When I first saw the driver for the Karigiri Hospital SUV at Katpadi Station (Vellore), I remember thinking, "home." At the time, my only goal was to get to Karigiri. Ever since then (so for about five weeks now), I've been wrestling with that word, that idea. Karigiri isn't my home, nor is Rameshwaram my home, nor is "Atlanta, you know the Olympics in 1996," (which is how I responded to the frequent questions "you are from which place?" or "what is your native?"), nor is TFC, nor is Dallas. There is something about the place of your childhood though. One time I saw the word "Georgia" written somewhere, and I just smiled, because I am so far from my place here, and Georgia just pulls at some strings inside the core of my being.
I read in Hebrews 11:13, "All these died in faith, without receiving the promises, but having welcomed them from a distance, and having confessed that they were strangers and exiles on the earth." Again, in 1 Peter begins his first epistle with, "To those who reside as aliens, scattered throughout..." Jesus was homeless. Siddhartha. Rich Mullins. Chris McCandless. So many missionaries and missionaries' children. There's something to this homelessness that really appeals to me. So, where is home? Heaven? Where the heart is? Where you make it (or Joe Dirt's interpretation)? I can't really say right now. I know that I really want to see Jesus face to face, but I also know that I really want to see my friends and family and have a cold glass of sweet tea.
For those of you who have access, listen to Rich Mullins song "Home." He expresses the same ideas much more artfully than me.
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Chillin with the Pauloses
Well, I made it Rameshwaram safely and the trip here was one of the best experiences in my life. I spent twelve hours attempting to communicate with a beautiful family (grandfather, grandmother, mother, daughter, nephew). I slept right between them all on the upper berth (the top slat of the three that constitute the sleeping class). As I slept, two inches from my left shoulder, other than the dividing screen, was a young guy named Hassan who I befriended and took pictures with. Everything about the trip was so genuine, so simple, so liberating, so Indian.
I arrived on the island yesterday at 5:00 am. I was supposed to call Israel Paulose when I arrived, but the phone booth didn't open until 6:00 am. Then, there was a power outage, and my reading light was the only sign of life (besides children crying) in the entire railway station. About twenty minutes later, the power came back on, I got an autorickshaw driver to call Israel, and he took me to the Pauloses house. There I met his newlywed wife, his sister, and her newlywed husband (I feel very out of place amongst these four giggling bundles of joy). Israel took me on a tour of the island, showing the fisherman's shed where the Pauloses slept for a few months when they first arrived on the island. Then he showed me a day care center that they had considerable difficulty building. When they were trying to buy the land, the fundamental Hindus threatened to kill them. When they finally bought the land and, bought the building materials, and had a foreign short-term team ready to start construction, the townspeople threatened them again, only this time they said if the Pauloses tried to build, they would drench themselves in kerosene and burn themselves alive! What kind of place is this? The day care center was built with no harm done a few days after that, and had some happy two-year-olds in it yesterday. Israel told me lots of stories of being beaten and threatened: one time the Hindus told him if he didn't deny Christ, they would peel off all his skin with blades, and he said "Fine, go ahead, I can't deny my Lord." So they went to get the guy who would oversee the skin peeling, but by a miracle that guy was nowhere to be found that day, and the emotions settled down in the next few days.
I also got to play with some little girls who had been rescued from their parents, who were planning to have them killed. One two-year-old girl named Denise was calling me the Tamil equivalent of "Papa" and I almost lost it right there because I realized she probably would never have a father (I did lose it later on when I thought about the girls who were not rescued as these were). Praise the Lord for this ministry and others like it!
