This blog like the many others that I have written have been
personal and have shown some of the emotions that I have felt and experience in
life and life in Uganda. Being personal causes me to be vulnerable, which I
hope and pray that through these blogs God is able to speak to you, because
these are not for the glorification of myself these are about glorifying Christ
and showing what He is doing in my life. I have had much time to reflex being
on my rural homestay, which I will blog about later on. Much of that reflection
has been about community, compassion, and how the two are so interconnected.
The word compassion comes from the Latin words pati and cum, which
together means to suffer with. Henri Nouwen stated, “Compassion asks us to go
where it hurts, to enter into places of pain, to share in brokenness, fear,
confession, and aguish. Compassion challenges us to cry out with those in
misery, to mourn with those who are lonely, to weep with those in tears.
Compassion requires us to be weak with the weak, vulnerable with the
vulnerable, and powerless with the powerless.” I believe that Nouwen stated it
best. Which made me wonder why is showing compassion and being compassionate so
hard for me. I believe that something we desire to get ahead, to have the best
job, and to be unlike the people around us. We do not want to suffer with
other. It put us into a place, which we would not be in control; we to would have
to experience the moment of powerlessness and weakness and to suffer with
another person. This is why I think I run away from showing true compassion
with someone whom is going through a time of heartache. However, since being in
Uganda I have been able to push past that fear and be able to hurt, cry, and be
angry with the people around me. In those moment is when I feel Immanuel, God
with us. I also think back at my life when I dealt with pain and suffering; and
what I remember in that in the moments of pain and suffering someone sat with
me and just let me cry. In the moment of hurt is the person who may not know
what to say or do, but that they just wanted to be present. I believe that one
of the mysteries of God’s love is not that He takes away our pain but that God
first wants to share that pain with us.
So how does community play into this? Compassion is not an individual person way of living; however, it is a way to live together with other humans. I have notice in my personal life when I feel like I have no community is when the struggles of life come crashing down. Quoting Nouwen again, “ But in the community gathered in Christ’s name, there is an unlimited space into which strangers form different places with very different stories can enter and experience God’s compassionate presence.” Moreover, community is not the people in your physical surroundings. I believe that the quality of community is a deep sense of being gathering in God. I find strength nothing that people in States, are praying for me throughout my experience in Uganda and throughout my life; from my home church, my home community, to friends from Judson College. In Job, he had three friends come and visit him for 7 days. Upon arriving they ripe their cloths and then sat with him for 7 days not saying anything. Which to me illustrates what true compassion and community looks like; sharing in the pain and suffering with them. I’m going to end with this quote from Nouwen, “To us, who cry out from the depth of our brokenness for a hand that will touch us, an arm that can embrace us, a word that speaks too us here and now, and a heart that is not afraid of our fears and tremblings; to us, who feel our own pain as no others human being feels it, has felt it, or ever will feel it and who are always waiting for someone who dares to come close-to us a person has come who could truly say, “ I am with you.” Jesus Christ, who is God-with-us, has come to us in the freedom of love, not needing to experience our human condition but freely choosing to do so out of love.”
So how does community play into this? Compassion is not an individual person way of living; however, it is a way to live together with other humans. I have notice in my personal life when I feel like I have no community is when the struggles of life come crashing down. Quoting Nouwen again, “ But in the community gathered in Christ’s name, there is an unlimited space into which strangers form different places with very different stories can enter and experience God’s compassionate presence.” Moreover, community is not the people in your physical surroundings. I believe that the quality of community is a deep sense of being gathering in God. I find strength nothing that people in States, are praying for me throughout my experience in Uganda and throughout my life; from my home church, my home community, to friends from Judson College. In Job, he had three friends come and visit him for 7 days. Upon arriving they ripe their cloths and then sat with him for 7 days not saying anything. Which to me illustrates what true compassion and community looks like; sharing in the pain and suffering with them. I’m going to end with this quote from Nouwen, “To us, who cry out from the depth of our brokenness for a hand that will touch us, an arm that can embrace us, a word that speaks too us here and now, and a heart that is not afraid of our fears and tremblings; to us, who feel our own pain as no others human being feels it, has felt it, or ever will feel it and who are always waiting for someone who dares to come close-to us a person has come who could truly say, “ I am with you.” Jesus Christ, who is God-with-us, has come to us in the freedom of love, not needing to experience our human condition but freely choosing to do so out of love.”
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