April 15, 2008
Dear Friends,
The days of April are quickly passing me by. One of my friends has officially declared winter dead, although we did experience some icy mix in Omaha last weekend and just barely survived its death rattle. I have many ideas (fantasies, really) of a lush garden growing in the plot next the building where I rent. Dreams of homegrown and brightly colored tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, and flowers are tempered by my complete lack of skill for growing things.
You will find a special spring treat in this letter. Our new prayer card! Mandy, Jara, and Daphne are my dear friends and co-workers on the Advocacy Team. Please pray for us when you remember. Your prayers are powerful support to us. Every Wednesday the Advocacy Team starts the day by specifically praying for you, our supporters. We each have about two hundred people that support us with friendship, prayer, and funds; we pray for you as a group and as individuals as your needs are made known to us. We pray for your churches, families, Sunday school and communities. We pray for your spiritual and physical health, we pray for your relationships, we thank God for you and we pray that God's heart for the poor will be prophetically made known among you.
You will see Jara Sturdivant's picture and stats on the reverse side of the postcard. Jara will be my traveling partner in May when I go to Freetown, Sierra Leone. Please pray that God will prepare our hearts as we make this visit. The dates of our trip are May 12 – 24. We visit our fields to offer staff development and encouragement and to receive a renewed vision of God's work among the poor. Look for a report on our travels in my July prayer letter.
Enjoying Spring Days,
Marcia Ghali
P.S. See my reflections on the latest Beggars Society Meeting on the reverse side of this letter. (Or below if you are reading this on the internet machine).
On Sunday at Beggars Society, the advocacy meeting that I coordinate, we had a simple evening of reflections on obedience by Father Bert Thelen and Elizabeth Day along with small group discussion. Obedience is one of the lifestyle celebrations of Word Made Flesh: "We celebrate total obedience which intimacy demands. Our obedience is our response and responsibility to the grace of Jesus." In preparation for our meeting I read parts of Eugene Peterson's, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, he uses Psalm 132 to explain obedience. I'd like to share my reflections from that reading below.
A collective memory of faithfulness is the foundation for obedience. Hope is the vision and energy of obedience. In the first half of Psalm 132 the Israelites remember the faithfulness of God by invoking the long and harried history of the Ark of the Covenant. Carried through the dessert, welded in war, lost to foreign conquerors and recovered by David. They remember the Ark of the Covenant as the sign of God's presence among them. They remember how it was misused as a talisman in battle. And the joy of restoration. The last half of the Psalm paints a picture of hope for new world. The enemies of David and God, will be dressed in dirty rags while his children will wear crowns that sparkles. Evil and injustice will be banished. God's presence among us is a promise of freedom. It's a picture of feet planted on the ground in the faithfulness of God and a leap of faith like a child to what we know He is promising. The kingdom is coming in our obedience and faithfulness to God's presence among us. We are faithful and obedient to his presence among us when we feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and visit those in prison.
Here are the discussion prompts we used at the Beggars Society Meeting:
1. What examples of obedience can you identify in the lives of those around you or in
your own life?
2. How can we obey God if we do not know God. What do you think about when
you think about God? Do you see any deformations in your picture of God?
3. Obedience is born in a foundation of God's presence. In what ways can you
identify God's presence in your life? In your community's history? In biblical history?
4. How does obedience confront or confirm you idea of power?
5. Who are we (the non-poor) asked to obey?
6. Who are the poor asked to obey?
7. How do we honor the most vulnerable in our obedience to God?
You can access the audio of the Obedience Beggars Society here: http://www.wordmadeflesh.com/learn/beggarssociety_archive.html