Sorry.

The other day I was traveling back to Cebu from a day of work in Manila. I got in the check-in line to get my boarding pass, but the line wasn't moving at all. At each of the seven counters the person was staring blankly at the screen. Each counter had a "trainer" helping the person. The trainers were also unable to understand what was going on. I learned later that Philippine Airlines was putting in a new computer system. Unfortunately, they hadn't done any training, even of their management people, so it was a big fiasco. I was afraid that I would miss my flight, so I made an inquiry, and I got snapped at by the person in charge. Nobody ever apologized about the poor service and the interminable wait.

When we arrived in Cebu the plane was taxiing to the gate, but it stopped and we sat there. And waited. For 35 minutes. The pilot made one announcement about another plane being in our spot. Then nothing more. No apology for making us wait so long.

It used to be that the service industries, at least, would offer apologies to try and placate their customers. It seems that this is changing. But I think it is  more difficult for people, in general, to say they are sorry for anything. Maybe it is a bi-product of our litiguous times, when any admission of guilt or culpability seems like a prescription for a lawsuit. Insurance companies tell us that if we have an accident we are to keep our mouths closed and admit nothing. When I sit in an aisle seat in the exit row, a lot of people pass by me on their way to the bathrooms. I routinely get bumped or tripped over. Sometimes I get hit pretty hard. Rarely, if ever, do I get an apology, even from the flight attendants. Recently a guy was getting something out of the overhead bin and it fell on my head, opening up a gash. Did I get a "sorry?"  Nope. It was like it never happened. Why did I have to be sitting there at that exact moment, any way?

As we become more and more self-indulgent as a society, we become less polite and less kind. Less likely to admit guilt. Less likely to admit guilt or say we are sorry.

A common response to this type of thinking goes like this: "Why should I say I'm sorry when I'm not? That's hypocritical." True. But I think the point is that God would want us to feel sorry if we bother, hurt or inconvenience someone else. "Be kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another." Theologian Albert Barnes writes that "Christianity produces true courteousness, or politeness. It does not make one rough, crabby, or sour; nor does it dispose its followers to violate the proper rules of social contact. The secret of true politeness is "benevolence," or a desire to make others happy; and a Christian should be the most polite of people. There is no religion in a sour, misanthropic temper; none in rudeness, stiffness, and repulsiveness; none in violating the rules of good breeding." If we focus on kindness in our dealings with others, we can avoid what Barnes refers to as  "hollow-hearted politeness." Our courtesy, our saying "sorry" is to be the result of love, good will and a yearning for the happiness of all others.

Of course, the other part of the verse I started above finishes the thought. "Be kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave.: Eph. 4:32.  That's the hard part because, even if I've been hurt, delayed, wounded, angered or annoyed, even if a person so obviously in the wrong fails to acknowledge their negative actions and say "sorry," I need to forgive that person. I need to forgive Philippine Airlines, not just as an institution, but each person who I dealt with. That's tough stuff. And if I fail to do this I should be the one saying "sorry" to them!

There is a hollow-hearted politeness, indeed, which the Christian is not to aim at or copy. His politeness is to be based on "kindness;" His courtesy is to be the result of love, good-will, and a desire of the happiness of all others; and this will prompt to the kind of conduct that will render her conversation with others agreeable and profitable.

Anti-numbness

Sometimes I need to pray for God to prevent me from becoming numb. I confess to feeling that way lately. The poverty in the Philippines is overwhelming, and the needs are so significant and pervasive. Every day lately I have become aware of heart-wrenching need and desperation that involves people who are very close to me. Most people here don't have health insurance and those that do find it lacking in meeting the needs of their families. Just in the past week I've been approached for help, either personally or in behalf of CSC, for medicines for heart .disease, treatment for broken bones, the need for kidney dialysis, eye surgery, cesaerean delivery and several other crucial needs.

