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Ready...Fire...Aim
In seminary, one of my supervised ministry placements (i.e. internship) was at a boys and girls club located in one of Atlanta's public housing complexes. Based on an action/reflection model of learning, students worked ten hours a week in a ministry setting and then shared their self-reflections each week with a group of peers, which was led by a faculty member and a site supervisor.
After several weeks working with some very funny and energetic youth, I wrote a reflection paper in which I shared feelings of confusion and guilt. I was concerned about the feelings I had when I worked with these young people. I had been born into a family, race and class that gave me a privileged status that I had done little to nothing to earn. Driving in to the housing project, I wondered if I was doing this to make myself feel better or if deep down I thought of myself as some Lone Ranger coming to 'help' or 'save' these poor kids. It probably didn't help that the new/used car my parents had picked out and bought for me happened to be white.
Sharing my reflections with my group, I labored over my feelings and speculated about my motives. When I finished, my professor,who happened to be African American looked at me and said, "I don't care why you're doing it or what your motives are. I don't care why you go there, and I'm guessing those kids don't either. What matters right now is that you're going. If you wait around to have pure motives and all the right feelings, you might never do a thing. Just keep going; keep being there with those kids; and keep feeling whatever it is you happen to feel. Maybe the right motives will show up and maybe they won't, but I believe God will use you to make a difference in those kids' lives, and God will use them to make a difference in yours."
Thank God for that professor, and thank God for those kids. I believe God used both to teach me about Christian discipleship.
Have you ever started something for the wrong reasons that God may have used for good?
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Honestly? I can't think of anything I've ever done in my life with pure motives. I read a quote today from Therese of Liseaux - quoted in another book and I immediately thought of today's reflection - as well as all this Lenten self-examination. She says - mind you - hundreds of years ago: "If you are willing serenely to bear the trial of being displeasing to yourself, then you will be for Jesus a pleasant place of shelter." I've never much liked dwelling on my sinfulness, mixed motives or illusions of innocence - however sin rears its ugly head - but I wonder if that's exactly when God can show forth the grace and mercy of Jesus through us. Hmmm - another one of those paradoxes?
ReplyDeleteYes, a paradox. Dwelling on sin, wallowing in our total unworthiness, is to deny that God claims us as children. To ignore sin, claiming we're not so bad, is to cheapen God's grace and claim we are more than children of God.
ReplyDeleteI think that's why she used the word 'serenely' - to avoid the 'dwelling on sin' part while still facing who we really are...
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