Home

Snow, but still dry

For the past month or so, it has snowed multiple feet in Yakama. Therefore, when I was there over spring break with a group of students from Pitt, our work and the after-school club that we went to with the kids on the reservation looked different. However, this snow-covered place is usually extraordinarily dry both physically and relationally. So, one of the main parts of the Bible that Sacred Road often refers to is Isaiah 58: 9-11. ".. If you do away with the yoke of oppression, with the pointing finger and malicious talk, and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday. The Lord will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail." To be an oasis or spring in a desert land is to rely on the Lord to fill us up, and only then will be able to pour out and love our first neighbors well.

Loving people like Family

On the Yakama reservation, and on several Native American reservations, there is much relational brokenness. Therefore, different worksite activities that one-week teams do can fill familial/relational roles: for example, by chopping firewood for an elder, we can fill the role of their children or grandchildren. By painting or repairing a home for a family, we can do the same. By giving piggy back rides, doing crafts, and playing jumprope with younger kids, we can fill the older sibling or parental role that may be missing in their lives.
During spring break of 2019, I had the opportunity to paint a set of bunk beds in a bus that we helped turn into temporary housing!

Making low the Mountains, so ALL people can see together

Isaiah 40 has been a passage I've dwelt upon often this semester. When I was in Yakama over spring break 2019, it came to mind again, particularly verses 4 and 5: "Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain shall become level, the rugged places a plain. And the glory of the Lord will be revealed, and all people will see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken." (Isaiah 40:4-5)

Journal Entry

Isaiah 40 is particularly relevant in the context of native america because the Lord seeks to reveal himself to all people. He doesn't chose one type of person or one group of people, and I think this is sometimes forgotten in mainstream America, which is tragic. In reality, the gospel (the truth that the Bible states, where Jesus came and lived and died for us so we could have relationship with God) is true for all nations, all people, for all time. And that's beautiful. In my journal, I wrote: (with pseudonym Sam for security/protection)

Lord, reading Isaiah 40 makes me think of Sam. Sam, who can't see over the seats of the bus yet, Sam who has the same set of clothes and hat for every kid's club, who has the most beautiful round, discerning and yet completely unassuming eyes. Sam, who isn't get 4 or 5 but who knows how to say "shut up" to her brothers and how to hit to defend herslef. Sam, who hasn't had her face cleaned or nose wiped in days. Sam is yours, Lord. But, she doesn't know you. She doesn't receive love well, mostly because she may not receive it often enough. I pray that you would level the mountains and make low the hills , so she can see over the seat of the bus, over the hills around Yakama valley, over the mistreatment or non-treatment she's experienced, over the ravaging of her community and destruction of her childhood.. over it all, that she would see You and know Your love for her.