I just got back from an interesting trip to the Middle East that I would love to post more about soon. But for now I wanted to talk about an interesting and challenging Christian activity that is taking place within Egypt. The Zabbaleen are Coptic Christians that live within Egypt. There is only 60,000 of them or so and they are responsible for picking up 1/3 of Cairo’s trash. They take this trash and pick it up off the streets and then bring it with them back home. Their home is literally a landfill. Trash surrounds them.

It puts a whole new spin on the idiom, “one person’s trash is another man’s treasure.” The men go out into the city and pick up the trash and bring it home where their wives sort out the trash into plastics, glass, papers, etc… It is a very efficient recycling system. After they do this they make goods out of the trash and sell it.

At first as an American I can respond with disgust and anguish that these folks are living in a landfill. Can you imagine little kids that often put whatever they find in their mouth living in a landfill and putting whatever he can find in his mouth!!! Sometimes there is broken glass and used syringes!!!

However it has been once told to me that an observation of the phsyical condition of someone’s life is an example of someone’s spirtiual condition. In light of this, when we look at the lifestyle of these Christians I can impose an idea that quite possibly this is exactly the life that we are to life. We are to be those who go within the dirtiest and darkest of places and pick up waste, sort through it and redeem it. These families give me quite a picture of what we are to be like. In the midst of darkness we are to be light. In the midst of trash we are to be garbage collectors and redeem the usefulness of fallen and broken items. To look at the bad and find the good within it. For more information about the Zabbaleen you can read:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A23780270

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zabaleen

http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0106/p07s02-woaf.html

“God so loved the world that He gave His son…” John 3:16I delight in the Risen One during this holiday season. Thinking about how the Creator of Heaven and Earth, took on flesh to walk among sinful people that He may teach them, heal them and call them back to Himself. A little over three years among mankind He spent and all this came together with the essence of His teaching, “You must die, so that you can live.” His death and resurrection being the example for us.As much as I am mesmerized by  His life on earth, I can’t help but get even more excited about a reality that is hidden from many, but hopfully not to you. John 1:14 says that “In Him we beheld the glory of the only begotten of the Father full of grace and truth.” And just as the Father sent Him, so He sends us (John 20:21). We are to be on this earth “the glory of the only begotten of the Father full of grace and truth.” For if we have been born again we have certainly been begotten. We have been born with a new spirit a new heart and a new desire.  I am often caught up thinking like an individual too much. Something that this meditation has helped me to realize is that corporately you and I who call upon Jesus as our Savior and Lord are a part of a unified will of God, the Bride, His Church, made from the blood and water that poured forth from His rib. Yes I am drawing a parallel to Eve, who was created out of the rib of Adam. We too, as the Church are His helpmate. Imagine how glorious it is that God of all Creation lives in Us His Church, as He works through us and earnestly seeks after His lost sheep, tossed and turned among the mountains and valleys of this sin-stained Satan-ruled world.  Through His message carried through our lives He is calling forth for Himself a pure and spotless bride from among every Tongue, Tribe and Nation.  Rejoice again that He has called you to join Him in the fellowship of His sufferings, that we might see the reward of His sufferings in the days ahead, when sin and death will be utterly destroyed upon His return. Let us speed His Kingdom. Pray earnestly for unreached peoples, Send missionaries with your finances and if God would so choose to honor you with such an assignment allow Him to utilize you as a Missionary among the unreached. What a joy we can find in those words. “God so loved that He gave…” 

The following was an email update sent by one of my friends, and I was intrigued by the questions that was asked. Please feel free to leave comments on my blog to answer the questions presented. It would be interesting to find out what others think.My Friends,The longer I live, the more people I am acquainted with, the more I am faced with the reality of suffering and pain. Physical trials, broken relationships, emotional and spiritual crises seem to strike everyone indiscriminately, reminders of just how brutal this world can be. We sense that this wasnt the original plan, yet we can do little to avoid the onslaught.These past few months I have had the unfortunate opportunity to watch several of my friends as they have struggled through some incredibly difficult circumstances, blindsided by the fierce trials of life. As my heart has ached for them, my mind has been sobered by the realities of struggle and pain that seem to plague us all, regardless of where we live, what religion we follow, or how much money we have.So, the question is: where is the balance? How much of this life is to be spent celebrating the victories and how much of it is to be in mourning over the defeats? How much are we to allow our hearts to ache for a world that suffers daily, mostly apart from any hope of redemption, and how much are we to embrace and enjoy the blessings, rejoicing in the incredible gifts God has lavished upon us?

I was reading and update of a friend and it had the marvelous quotation of Kramer from the sitcom Seinfeld? ”Do you ever yearn?”  I do think that question sometimes about my yearnings. I sometimes fear that I am moments away from slipping into “comfortable Christianity”. It would make life alot easier if everything was just about going to church on Sundays and Wednesdays and appearing at the men’s fellowships that the church offers and the rest of the days of the week, I just focused on my hobbies (i.e. cooking, reading) and in the other open times just watch tv.    I am taking a limited sabbatical right now and the fear of “comfortable christianity” is one of the things that I am every now and then get anxious about. “Am I slipping?” Then I have to remember that I am on a sabbatical right now and I am supposed to rest. One of the great things about resting is there isn’t any anxious-hurried-drive that motivates me to “advance the kingdom as fast as possible” as if “it all depends on me”. It is a good reminder that the world still spins when I am not active in creating ministry opportunities and that Jesus is still on the throne and salvations are still happening. Then I am reminded that these seasons of rest are for dreaming and feeling and hoping and praying and drawing closer to Him. I have learned a lot about patience and grace and effecitive service just in sitting and waiting and resting. It is pretty nice!  I recognize that though I am not promised tomorrow, or the next five minutes for that matter, yet right now I am able to stand back enjoy God’s panarama of what He is doing, praise Him for His marvelous works and just dream. As I stand back and view His dealings I ask “Where does God have me in this panarama?” Is it in the villages, is it in the city, is it among the homeless, or the prisons or the hospitals, is it with kids, is it with muslims or buddhist, or christians? Many questions, many yearnings, and somehow I rest in the confident hope of the bigness of God and His plans and realize that all my seemingly different desires are all wrapped wholly into His ultimate purpose for Me, and as I rest in His soverigntly, and obey His voice, I will be able to look back upon what used to be my dreams and find out they have become realities.

Stripes that wound scour away evil, and strokes reach the innermost parts. Prov 20:30

All the people said, “His blood shal be on us and on our children!” Then he released Barabbas for them; but after having Jesus scourged, he handed Him over to be crucified. Matt 27:25-26

It is interesting to note that Israel declared His blood shall be on them and their children. Of course they are talking about the blame associated with punishing Him. However, one can’t help, but think how it is by this very blood that we gain forgiveness of sin. Then on another note, the murderer in this story is released and goes free, while the innocent man takes the punishment the murderer deserved. I would like to think of myself as Barabbas in this story. I have murdered many timees in my heart and have led many rebellions against God, and instead of my being punished, I scream along with the Jews “Crucify Him!” not knowing what it is I am wishing upon myself. Assuming in my rebellious heart I am getting away with murder, and getting what I want and that is this “holy man” being sentenced to death, so I don’t have to deal with him anymore, only to find the scourging and the crucifixion only led to His secret plot to capture my heart back for Him. What a marvelous Savior!!! May His wounds continue to scour away evil in me, and reach the innermost parts, and along with Paul may I take it upon myself to see to it that I may fill up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ. That every tongue, tribe, and nation will come to the throne of grace and mercy, begging also that His blood would be on their hands and cover them, for the redemption and forgiveness of their sins.