation can be lost in the extra fluff surrounding it.   Your work goes from something like the Mona Lisa to a  “Where’s Waldo”.  Creating something without negative space makes it hard to really appreciate the beauty of what you are creating.   It makes it hard for others to appreciate what you are creating as well.
One day I was shown the quarry down the road from where I work, and ever since then I keep going back to it.  A quarry doesn’t sound that interesting, it is a place where people dig up rocks and sand.  Instead of filling up, a quarry is a place where people work to empty something.  As the quarry is dug deeper, more and more of the quarry is removed, but at the same time, more and more of the quarry is revealed.  I’ve not yet been to the Grand Canyon, but I know that you don’t go there to see the things that fill it up, but rather how empty it is.  Yes, there are boundaries, but without those boundaries you couldn’t know how empty it is, and you couldn’t be moved by how incredibly large it is.  When something is emptied out, a beauty that can not be taken away remains.

AnightwithStars

A secret location in northwestern Ohio. Canon 5dMKIII and Rokinon 14mm. Copyright Joshua Stairhime 2017

God is a master of using negative space.  He created the sky, something inconceivably large, but something that seems so incredibly empty.  Or at least it seems empty as we run about trying to fill our lives with something.  It isn’t until you stop to appreciate how empty the night sky is, that you start to see the beauty it contains.  It isn’t until you turn off the lights, and slow down that you can see the stars poking through the inky blackness you’re surrounded by.  We couldn’t see the beauty of the stars if they were jammed in tightly next to each other.  It is in the negative space of the sky, that those little pinpricks of light can shine out from and make us feel so small.
I’m hoping to start accepting that emptiness isn’t the curse we’ve made it out to be.  It is, after all, a still small voice that speaks after the wind, after the earthquake, after the fire, that is the only voice that can truly fill us.  After Elijah had confronted the prophets of Bail, after he had won the Superbowl of spiritual confrontations, he had to go somewhere to be emptied out.  He couldn’t handle being full.  He needed a rest, so he hid himself away from the world, and it is in those moments that God spoke to him.  He found peace in those moments.  He found himself in those moments.

So maybe it is time for you to stop trying so hard to be full, and to instead allow yourself to be empty.

Make room for something bigger.

Make room for the breath of God to fill you.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled.

To be hungry, you must be empty.

Be empty.




Snake Bite

I wasn’t supposed to be there.

I knew I should leave.  If the growing sickness in the pit of my stomach wasn’t an obvious enough indication of the danger I was facing, then I suppose my brain never had a chance as it begged me to stop, to turn around, to run the other way.

I didn’t.
Not only did I not turn around, but I moved closer to the danger.  I drew the danger closer to me.  They say you should keep your friends close and your enemies closer, but there is very little reason to hold a poisonous snake by the tail.  I wasn’t just holding the snake by the tail, I was putting it in my lap, expecting it not to bite.

I had been warned.

I didn’t listen.
Continue reading →

Flap (DOP #24 2016)

You’ve likely heard of the butterfly effect, which is a concept that proposes that even a butterfly flapping its wings can change the weather thousands of miles away.  The concept suggests that a very small change can have a big impact on the end result.  If you give it some thought, it is pretty cool to think that even the smallest change in conditions could result in a big impact down the road.

As I think about my actions in the world, it is a bit terrifying to think that my deliberate choice to eat 7 pieces of licorice instead of 6 might be changing something in my life a few weeks from now, but surely that isn’t exactly how the concept works.  It seems quite unlikely that such a small choice you make now will result in a totally different situation for you next month.  Yet, we see this born out in history.

How often does one person act, and then we see the result worldwide?  A person catching a thrown football instead of missing it can change the fortunes of thousands of gamblers.  Those gamblers may come out of this new situation for better, or for worse.  Those effects will cause ripples too, as the man who just won $50 by guessing the outcome correctly may spend some of that money on his family, where the man who lost $50 will have to go without something that he would have purchased, perhaps skipping the microscope his son wanted for his birthday in favor of something less expensive.  I could go on, but I suspect that you get the picture.

Now the butterfly doesn’t know how to effect the specific changes it wants, and this is that part that gets tricky, because we humans think we are smart enough to know what will happen as a result of our actions.  Unfortunately I’m not sure I see much evidence of this.  For example, in my own life, since I want to be in shape, some small actions I could take to affect the outcome of my desire would be to drink less sugary drinks, and drink more water.  Or perhaps I know that 20 minutes of exercise a day will get me closer to my goals of fitness, but I spend that time reading Facebook posts while drinking a large soda instead.  Need I go on?

So when we pursue peace, we often think of large grandiose actions that are incredibly difficult to achieve, and as a result, we fail to act on them.  What if we spent deliberate time each day focused on a small achievable action to bring peace into our lives?  What if it was as simple as one moment, stopping yourself before you walk out the door, reminding yourself to be peaceful in your interactions with those around you today.  It seems so small and insignificant, but what could this small moment mean a week from now, a month from now, or a day from now?  What if we repeated this moment each day, trusting that even though we don’t see a specific effect, that our so small actions will affect our outcomes?

Today, as you walk out your front door…seek peace.