There is a legend in Chicago city history - the Great Chicago Fire of 1871.  It was possibly the greatest U.S. disaster of the 19th century, and only from the immediate rebuilding of the city and support from cities all over the world was Chicago able to emerge as global city and economic hub for the country.  It’s why the city is sometimes known as “the Second City” because so much burned in the fire that the rebuilding essentially created a whole new community.

Over the past week, Hurricane Ike partnered with a Pacific tropical depression dumped over 90 billion gallons of water over Chicago this past weekend, flooding sewers and rivers, and eventually streets and whole city blocks.  Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich declared Chicago and the 7 surrounding counties disaster areas.  Though Chicago is far from any coast, the combination of both storm systems actually gave the city more rain that Houston!

Over the air waves, I kept hearing stories of families whose basements had been flooded out, or others who had evacuated from their homes and were living in temporary shelters.  During an age of extreme weather, I have seen New Orleans and Indonesia and others get hit hard, and yet still felt disconnected from the disaster and did not involve myself in assisting those in need.  Usually the voices in my head say something like, “I’ll just get in the way,” or “I don’t have time to do this - I’ve got to take care of myself.”  When disaster came to us, I felt God saying, “The body of Christ helps its neighbors - you are a part of the body of Christ, and your neighbors are in need of your help.”  It was pretty obvious what I was supposed to do next.

I put on my oldest clothes, put some of my personal stuff in a ziplock bag and headed out the door.  I didn’t have any tools, and virtually no knowledge of how to safely deal with a flood, but I went with hands to serve.

The streets in Albany Park were either filled with cars trying to get out, or water pouring in.  I walked up to a water managment truck waiting in the long traffic lines and asked where to help out.  They pointed me toward St. Louis street, and I set out.

There I met a river where once was a street.  No body was out except an old man named Pete, who was fuming mad that no one in the city was listening to him.  He had worked on sewers and flooding back in Greece, and knew that all they needed to do was vaccuum the clog in the sewer system, and the water would recede.  In the meantime, he’s trying to figure out how to drain his completely flooded basement, check his foundation and turn his power back on.

More city crew began arriving at the dead end street.  Most were wearing nice shoes and weren’t getting into the water.  I hadn’t yet gotten wet either.  And when I saw some locals at the end of the street repositioning sandbags against the riverbanks (they were just sitting out in the street), I felt like I needed to join them in the filthy waters.  A city official stopped me after he saw my intentions, telling me how nasty the water was since the sewers had overflowed.  It was tempting to turn around and find some other way to help out - I’ll be honest - I’ve never been fond of tuberculosis.  I paused, waiting for the Spirit to give me some confirmation that I truly was supposed to wade into the waters.  Maybe against sound judgment, but certainly not against the model Christ gave us, I joined my neighbors in the mess.

We worked for several hours, pushing back the power of the river.  There is something deeply spiritual and worshipful in tossing sandbags.  Among the dozen or so out there were Mark and Tanya, a young couple who worked for the Chicago Symphony.  Their whole basement was floor-to-celing flooded, and their first floor was soaking too.  I can’t imagine the feeling, but I kept wondering what good it was to fight the river since everthing was submerged already.  Then I heard some talking about how the water had severely weakened their foundations.  Yeah - that would put me to work too!

Some were really angry at the city for doing so little.  While I was there, it seemed the city was doing everything it could with all the redtape it has established for this sort of thing.  It was disappointing to see neighbors in the mud and waters while city workers still had nice, dry shoes on.  One city official came over and helped us with a sandbag line, saying, “I just can’t stand back and watch - this is what I’m here for…”

It became a great mix of neighbors and city workers.  Those working for a paycheck and those working to save their home, and me, just watching the momentary community rising above the disaster.  I did not go to New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, in fact, I’ve never been to a disaster area in my life.  This was a sort of baptism into serving those in crisis - just a few miles from my own home.