Each of these involves people who feel desperate. Some have nowhere else to go for help. Almost every day, and sometimes more than once a day I hear these stories and have to make decisions about using personal or ministry funds for these needs. Often these are life and death matters. Sometimes I feel weary and often I wonder if feeling numb is just a defense mechanism that my mind, or my heart, uses to allow myself to be able to deal with all of the emotion surrounding these needs. Sometimes I do feel like I'm numb. But I don't want to be.  I want to be compassionate and overflowing with kindness and mercy. Even if the limitations of personal and ministry resources prevent me from responding as I'd like to, I want to be concerned and prayerful.

Here are some of the manifestations of numbness that I have seen in others, but, in a more troubling way, in myself:

-  You tend to feel annoyed that people are taking up your time and invading your schedule with requests for help. I always have to remind myself that, for the desperate person asking for help, nothing is as important as that moment. Although most of the people who approach me would not want to annoy me, they are willing to run that risk for the burden that they bear.

-  You start to think that this particular situation is just like another that you heard about or dealt with. Of course, its not true. No two situations are the same. Each has distinct people involved, and each case touches individuals and families in unique ways. It never helps a person in need to know that someone else was already in my office with a similar need.

-  You start to think of things to say before you've even heard the story. You might end up not really listening to anything. You try to shield yourself from the emotion or the tears by putting up a barrier.
Sometimes that barrier might be a kind of blaming game: Hey, they should have prepared for this kind of need. Why didn't they save money?


I don't want to be that way. I want to let the Holy Spirit lead me. I want discernment to know the ways that I should respond to the needs I am shown. I want to be willing, like the Good Samaritan, to respond to needs in a loving, compassionate and kind way. I want to avoid blaming, lumping and annoyance.  I don't want to be numb.

Please pray for Marlys and me, and the rest of the CSC staff as we strive to do share Christ with the needy people around us.

On Reunions

I was a part of two reunions in recent days. One I attended, and the other I was involved with online. The one I could not physically attend was my 40th high school reunion in St. Paul. Our class has a Facebook page, so I was in on the pre-reunion stuff, the planning and the efforts to find our classmates. The one I attended was a gathering of the people who were our neighbors and friends when we started the ministry: the Bulacao crowd. These were our first friends, the people we helped when we arrived in Cebu in 1979. Together we formed what later became the Bulacao Evangelical Free Church.

Both reunions were enjoyable and, at the same time, somewhat haunting. The Murray High School class of 72 is a great bunch of people. It was interesting to see, through Facebook posts, where people ended up, how they have or have not stayed connected, and what their memories of our high school years are. These are people that spent years together in school and there is a bond that exists that is hard to explain. Reports from the affair talk about a great time, where people stayed on and didn't want to go home. Some stayed until 3:00 am.

The haunting part came when somebody posted a list of our classmates who have died since 1972. The list was longer than I expected. Since I live on the other side of the world from St. Paul, I hadn't heard about many of these passings, so there were several surprises. One name leapt off the page at me, and left me feeling sad and ashamed. This guy had only gone to our school for a couple years, as I remember. He had a major speech impediment. He was a nice guy but he could not talk. I don't remember that he had any friends at Murray. I don't know if we made fun of him - probably, knowing how mean young people can be and how peer pressure and personal insecurities can combine in awful ways. To be sure, he wasn't a part of any group. Maybe we just didn't feel that he was as cool as we were. (We weren't all that cool but we thought we were!) For whatever reason, he was shut out. I've been thinking about him for the past few days since the reunion. Why couldn't I have stepped out of the crowd and been a friend to him? What effects did the things we said and did have on him? How would his life have been different if high school had been a positive experience for him, with friends and activities and inclusion. Maybe even one person (Paul Healy) could have made a difference. Now that I'm older I wonder about his parents, and how they must have felt, longing that he could have had friends or some kind of normal experiences. I can imagine how they felt if they knew kids were mean to their son. Haunting.

At the Bulacao reunion there was also a time for reflection. Some of the people in our initial group have died or moved away. I wonder if there was more that we could have done to help some of these people, either in meeting their physical needs or in letting them know better the love of God in Jesus. Were we too busy to recognize their needs? How did those years impact their lives and where do they stand with God? Questions.

