Deep Breaths

Right now we are flooded with campers....lovely little middle schoolers cavorting through our buildings, banging on our doors for fun, destroying our property and disrespecting the staff and neighbours (like the people who stood outside their church van at 8am this morning in the parking lot blaring Christian worship songs from the speakers). My custodial, a wonderful sweet older lady, was bemoaning the toils of having to clean up after these kids on a daily basis and she said something I will never forget: 'In all that they are teaching these kids about Jesus in their camp sessions, can't they show them how to respect others and their property?' The camp counselors often gather their students in the lobby right outside my office door and I can usually hear their conversations if I am at my desk. The other night I overheard a rather lengthy discussion about drugs and he was advising his young listeners not to smoke pot because there were far greater rewards in their crown in heaven if they avoided such things. Later that night, the same students were not smoking pot but they did keep wiping off my 'do not enter' sign from the whiteboard on our apartment door and then banging on it and running off laughing.

I do not intend to undermine the counselor who gave sound advice to his students to avoid taking drugs, I applaud his care and love for these kids. What does concern me is that I have spent a lot of my time with youth groups saying and focussing on the same kinds of messages 'don't do .... because of.....' instead of pointing out all that we can and should be actually doing. John often has said to me that God asks us to give up something only in the place of something far greater. He offers perfect beauty and intimacy in marriage in place of relationships without full commitment, emotional freedom of grace and forgiveness in the place of bitterness, revenge and hatred, charity and blessings for everyone over personal gain and material objects.

What are we replacing for our students if all we're giving them is a list of don'ts? I am more convinced than ever that we should all be looking at who we are at our core and how we are impacting our world by our choices. Shouldn't we be teaching our students about the character of Christ; about what it means to take up your cross and follow him (which doesn't just mean give up drugs, sex etc but truly lay down our core of selfishness) and how we are to practically love others as ourselves? What should we be doing because of who we are? Maybe the other things wouldn't be such a struggle for our students if they were focusing on all that has to be done and not just what they should be avoiding.

Living on campus, right in the middle of downtown Cleveland, at the heart of a residential area, I often wonder what the people around us think of Lee and more importantly of Christ. One of the unofficial slogans here is 'a campus where Christ is King'. In this community we have provided a great many services. From supplying all kinds of jobs and industry to Cleveland, either through students' purchasing power or the filling of positions around campus, to the hundreds of hours of community service projects every semester, Lee's impact is definately felt. The students are required to go to Chapel, we have prayer groups, social justice clubs, small groups, conservative lifestyle guidelines and not forgetting that everyone gets a minor in Bible - surely it seems as if all the bases have been covered. However, is Christ holistically King here? I think about how money is (and isn't) spent, the tactics used to aquire donors and feed enrollment numbers, the hierarchy and the job expectations, the Pentecostal snobbery and of course the way the employees are treated. More than any of these, the one thing I worry about the most, is the message sent to our immediate neighbours. As it has constantly expanded, Lee has been consuming its way through surrounding property and as a result we are face to face with many local residents. Right at my back door, there are several elderly people and families who indirectly interact with us on a daily basis. Here is my question? Do they think Christ is King on our campus? In our lives? When we take up their parking spots or wake them up with loud noises, or buy them out of their property for our new dorms, what do they think of Lee? What do they think of Christ? You see, people really take note of what we say about ourselves- they look to see if we are genuinely following what we claim. Does Lee completely know and embrace the responsibility of making such a statement as 'a campus where Christ is King'?

Looking around at the Christian world, especially here and in the West in general, it seems that we have watered down this identity of Christian to something less than the huge task entrusted to us. Just like Lee, we are telling the world that we are following Christ and moving towards becoming like Him more and more everyday, that we are willing to lay down our entire lives for the love of our God and others but are we perhaps picking and chosing what we like and/or what is easiest? Will people look at me and say 'there goes someone with the love of Christ overflowing in her heart' or will they spit in my wake as they mutter 'hypocrite'?

We are never going to be perfect (I think of the apostle Paul and his famous words about the struggle of what we want to be doing and what we actually do). Being a Christian is one of the hardest and most challenging lifestyles one could choose to follow. My issue is not that we are necessarily failing at being perfect but moreso that 1) we cannot seem to be honest about our truly sinful selves and 2) we don't enter into this commitment as we should. No one should get married thinking 'well I will give this idea of being a wife a go and if I can't be faithful- no worries!' What we do is go into it fully aware about the kind of relationship we are signing up for and promising to do our best against all odds- I didn't get married thinking I would be the perfect wife, but I definately didn't think, "seeing as I can cook well it won't matter if I am mean to John at dinner!" But isn't that kind of how we look at our commitment to loving God and loving others? I can pray really well so it doesn't matter if I am rude to the person serving me coffee. What would happen to our testimony as Christians if we could be honest about who we are but give it our all to let people see Christ through us? What if Lee tried to follow a slogan like 'we are a campus constantly trying to let Christ be King even though we are not there yet but this is our ulitmate goal because that's what being a Christian college is all about- let us know how we're doing'.

I am Leia, a woman trying to let Christ be King over her heart and although I daily fail, this is what I am committed to- please fogive me for my shortcomings but help me see how to do better!