I arrived on the island yesterday at 5:00 am. I was supposed to call Israel Paulose when I arrived, but the phone booth didn't open until 6:00 am. Then, there was a power outage, and my reading light was the only sign of life (besides children crying) in the entire railway station. About twenty minutes later, the power came back on, I got an autorickshaw driver to call Israel, and he took me to the Pauloses house. There I met his newlywed wife, his sister, and her newlywed husband (I feel very out of place amongst these four giggling bundles of joy). Israel took me on a tour of the island, showing the fisherman's shed where the Pauloses slept for a few months when they first arrived on the island. Then he showed me a day care center that they had considerable difficulty building. When they were trying to buy the land, the fundamental Hindus threatened to kill them. When they finally bought the land and, bought the building materials, and had a foreign short-term team ready to start construction, the townspeople threatened them again, only this time they said if the Pauloses tried to build, they would drench themselves in kerosene and burn themselves alive! What kind of place is this? The day care center was built with no harm done a few days after that, and had some happy two-year-olds in it yesterday. Israel told me lots of stories of being beaten and threatened: one time the Hindus told him if he didn't deny Christ, they would peel off all his skin with blades, and he said "Fine, go ahead, I can't deny my Lord." So they went to get the guy who would oversee the skin peeling, but by a miracle that guy was nowhere to be found that day, and the emotions settled down in the next few days.
I also got to play with some little girls who had been rescued from their parents, who were planning to have them killed. One two-year-old girl named Denise was calling me the Tamil equivalent of "Papa" and I almost lost it right there because I realized she probably would never have a father (I did lose it later on when I thought about the girls who were not rescued as these were). Praise the Lord for this ministry and others like it!
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Reflection
This evening, I am faced with the question "what did I get out of my time at the leprosy center at Karigiri?" The lessons I have learned through quiet introspection, prayer, and reading were priceless, but what about the social, relational, missional aspects of my trip. What about the research I came here to be involved in? Well, my experience at Karigiri was not what I expected, as I mentioned before. I expected to assist in an ongoing research project in which I would: 1) contribute to the scientific body of knowledge, 2) gain experience in how to conduct tropical medicine research in a third world setting, 3) list a unique research project on my medical school application. For the most part, none of these came to fruition. I would hesitate to say that I contributed much, though I may not be aware of ways I did contribute. I would hesitate to say that I know how to navigate my way through research in tropical medicine, though I am closer than I was before. And I would hesitate to put on my med school application that I was involved in a research project in leprosy, though I was involved with several projects at a leprosy research center (and I can still say that! Ha!).
A valuable lesson that I did not expect to learn is that you can't just limit a person's illness to one area of treatment. People are so complex! I had the opportunity to see a man in a rural village who had a severe eye infection, and then a few weeks later, I watched the surgeon fix his eye at the hospital. I learned how to rehabilitate a leprosy patient's "claw hand" to prep him for reconstructive surgery, then watch the surgery a few days later, then watch the occupational therapists teach him how to use his newly formed hand for his job as a farmer a few weeks after that. This kind of exposure would not be possible at most medical centers, and especially not at most reseach. I tasted the joy of seeing a newlywed couple of leprosy patients, who may have never been able to marry had they not been introduced to one another by some of the nurses. The taste of this joy is exotic and rare and it's something I never could have anticipated.
I have a new respect for those medical missionaries who have gone before me and who I wish to emulate with my life. Seeing the incredible influence and impact that Dr. Paul Brand and Dr. Ida Scudder had in this entire region of India really inspired me. On the other hand, the oven that is otherwise known as south India, from which there seems to be no escape (not even medical facilities), has deepened my respect for those who have buffeted their bodies into submission and learned to accept the environment (and this goes for the power outages, ubiquitous lizards, ubiquitous public urination, and the dirty surgical drapes as well). It's really all just a matter of perception, and it's something that just takes time. Five weeks here has gotten me farther than I thought in this process also. I really thank God for making the lessons He wished to teach me plainly obvious to me in my time at this leprosy center. I have high hopes for the next three days in Rameshwaram too. At the very least (and I say this with reservation because I want to avoid expectation and thus disappointment), I hope to see the ways God is moving in south India and to discuss with someone the role of Western believers in this movement. I leave tomorrow at 9:45 am for Chennai, arrive at noon, then leave Chennai at 5:30 pm for Rameshwaram, arriving at 5:15 am the next morning. I've chosen to take the lowest class of train travel for economic and ethical purposes. This basically means sleeping under the stars on a rickety train with the poorest of the poor (Ok, I suppose those who couldn't afford a ticket at all would be poorer); but it's worked out so far, and I hope and pray for the best in the next few days. Peace!
