We started out tired today. Last night's conversations got late in all the rooms, it sounds like. That, of course is a good thing, because one of the primary purposes of the trip is to grow friendships, explore Christian conversations and share ourselves with each other. That is definitely happening! Each adult leader joins a room full (4) kids at 11:00 for a smaller group devotion/conversation. My deep and sincere thanks to Sandi Thompson-Melby, Teesha Willinger and Tina Nelson for being so willing and able to guide our kids physically through the crowds and also spiritually as we talk through WIGIAT (Where Is God In All This).
We enjoyed another late wake-up call today (8:00). I say late because most other groups are waking up at 6:30 or 7:00 in preparation for a bus ride into town from their distant hotels. We made our way to the Cobo Center where the grandest and greatest ministry fair you've ever seen took up acres and acres of indoor convention center floors. Mini-golf, bumper cars powered by bicycle wheels, volleyball, basketball, tetherball, and every organization within the Lutheran church you can think of was represented. Peace without walls, walk for water, the malaria campaign... people were donating blood, hair and money. People made bracelets, peace puppets, art for hope and received buttons, tattoos and lots of pens. Thousands of participants spent the entire day walking from booth to booth, experience to event, court to conversations.
By 3:30, we were physically spent. Not even the sour patch slurpee from 7-11 could jolt our kids out of their fatigue. Many took naps. Most at least took a couple hours to rest in their room (seriously... we're walking 20,000+ steps a day here!) By 6:30 we made our way to Greek town for authentic Greek cuisine. It was our one out-of-our-comfort-zone eating experience for the trip. A few had burgers or pasta, but some went for it. My whole table tried the octopus tentacle I ordered as an appetizer, Jacob ate grape leaves, Emily loved her dish and Pastor Karyn joined us!
After running out of noodles - which made us late - we ran to Ford Field for the main event. We got there a few minutes late which put us in the nosebleed section. Little did we know that later, that would be a good thing. We heard from a Youn Adult in Global Mission again tonight who offered a great story about a God-moment when peace was experienced between herself and the two blind arabic speaking muslim students she was tasked to teach. The moment came through yoga. Breaathing in peace and using bodies she said communicated something true and deep.
We then heard from a Jerusalem born Pastor who works with BRIDGES (Building Respect in Diverse Groups to Enhance Sensitivity). It was a good talk about recognizing the similarities we hare while honoring differences.
We then heard from Pastor who lived through Hurricane Sandy. She shared that her apartment building remained unscathed while the one across the street lost power, got flooded and had no heat. After 11 days like this, still no one had gotten around to helping her neighbors. It was a public housing facility and most were black or brown. It truly bothered her that there was such desparity between her building and the one that was only across the street. It made her ask, Whose lives matter? Why aren't we all around one table? She has since explored some of these questions and begun a "Dinner Church" which ceters around eating together (genius!... like Jesus did) "All of this inequality and broken systems will break your heart if you really take the time to see it and notice it. It may even break your faith. Maybe that's not such a bad thing." What she was saying is, maybe our faith needs to be bothered out of our comfortable narcissism and into other people's difficult lives. And maybe that can happen easiest over the dinner table, My favorite part was that she admitted her ministry has not built the bridge between the buildings, but we now have people standing in-between and that's a start. "I haven't figured anything out. I just refuse to look away."
Then came Motown! As a surprise, a member of the capitals, the miracles and two temptations came on stage in bright red suits and sang 3 small sets of songs EVERYbody knows. Motown was a bridge building (see the theme yet?) force during the Civil Rights struggle as they called for dancing in the streets as well as sharing th best of 'Soul' music from African Americans. That the music came from Motor Town USA - Motown - made it especially appropriate for us to hear tonight. It was great!
Our final speaker was a Pastor from Milwauke whose congregation endured the racist shooting of Darius, an 11 year old boy, four years ago. His white neighbor killed him while the boy took out the trash. In the aftermath, Darius' mother chose not to hold on to hatred, and his Pastor has chosen to make 'loving your neighbor' his ministry. At the center of his message is the power of Jesus. It can only sound simple and perhpas even obvious as you read this blog - especially if you are already a Christian. But this Pastor talked about the power of Jesus for about 10 minutes in a VERY energetic way. His words and style broke into our kids' imaginations better than any other speaker this week.
Tomorrow is our service day. Their have been hiccups the last two days for other groups as they seek to be loaded onto buses and launched into the city. I pray we have the opportunity to offer our hands in the name of Christ!
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