"She doesn't have a name"

We were sitting together in a circle as a first grade class, each repeating the simple phrase on the board, “The name of my mother is___” and filling in the name of our own “mamá”. As each child finished the sentence with great excitement to share the name of their mom, it finally landed on one small student who looked up and quietly refused to complete the sentence. Eventually, the teacher was able to coax out the following:

“She doesn’t have a name.”

“She doesn’t have a name? Of course she does. Every mom has a name!”

“No. She doesn’t have a name.”

After a short time I watched her move on to the next child and finish the activity, but this conversation kept repeating in my head. How can you not know the name of your own mom?

Maybe it was cultural, and his parents were called by their last names more frequently. Or with this student, he was just being stubborn and wanting to create a scene. That had to be it I concluded, he was just being his usual self and pretending he didn’t know what was happening in class.

A few days later we learned something very important.

They were an immigrant family recently come to the United States. Only a father in the picture. A father working multiple jobs just trying to make it here in this country. No money for school supplies, for new shoes, or a school uniform.

He doesn’t know her name.

He doesn’t have a mamá.

This week I have been spending a lot of time meditating on the concept of knowing the Lord. Not knowing Him in the sense of understanding a lot of things about Him, or even knowing His Word. Not having all the right answers to all of the questions, or being able to repeat the ten commandments or knowing how to live “morally.”

I’m talking about KNOWING Him. Knowing Him so closely and intimately that at times it’s like you can feel His breath on your back.

Walking so closely with Jesus that when temptation and sin are at war within your heart, so is a love and desire for the Lord. Feeling your heart break for the same things the heart of Jesus broke over.

Weeping at the sin in your life and running to the cross in repentance because you desire so badly for reconciliation with this God.

Do we have that? Do I have that?

Chicago is such a different world to me. Right now I feel “home” is becoming similar to Mexico with the culture, language, and feel of the neighborhood. This weekend I had the opportunity to visit an area of Chicago heavily populated by Pakistani’s and it felt like I had just flown into another country. As I went downtown, it felt overpopulated by Starbucks and consumerism feeding to the white, middle class culture. Such different worlds. Even when I took the bus home I noticed that before the main street leading into Little Village, every single African American got off the bus. Very clearly noticeable was the dividing line between the two communities. An unspoken word between two cultures speaking very clearly where the lines cannot cross. At this place, they are no longer welcome.

And through seeing just the tiniest speck of culture in Chicago, it has all screamed very loudly, “Do you know Him?!!!”

It’s easy to feel the darkness here in certain places, on specific streets, on different corners. The same haunting darkness travels through the city, and this voice inside me starts whimpering as I look around at the millions of people, “Do you know Him?” And yet it’s the same feeling that comes when my car drives through Eureka. “Do you know Him here?” It has begun calling out louder and louder at my apartment, “Do you know Him here?”

And it’s one that beats on in my own heart every day here. “Am I pressing in to know Him?”

I have found answers to such questions often require time. Silence. Reflection. Meditation. Worship. Questioning. Struggling. Fighting lies. Trusting. Clinging to the Word. Hoping in the promises. Waiting.

But the incredible thing even in this constant wrestle to know Him deeper?

I know the name of my best friend, my Perfect Father, my greatest Lover, my King, my Savior and Redeemer, the One who has come to rescue and redeem, the One who makes all things new again, the One who picks up every broken piece and speaks breath and life into it, the One who brings dignity to the forgotten and neglected, the One who prays for me daily, the One who knows the deepest parts of my inner being and sees every mistake, every sin, every mess, every wrong motive, every doubt, the One who is high and seated in His throne….

He told us His name. I don’t have to ask who He is.

He isYahweh.

It’s like I feel His breath on my shoulders when I write it. Yahweh is here. Yahweh has come. Yahweh has KNOWN me.

And He WANTS so badly for me to know Him too.

By whispering His intimate and most personal name, He extends His nail pierced hand and gently calls out, “Come. Come eat with Me. Come commune with Me. Come know my goodness, my mercy, my love, my discipline, my character, all that I am. Come be with Me. Come let me heal you. Come let me make beautiful things out of your mess. I want you. I love you.”

I cried when I found out my student doesn’t know the name of his mom because he doesn’t have one.

And I cried the first time this great God came down to me and spoke life into a deadened soul and whispered gently, “I am Yahweh. Your God.”

And sometimes up here I cry when I talk to Him. Because it’s so amazing that He is fighting way harder than any effort I ever put forth for me to know Him.

I am so longing for the day when all things are made final and complete, healed and whole forever. In my own life. In the lives of those I love. But while I wait in the darkness here for that completion, the voice has started to echo louder and louder, “Tell them. Tell them you know Him. And that they can know Him too!”