A valuable lesson that I did not expect to learn is that you can't just limit a person's illness to one area of treatment. People are so complex! I had the opportunity to see a man in a rural village who had a severe eye infection, and then a few weeks later, I watched the surgeon fix his eye at the hospital. I learned how to rehabilitate a leprosy patient's "claw hand" to prep him for reconstructive surgery, then watch the surgery a few days later, then watch the occupational therapists teach him how to use his newly formed hand for his job as a farmer a few weeks after that. This kind of exposure would not be possible at most medical centers, and especially not at most reseach. I tasted the joy of seeing a newlywed couple of leprosy patients, who may have never been able to marry had they not been introduced to one another by some of the nurses. The taste of this joy is exotic and rare and it's something I never could have anticipated.
I have a new respect for those medical missionaries who have gone before me and who I wish to emulate with my life. Seeing the incredible influence and impact that Dr. Paul Brand and Dr. Ida Scudder had in this entire region of India really inspired me. On the other hand, the oven that is otherwise known as south India, from which there seems to be no escape (not even medical facilities), has deepened my respect for those who have buffeted their bodies into submission and learned to accept the environment (and this goes for the power outages, ubiquitous lizards, ubiquitous public urination, and the dirty surgical drapes as well). It's really all just a matter of perception, and it's something that just takes time. Five weeks here has gotten me farther than I thought in this process also. I really thank God for making the lessons He wished to teach me plainly obvious to me in my time at this leprosy center. I have high hopes for the next three days in Rameshwaram too. At the very least (and I say this with reservation because I want to avoid expectation and thus disappointment), I hope to see the ways God is moving in south India and to discuss with someone the role of Western believers in this movement. I leave tomorrow at 9:45 am for Chennai, arrive at noon, then leave Chennai at 5:30 pm for Rameshwaram, arriving at 5:15 am the next morning. I've chosen to take the lowest class of train travel for economic and ethical purposes. This basically means sleeping under the stars on a rickety train with the poorest of the poor (Ok, I suppose those who couldn't afford a ticket at all would be poorer); but it's worked out so far, and I hope and pray for the best in the next few days. Peace!
Saturday, July 25, 2009
The Tasty Fruit of my Reading
I just wanted to demonstrate again the common themes that God has illuminated in my reading. I read Ten Fingers for God (by Dorothy Clarke Wilson), the biography of Paul Brand, a surgeon who grew up as a missionary kid in India, was educated in the U.K., then returned to Vellore, Tamilnadu, India (where I am right now), to focus on treating and researching leprosy. Paul Brand probably contributed more to the advancement of our understanding of leprosy than any other person in history: he pioneered reconstructive operations on the hands and face, he spent years tracking the deterioration of patients’ distal body parts, and found the best footwear for leprosy patients (MicroCellular Rubber, manufactured only at this leprosy center, is a soft and pliable material used for the insoles of shoes and was the result of years of research by Paul Brand and many others. I now have a pair of custom-fitted sandals with MCR insoles!).
I also read Tolstoy’s A Confession. It is basically an autobiography of his search for the meaning of life. After writing War and Peace and Anna Karenina, Tolstoy went through a period of his life where he questioned why he was alive and often contemplated suicide. He also left the comfortable, upper-class way of life and studied the philosophy and religion of the peasants. After experimenting with various paths and modes of existence, he basically concludes that true Christianity, not the form that has been distorted by centuries of false teaching and hypocritical living by the Church, but the one actually presented in the Gospels and the rest of the New Testament, is the only path that offers a worldview that is both true and satisfying. The book/essay ends with him trying to sort through the mess that the Russian Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Protestant Churches have made of Christ’s teaching. His conclusions are spelled out a little better in the work The Law of Love and the Law of Violence. These conclusions were obviously dear to him, because he ends this essay with, “This is what I wanted to say to my fellow men before I die.” What I would write down for my fellow man if I were on my deathbed?
If you look at all the books I’ve been reading, especially The Story of My Experiments with Truth, Siddhartha, and A Confession, they all tell the story of someone searching hard after something. Even Paul Brand spent most of his life searching for the causes of hand and foot deformities in leprosy patients and how to remedy them. They all made me question what it was that I was searching for, or if I was searching at all. Once I had pinpointed the basic idea that I wanted to honor Christ by doing what He did, but I had no idea how to do this in my context, I began thinking of ways to implement this lifestyle (this search has been going on for about five years now, though I’ve had more time to dedicate to intense investigation while in my simple room here and atop “Elephant Hill”).
