Back In The City, Back In The Fog

This morning I woke up, grabbed my Bible and journal and sat down at my desk to read, which is where I am writing to you now. I can not help but reflect on how today is another gloomy day. Nothing puts me in a somber mood quicker than waking up to a grey sky. Especially after spending a summer in LA and Colorado full of blissful sunny skies.


Somberness sometimes turns into a disagreeable mood, and a disagreeable mood sometime turns into depression all because the fog has a strange ability to slowly drain the hope out of me. This all sounds silly huh? Especially since I can drive 15 minutes to another part of the city and bask in all the UV I want. But that's just it, and that's just what hit me today.


I said to myself this morning, after taking in all the grayness my living room window let in, "Yes, but the sun is still shining." It started with the realization that the sun was still shining in other parts of the city, in other parts of the nation and even in other parts of the world, but then my realization went deeper. The sun is still shining here. In the Outer Richmond district of San Francisco, here at my house. The fog is merely shallow and fleeting. Yes it's here now, but it comes and goes and is powerless against wether the sun shines or not. For the sun will always shine whether I can see it or not. In fact, if it didn't I could not move or see at all and I would not live in a way that hopes to see it's rays. This thought filled me with a smidgen of joy.


For the Son always shines despite the fleeting reality of fog.


-A. Waidley

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The Name Change

     By now you may have already heard but a few nights ago at the National Staff Conference in Fort Collins, Campus Crusade for Christ officially changed its name to Cru after 60 years.  While the news may or may not come as a shock to you, there are a lot of opinions flying around about the name change right now and I wanted to let you, our friends, family and supporters know the heart behind it.  Personally I believe the name change is a great thing and despite what people/media/blogs/whoever might tell you, a name change does NOTHING to change the mission and vision of our organization.  We are as committed as ever to seeing college students around the globe come to know Jesus and figure out what it means to walk with Him.

     I remember the first week I was on campus at San Francisco State as an intern 3 years ago (wow, has it been that long?), the team and I were tabling at the beginning of the semester with a sign that said in big letters “City Cru” and in much smaller letters “Campus Crusade for Christ at SFSU”.  Within an hour I remember seeing more than a few people stop to read our sign, see the word ‘crusade’ and give a head shake of disgust and walk away.  It all culminated when a student actually stopped, read the sign, looked at us and yelled, “Crusade?  That’s pretty f-ed up”.  I can remember sharing with people on campus, trying to get into spiritual conversations to get to know a person and introduce Jesus to them.  When our name came up, there were almost physical reactions of walls being put up and conversations would end.

     The reality of Campus Crusade for Christ is our mission, hope and vision is for college students to have an opportunity to know the truth, love, mercy, grace, and life of Jesus Christ.  We desire to build relationships with college students from every walk of life and relationships are built through conversations.  In a city like San Francisco the simple fact is a word like 'crusade' is a barrier to the gospel of Jesus because it almost immediately causes people to a) associate you and the organization with THE crusades b) puts both you AND the person you are trying to get to know on the defensive which c) causes the person not to trust you and to want to pull away from the conversation.

     One of my friends (ok, one of my bosses) who is finishing up his doctorate at Fuller in Christian Ethics in the public sphere said something super insightful to a group of us recently.  What he said was if you look at the history of the church over the past 2000 years around the world and even in America until the early 1900's, what has characterized it especially in times of growth and revival is that Christianity was a 'first word' movement.  Christians were concerned with walking with Jesus and meeting the needs of the communities around them, healing the broken, feeding the hungry, living a lifestyle of sacrifice and grace and all the while sharing the love of Jesus in word and deed.  But in the past 100 years the church in America has shifted to become a 'last word' movement.  He pointed out that today it seems like Christianity in our country is more concerned with making America a 'Christian nation' by legislating it into our laws and trying to 'reclaim' the culture than it is with actually walking with Jesus.  I suspect a lot of the push back against the name has more to do with this 'last word' Christianity than actual concern for the spreading of the Kingdom of God, as if changing our name means we've 'lost' some sort of cultural battle.  The name change was the result of years of prayer with the leadership of Crusade seeking the Lord faithfully and humbly through a long process.  It wasn’t an arbitrary change for the sake of political correctness but a change meant to further the Kingdom of God and spread the name of Jesus.

     The reason Alex and I joined staff with Campus Crusade in the first place wasn't to make some sort of political point, or to bash culture or to push certain social beliefs on people but to share the incredible true life Jesus offers to all; I've said it many times, but we were made to follow Jesus, we find our true purpose when we surrender our lives to Him and everything else, every issue, every debate, every concern, every cause pales in comparison to the question of where you stand with Him.