John 1:14 says that Word of God became flesh and moved into the neighborhood.  If the powerful, pure creative power of God can become something as lowly, frail and decaying as a human, shouldn’t we be able to walk through sewer water and share in the burden of humanity with fellow neighbors?  This is a struggle for me - but it is the message of the cross.  It is, like Ghandhi and Jesus agree, how we lose ourselves to find our true self.

Nickelback’s, “If Everyone Cared” stirs in my mind the possibilities of a tidal wave of committed followers of Jesus who see God’s Kingdom being ushered into this world; with his peace and wholeness reigning across the earth and in each heart.

“Never doubt that a small group of committed people can change the world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has.“

— Margaret Mead

Let me give you just a peak into my childhood.

The church I grew up in was pretty dang conservative. Without going into unnecessary ruminations over things long since gone, one particular concept in this church has sparked my interest as of late. It’s the two words that struck both anger and fear into the hearts of even the most staunch and legalistic.

“CHANGE AGENT”

Beware the accursed label for, much like a pirate’s “Black Spot”, once it has been given to you, you will wear it to your grave. Because the church brotherhood I grew up in believed that the church was perfect and fully “restored” to the pristine blueprint of the New Testament (is there only one model of church in the NT?), anyone who attempted to change the model or expression of how church was done or developed was labeled with attempting to derail the entire holy experiment. For this particular group, “be-holding the pattern” was of utmost importance, and anyone to varied from this pattern was heretical.

It is ironic how God brings people to terms with their own terms. Over the last few years, “change agent” has become a life goal of mine, and I pray regularly for “change agents” all over this continent. Not just the church needs changing either. I’m praying for change agents who change the world. For scores of people who, with eyes fixed on a completely different culture, subvert the culture they’re working undercover in.

I’m hoping to partner and network with as many change agents as I can in Chicago.  I think the church is in deep need of change; maybe the supposed “pattern” of the New Testament is about change anyway!  What I mean is - wasn’t Jesus a change agent?  Weren’t his followers agents of transformation that eventually swept across an Empire stuck in its ways?  Isn’t the Kingdom of God itself an agent of change?

Where would this world be today if more of us refused to sit back and let things rot as they are?  Why is complacency revered?  Why are whole systems built on the assumption that no one will have the gumption to do something about the wrongs they see?  When will there be justice?  When will there be creative life bubbling over into the church?  Our schools?  Our homes?  Our government?  We desperately need change agents to break the pre-conceived “blueprints” and perfect ideas of our world.

Change agents were chided and run out of town in my church growing up - but I say we kick out the squatters.  This world is a changin’.

As we enter into Holy Week, I suppose I’ll spend this post just writing a few reflections on my Lenten season!

For the past six weeks, I’ve been on an oil fast, meaning that anything associated with crude oil or fossil fuels are off the menu.  Its been interesting to see just how pervasive gasoline, coal and other toxic elements I, and so many Americans, consume on a regular basis.  We are responsible for 25% of the entire world’s contributions to pollution.  Whether we like it or not, we are on a collision course with a global crisis, and America is the one in the driver’s seat.

It was easy switching my apartment’s power to solar/wind energy.  I signed up with Commerce Energy and got hooked up with a “100% Free and Clear” Plan (sounds like a cell phone service or something) that juices us up with only local wind and solar energy, while remaining on “the grid” (so people won’t call us hippies).

We bought tons of those energy saving bulbs, applied some new weather stripping to our doors, put in a automatic thermostat (then turned it off completely as the weather got nicer), and lowered the temperature of our water heater to 90 degrees.  These things seemed to keep our energy use (and our bill) low, keeping our green energy company in the poor house!

The most obvious impact it made on my life was on my driving.  I am the primary driver of our one car, but for these last 6 weeks, I have been hitching rides with friends.  When Trina is heading somewhere, I sit in the passenger seat and come along for the ride.  Admittedly, there are probably a few loopholes in this strategy I could’ve taken advantage of (and may have a time or two when I really wanted a smoothie on the other side of town!), but I tried my very best to cut my travel way down during this season.  I noticed that in the month of March we had cut our gasoline bill down to 40% of what we normally spend, which is a good sign that this was actually making a difference.