I found some answers when I picked up Irresistible Revolution (Shane Claiborne). I think it was that it not only documented his struggle through the fakeness and hypocrisy that pervades much of Christendom and also the emptiness of indulgent living, but it also provided a solution, or at least real-life illustrations of various solutions. It was the quest to live as an “ordinary radical,” one who radically ignores social and religious norms to live out the simple meaning of the teachings of the Bible, but who is also an ordinary person, not a super-Christian, an ascetic monk, or a member of a cult. He made sure to point out that this lifestyle of love and sacrifice and action is nothing new, just new for our generation and possibly new for your particular context. In the same way, it is not a lifestyle that is confined to a particular group of people (such as his community called Simple Way in Philadelphia), but can be manifested in a multitude of ways. It causes you to think outside of the box (Republican vs. Democrat, traditional church vs. emergent church) and asks that you simply do what the Bible and says and what makes sense, and because of this, I would say that at least giving Irresistible Revolution a chance is mandatory.
Here are the marks of what is known as Neo-Monasticism, which could be considered the general umbrella under which Claiborne’s Simple Way and other likeminded communities would fall:
1. Relocation to the abandoned places of empire
2. Sharing economic resources with fellow community members and the needy among us
3. Hospitality to the stranger
4. Lament for racial divisions within the church and our communities, combined with the active pursuit of a just reconciliation
5. Humble submission to Christ’s body, the church
6. Intentional formation in the way of Christ and the rule of the community, along the lines of the old novitiate
7. Nurturing common life among members of an intentional community
8. Support for celibate singles alongside monogamous married couples and their children
9. Geographical proximity to community members who share a common rule of life
10. Care for the poor of God’s earth given to us, along with support of our local economies
11. Peacemaking in the midst of violence, and conflict resolution within communities along the lines of Matthew 18:15-20
12. Commitment to a disciplined contemplative life
I wouldn’t say it’s flawless, but it seems to be a much better way of life than what I see around me most of the time.
I also read Tolstoy’s A Confession. It is basically an autobiography of his search for the meaning of life. After writing War and Peace and Anna Karenina, Tolstoy went through a period of his life where he questioned why he was alive and often contemplated suicide. He also left the comfortable, upper-class way of life and studied the philosophy and religion of the peasants. After experimenting with various paths and modes of existence, he basically concludes that true Christianity, not the form that has been distorted by centuries of false teaching and hypocritical living by the Church, but the one actually presented in the Gospels and the rest of the New Testament, is the only path that offers a worldview that is both true and satisfying. The book/essay ends with him trying to sort through the mess that the Russian Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Protestant Churches have made of Christ’s teaching. His conclusions are spelled out a little better in the work The Law of Love and the Law of Violence. These conclusions were obviously dear to him, because he ends this essay with, “This is what I wanted to say to my fellow men before I die.” What I would write down for my fellow man if I were on my deathbed?
If you look at all the books I’ve been reading, especially The Story of My Experiments with Truth, Siddhartha, and A Confession, they all tell the story of someone searching hard after something. Even Paul Brand spent most of his life searching for the causes of hand and foot deformities in leprosy patients and how to remedy them. They all made me question what it was that I was searching for, or if I was searching at all. Once I had pinpointed the basic idea that I wanted to honor Christ by doing what He did, but I had no idea how to do this in my context, I began thinking of ways to implement this lifestyle (this search has been going on for about five years now, though I’ve had more time to dedicate to intense investigation while in my simple room here and atop “Elephant Hill”).
I found some answers when I picked up Irresistible Revolution (Shane Claiborne). I think it was that it not only documented his struggle through the fakeness and hypocrisy that pervades much of Christendom and also the emptiness of indulgent living, but it also provided a solution, or at least real-life illustrations of various solutions. It was the quest to live as an “ordinary radical,” one who radically ignores social and religious norms to live out the simple meaning of the teachings of the Bible, but who is also an ordinary person, not a super-Christian, an ascetic monk, or a member of a cult. He made sure to point out that this lifestyle of love and sacrifice and action is nothing new, just new for our generation and possibly new for your particular context. In the same way, it is not a lifestyle that is confined to a particular group of people (such as his community called Simple Way in Philadelphia), but can be manifested in a multitude of ways. It causes you to think outside of the box (Republican vs. Democrat, traditional church vs. emergent church) and asks that you simply do what the Bible and says and what makes sense, and because of this, I would say that at least giving Irresistible Revolution a chance is mandatory.
