que pasa

On Sunday, Mr. T (one of my home church missionaries working in Middle Country) shared a message which struck a chord deep in me. I generally look forward to his sharing because his messages succinct and "fat-free". I’ve articulated my takeaway from his latest sharing once but I think it has become significant enough to share with all.

In Luke 13:6-9, Jesus told the parable of the barren fig tree. Mr. T interpreted the parable to be that Papa is the keeper who pleaded with the owner to give the barren fig tree one more year to live, during which the keeper would nourish the tree, so that it might have the chance to bear fruit. Typically, I would have interpreted the parable differently, that Papa was the owner who agreed to give another the fig tree another chance, but the conclusion reached would still be the same.

This different perspective is interesting to me because as I look back on my move to Shanghai, I also see that Papa is the keeper the in the parable. Chengdu was, to use one of Jukebox’s phrases, a negative-positive experience in my life. It was very rough, and even dark at times, but all in all, I have emerged a more mature (but less healthy in all respects) person. Shanghai has and continues to be even more trying and challenging professionally, but it is an environment within which I am gradually recovering my spiritual health. I feel that going to Shanghai has been Papa's way of keeping me, nourishing me, giving me one more year – not so much an actual time period, bur more like another chance.

So, coming back to Mr. T, his challenge was that how could we be like the keeper in the parable? How could we be somebody who gives another person that provides nourishment to another so that they would have "one more year" to recover and bear fruit?

What scares me about responding to this challenge is that Papa will ask me for the one thing that I have resisted for the longest time. To care for the people of Middle Country - people whom I have criticized and whined about many times in this blog, people I do not love and cannot imagine caring for. Yet at the same time it is clear that I should love my neighbors, and it’s obvious who my neighbors are, and that I care not for them.

There is another group of neighbors though that is emerging – people in my small group in Shanghai. While I already like these people, to care for them would mean investing in relationships – and that takes a lot of effort to build – something that I am also hesitant to do. As I write this, I realize now how self-centered I have become and will continue to be if I do not arrest this.

I am also concerned with how my home church small group is doing. I think that it is a phase all such groups go through, and can only hope that we will emerge stronger and better for this. Yet I feel that I have no right to say too much because I am not physically present. Truth is, I have not done much by way of keeping relationships either.

Perhaps therein lies the problem. Papa is a relationship keeper, but I have become poor at that. I have been so preoccupied with my own problems that I cannot see the bigger picture anymore. Maybe this is what my Shanghai experience is, a time for nourishment and recovery so that I may be able to provide the something similar for others. We'll see.