     Below are a few links I think would be really helpful for you to read if you are interested in hearing a bit more about how the leadership of Campus Crusade for Christ prayed through and finally decided upon Cru.  As Alex and I have heard from the leadership, what has remained completely clear throughout has been the humility and openness they have demonstrated.  This was not an arbitrary name change, nor was it a change to be more “politically correct”.  Bottom line, it was a change made to remove barriers to people hearing the truth and true life found in Jesus.

Links To Read:

1)  The first link is the official Cru page.  It has many answers to the most frequently asked questions concerning the name change.  Please, please read the content here before anything else:  http://www.ccci.org/about-us/donor-relations/our-new-name/qanda.htm

2)  The second link is a blog from a former Campus Crusade for Christ staff member against the name change, who, after seeing how Steve Sellers and other CCC staff leaders humbly presented it, had some reflections:  http://assumethebest.info/campus-crusade-name-change

3)  The final link is an article on the name change from Huffingtonpost.com written by a Sojourners staff member.  It is good:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lisa-sharon-harper/campus-crusade-for-christ-cru_b_906732.html?ref=fb&src=sp

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14 Lines on the Proverbs and Other Meanderings

Alex with some of her Bible study girls.

     Well the school year is finally coming to a close here at San Francisco State.  As I type this Alex and I are on our way to debriefing meetings to celebrate the year and talk through with our staff team what went well, what didn't and shaping our fall semester.
     It goes without saying Alex and I are so thankful to all our friends and supporters for your prayers and love, without you this ministry wouldn't be possible.  We will share stories with you all in the coming weeks; in the meantime, here are some meanderings from the past couple weeks.


Meanderings:
- Alex and I both were able to end the school year well.  This was a huge answer to prayer.  Our relationships and bible studies we lead all ended in encouraging fashion.
- I have been reading through the Proverbs lately and am struck by how often they point to Jesus.
- With the Easter season a couple weeks behind us, I've realized how easy it is/how our culture tends to focus on the Cross and not give as much attention to the Resurrection.  But the early Church in Acts had it switched, they preached the Resurrection heavily.  "We are Easter people living in a Good Friday world" was a refrain I heard and loved this Lent and I hope to have a deeper grasp on what it exactly means to live my life in light of Easter and the crazy, new, abundant life God offers, not simply the Cross (which is glorious of course, please don't misunderstand me).
- Switching gears, the Lakers losing was shocking but looking back on the season, not unexplainable.  I hope they trade Bynum; Kobe, Gasol and Odom should be fine.
- Parks and Rec continues to be the best show on television in this marriage's humble opinion and if you don't watch it you need too.


14 Lines On the Proverbs:
Refresh my bones, oh Lord, and heal my flesh
Fill my cup and awake my soul from dreams,
from delusions of self-sufficiency
for I will always seem wise in my eyes.


You hate a proud heart, my wisdom is fraud,
a shallow imitation of your depths,
cute sayings, sugar coated destruction
sweet music playing as the ship goes down.


But your wisdom is true life abundant,
your wisdom was bought at a precious price;
it led you to your death, broken and shamed,
it led to triumph, walking with the dawn
God forever altered, beauty reformed,
the door re-opened to the way it was.

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In the Garden

Death defeated, afraid but filled with Joy,
a simple word, my name in a garden,
and at once, true love leads me to worship;
while whispers cast doubt on victory thought final.

Evil trembles at the thought of new hope,
Dawn breaks with new creation on its wings.
Am I the first to see Him, to touch Him
or has He been laughing in the garden awhile?

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Meanderings (the last 10 days)

photo by Anthony Lam

Meanderings -
It was my birthday this past Monday (the 11th) and like any good American, I worked all day.  It really was a good day; Alex had already thrown me a small British themed birthday party (complete with a banner featuring: Harry Potter, the Queen, a shirtless David Beckham, Tolkien and N.T. Wright) on Saturday so I was able to focus on the talk I was giving at our weekly meeting.  Studying for the talk (on the spiritual disciplines and prayer in particular) really convinced me of how often I relegate (a wonderful soccer term) prayer to the garbage time of my day instead of making it central.  And when it comes down to it, the reason I don't pray enough is a) I don't believe Jesus will be faithful to hear and answer my prayers or b) I am lazy and value my own comfort (see: sleep) over the life-giving presence of God...when I put it like that it makes me realize how insane it sounds.  Jesus is entirely and perfectly faithful and has proven himself to be so time after time in my life and forgoing being in the presence of the Almighty because I would rather sleep or read espn.com is so...selfish.  




