The Future
I've been hesitant to share this with you. But I feel like it's time.
In April of 2003 after struggling through three very low paying jobs, I was hired at Time Warner Cable. Having just left the mission field, I assured myself that after a time of healing from life there and paying some bills, I would find something that I called, “More altruistic.” Well, a few months ago I passed my 9 year anniversary. Nothing ‘more altruistic’ came along in those nine years, or maybe I got so lost in the noise of our culture that I forgot I wanted to find it. If we spent any time talking during those years, you may have been subject to listen to me pine for adventure, or wanting to REALLY help others, or life in a van or something similar. I was always saying I wanted to just leave it all and run away. I wanted to sell everything and just love on hippies at campsites. I wept reading books by Don Miller and Shane Claiborne because I knew I longed so deeply to be a part of the kind of community and adventure they talked about. I wanted so badly to give myself over to completely trusting in God to provide and learning to love others share the Gospel with them by serving them completely and full time. I was a Bible major in college but unlike most of my fellow Bible Majors, never wanted to be a pastor. I loved talking about God, but never wanted to be a theologian. I loved public speaking, but never felt like a preacher. If I had been more honest, or courageous, I would have been able to say that life in corporate America was stifling everything about myself that I appreciated. It was choking my free spirit, my heart for others and transforming me into an even more self-absorbed person than I had previously been.
So what happened?
In 9 years I earned a little more than $250,000…none of which I have left to show for it. To add to that shame, all of the “possessions” I amassed would cumulatively sell in a yard sale for no more than $400. On top of this, most of my relationships within my community are shallow, my soul tired, my habits self-involved, and I have watched approximately 32,850 hours of television; most of which were reruns of Friends.
Welcome to the American Dream. What a crock.
Almost two weeks ago, I was confronted with the possibility of a different reality, a different kind of future. In an attempt to not exaggerate what happened to my heart, I will describe it as the hand of God playing every note of my deepest soul as though it were an auto-harp. I may have even heard the harp playing. (that wasn’t exaggerating was it?) My friend Sher and I, (friends for just under 20 years) started a conversation that consumed me, crippled me and liberated me all at once. Sher started a community in Chicago, that instead of butchering the intention, I’ll just point you to the website and you can investigate for yourself. In short, for me, it would mean leaving everything I have and have known to live in a house with people with the sole intention of loving people in community. Up until this point, for her, that has mostly meant the poor and homeless. There are, however, powerful visions being planted in her heart that are expanding this whole idea into parts, places and people that would have me unclenching broken parts of my heart in faith and vulnerability and learning to love people from a place of a crippling insecurity that I’ve wrestled with for years. I’ll save those updates for when they become more relevant.
So why am I sharing all of this with you?
On June the 22nd, I’m flying to Chicago to stay with Sher for a few days. In all sincerity, my primary intention is going so that I can support her in the endeavors of the weekend, and see for myself just what it is that she does. To be honest, I have been so jaded in the last few years that I have all but ignored what she was doing, because it hurt parts of me that I was denying, that I was forcing to incorporate, that I was running from. But she and I, and now you, will know that there will be a second conversation happening in my heart over those few days. The conversation will be, “Is this where I’m being led? Can I do this? Is this where my heart belongs? Is this my next step? Is this where God is calling me? I hate typing those questions because they all drip with “Me” and “I” and “my.” If I can be frank, I’m really sick and tired of being obsessed with myself. I’m ready to drop dead to the concerns of my heart and life and start investing what little I have into other people. Even if that means just roaming the streets of Chicago and smiling at people, or doing chalk drawings of encouraging messages for people on the streets they walk to work. Too many people hurt. And I don’t help them. People don’t have shoes and I have too many shoes. Too many people have no food and I overeat. Too many people are broken hearted an alone and I watch TV. Too many people need to be listened to, and I have been waiting in line to talk, when I mostly have nothing good to say. I say all of that so that you hear that even though the questions at this point do sound a lot about me, its really just my heart figuring out how to let go of me.
It makes me nervous to type, honestly…maybe nervous is the wrong word, shakey is a better word. I’m honestly not scared of jumping in. I have “small faith” obsessions about how I would make money, what if I weren’t successful, what if I ended up becoming homeless because I’m such an idiot about money sometimes? And since I’ve been investigating this I realize just how hard it will be to cut ties with Corporate America and the “American Dream” I’ve been creating here for myself. Opening one’s door and saying, “Make me an offer” on everything in your house sounds easy enough, but there are debts (thanks to Dave Ramsey, they’re smaller than they were), lease obligations, work obligations… How does one go about severing ties in a righteous way? And how do I keep working for the right amount of time? And work? Gosh, How to I wake up, and go to work and care about this thing I’ve been fighting hard to care about for years? Now that I’m finally admitting how unfulfilling it is, I have to figure out how to balance a growing contempt for it while maintaining enough respect and gratitude for it that I finish with grace.
All of these thoughts are premature, but you get it, I think.
In the last several days, I have reached out to several of you to be praying for this upcoming trip. (check your facebook associated email, you could have been one of them!) And you have been faithful to do so. So I figured I’d throw it out there for all 50 of you who read this blog. I thought about waiting and making some big glitzy announcement, but you guys are friends and family and it would be much cooler if you were involved. At the end of the day, this is a decision that I have to live with and therefore can only make with God’s help. If it’s His idea for me, then he will provide the encouragement, the prompting, and the finances to make it happen. That doesn’t mean, however, that I won’t take your advice at jiggsm@gmail.com. I’m not scared.