Here are the marks of what is known as Neo-Monasticism, which could be considered the general umbrella under which Claiborne’s Simple Way and other likeminded communities would fall:
1. Relocation to the abandoned places of empire
2. Sharing economic resources with fellow community members and the needy among us
3. Hospitality to the stranger
4. Lament for racial divisions within the church and our communities, combined with the active pursuit of a just reconciliation
5. Humble submission to Christ’s body, the church
6. Intentional formation in the way of Christ and the rule of the community, along the lines of the old novitiate
7. Nurturing common life among members of an intentional community
8. Support for celibate singles alongside monogamous married couples and their children
9. Geographical proximity to community members who share a common rule of life
10. Care for the poor of God’s earth given to us, along with support of our local economies
11. Peacemaking in the midst of violence, and conflict resolution within communities along the lines of Matthew 18:15-20
12. Commitment to a disciplined contemplative life
I wouldn’t say it’s flawless, but it seems to be a much better way of life than what I see around me most of the time.
Friday, July 24, 2009
Siddhartha
Hesse’s fictional parallel to the life of Siddhartha Guatama, who became known as the Buddha, tells the story of a character named Siddhartha who is on a lifelong quest for truth and salvation. He begins by leaving his wealthy background as a Brahmin (the highest priestly caste in Hinduism), noticing that “ablutions were good, but they were water, they did not wash away sin, they did not quench spiritual thirst, they did not dissolve fear in the heart.” He becomes an ascetic, a “world-renouncer,” for a time, but finding that this is not the answer either, he tells his best friend Govinda, “I, Siddhartha, find only brief anodyne in my exercises and meditations and am just as far from wisdom and release as a child in my mother’s womb.” To me, the most fascinating part of the book is when Siddhartha crosses paths with the historical Buddha, Gautama. Following the masses of seekers who become disciples of the Buddha, his friend Govinda sets off in the Buddha’s footsteps, assuming Siddhartha will do the same. But then Siddhartha realizes that if he really wants to follow the Buddha, he will do what the Buddha actually did, which is not to sit at the feet of teachers, but to walk the earth on a personal quest for eternal truth. So, Siddhartha shocks everyone when he leaves the “world-renouncers,” leaves his friend Govinda, and walks away from what would seem to be the path leading to truth.
I couldn’t help but see the parallel in what God has been teaching me in so many ways here in India. That is, if you really want to follow Christ, if you really want to be a Christian, you can’t do it by studying the theology behind his words and by “sitting at his feet” in church, but by doing what he actually did. Jesus left his comfort zone and spent time loving the poor, outcast, and sinful. Add to this preaching against the wickedness of self-righteousness and greed, and you have a summary of his lifestyle. To be sure, we need to study the critical issues in theology, and we definitely need to sing hymns and spend hours in quiet devotion, but do we not also need to “sell all that we have and give to the poor” and befriend a few winebibbers and tax collectors. Should we not live, in the words of Tolstoy, “in the possibility of being useful to people to whom it is easy to do good, and who are not accustomed to have it done to them.”
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
In Case You're Wondering...
If you're more interested in what I'm doing with my days rather than my nights, I've been spending time with various people on the leprosy center campus. Today I saw a C-section, two late-stage cataract surgeries, and learned how to prevent and care for the foot ulcers that many of the leprosy patients develop because of peripheral nerve damage. Tomorrow I'm hoping to get fitting for my own custom pair of leprosy sandals, complete with the one-of-a-kind Microcellular Rubber insoles (Karigiri is the only place in the world that makes them)!!! I have made arrangements to make another visit to a rural village, see my friend Muniswami's home, and hopefully seeing some important aspects of Tamil culture as well. I'm leaving Karigiri next Wednesday morning, taking a day train to Chennai, then an overnight train to Rameshwaram. I still haven't gotten any good info from the Body of Christ Ministries workers down there, but I trust that I will gain some valuable experience nevertheless.
