Little Earth

Okay, I should totally be doing homework right now, but...

Instead of going to the church downtown for a normal Friday night kids club, we handed out fliers, with the help of a bunch of the kids, for an event that will be going on next weekend. The development we were in -- where a lot of the Friday night kids live -- was called Little Earth, and it's a Native American housing complex. It's actually a nice place, although packed really tight for the number of people living there, and, my word, Jessica is in love.

Going made me miss the Rez so bad, but I definitely have a new favorite place in the Cities. Those kids are gorgeous, and I very much did not want to leave after only being there such a short time. If Nicaragua didn't have such a strong, strong pull on my heart, I could easily settle down on the Rez or in a place like Little Earth and spend the rest of my life just living there and loving on those people. (If anyone has a cloning machine or some other magical way to reconcile the two worlds, please, let me know. It would make life a gillion times simpler.)

The rest of my team was very much in culture shock mode -- even more so than after a normal Friday night -- which shouldn't have surprised me as much as it did. Something about realizing for the first time that being white can be a detriment to ministry can take some processing -- I think it was the first time most of them had heard the phrase "I hate white people" come out of a kid's mouth, or any one's mouth for that matter.

Maybe I'm nuts for not being as shocked and appalled as they are, but, if I am, I never want to be sane. I never want to see those kids as anything other than beautiful. I never want to let the rough elements of Native culture and history prevent me from binding my heart to theirs. I never want to feel the need to apologise to someone after they spend time in Little Earth. I always want to remember, and I always want to care.

If I am insane, may God use it to his glory.