Thanks, friends. I’ll, of course, keep you posted.
In April of 2003 after struggling through three very low paying jobs, I was hired at Time Warner Cable. Having just left the mission field, I assured myself that after a time of healing from life there and paying some bills, I would find something that I called, “More altruistic.” Well, a few months ago I passed my 9 year anniversary. Nothing ‘more altruistic’ came along in those nine years, or maybe I got so lost in the noise of our culture that I forgot I wanted to find it. If we spent any time talking during those years, you may have been subject to listen to me pine for adventure, or wanting to REALLY help others, or life in a van or something similar. I was always saying I wanted to just leave it all and run away. I wanted to sell everything and just love on hippies at campsites. I wept reading books by Don Miller and Shane Claiborne because I knew I longed so deeply to be a part of the kind of community and adventure they talked about. I wanted so badly to give myself over to completely trusting in God to provide and learning to love others share the Gospel with them by serving them completely and full time. I was a Bible major in college but unlike most of my fellow Bible Majors, never wanted to be a pastor. I loved talking about God, but never wanted to be a theologian. I loved public speaking, but never felt like a preacher. If I had been more honest, or courageous, I would have been able to say that life in corporate America was stifling everything about myself that I appreciated. It was choking my free spirit, my heart for others and transforming me into an even more self-absorbed person than I had previously been.
So what happened?
In 9 years I earned a little more than $250,000…none of which I have left to show for it. To add to that shame, all of the “possessions” I amassed would cumulatively sell in a yard sale for no more than $400. On top of this, most of my relationships within my community are shallow, my soul tired, my habits self-involved, and I have watched approximately 32,850 hours of television; most of which were reruns of Friends.
Welcome to the American Dream. What a crock.
Almost two weeks ago, I was confronted with the possibility of a different reality, a different kind of future. In an attempt to not exaggerate what happened to my heart, I will describe it as the hand of God playing every note of my deepest soul as though it were an auto-harp. I may have even heard the harp playing. (that wasn’t exaggerating was it?) My friend Sher and I, (friends for just under 20 years) started a conversation that consumed me, crippled me and liberated me all at once. Sher started a community in Chicago, that instead of butchering the intention, I’ll just point you to the website and you can investigate for yourself. In short, for me, it would mean leaving everything I have and have known to live in a house with people with the sole intention of loving people in community. Up until this point, for her, that has mostly meant the poor and homeless. There are, however, powerful visions being planted in her heart that are expanding this whole idea into parts, places and people that would have me unclenching broken parts of my heart in faith and vulnerability and learning to love people from a place of a crippling insecurity that I’ve wrestled with for years. I’ll save those updates for when they become more relevant.
So why am I sharing all of this with you?
On June the 22nd, I’m flying to Chicago to stay with Sher for a few days. In all sincerity, my primary intention is going so that I can support her in the endeavors of the weekend, and see for myself just what it is that she does. To be honest, I have been so jaded in the last few years that I have all but ignored what she was doing, because it hurt parts of me that I was denying, that I was forcing to incorporate, that I was running from. But she and I, and now you, will know that there will be a second conversation happening in my heart over those few days. The conversation will be, “Is this where I’m being led? Can I do this? Is this where my heart belongs? Is this my next step? Is this where God is calling me? I hate typing those questions because they all drip with “Me” and “I” and “my.” If I can be frank, I’m really sick and tired of being obsessed with myself. I’m ready to drop dead to the concerns of my heart and life and start investing what little I have into other people. Even if that means just roaming the streets of Chicago and smiling at people, or doing chalk drawings of encouraging messages for people on the streets they walk to work. Too many people hurt. And I don’t help them. People don’t have shoes and I have too many shoes. Too many people have no food and I overeat. Too many people are broken hearted an alone and I watch TV. Too many people need to be listened to, and I have been waiting in line to talk, when I mostly have nothing good to say. I say all of that so that you hear that even though the questions at this point do sound a lot about me, its really just my heart figuring out how to let go of me.
It makes me nervous to type, honestly…maybe nervous is the wrong word, shakey is a better word. I’m honestly not scared of jumping in. I have “small faith” obsessions about how I would make money, what if I weren’t successful, what if I ended up becoming homeless because I’m such an idiot about money sometimes? And since I’ve been investigating this I realize just how hard it will be to cut ties with Corporate America and the “American Dream” I’ve been creating here for myself. Opening one’s door and saying, “Make me an offer” on everything in your house sounds easy enough, but there are debts (thanks to Dave Ramsey, they’re smaller than they were), lease obligations, work obligations… How does one go about severing ties in a righteous way? And how do I keep working for the right amount of time? And work? Gosh, How to I wake up, and go to work and care about this thing I’ve been fighting hard to care about for years? Now that I’m finally admitting how unfulfilling it is, I have to figure out how to balance a growing contempt for it while maintaining enough respect and gratitude for it that I finish with grace.
All of these thoughts are premature, but you get it, I think.
In the last several days, I have reached out to several of you to be praying for this upcoming trip. (check your facebook associated email, you could have been one of them!) And you have been faithful to do so. So I figured I’d throw it out there for all 50 of you who read this blog. I thought about waiting and making some big glitzy announcement, but you guys are friends and family and it would be much cooler if you were involved. At the end of the day, this is a decision that I have to live with and therefore can only make with God’s help. If it’s His idea for me, then he will provide the encouragement, the prompting, and the finances to make it happen. That doesn’t mean, however, that I won’t take your advice at jiggsm@gmail.com. I’m not scared.
Thanks, friends. I’ll, of course, keep you posted.
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