My Muslim Friend

A little girl from the Thanksgiving outreach with her turkey!

Tuesday evening David and I drove into Trinity Fellowship Church’s parking lot a few minutes later than our normal early arrival to North. We had taken a detour to northeast Amarillo to pick up a friend that we had met at the Bethesda’s Eastridge Thanksgiving Outreach a few weeks earlier. Khadija and I had hit it off right away because we shared one very important thing in common, a fierce love for The Ohio State Buckeyes (we both used to live in Ohio)! We had been chatting via phone ever since our meeting in Eastridge, and Tuesday afternoon my new sweet friend had called and asked if she could attend North with us. We were honored to go pick her up.

As we entered Trinity, Khadija asked me to show her North’s ‘cause wall’. She appreciated our Thanksgiving dinner and really wanted to know how she could get involved in our volunteer opportunities called ‘causes’. I began telling her about our ‘causes’ and why we do what we do. As time drew near for North to begin, I could sense Khadija growing a little nervous. She didn’t say, but I knew she was probably wondering how people would respond to her Ethopian clothing and Muslim headscarf. I wasn’t worried. I know the kind of people who attend, and it wasn’t long before she was commenting on how incredibly nice and friendly everyone was to her.

Tuesday was a particularly special night at North, it was a night of worship as our worship pastor, Patrick Schlabs, released his first worship ALBUM. Khadija and I sat side-by-side, and I could see her concentrating on the words to the songs I can close my eyes and sing. When the worship ended she was beaming.
“I loved it,” she said. “And I was very touched, particularly by the song ‘Immanuel’.”
She told me that she really enjoyed North, but that the way we worship Jesus is very different than the way she worships her god. When I asked her to explain how she said,

“When you worship Jesus, everyone worships with passion. I see you all have so much passion for your God. I am very touched and know that I need to have passion in my life for something.”

When David came to find us, Khadija told him the same thing she had told me about the song ‘Immanuel.’ He told her it meant, “God with us,” and that we sing it because we serve a God who is near us and loves us. She explained to him that Muslims do not worship Jesus, but believe He was a prophet. She wanted to know what we believe about Jesus that is different. David was able to share with her the Gospel. He explained how we all strive to connect to a god who is distant and use religion as our means, but our God came to us. Because of His great love, Jesus came to us to remove all that stands in the way of God and us. We love Him passionately because He first loved us so passionately.

We talked about life and about Jesus the whole way back to the Eastridge neighborhood. She told us more about her religion and her 7 brothers and sisters. As we pulled up to her family’s apartment, Khadija asked us if we would like to meet her mother. She said it was a treat tonight because her mom got home from work before 1am because a machine had broke down at her factory job. We were greeted just inside the door by smiling faces. The children remembered us from the outreach. They were sharing a plate of noodles and meat on the floor, as they politely took turns passing around forks full of food. Khadija’s mom was radiant and smiling. She offered us her authentic Ethiopian food, which smelled delicious. The apartment was full of love and warmth.

As we got in the car and drove back across the railroad tracks, we just smiled at each other. Heading back southwest over the bridge, we could see downtown Amarillo, Texas glowing in the night.
“The gospel really works,” I said. “It works for me every day, and it works for every soul on this earth. It’s what everyone needs.”

Jesus said to, “Go into all the world and preach the good news to all of creation.” Most of the time that isn’t some grand adventure. Most of the time that’s not literally traveling all the way to Ethiopia. Most of the time it’s loving your neighbor. We are saved because God’s love came to us. He is why we live. It’s His love we have to give each day. There wasn’t a magical conversion. There wasn’t a special sinner’s prayer. But Khadija wants to beginning serving with us at Faith City Ministries, and she wants to come back to North next week.

Want to hear what the ministry of North is all about? Check out a sermon from North HERE!

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I’d also like to send a shout out to North attendees, Macy and Becca, who are supporting “A White Stone Cause” as they are missionaries in France! They are sporting their “Jesus Loves Strippers” Shirts! Love you ladies!

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A Woman of the City

Ever seen a cartoon get hit on the head? They fall on the ground and little birdies chase each other around and around. That’s how I’ve felt all week. Thoughts swirling around my noggin’ like little birdies, around and around.

Thoughts from this article, this video (if you’re a man, please watch this especially) , conversations about the sex industry and Amarillo with a sweet friend who is doing something about it, and especially North’s new series “I Love My City”. There’s a righteous rage boiling just under the surface, one that’s going to take a few blogs to write out. One that I believe is going to see my lifetime to walk out. But I’m willing to count that cost.

There’s a real “smile and wave” mentality in our culture today. Much is going on behind closed doors, but it’s terribly uncomfortable to talk about what’s in “the dark” of our lives, relationships, and even in our city. Once again, our worship of what is comfortable supersides reality. Kind of ironic when our generation claims to be relevant and love what’s “real”.

