JoeTucker’s Weblog

This is a question I am often asked on the phone, via facebook, etc. And to be honest it’s hard to answer succinctly. Sometimes I say things are “intense,” because they are. It is intense always being in ministry, living with 5 people, meeting neighbors in a new place, and of course there is the immensity of the city itself, intense indeed.

But it’s good. So I sometimes will say that on the phone or in a facebook message. But ‘good’ doesn’t do this experience justice (and trust me Mission Year is all about justice). It’s not ‘good’ in the sense of, “Oh life’s good” as we shrug our shoulders; which we all know only means that life is boring or uneventful or the same-old-same-old. And my life in Philly has hardly been that. Many days are different here, with new challenges, excitements, encouragements, and/or sad/joyful realizations. So ‘good’ just doesn’t work. The curse of semantics!

So we return to the original question. How are things in Philadelphia? Good? Yes. Intense? Assuredly. But something more…worthwhile. Worthwhile, as in the awkwardness, the trials, hardships, new lessons, and challenges are worth it.
Worthwhile in the sense that the ‘joe’ that emerges from the year will not be the same ‘joe’ that entered into it not more than two months ago.

Worthwhile in the sense that absolutely nothing we do, no one we know, nothing we own is of greater worth than knowing Christ and growing in His likeness and love.

Word!

Grace and peace.

Some of you may have thought that with all my new experiences in Philadelphia that I would have developed new passions and left behind some of my old passions such as the campaign to spread the joy and depth and beauty of facial hair. Well rest assured that I am still concerned about facial hair in both Akron, and Philly and the world.

My roommate Chris has a fantastic beard that I have encouraged him to continue to grow. There is a man who I work for at a Medical Clinic in Kensington (a district of Philly) who has recently started growing a beard and I have encouraged him in this endeavor as well. And it is great to come to this city and to work with people and encourage them to grow out their beards.

Philly has warmly embraced the beard. I often see men on the subway with thick beards. Walking throughout the city there are regal beards, tattered beards, well-cut beards, the classic college scruff beard. The whole works.

But there is also resistance to the beard trend. There are still those who mock and encourage men to shave their beards. But rest assured that I am working hard to continue to fight for the continued rights and freedoms of beards everywhere.

Grace and peace.

So my bike seat was stolen today. The bike I still have, the tires are still there, but the seat…

Which does indeed make riding a little harder (I used a lot of different muscles and didn’t sit down for 30 minutes, while riding hunched or erect up and down the main streets of Philly). I have a great many things on my mind and suspect that I will not be able to get them out in any reasonable order, but will try anyway for the sake of my own comprehension as well as the understanding of my readers (desperate for a blog post after a two week drought!).

Thought one: Interdependence. This is a big Mission Year buzz word. Essentially it means that we depend on one another. I’ve been reflecting on the idea a lot. The idea that rather than pursuing independence (depending on solely ourselves) we should put ourselves in positions where we actually need one another. One example given to us of this was lawnmowers. Everyone needs to have their lawns mowed, but does everyone on the block need their own individual lawn mower?? So the question we are often prompted with within our community is not necessarily how can we serve the community, but how can we better put ourselves in a position where we can mutually serve the needs of the community and have the community serve us?

Thought two: The Cost of discipleship. I reread some Bonhoeffer this week and reread Luke 14. I had to remember that following Christ was more worthwhile than anything else. Without that truth this year is foolish (incredibly foolish). Furthermore I personally have been recounting the cost of following Christ (the Bible tells us that this is a good thing to do, consider Luke 14!) And more so asking questions and beginning to seek answers. How does following Christ intersect with my dreams of success and accomplishment? To what end does God “reimburse” you for the sacrifices you lay before Him? Or does He? Stuff like that. I’m having a hard time expressing them presently, but I’m sure I’ll post more thoroughly at some point.