I am aware that, for some people, high school was the worst time in their lives. That wasn't true for me, but I am sure that some stay away from reunions because of those negative memories. We had an evening to honor one of our basketball coaches a few years ago and I was shocked by the number of guys who would not come because they held 30 year grudges against the coach for not playing them enough.  Maybe that's just the nature of reunions; some will show up and have a good time, others will stay away.

For me, I am acutely aware that I cannot change the things that I did or didn't do in the past to classmates, churchmates or others I came in contact with. The best I can do is to try my best to be aware of needs around me today, to treat people with dignity and love, and to encourage others to do the same. In an age when being like the crowd and being cool is as strong or stronger than when I was young, that is a difficult task, but I believe it is what Jesus would have us do: Love the unlovely; reach out to the lonely, and be a friend to the friendless.

To Tweet or not to Tweet

We are having a Tweeting debate at CSC these days. Although we do not have a CSC Twitter account, there is some talk about the need to go in that directions in the future. We have decided to put an emphasis on getting the word of the ministry out through Facebook and our CSC website. We want to do that better, to put the message out in ways that will be favorably received. The whole world of "Likes" and "comments" and "hits" has come to CSC. We want to do it in a quality way, not flooding people with information, but realizing that many enjoy regular updates.

Bjork Ostrom is our man. He is an expert on social media and is dragging us (at least some of us), kicking and screaming into the modern age. People go to Facebook often. People read blogs. People respond to pictures and videos. Why shouldn't we use these tools to get people thinking about CSC?

But Twitter? I confess to having a bad attitude about that. In fact, I have been known to lampoon people who offer unsolicited personal information by offering up a "Tweeeeeeet" call. People laugh, often nervously, when I do that. They know I'm a dinasour, and my "tweeeeting" does nothing to curtail their verbal status updates or their use of Twitter to let their following public know what they're doing or thinking.

Maybe I'm way off. Maybe, come to think of it, this blog is a type of "tweet" in and of itself. It is certainly an unsolicited opinion. But its different, too. Hopefully, I don't use this forum simply to draw attention to myself, (where I'm going to eat; what I'm doing this weekend, etc.) but to highlight an issue or event that is important to CSC, and for which I might have an insight or an opinion.

Anyway, we are thinking about Twitter as a way to bring the day to day activities, prayer requests and important issues to people who may want to know about them. I'm kicking. I'm screaming. Help me out!

What a day!

Our days are always full here in Cebu but today was especially fun. We are trying to make some decisions about admitting children to CSC now that we have some vacancies. So our social workers, child care team and nurses are trying to see the referred children and make some assessments about them. This involves lots of things: visiting them in the hospital; doing blood tests on the mothers and scheduling medical exams and additional tests. Carmelita, our head social worker, had clients dropping in all day, needing answers to questions and presenting her with their problems. Sometimes these folks have an appointment, but often they don't.

This morning a woman showed up with her three month-old baby which had been brought to Cebu from another island. Later the mother of a teenager who had give birth to one of our kids came with some financial needs. Another meeting with a birth mother that involves a very complicated situation with her child's birth certificate is scheduled for later in the afternoon. Just after lunch we had a meeting of the admission team: nurses, social workers, child care team and counselors. We talked about all the different referrals and came up with some priorities for admission and decided in which house each would be placed.

In the midst of all of this, children are brought to doctors, teachers teach, bills are paid, reports are written, meals are cooked, facilities are cleaned, counselors counsel and the children are supervised on the playground. Today we have seven children who are isolated in our infirmary with sore throats and fevers. This means that extra workers need to be scheduled and others will work overtime. One of our boys had major dental work done today so one of our child care workers needed to go with him. Our driver, Edwin, was scurrying to pick up kids, deliver workers and bring delivered items to the homes.

Luckily, we have a hard working staff that consists of people who are willing to work hard and can handle the stress of a day like today. There are lots of days like today, and when we wake up in the morning we never know exactly what the day will bring. Such is the life of those who work with children.

When I was younger, a day like today didn't seem to be tiring at all. Another meeting? Bring it on. Need to run across town on an errand? No sweat. Reports due today? I'll finish them up straightaway and get them in the mail. Go to Manila for a meeting or matching? When do I leave?

