I’m Sorry…Tremaine?

Everyone wants to be a part of something where they feel they belong, right?

That's what kind of helped us to make a quick decision as regarding our "search" for a place to worship - when we came to City Church, people told us that we belonged through the many ways they reached out to us as a new couple in a new town [we went to 3 separate dinners the first week we were here - we'll be trying out a small group this week].

This, however, is no particularly sentimental blog on belonging.

Sunday night, I dropped Laura and her sister off while I parked the car [it was raining and we were already late]. When I finally found them, I had to make my way through people on the outsides of the rows of folding metal chairs so that I could make it to them [since they were standing on the inside]. We worshiped, but I noticed that the guy standing beside me didn't stand up for any of the songs, prayers, or creeds. Unfortunately, we didn't meet during the "meet your neighbor," [for lack of better words] time in the middle of the service.

Partaking of the communion meal was interesting - he didn't seemed interested in waiting for everyone else before his tasting of the sacraments.

After the benediction, I thought, "I need to meet this guy." I introduced myself and picked up his communion cup [he had dropped it].

"My name is Gene," I said as I reached down.
"I'm Tremaine," he said from behind his dark sunglasses, beneath a sea of a jerry curl sheen.
"Germaine?" I asked, as I generally can't seem to hear what most anyone says the first time around.
"No man, Tremaine. Hey, are you a Jap?" he asked smiling, oblivious to his cultural faux pas.
"Excuse me?" I asked laughing, with some amused disbelief.
"Are you a Jap?" he was smiling innocently.
"No, my mom is Korean, but I can't even speak the language." I laughed - this wasn't necessarily uncommon ground for me. A few years ago, I was riding a bus through Birmingham (actually, it was a trolley) and a guy asked me if I was related to Yao Ming. It's the kind of thing you become sadly accustomed to when you have a somewhat olive skin, slanted eyes, and black hair.
"Aw man, thems is some of my favorite peoples. Some of my good friends is Korean man. Hey, do you have ten dollars? I need it to get a ride home."
Bold as a lion.
The thing about Philly, is that there is public transportation. I've read some complaints - but I've seen buses everywhere. A SEPTA ticket (for a bus or the subway) is $2. A token, if you have the privilege of entering one of the stations that sells them is $1.30. So, unless he was making 4 transfers, a ride home shouldn't cost $10.
"No man. I don't carry cash with me." I'm always honest with this - I don't keep cash unless I know that I'm going to need it. I knew I wouldn't need any tonight.
"That's alright man," he said this before walking away.

It didn't scare me away. More often than not, it's this very kind of encounter that keeps me wanting to live in "the city." It's the very boldness that someone like this has to remind me of our abject and complete brokenness and the grace that is really alive and abundant in my Christ.
I had wondered if anyone like this entered into this congregation.
I am happy that they do and hopeful that in the midst of the broken worshiping the Perfect, that they too will see His holiness and grace.

Also, thanks to BP for giving us the reference for this church.

Traveling times

My new job requires that I travel around the NE of our United States. Overall, I’m pretty excited for the opportunities that it’ll provide. This week’s assignment in my “Education Path,” (as I am learning my new position) took me to Warwick, RI.

My company put me up in the posh Holiday Inn Express. To be honest, the hotel wasn’t really bad…and I wouldn’t be writing about it now if it wasn’t for a few strange happenings.

First off, my body itches…a lot.

Really, it’s just my rib cage, stomach, back and neck [my extremities don’t seem to be affected]. I can’t understand why but I do have assumptions based on my own physiology. I have allergies, and they can be pretty bad. During allergy season (it still seems to be spring here for the most part) I usually use a mild or hypoallergenic soap such as Johnson and Johnson’s baby wash or Dove.

On any given [non-allergenic] day, I usually get along fine using a hotel’s soaps and shampoos. My assumption, was that my allergies were aggravated due to the high pollen content in the air [evidenced by the fact that cars are still yellowed by the stuff here] mixed with the usage of an unfamiliar and potentially strong soap and shampoo [that smelled unfortunately like cinnamon].

My second assumption would be similar to the first, except you would substitute “…unfamiliar and potentially strong soap and shampoo,” with “hotel towels washed with an unfamiliar and potentially strong detergent.”

Both of the assumptions are possible, even while Allegra D 24 hrs is coursing through my veins.

The third assumption is the worst – the assumption that perhaps I have shingles.

New topic.

Holiday Inn Express now serves coffee along with an ambiance that that produces [no, I did not mix meanings – I did not mean “elicit”] an obtuse arrogance within its guests. Thankfully, this coffee can be brewed in the privacy of your own room or while challenging the elderly for their space in front of the bagel toasters during your continental breakfast. I don’t write this out of experience, per se, but by the very words and advertisements of Smart Roast Coffee.

You’ll recognize that you’re drinking Smart Roast by the bold styling of their cups: 90% purple, 10% gold [Go Falcons!]…100% FREE. To be sure, you’ll want to look for the circle on the cup that ensures that your brew has been selected from only the finest and that it is in fact created with 100% Arabica beans [as an aside, if this was the finest that Arabica beans had to offer, I would never drink a coffee brewed with Arabica beans again…revision…I would never pay for a coffee brewed with Arabica beans or engage in the purchase of Arabica beans again].