The Freedom of Simplicity
What Foster's book describes is the core of the spiritual disciplines; it is to me the essence of the Christian life. I rarely come across a book that I would consider “mandatory” for people of all walks of life, but this is one. Possibly the best way for me to document my growth through the book is to show a few of the passages I marked from each chapter. The lessons I learned from praying my way through this book were remarkably fitting for my daily experiences here in India. I thought about editing this and making it shorter, but then I was like, “Hey, if you don’t have time to read my entire post, you can just read the parts that interest you.” Ok, here we go:
1. The Complexity of Simplicity
“It is a strange combination and quite difficult to explain, though quite easy to recognize. It produces focus without dogmatism, obedience without oversimplification, profundity without self-consciousness. It means being cognizant of many issues while having only one issue at the center—holy obedience.”
2. The Biblical Roots: the Old Covenant
“Can God be pleased by the vast and increasing inequities among us? Is he not grieved by our arrogant accumulation, while Christian brothers and sisters elsewhere languish and die? Is it not obligatory upon us to see beyond the nose of our own national interest, so that justice may roll down like waters and righteousness like an everflowing stream?”
3. The Biblical Roots: the New Covenant
“He knows that we have an almost compulsive need to secure ourselves by means of earthly things but tells us no to do that, and proceeds to give three reasons why we should not amass earthly treasure but should store up heavenly treasure: (1) this world is a very uncertain place...(2) the fact that whatever we fix as our treasure will take over our whole life...(3) the provision has already been made.
4. Simplicity Among the Saints
“The Desert Fathers’ experience has particular relevance, because modern society is uncomfortably like the world that they attacked so vigorously. Their world asked, ‘How can I get more?’ The Desert Fathers and Mothers asked ‘What can I do without?’ Their world asked, ‘How can I find myself?’ The Desert Fathers and Mothers asked, ‘How can I lose myself?’ Their world asked, ‘How can I win friends and influence people?’ The Desert Fathers and Mothers asked, ‘How can I love God?’ ”
6. Inward Simplicity: Holy Obedience
“Holy obedience is the insatiable God-hunger that will make a person dissatisfied with anything less than the pearl of great price.”
“There are plenty to follow our Lord half-way, but not the other half. They will give up possessions, friends, and honors, but it touches them too closely to disown themselves.”
-Meister Eckhart-
“Fenelon is, I think, far wiser when he says simply, ‘Self-love prefers injury to oblivion and silence.’ To be silent is probably the best way to deal with self-love.”
7. Outward Simplicity: Beginning Steps
“But we must not shrink back from our task. We must risk the danger of legalism, because to refuse establishes a legalism in defense of the status quo. Until we become specific, we have not spoken a word of truth.”
“Precision without legalism...practical accommodation without ethical compromise”
“Poverty is a means of grace; simplicity is the grace itself.”
8. Outward Simplicity: Longer Strides
“God calls some of us to increase our income in order to use it for the good of all. Again, I emphasize the danger of this ministry. We are dealing with dynamite. Wealth is not for spiritual neophytes; they will be destroyed by it. Only the person who has clean hands and a pure heart can ever hope to handle this “filthy lucre” without contamination…we will be living close to hell for the sake of heaven.”
“If we imprison them in ghettos of affluence, how can they learn compassion for the broken of the world? So let us walk hand in hand with out children into pockets of misery and suffering.”
9. Corporate Simplicity: The Church
“In a world of limited resources, our wealth is at the expense of the poor. To put it simply, if we have it, others cannot.”
“The sole cause of man’s unhappiness is that he does not know how to stay quietly in his room.” –Pascal–
“A final personal disposition for embodying Christian simplicity is increasing our proclivity toward risk-taking, that God’s reign might be known.”
10. The Simplicity of Simplicity
“Simplicity is essential in the way that an engine or wheels or brakes are essential to an automobile.”“To be sure, the cost of simplicity is great, but the cost of duplicity is greater…simplicity may be difficult, but the alternative is immensely more difficult.”