(2 Corinthians 5:20) “Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us.”

Chicago

“I’ve lived in this neighborhood for over 5 years and I’m still considered an outsider. It takes a long time to become on the inside of this community. It means going out of your way and partnering with organizations already doing something here. And even if you do that, it takes a really long for you to become even a part of the inside with them. You’re a visitor to this neighborhood this next year. This isn’t your home. Remember that.”

Welcome to Chicago! This was one of the first pieces of advice I was given by someone here in the community upon arriving at my new “home” for the next year.

“Remember, you are just a visitor. This is not your home.”

They were right you know. I’m clearly not at home here. Spanish is not my first language, I’m a different race than 99% of the people living here, and I bring in a whole new culture to this world. No matter how long I stay, or how hard I attempt, I can never become a complete part of their culture. It wasn’t mine to begin with. I wasn’t born into it.

For the first time apart from my study abroad experience, I’m now living as a visitor in someone else’s culture. I’ve become the minority in language, culture, race, and even religion. And in some new ways I have not previously known, I have been reminded of Home.

I feel it when I have to communicate in Spanish. I feel it when I pass people on the street and there is a split second where I’m not sure whether I should say “hello” or “hola.” I feel it when I go for a walk and see the diving lines of communities by the physical landmarks that have been set up. Or when I pass the archway so clearly built as one enters the community that says “Bienvenidos a La Villita.”

And you know what? It is so good for me to be a part of the “outsiders.” So good for me to be the minority. Why? Because I am so reminded of the gospel.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word WAS God….And the word became FLESH and DWELT among us…” (John 1)

God Himself- the Creator of all things, the One who holds it all together in the palm of His hand, the One who just SPOKE and things came into being….this God of whom all Creation bows before and screams His praises, who tells the waves just how far they can come on the sand and controls exactly where the lightning strikes- this God who is such a mystery----put on flesh and threw up a tent in our backyard. He moved into our neighborhood. He came to us. Why?

“The Bible from Genesis 3 to Revelation 22 tells the story of a God reckless with desire to get His family back. God struck the decisive blow of reconciliation when He sent the Son on a long journey to planet earth. The Bible’s last scene ends in jubilation, the family united once again.”

It’s the story of a family scattered all over the world. A family that was displaced ever since the garden. We see reminders of this displacement in refugee camps today. Where family members are separated, not knowing when or if they will ever see those they love again. It’s this heartbreaking, most beautiful story ever written. Heartbreaking because the children that were so deeply loved and pursued by the most faithful Father ever known, pushed Him away and ran and hid. Heartbreaking because they thought their way, their sin, was better than Him. And so they were sent on a long, long journey. Out of the garden, out of their home.

But beautiful- because the story didn’t end there. Beautiful because this same God made them a promise that He would come back and rescue them. That someday He would unite the family once again. He promised them His only Son.

And so when the Son came and threw up a tent in our neighborhood, everything changed. Nothing would ever be the same. God Himself had come. Now, instead of just knowing about Him, we could KNOW Him. We could know everything about Him in the most intimate way. He came and sat at our kitchen tables, laughing and sharing stories. We saw Him weep, we saw His heart break for the lost and those who rejected Him, we saw Him angered at the religious who refused to recognize their need for Him, we saw Him pick up the whore from the dust and restore her dignity, we saw Him forgive the sins of the greatest debtors, we saw His incredible patience with the disciples, we saw Him touch the untouchables, we saw Him laugh and play with children, we saw Him pick up the Cross and make the final steps this reconciliation would require. We saw Him make the final choice to give up His spirit and pay in full for the sins of the whole world.

We saw the final hammer fall on the judges table, “It is finished.” The lost children who had been wandering for so long-now, they could come Home. No longer “insiders” and “outsiders” to the faith- but because of the Cross “to all who receive Him, who believe in His name, He gives the right to become the children of God.”

Becoming a visitor in a community not my own is such a reminder to me of the Home to come. When the family will be united once again. All things healed, whole, complete. Forever. And if we really understand grace, and if we really grasp the Cross and the gospel- than all of this will move us to make a decision.

Do we have a relationship with Jesus Christ? Have we truly gone to the Cross and repented of our sin and trusted in Christ alone as the only One who saves? Have we been reconciled to the God of the Universe? And if we have- then what are we doing to make sure the rest of the world knows about this incredible Story?

We should want so badly for all we know to be a part of that celebration. It should change everything about our lives. There are a lot of people I want celebrating with the family when He ends this whole thing. And so I’m going to pray my guts out for them, do all I can to herald the gospel wherever He places me, and trust that Jesus is going to come do some incredible acts of salvation all over the world.

May we be so reminded that this world is not our home, and the Day is coming very soon when He will reunite the family forever.

Sweet Jesus, may You come soon.