If that’s not enough to identify dark substance, then find the joint HIExpress and Smart Roast motto:

Consuming Smart Roast® while staying at a Holiday Inn Express® may increase brain activity, creating a euphoric state of superiority.

(Emphasis added by me). Remember, in order for this surrogate arrogance to be implanted, you must stay at a HIExpress.

The power of this coffee is further evidence by means of the sheer size of the cup – what mere mortal could endure more than an espresso size hit at one time [the coffee lid says 8oz, which may or may not be true – but there’s no way I’m ever filling a coffee cup to the brim – that’s foolish].

While I do appreciate free coffee, I think I nearly reached my limit with Smart Roast – I had to admittedly doctor it up with creamers and Splenda as the very taste of this particular coffee started to make me gag.

This is something I nearly never do.

If I’m buying a truly tasty coffee, I drink it black. If I’m brewing my own coffee at home, I drink it black. If I’m drinking coffee at someone else’s house, I drink it black.

When I pee, I stand up, and that’s why I like my coffee black – dark black – the kind of black that bends light by the seriousness of its blackness.

Other than that, there wasn’t much eventful that happened in Warwick. If there was, I had such a euphoric sense of superiority that I couldn’t have noticed anyways.

Working through Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount has been a little slower going than first expected. There are the obvious hang ups (the business of life, moving nearly one thousand miles, starting a new job, etc). Then, there’s also the not so obvious hang up of definition (i.e. translating from English back to Greek for a more inclusive understanding of what I’m reading when I read it).

There’s been a lot of good in taking the time for definition, however, as it has reminded me of how I do take words for granted rather than dwelling on their inherent and implicit meanings. In addition, it reminds me of how some words (maybe in their over usage or flippant understandings?) have lost the significance, breadth, and depth on me (i.e., reading over a text and glossing over what it’s really saying all for the sake of “just reading”).

In the very act of translation, we may lose some of the force of what was originally said. Being the case, I will put out the caveat that we are not to mistrust a translation simply because it is a translation. In the vein of Christianity, we can believe that though we may not (at first) understand the intricacies of meanings behind the words we are reading, we can still yet trust that the Holy Spirit is real and that He will enlighten, penetrate, and correct our hearts and misguidance to the end that Christ is made more beautiful in and through our lives.

A little sharing regarding three verses in the Beatitudes (and hopefully, a reprieve from my “How To’s”).

Matthew 5:6 – Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

Generally speaking, I would have seen this as “Blessed are those who really desire holiness because God will give them satisfaction.” Honestly, in breaking apart these words I was kind of blown away. Spiros (the main resource I use in my translation as I can’t yet understand or read Greek) gives some great insight. First, “Those who hunger” is altogether one phrase and is more correctly identified as “Those who starve, are famished; to metaphorically hunger for something other than literal food.

As a middle class American, it is hard to understand the impetus that starvation is for action to someone who is starving. The implication is that Christ is not speaking of mere desire, but of a deeply seated and desperate desire (hunger) for righteousness. The implication is that when one is starving for something, there’s not a whole lot that can avert the pains of starvation apart from satisfaction.

So the Holy Spirit reminds me, “You aren’t starving for righteousness, but you should.”

Matthew 5:7 – Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

Matthew 5:7 is the only verse that uses this sense of merciful (eleēmōn) to reference believers in the New Testament of the Bible (according to Spiros). It means compassionate, benevolently merciful involving thought and action and is generally relegated in speaking of God’s mercy to us. As such, mercy is much more than giving a sandwich to the homeless person who asks you for extra change. Mercy, as defined, is a planned and intentional action for the benefit and well being of others when there is a recognized need (i.e. compassion). Therein, it is much more than “I forgive you.”

Matthew 5:12 – Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Jesus tells us that we are blessed when we are persecuted for his sake (see the preceding verse 11). If (or when) we are persecuted for His sake, the translation of verse 12 could be elaborated upon by saying “Joy to you! Be glad in an exuberant and absurd way!”

I don’t think that it is something that I can quite understand, because when I feel wronged I am not prone to turn the other cheek and rest in quiet faith. Instead, my actions will more often dictate that I simply don’t trust that God has a plan for the situations I am placed in and that there is more truth in chaos rather than in a God who has a perfect and exacting plan for my life. In essence, it’s easier to know what the truth is than it is to believe the truth.

Sometimes hope comes with the knowledge that I’m wrong, however.

I can hope in a Christ that speaks the Beatitudes so that I might be drawn to Him and changed through His power rather than a Christ that speaks and says, “Now do this, or else.” The same grace that opens my heart to see this Jesus is the same grace that allows me to accept the broken world around me and to not expect the very thing that it is unable to produce apart from God’s grace: righteousness. When I drive through the streets of my broken city, I can lament with those who are not part of my family in the knowledge that in and of myself, I am lacking too. In the vein of that knowledge, I can also (from the depths of my own iniquity) point to one who is better than us, but who became like us so that we could be better than ourselves.

In short, the Beatitudes remind us that we suck. But they also remind us that there is a God who came to us to save us, that there is a transcendent hope beyond what we consider as tangible, and that there is a completion to be fulfilled by a God who sacrificed Himself and was resurrected to give us real life. They remind us that Jesus is about the building of His kingdom and that we have the privilege and unspeakable joy (rejoicing in persecution…) to be a part of that work.