Random thoughts:
- Well sitting in a coffee shop nodding my head to a Train song, it finally hit me.  At 25, I have officially hit middle-age...right?  Isn't 25 the age I just give up and go Volvo shopping and get really into CSI: Miami? 
- I heard recently The Magician's Nephew is going to be the next movie in the terrible Chronicles of Narnia movie series.  Early reports are C.S. Lewis continues to roll over in his grave.
- Blake Griffin's rookie season was the most spectacular regular season I remember a player having.
- Reason #1002 I love my wife: she also loves Norm Macdonald (p.s. his new weekly Sports Show Tuesdays at 10:30 on Comedy Central is the new best show on tv)


Prayer Requests:
- first of all, a praise: the student we wrote about in our last prayer letter that Alex met has accepted Christ!  So rad.
- Alex and I have been feeling pretty tired this week.  Pray for continued reliance on Jesus, not our own power and energy.  We want to finish the school year well, not just fade away into the summer.
- Pray for our students to really embrace prayer and make it central in their lives.  

As always, we love you all so much and are so blessed to have you be a part of our ministry.

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Written Prayer

I (Josh) process through written prayer sometimes.  Here is one such prayer written 04/06/11 on campus at SFSU, revised 04/13/11 in the quiet of my home

Dear Lord,

Help me to know how to listen and how to love.  Help me to care, to deeply feel the agony of sin, to deeply hate the evil in this world, to deeply hope for signs of redemption, to deeply long for wrongs to be righted, to deeply live out a life of mercy and to deeply trust in you alone.  Guide me Holy Spirit, direct me, lead me, quiet me, silence me, animate me with your purposes and power.  Remind me of the Cross, the ultimate shelter, the ultimate stronghold, truest love manifest, total redemption begun.

Amen.

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Meanderings: March 28th - April 2

picture by Anthony Lam (one of our interns)

Meanderings

The past 6 weeks have flown by…I’ve mentioned as much in our last prayer letter.  Alex and I have been busy adjusting to life, to the ministry, to the cycles of momentum that exists at every college campus and to being married co-workers in San Francisco.  It has been a wonderful and challenging period.  However, as great as it has been, I am a bit disappointed in myself.  Why?  Well, simply put, in my moments of free time and rest, keeping this blog updated is far from my mind.  I love to write, I love blogging here and I love our supporters to be up to date with what is going on in our lives on a weekly basis…but I have been terrible at keeping this blog up to date.  So I wanted to apologize to everyone who reads the San Francisco Call regularly.  Starting this week I am going to schedule time each week to post happenings, prayer requests and stories from the past week.

This week was spring break for SFSU and City College, which means Alex and I were not on campus.  To be honest, the break came at just the right time for me, I was definitely beginning to feel the fatigue of 6 weeks straight of ministry with hardly a moment to rest.  This week has been a good time of reflection and refreshment, a time for Alex and me to look inward and listen to the Holy Spirit.  I have been convicted recently of how easily I am distracted by lesser things and often put off having deep time with the Lord in order to read a book or look at sports scores or different blogs.  This week has allowed me to spend deep time with Jesus in prayer and the Word and already I feel renewed and ready to tackle the remaining 5 weeks of the school year.

Random thoughts:

-  Alex and I are going to be joining an indoor soccer team which will be fun and a great way to burn off some pent up energy on Sunday evenings, so that should be fun.

-  The Lord has already answered one of our major prayer moving up here, namely to have great community and friends.  If you’re reading this, you know who you are, but we really do thank Jesus daily for the amazing relationships we have already established here in SF.

- As of this morning (Saturday), the Dodgers are undefeated at the expense of the Giants and the Lakers are rolling.  As a LA sports fan in enemy territory, I am stoked :)

Prayer requests:

- One of our student’s father passed away suddenly last weekend from a heart attack.  Please pray for the peace of Jesus to be upon him and his family and that the community of City Cru can come alongside him and love him well.

- We have taken some time this spring break to do some more support raising.  It is a continual process as staff and we would love to see the Lord bring in some new support.  God has provided for us in incredible ways and we have faith He will continue to do so.  Please pray for those who we are contacting to be open to the Lord’s promptings if He would have them join our team in whatever capacity.

- Pray for Alex and me to have hearts and spirits of continual thanksgiving for the way God has provided for us and our ministry already.

- We have a couple outreaches coming up but this week specifically we are going to be partnering with other clubs on campus to raise money for the cause of orphans around the world.  Our intern Matt has started the Orphan Scholarship Fund to raise money for orphans to go to college.  To read more about the Orphan Scholarship Fund check out the facebook group and the article below:  

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=105704342826298&v=info

http://www.christianallianceblog.org/?tag=orphan-scholarship-fund

Please pray for God to open up doors for City Cru to show his love for both orphans and the campus of SFSU and that we would be able to raise the money.  Also pray for City Cru to make connections with students and other clubs and for relationships to be built.

Thanks so much for your thoughts, support and prayers.  We love you all so much and remember to check back regularly for updates and musings, I promise I will be more diligent in updating the blog.  Again, we love you!

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