Pride Parade III – Return of the Bigots

For the third year in a row, Faith Church has been showing the love of Christ in a very unusual place (for an evangelical church). We were at the Michigan (Gay) Pride Parade which ends with a rally on the capital lawn. Due to a family commitment in Traverse City, I couldn’t be there, but we have some great leadership in the Christ In Action (CIA) team.

Last year was fairly peaceful because there were no churches protesting the rally. This year they were back in full force. Notice the photo of the protesters; you will see the police moving them across the road. In the second photo is Pastor Brandon Bruce standing in pretty much the same place.

Our team went over to the protesters to give them water as well only to be called “phony Christians”. That actually helped with the outreach as the parade participants saw that we had at least one thing in common, the bigots don’t like us. It opened the door to better and more conversations.

When Pastor Brandon shared the results of the event with the Faith Church family, he said, “We were right where we needed to be. We were there neither condemning people nor condoning their actions. We were simply sharing the love of Christ, no strings attached”.

I love being part of a church that cares about broken people, no matter which way they are bent.

Small World or Big God?

A few weeks ago, one of my favorite couples here at Faith Church finished up @ MSU and made a move out to Vancouver, BC.  Brennan and Ashley Westerman had been part of one of my small groups and on the worship team.  They also got me hooked on kayaking and were involved in several CIA events.  On their last Sunday I asked, “Have you got a house lined up?”  They told me they were going to be house sitting for a couple who were going on the mission field for one year.  During that time they would find an apartment or house for the future.

Then the last week of May, we had the pleasure of having Jim & Penne Koch of My Father’s House, Jamaica  www.jaminjamaica.com with us for an extended weekend.  We’ve had a relationship with them for four years, but have formalized that relationship into a partnership this year.  Jim and Penne are going to spend this coming year doing more fund raising, but to have the freedom to do so required having someone who could act as house parents in their absence.  Enter Dan & Jennifer Rennert and their four children.

 The eldest four members of the Rennert family went to Jamaica for a week’s visit at the end of the summer of 2008 to meet everyone at My Father’s House and see what it is really all about. They had found MFH on the web and God was tugging at their hearts to get involved.  They decided to take the year, beginning in the summer of 2009 to help at My Father’s House!

 The week after Jim & Penne were with us, I got this e-mail from Brennan. 

 Hey Chris!

A VERY crazy thing happened....

We're in Vancouver now, and we met with the people whose house we'll be renting.  We've known that they were leaving for a year to be missionaries...we found out exactly where they're going and what they're doing.

Okay, here's the punch line.....

They're taking over My Father's House in Jamaica!  We couldn't believe it!

I'm just assuming it's the same place....can't imagine there would be more than one with the same name.  So that's pretty nuts.  They said the normal leaders are leaving to do some fundraising, and only coming back when groups come in.

 Brennan

 I related that story to someone and they said, “It’s a small world”.  Yes, I suppose it is, but I think this one can be chalked up to a Big God. 

 

Remember to pray for Jim, Penne, the Rennerts and Brennan and Ashley.  

What (else) I Did on My Vacation

Our trip to New Zealand and Bougainville was full.  If you've followed along you've caught up on much of what we did.  However, no trip to NZ is complete for me unless I catch up with some of the people who first took me there.  The Churches of the Wesleyan Methodist Church of New Zealand.

It was great to connect with several of the church people we have gotten to know over the years here.  The first Sunday we went to Papakura to visit our dear friends Edgar and Judy Hornblow - yup - that’s really their name - they are the coolest people you could ever know.  

When we first visited Papakura in 2002 they were meeting in a doublewide house converted to be used as their church.  They are now building an enormous ministry center that will include two video venues to use as outreach to the community, they have an early childhood development center in place and the new gymn also includes a first class rock climbing wall.  (Faith church, we may want to redesign our new building!)    : )    

In the video below, Edgar takes us on a tour of the new Papakura building: 

The message that day was brought by a young woman name Jo.  She spent 3 months at Kentwood Community Church and is following a call to ministry now that she is back in NZ.  We were blown away by the message she brought - it was powerful, well constructed and well delivered.  I got a chance to see her again the Sunday before we left - It is encouraging to see what God is doing in this country.  As I sat in the Papakura church on that Sunday morning I was so moved by what God has done in seven years.  Our partnership with NZ in the West Michigan District (Rockford is Papakura’s partner)  has had an impact that continues to go on and on.  This was affirmed again and again over the next several weeks.

