[Watch this short 25 second video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3w_Vy0lDk_A
Sports fan, if this is the first time seeing this, how did you react? If you have seen this, do you remember how you reacted the first time you saw this? My reaction was similar to the crowd's. "Ooooohhh!" Witnessing a dunk so rare and so powerful gets my adrenaline going. Can you think of a time when God answered one of your prayers and there was no other explanation for how things happened except that God did it? When God answers prayer, I feel so loved and my soul goes, "Ooooooohhh!!!" It's in those moments where God renews and recharges my faith, bringing me assurance of his love and grace. Don't get me wrong, God does not exist to fulfill your needs and answer your prayers, He exists for us to give him glory. Again, it's not the answered prayer that gets me jumping, it's that intimacy with God that I do not deserve. I get a small fraction of God's entirety.]
In the last couple weeks, the word "widow" has come up a bunch and caused me to think about this word. A widow is a woman whose husband has died and she doesn't remarry.
I began to redefine what a "widow" is based on what I see in Brentwood. Out of all the people I know and have met in this poor neighborhood, I can think of no households that have both a mother and a father. I'm not saying they don't exist, I just haven't seen any. Many inner cities and poor communities have a maternalistic family structure (mother is the head of the household). Where are the fathers? In a neighborhood where prostitution is normal, and very few good examples of marriage are present, there is no reason for people to practice any sort of abstaining from sexual sin. Although these fathers or "baby-daddies", as they are called here, are usually still alive, their presence in their child's life is dead, widowing women over and over again. There are many scriptures about showing care to widows even financially since a husband's death can be detrimental to her family's ability to afford food and clothing. The more babies born in Brentwood without a loving husband or father, the greater chance that the next generation will be even worse off financially, opportunistically, and spiritually. There are many over-18-year-old males here, but they are men who are lost in irresponsibility.
Last Wednesday at church, there was a guest preacher, Marcus Cosby from Houston, who taught on Luke 7:11-17, when Jesus raised a widow's son from the dead. It was one of the most powerful sermons I've ever heard, not because of the pastor's words and clever story-telling, but because God spoke through this man to so many people in the congregation. To preface this part of the Bible, please read Luke 7:1-10. This blog will still be here after you finish reading it, I can wait, trust me..........
Verse 9, Jesus marveled at this man's faith. Jesus. Marveled. awesome. After Jesus healed the servant, he and his disciples and a huge crowd followed him into a town called Nain. I imagine this huge crowd was amazed at the miracles, joyful, in awe. This crowd, smiling and celebrating, came to Nain and collided with another crowd, solemn and sullen (pastor's words, not mine). Luke 7:13, possibly one of the most telling verses of the depths of who Jesus is. Look in your Bibles or to that online Bible you looked at earlier and read it. "And when the Lord saw her," stop. Right after Jesus marveled at the centurion's faith and healed his servant, with a joyful crowd following him, Jesus saw her. Out of all these people, He saw the lowest person in spirits and emotions. A widow. A widow who lost her son. Not just her son. Her only son. This woman was about to attend her second devastating funeral. Cut off from her husband, now her son. Jesus saw her out of everybody. That's the kind of God I love and serve. One who looks at me when I'm in my lowest. When I think things are going tough, He sees me. When I try to hide my hurt when I'm around people, he sees me! I hope that encourages you. The Bible goes on to say he had compassion on her and told her, "Do not weep." As if saying, "I got this." Jesus being a man of parables and metaphors, I wouldn't doubt if he looked at her son, her only son, dead, knowing that he would be raised from the dead. I wonder if he put himself in that boy's place in his mind. God's one and only son, to die, only to be risen. Although I haven't gone through anything in my life as bad as this widow, I know in my heart that I want a God that weeps with me, that sees me, that wants me enough to die for me so that I may be with him for eternity. Praise God! Thank you Lord. Thank you for continuing to pursue me even when I sin against you! Remind me that I am dead to sin and alive to you in Jesus Christ. (Romans 6:11).
Whew, God is so good. You should see the movie "Courageous", at Redbox for a buck. It's a good movie about fatherhood, the hood, and brotherhood. Just some updates. We got three new kids this past week. Dreshaun (dray-SHAWN) 2nd grade boy (crazy smart for his age, but still sucks his thumb...as well as most of his other fingers), Dauna (DEE-awna), just think the letter D-auna, 3rd grade girl (super kind and loves to sing, close to grade level), and Davon (DAY-vahn) 4th grade boy (crazy smart for his age yet demands tons of attention, often distracting to others). These three are all siblings and bring our total to 10 kids. God's used these three to show us where the leaks are in our own strength and have allowed us to see the gap in behavioral differences in our first seven. Please pray that attitudes get better, that the collective volume of chatter remains the same (we don't like raising our voices to the kids), that opportunities come to talk to people about becoming summer interns with the ministry. I'm including our first ever 2nd Mile Update video!
Update video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bibo90DiTAc
Spoken word about a man's lack of a father
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8E0DMcZ23kE
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