I don't know if I'll be able to keep up with myself, because I have so much to say about Wilson's Ten Fingers for God, Claiborne's Irresistable Revolution, and Tolstoy's Confession. I guess I'll have to suck it up and only give you the crux of what God taught me through the books.
1. The Complexity of Simplicity
“It is a strange combination and quite difficult to explain, though quite easy to recognize. It produces focus without dogmatism, obedience without oversimplification, profundity without self-consciousness. It means being cognizant of many issues while having only one issue at the center—holy obedience.”
2. The Biblical Roots: the Old Covenant
“Can God be pleased by the vast and increasing inequities among us? Is he not grieved by our arrogant accumulation, while Christian brothers and sisters elsewhere languish and die? Is it not obligatory upon us to see beyond the nose of our own national interest, so that justice may roll down like waters and righteousness like an everflowing stream?”
3. The Biblical Roots: the New Covenant
“He knows that we have an almost compulsive need to secure ourselves by means of earthly things but tells us no to do that, and proceeds to give three reasons why we should not amass earthly treasure but should store up heavenly treasure: (1) this world is a very uncertain place...(2) the fact that whatever we fix as our treasure will take over our whole life...(3) the provision has already been made.
4. Simplicity Among the Saints
“The Desert Fathers’ experience has particular relevance, because modern society is uncomfortably like the world that they attacked so vigorously. Their world asked, ‘How can I get more?’ The Desert Fathers and Mothers asked ‘What can I do without?’ Their world asked, ‘How can I find myself?’ The Desert Fathers and Mothers asked, ‘How can I lose myself?’ Their world asked, ‘How can I win friends and influence people?’ The Desert Fathers and Mothers asked, ‘How can I love God?’ ”
5. Inward Simplicity: The Divine Center
“Oh blessed simplicity, that seizes swiftly what cleverness, tired out in the service of vanity, may grasp but slowly” –Kierkegaard-
“One of the most profound effects of inward simplicity is the rise of an amazing spirit of contentment. Gone is the need to strain and pull ahead. In rushes a glorious indifference to position, status, or possession.”
6. Inward Simplicity: Holy Obedience
“Holy obedience is the insatiable God-hunger that will make a person dissatisfied with anything less than the pearl of great price.”
“There are plenty to follow our Lord half-way, but not the other half. They will give up possessions, friends, and honors, but it touches them too closely to disown themselves.”
-Meister Eckhart-
“Fenelon is, I think, far wiser when he says simply, ‘Self-love prefers injury to oblivion and silence.’ To be silent is probably the best way to deal with self-love.”
7. Outward Simplicity: Beginning Steps
“But we must not shrink back from our task. We must risk the danger of legalism, because to refuse establishes a legalism in defense of the status quo. Until we become specific, we have not spoken a word of truth.”
“Precision without legalism...practical accommodation without ethical compromise”
“Poverty is a means of grace; simplicity is the grace itself.”
8. Outward Simplicity: Longer Strides
“God calls some of us to increase our income in order to use it for the good of all. Again, I emphasize the danger of this ministry. We are dealing with dynamite. Wealth is not for spiritual neophytes; they will be destroyed by it. Only the person who has clean hands and a pure heart can ever hope to handle this “filthy lucre” without contamination…we will be living close to hell for the sake of heaven.”
“If we imprison them in ghettos of affluence, how can they learn compassion for the broken of the world? So let us walk hand in hand with out children into pockets of misery and suffering.”
9. Corporate Simplicity: The Church
“In a world of limited resources, our wealth is at the expense of the poor. To put it simply, if we have it, others cannot.”
“The sole cause of man’s unhappiness is that he does not know how to stay quietly in his room.” –Pascal–
“A final personal disposition for embodying Christian simplicity is increasing our proclivity toward risk-taking, that God’s reign might be known.”
10. The Simplicity of Simplicity
“Simplicity is essential in the way that an engine or wheels or brakes are essential to an automobile.”“To be sure, the cost of simplicity is great, but the cost of duplicity is greater…simplicity may be difficult, but the alternative is immensely more difficult.”
I don't know if I'll be able to keep up with myself, because I have so much to say about Wilson's Ten Fingers for God, Claiborne's Irresistable Revolution, and Tolstoy's Confession. I guess I'll have to suck it up and only give you the crux of what God taught me through the books.
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