Our first contact with New Zealand were Richard and Jane Waugh at the East City Wesleyan Church (partner with Kentwood Community Church).  It was great to see them again and spend a fair amount of time with them.  The church is in its new facility which was also only a dream when we first met.  We got to worship with them on the morning of the last Sunday in NZ.  Richard and I always have the most stimulating conversations about what the church could be in the future.  He is one of my favorite people in the world.  

I got invited to meet with the national missions board and share some of my experiences in Bougainville.  Mike Yates (Shore Grace church) is the head of the team and another West Michigan partner (Watermark).  Bougainville is one of the key places New Zealand Wesleyans are reaching out to and is having a great impact.  Kathy Clifford is a missionary from NZ, splitting her time between Northeast India and Bougainville.  She is a great asset to the kingdom.  I had the privilege of meeting with her a few times and getting my missions worldview tuned up.  

I was also able to spend several hours with one of our Faith Church missionaries, Brent Dongell.  Brent is doing great and told me that he really feels like he is beginning to get into the rhythm of life in New Zealand.  You can tell by hearing him talk and by how others are responding to him that he is having a great impact.  He is filling the youth group gap at Cession Community Church (partner with Lowell Impact) where Brett is lead pastor and Kristen is the catalyst behind children’s ministry.  I asked Brent if the children’s ministry would be fueling the youth program in the near future, but he said that the families are largely young and so there are very few even upper elementary kids.  So he really is building the youth group out of unchurched kids - Go Brent!  Go God!  Brent is also leading small groups at Cession.

Cession is doing well.  Their band is awesome (Brent sang in the worship team our last Sunday there - I have video!).  There are several new families since we last were here, they’ve begun a Sunday morning service and are introducing an alternative Friday service once a month beginning this week. Brett does a great job preaching and there are several others who are very capable leaders and speakers in the church.  Brett’s forte is developing and empowering new leaders.  I’m so very proud of my family’s church and what God is doing there.  

Good to be "home" but this is weird

I'm really glad to be home and connecting with friends and family here.  Using the word, "home" as a segue, here's a weird video that one of my friends put me onto:  ENJOY!

Back to Michigan

Six weeks.  It sounds like such a long time, yet goes by so very quickly.  We are aboard our flight from Auckland to LA as this is being written.  It was a great vacation and mission trip, and I have a mix of feelings about coming home.  I will miss my New Zealand family and friends we leave behind.  There is always a sense of loss and grief with our departure.  Yet, there is an anticipation of seeing our family and friends in the US and getting back to “normal” life.  While it is impossible to be in more than one place at a time, it is very possible to have your heart in more than one, or in this case two places.  I am leaving some of my heart in New Zealand and Bougainville as I return home.  

If you have been following along with my adventures in B-ville, you haven’t heard much about life in New Zealand, so I’ll take this day to catch you up.  To the shock of many, I didn’t get much bike riding in.  There were several reasons: I wasn’t in great shape for the hills they have around here; There were lots of projects that needed attention around the house and also giving time to help Marcia with the kids so she could do some projects as well; but the reason I haven’t told Marcia yet was that the first Saturday I rode, there was a car-bicycle accident that I came upon shortly after it happened.  The rider was laying in front of the car with a broken collar bone and the bike was midway under the car.  The group of riders were going through a round about and the car didn’t give way.  The rider should be alright, but it affected me more than I expected.  I don’t think it will slow me down back home, but it will make me cautious.  

The projects around the house kept me busy as well.  It seemed like there was something to do almost everyday.  Brett and Kristen have bought a really nice home that is about 20 years old.  It’s probably about 1,800 square foot three bedroom ranch.  However, it hasn’t had anything done to it since it was built, so a lot is out of date and seriously needing maintenance: enter Marcia and Chris.  

Marcia had a nearly daily project of “clean kitchen - do laundry - help Rhys pick up toys.”   She also did quite a bit of painting.  The lounge (living room) is quite large (18 x 24) with a nice crown molding that was painted a silver grey and the walls were done blue gray with a dark taupe grey accent wall.  She painted that room while I was in Bougainville and then did the dining room with the same theme the last full week we were in NZ.  It was a challenge to paint while the two children were either having naps, in bed for the night or otherwise distracted (where I came in from time to time.)

My first project was removing a really 80's chandelier over the dining room table and replacing it with something much more contemporary.  We made the mistake of letting Rhys seeing the project in progress.  Rhys doesn’t handle change well, in fact, he originally was not planning to move with the rest of the family from the apartment to the new house.  While I had the fixture down and bare wires hanging out of the ceiling, Rhys came out, observed the damage and said, “I don’t appreciate it when people destroy my roof!” to accent his displeasure, he later came out and said, “This makes me very angry!”   I expected it to be a very long six weeks.  Fortunately, other projects were more warmly received.