Twice I made out of town trips with miles that equaled close to 600 miles (one to Austin, and one to Abilene State Park).  For awhile I really didn’t know what to do, but then discovered Trees for the Future.  Its a pretty neat organization, which helps developing villages plant trees, giving them many of the resources they need for sustainability, as well working towards a “global cooling” initiative.  I made a contribution to cover not only the miles I drove during Lent, but since each tree only cost $0.10, I “planted” enough to cover every mile our car will ever drive!

Honestly, I know that I wasn’t perfect in keeping my commitment to an oil fast, but as this holy season comes to a close, I feel as if I have communicated to God through my actions (rather than just my words) that his creation matters to me - and that his creation’s future is something I have the power to influence.

If anyone is united in Christ, there is a “new creation” (2Cor 5:17) - for me, this verse not only means a new creation in myself, but truly a return to the Garden - where God walks with man in the cool of the evening.  We, like the earth itself, are god grown.

Trina and I were looking for a good movie the other night and picked out The Second Chance.  It was a gamble for us because we’d never heard of it before, and when we saw that Michael W. Smith was one of the stars of the show, we figured we had the flick pegged right then and there.  You see, I guess I’ve never been a MWS fan, not just because I’m not down with long drawn out praise and worship CDs, but because to me he’s always been the Nashville-white-boy-poster-child of suburban Christianity; something that I’ve grown up in but recently have been trying to move away from.   But with the lingering facination I still have with the pop-Christian subculture, we went ahead and gave the movie a “second chance”.  *insert forced chuckle here*

Ethan Jenkins (Michael W. Smith) is the associate pastor at The Rock, a massive megachurch in the suburbs of Nashville, TN.  He is also a Christian musician who is filthy rich off of his albums and his latest book release (sounding familiar?).  The Rock is financially tied to Second Chance Ministries, an urban church on the other side of the tracks that is on the verge of financial ruin.  For decades white folks have been descending on this ministry to “sling potatoes” pass out bibles, and support it financially, but when Jake Sanders (Jeff Obafemi Carr) the pastor of Second Chance finally lets The Rock know that their money and superficial help is no longer wanted, The Rock forces Ethan to watch and observe Jake and the ministry Second Chance in order to keep a closer eye on the ministry.

Ethan and Jake are forced into proximity, but have no respect for the other or their respective ministries.  As the relationship between The Rock and Second Chance begins to dissolve, Ethan must make some hard choices about God, life, and what church is really all about.

What makes this movie so surprising is its honesty.  Contrasts between the rich and the poor realities are made both verbally and non-verbally throughout the film.  The film portrays the complex life of the urban poor with ferocious tenacity and throws it in the face of its expected audience - us white suburbanites watching from the comfort of our own homes.  Also, the political “ugly side” of the mega church is shown for what it is on our screens and having seen it first hand I can say that they spared no gruesome detail.  Finally, strained race relations are believable and layered multifaceted.

MWS fits perfectly in this role.   Ethan, a white guy with a clean shave and gelled hair, he drives onto the scene of Nashville’s underbelly with a BMW and a new leather jacket.  As his heart begins to be transformed, he begins to see signs (literally) of The Rock’s misunderstanding of what Jesus Christ and his Church is all about.

This movie never outright preaches, but it was fully convicting.  The chasm between an event-based faith and the life-on-life of organic christianity has never more clearly been communicated.  The comfort-centered “evangelism” delivered by the whites clinched my own heart and helped me see where I still put myself above others.  It also shows the need for forgiveness and reconcilliation between worlds we know little or nothing about.

My only complaint is the lack of a decent ending.  I won’t give it away, but I wish there had been some more closure on some of the relationships we had invested in throughout the flick, but I guess that too is honest - we should never expect a clean story when it comes to life.  It is always moving, shifting, and without proper closure.

—-

I’ve been talking with Agent B for the past few weeks, just sharing stories of life mostly, and as I watched this film, I kept thinking of his service with the Izzy Group Ministry.  How many professional Christian workers and their ministries to the poor are pushed around by the politics of the Sugar Daddy Church only to finally see their work die under the weight of the institution?