But I'm starting to feel my age. I sometimes get tired keeping up with all the activity at CSC. And even though there are lots of people to cover the various tasks that need to be done in a day, I still am amazed at the number of decisions that need to be made, and the increased complexity of leading this ministry. Its a real blessing, though, and we have a wonderful life here in Cebu. And days like today make us understand the importance of our work and the roles that everyone play in making things work here in Cebu.

Father to the Fatherless

The theme for our banquet this year will be Father to the Fatherless. Of course, that describes our Heavenly Father and his role in the lives of his children. But at CSC, it has an additional meaning. We have some very dedicated, loving and compassionate men working here who have taken on the fatherly role for children who have lost their biological fathers. Some of their fathers died, some just left them. Some were loving, but most were absent or abusive. Most of the kids that come to live with us have had a very bad experience with their father.

CSC plays a crucially important role for these kids in three ways. First, we try to restore trust. At CSC they have subsitute father images who offer understanding, acceptance and loving discipline - something most of our children have never experienced. Our desire is to stop the cycle of abuse and neglect in our children's lives, and it often starts with the love of a CSC father, either a house father, or a staff member.

Secondly, we are preparing many of our children to be able to accept the love of an adoptive father once they are placed. That might sound a little simpler than it actually is. They need to learn about expectations, and learn to accept that they will be loved and not abandoned by the next father in their lives. They need to observe good, Christian men who, though far from perfect, are doing their best to follow biblical patterns for their lives and for their parenting of their own children and the CSC kids.

The third way that the fathers of CSC impact our children is helping teaching them, through their example, about the unconditional love of their Heavenly Father. This is crucial for them. They need to be able to love God, to experience his love for them and to accept his gift of salvation. Those kids who have experienced the anger, violence and lack of acceptance from an earthly father might have a problem with the portrayal of God as a loving Heavenly Dad. If we are doing our job well at CSC, we can be giving them a different way of thinking about what a dad is.

We look forward to developing this exciting theme at our banquet on April 28th at Bethel University.

But for the Grace of God

Last night, while driving back from the south of Cebu island where I had visited the CSC kids at camp, I almost hit three women who were standing in the middle of the road. It was very dark, there were bright headlights in my eyes, and I didn't see them until it was almost too late. I swerved and barely missed them.

This morning when I woke up I thought about how different my life would be today if I had hit them. Almost certainly they would have been killed. I would have been put in jail until the police could determine fault, and it is fairly likely that, even though they were in the road in the dark, I would have been blamed. So, aside from the huge emotional blow of having hit and killed three people, I would have needed to pay a huge amount of money. My life would have been turned upside down. I would have a terrible memory to live with for the rest of my life. My life, my family and the ministry of CSC would have been affected significantly, not to mention the families of those women. I am so very thankful that I didn't hit them!

I think its true that our lives are full of "close call" experiences, choices and events that, had they gone a different way, would have changed the direction and quality of our lives or those of other people. Maybe it was a fork in the road where you needed to make a decision about your future, like taking a job, entering a relationship or making a change. Maybe it was something small, like choosing a class in college that opened up your mind to information or challenges that led you to choose a particular career. Maybe it was a bad choice that you avoided, something that would have dragged you down or put you on a path of misery. Perhaps it was a near miss like my experience on the road last night. Or it could be that something bad did happen, and we think about how much better our lives would be if it hadn't.

I wonder about why God chooses to intervene sometimes, and other times He does not. I guess its similar to the question that is raised in the song "God Help the Outcasts" in the Hunchback of Notre Dame:

I don't know if there's a reason

Why some are blessed, some not

Why the few You seem to favor

They fear us, flee us, try not to see us.

I'm not sure that I'll ever get an answer to the whys of this question. One part of dealing with this dilemma is to be thankful to God for the things He did spare us, and for the grace He gives to help deal with difficult things that do happen, whether they are of our own making or not. The second part is developing our compassion and grace in relating to those who have to deal with the results of tragedies. The key is to remember, with D. L. Moody, the reality that that person, but for the grace of God, is me.