Before leaving for Bougainville I put two more light fixtures up in the lounge which really updated the look in there.  Then we began work on the guest bath and toilet (two separate rooms) - very common in NZ.  The wall paper was a yellow vinyl that was curling up on the edges.  The idea was to remove the wall paper and paint.  Unfortunately, the builder had wall papered over raw drywall board, so removing wall paper also removed layers of the underlying board as well.  We tried our best to do as little damage as possible, but even after patching as best one could, the walls are still rough, but not too bad.  I also had to replace and repair trim around the base of the shower.  Building is really different in New Zealand.  They make great use of MDF (multi-density fiberboard - aka dense paper) in the trim.  After being exposed to water for 20 years, the trim was swollen and really nasty looking.  It has been replaced with real wood that should last a bit longer.  

Another part of the project was replacing aged flooring.  We went to the lumber yard and found a really nice looking self adhesive vinyl tiles.  They look like dark granite tiles with lighter grey grouting and really are pretty convincing.  The best part was they were on closeout and so we did the floors of both rooms for about $70 NZD (or about $35 US).  It took me a full day’s work to get them in, but the effect was so dramatic it was really fun.

After the paint and flooring were in, both rooms looked so much better, but we also wanted to update some of the fixtures with a more modern, nickle plated or chrome.  They found a nice towel bar on line and had sharp looking handles for the cabinet.  The big surprise was trying to find nickel or chrome hinges for the cabinet doors.  We looked literally everywhere.  They are not to be found in New Zealand.  We will buy some - probably at Lowes or even Meijer and have them ready to take back with them on the next trip.  It was unbelievable how much time and energy went into searching for something so simple.

After I returned from Bougainville, the next big project was repairing the deck.  They have a very nice deck that is 15 x 18.  However, it too, showed many signs of neglect.  Some boards had broken down so much that there were holes right through them.  I spent a day in the sunshine powerwashing the deck.  Several more weak boards showed up.  When all was said and done, 36 linear meters of new boards were required.  Brett and I went to the lumber yard to get the boards and found out that the deck was made of an Australian wood called kwillia.  It is very beautiful with a tight grain and costs $7.50 a meter.  Pine was $1.50 per meter and won out.  Bringing the 6 meter long boards on top of the Honda van was quite a process but after they were stained and installed the deck looks much better and is certainly safer.  Rhys helped me with the deck and it was a lot of fun.  To remove the old boards, we had to pry them up bit by bit using a claw hammer and a couple large screwdrivers.  As I would lift the board with the hammer, Rhys would put the screwdriver in the gap so I could move the hammer and begin the process again.  He also collected nails for me and helped me so much.  We had fun and later walked down to the market to buy an ice block (aka popsicle) as a reward.  

There were several other smaller projects, but we sure kept busy - going home to rest?

Homeward Bound

Saturday, February 7, 2009

We went to bed around 11 and had to be up @ 4:30 to catch the PMV (Public Motor Vehicle) down to Bukatown.  So we were up very early, dressed and finished packing in the dark and were out to the road by 5:15.  The stars were out when we first got up and very beautiful, but I could see some clouds moving in to block the view.  A few minutes after getting to the road it began to rain.  We waited under an overhang for about an hour and 15 minutes before our 5:30 ride came @ 6:45.  

A PMV is a flatbed truck with short side rails.  Planks are laid across the rails and then there is a canopy frame work overhead with a tarp attached to keep out the rain and/or sun.  There were 6 rows of planks on the one we flagged down.  (The PMV in this photo is not the one we used - it actually is much nicer and ours had a canvas/tarp roof, but no sides)  

We bid our friends in Tanamalo goodbye and climbed aboard.  I sat in the middle of the truck and was greeted by the scent of unwashed bodies, “fresh” fish wrapped in taro leaves and other pungent odors.  The great thing about smells is that you quickly grow accustomed to them and they blend in.  

The plank we were sitting on was about 5 inches wide and polished smooth by innumerable buns sliding all over it every day over several years.  This made staying in one place a bit of a challenge, further complicated by the lack of anything to hang onto.  So I set my feet solidly, arranged my center of gravity and held on for a two hour+ ride.  The roads get proportionately worse the further you get from the government center (some things are the same no matter where one goes). So they started out as abysmal.  There has been quite a bit of rain during these two weeks and so the combination of constant traffic and wet roads have led to further deterioration.  In other words, it was a very long ride.  We were thrown side to side, up and down and forward and back as the PMV tried to avoid the worst the road had to offer.  