I want to say this up front, loud and clear, you can’t passionately love Jesus if your not willing to open up your heart to Him…even the deepest darkest parts. He’s not asking for the pretend. He’s not asking for the good Christian girl. He’s not asking for you to sing the right songs and raise your hands at the part where the music gets loud. He’s not asking for the right answers. Just like He’s not asking for the right hair, makeup, and clothes. He’s asking for your heart, all of it. Likewise, you can’t really love the people around you, if you’re not willing to fight for them. If you’re not willing to go to the dark places with them, not to pat their hand and tell them “it’s ok,” but to pull them out and tell them their not alone. And HOW IN THE WORLD, do you think you can love your city if your OK with the people all around you faking it. If your OK with the fact that their are hurting people standing next to you in line at the bank. If its NO BIG DEAL, that they are desperately trying to find out who they are in everything the world has to offer, and you go to church every week and hear that “Jesus loves and Jesus saves.” It’s not that it doesn’t mean anything to you; it just doesn’t mean ENOUGH to you.

I’m sick over it. I’m so sick over it, I’m practically immoble. Am I sick enough to change? God, change my heart!

Amarillo, Texas.

Try finding statistics on crime, poverty, drugs, abuse, and the sex industry. You can’t. Talk to a police officer or paramedic if you want the truth. And the truth is dark. There is one side of the city that’s practically impenetrable to police; organized crime and the sex industry is rampant in this transit town of Route 66 (I-40). Amarillo has been prositution hotspot in the country since around 1890 when the railroads ran through here. Darkness has history here. There’s only a 3 man taskforce that deals with sex crimes in Amarillo, noone who deals with human traffiking. And drugs and human trafficking are the two money-makers of organized crime. You probably only know a fake, pretend version of the city you live in. And you can only love a pretend city with pretend love. It’s sad, but most of the time, we love our comfort a whole lot more than we love God…let alone the people around us.

The stereotype used to be that most passionate churchgoers where women.

Church women who dragged their cleaned up husbands to church. I don’t see that anymore. When I look around I’m beginning to see a stirring of men in church. Men who are longing to give their lives to a greater cause. But where are the women? I still see women in the church, but many times their eyes are wandering for that Godly husband. Thinking their purity and moral efforts will be able to “cash in” for the perfect “Ken” church man. I see hearts so hardened by deals with God…’I go to church why am I alone or struggling or sad’. I see conversations resorting to gossip and comparision. There’s so much strife, so much unhappiness, so much unfulfillment, because there is so much MORE!

Psalm 37:4 Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart.

God has called you to do something radical with all the passion, all the beauty, all the hate for the injustice, all the love for the broken. It’s an amazing life. And it starts with getting honest with yourself and getting honest with God. I can’t stop reading this story in Luke 7, as Jesus went to some very important church-folks house for a meal:

“And behold, a woman of the city, who was a sinner, when she learned that he was reclining at table in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster flask of ointment, and standing behind him at his feet, weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head and kissed his feet and anointed them with the ointment.

Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, ‘If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, for she is a sinner.’ And Jesus answering said to him, ‘Simon, I have something to say to you.’ And he answered, ‘Say it, Teacher.’
‘A certain moneylender had two debtors. One owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. When they could not pay, he cancelled the debt of both. Now which of them will love him more?’ Simon answered, ‘The one, I suppose, for whom he cancelled the larger debt.’ And he said to him, ‘You have judged rightly.’

Then turning toward the woman he said to Simon, ‘Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not ceased to kiss my feet. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven—for she loved much. But he who is forgiven little, loves little.’ And he said to her, ‘Your sins are forgiven.’ Then those who were at table with him began to say among themselves, ‘Who is this, who even forgives sins?’ And he said to the woman, ‘Your faith has saved you; go in peace.’

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This “Woman of the City” , the most bold woman I have ever heard of, did the most uncomfortable thing imaginable. Aware of her sin. Aware that the “church men” knew her sin. Aware of the fact that Jesus is the only one who could actually condemn her. She didn’t pretend. She didn’t compose herself. She didn’t talk the “right” talk. She didn’t handle herself the “right” way. She didn’t pretend that she didn’t have darkness in her life. She didn’t act like she had it all together.

She threw herself at the feet of Jesus. Weeping over the sins she had committed and those I’m sure committed against her. Consumed with love, she gave Jesus everything she had. All in front of the eyes of her city’s “leaders,” church people who were missing it! This “woman of the city” made one of the greatest statements in the Bible. She loved too much to pretend.

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Are you a woman of your city?
Do you see the pain around you? Do you see what Christ has done for you?
Do you love Him in such a way, that it makes a statement to everyone around you?
Or, are you just like everyone else?

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