The passengers were interesting also.  It wasn’t long until the truck was fairly full.  Some were still drunk from the night before.  Two young girls got on and one was busily chewing away on her betel nut.  I got an education in how they add lime to the betel nut to get a stronger narcotic reaction from the nut.  

The passing scenery was very interesting as we traveled along.  The countryside is breathtaking.  A drop off into the ocean on one side and the jungle encroaching on the other with coconut palms all along the way.  At one point I leaned over to Jeff and said, “I’m having a ball!”  It really was a great experience.

We arrived safely (but sorely) in Bukatown around 8:30 a.m. and were taken to the Kuri Lodge where we had a breakfast of four! slices of toast with butter or peanut butter, sausage (aka - hot dog), baked beans and two runny eggs, chased by instant coffee which I tried to improve with a creamer that refused to dissolve.  However, the view was magnificent - over looking the channel and the barrier islands, we sat on the veranda and watched boats go back and forth.   The water was amazingly clear and the most beautiful aqua color.  Fish of several types were easily visible.  

While we were there, Dudley, the pastor in Bukatown came to sit with us and keep us company.  He was a very entertaining guest.  He told us many things about the days when he worked in the mines as an assayer (chemist).  He said that at that time he lived just like we do, houses just like ours with carpet and air conditioning and food like ours - T-bone steak....wait a minute, Dudley, you lived better than we do.  

He told us many stories and filled us in on some of the on going controversies the people of Bougainville face.  I asked him if he knew what the name of the island was before it was named after a French explorer, but he didn’t know that but he did have a great one about how Buka island came to be named.  The explorer, Bougain, came to the island and saw two women fishing on the reef.  He asked them in English, what is the name of this place.  One looked at the other and said, “What did he say?”  Which in the local language is “Buka?”.  And so the explorer wrote down, “this place is called Buka.”  

After staying at the lodge until 11:30 we made our way to the airport.  Checked in - security was interesting as they went through our bags and then used a hand wand on every passenger.  We waited around in the airport until about 2:15 and then a quick flight into Port Moresby.  We didn’t stop on Raboul this time because the airport was shut down due to volcanic ash.  

After a quick check through with our luggage, we were in a cab and back at the mission house that has two controls on the shower.  Wow - a hot shower feels great after two weeks.  Dinner is soon and then off to bed and another day of travel tomorrow.

Finishing Up

Friday, February 6, 2009

Today we finished up classes.  The last three messages were preached and the guys did a pretty good job.  Jairus hit a home run with his and pulled himself up to an A- So I ended up with two A’s one A-, a B+ and two B-.  Not bad and I think it was a fair reflection of their work.  I met with each of the three students and had a good exit interview with each of them.  

Part of my coming here was to see if this is something I could do and would like to do in the future.  The answer is,a yes.  I gained confidence as I gained experience and really enjoyed being with the students and learning more about this place. Jeff is talking about seeing if I can come back to do it  again and I looked at the curriculum for the Church History and Spiritual formation classes.  I could also teach a Bible class without too much difficulty.  

I spent tea time with Nathaniel Sulis who is the national outreach director.  They do preaching in the markets sometimes and are talking about doing a revival where the speaker would go from place to place and have a special program.  Another opportunity for experience here, although I am more of an encourager than and evangelist.  We shared several different ways of doing outreach and I explained servant evangelism to him.  I also took him into the library and we went over the better books in it.  Most of them are pretty old: Master Plan of Evangelism and Out of the Salt Shaker were newer books.  I’m going to pick up a copy of Servant Evangelism and send it over for him and one of the Library.  

In the afternoon I finished scoring the grades, took a brief nap and then spent a bit over an hour with the interviews.  After that I went to help Jonathan with the door and table he was building.  Because he was working on those things, I did some of the rough prep for dinner - peeling kaukau and getting onions ready.  I also made a pot of coffee with the last of our store.  I’m looking forward to a good cup when I get back to NZ.

After dinner we went up to the classroom for a final meeting, took some photos and ran the videos of the guy’s preaching.  Several giggles, as they watched each other.   

Our final entertainment was watching “Glory Road”.  It was much more meaningful to Jeff and I since it was set in the US in the mid 60's.  A sad but glorious movie.  Jeff had never seen it and was very impressed.  One of my favorites.