Thought three: I miss mathematics. I tutored various students in algebra, fractions, and negative numbers today, and I realized that I miss the intellectual stimulation of advanced math. Craziness, I know. Oh and I am confident that I could get a job in Philly teaching just fractions, the school systems here have done a horrid job of teaching basic mathematics.

Thought four: Anti-racist. Mission Year has us read various books to enhance our experiences, ones such book is “Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together In the Cafeteria” by Tatum (an excellent read thus far that I would highly recommend). Essentially one of her claims is that whites need to be actively anti-racist in order to confront racism today. Very interesting (and controversial) stuff.

Thought five: A proverb, that is a mission year favorite, that I plan on reflecting on later: Without oxen a stall is clean, And great is the increase by the power of the ox.

Think on these things

Grace and peace

Every week in Mission Year we fill out Weekly Reflection forms. These are forms to help us put into words the emotions, thoughts, insights, experiences, and truths that we are experiencing, understanding, etc. while in the city serving as we are. There is a slot every week entitled “Justice” where we are supposed to write about how we see justice enacted or where we see injustice present.

For the first few weeks I have struggled on what exactly to write in this section. It is not that I haven’t seen “injustice” so to speak, rather I haven’t been able to fully express what it was that was “un-”just about it. Until today.

My scheduling is beginning to coalesce and this Thursday afternoon I was able to help the school that we work with host their gym class. I should use the term gym here lightly, because the school itself is operated out of a large house and doesn’t have a gym. They drive their kids to the closest park, which is only a few blocks away. The gym teacher, Daryll (who attends our church and is a genuinely authentic, funny, and likeable person!), lead the kids in jumping jacks, stretches, push-ups, and to my delight a game of ultimate Frisbee (which isn’t so ultimate when playing with 4^th-8^th graders, but hey you take what you can get!!).

It was during the picking of teams that one of the kids came to me with a small object in his hand. It was a bullet. He had found a bullet on the ground. I squelched his excitement (yes the child was excited to find a bullet…) by having him get rid of it promptly. But this brief experience has stayed with me for the rest of the day.

I never found a bullet in the park growing up. I never knew of any friends who found bullets in public parks where kids exercise and play on playgrounds.

And I can recall speaking to some of the nurses and staff at Esperanza Medical center (a non-profit health clinic where I volunteer twice a week doing medical billing/grant writing) while they discussed the morality vs. necessity of putting sharp boxes in parks (boxes for sharp bio-hazard objects, such as used needles; makes sense in a hospital, seems most unfit for a park). They fancied their conversation to the condom debate: we don’t want them to shoot up in the park (have pre-marital sex) but if they’re going to do it anyway, they may at least have a safe place to throw away the needle.

I never found a used needle in a park. I didn’t have any friends who found used needles in our local parks.

And there we have it, injustice. Something I was privileged not to have to endure is common place to the people here. To my neighbors here. To me now. It’s not right for bullets to be found in parks. The whole debate over whether to have a sharp box in a park or not is despairingly saddening.

And as Christians we are called to do something about it. To “restore the broken walls of the city” and “defend the cause of the oppressed” I look forward to filling you in on how that is lived out in my life. (How is it lived out in yours….)

Grace and Peace

I have a theory considering thunderstorms. My theory is such: any thematic scene is enhanced by a thunderstorm. Consider such movies as Jurassic Park, V for Vendetta, The Shawshank Redemption, and for the ladies out there The Notebook. All great movies (debatably), all with fantastic thunderstorm scenes.

Such it is for me in Philadelphia thus far. My first full day in the city with my team, it poured as we explored our neighborhood, I considered it my Baptism. Now I sit inside as a thunderstorm approaches, the soothing drop of rain, the blue elucidation of lightning, and the powerful roar of thunder, and the still but quiet voice of the Word of God.

I finished studying I and II Corinthians and decided to start reading I Peter. And as God would have it (as He so often does, in ways some think casual others observe as serendipitous) it was the exact chapter I needed to read (hear).

If you stay current with my blog updates (which you should!) I recently commented on how I am not having a lot of fun (I am having some fun mind you. However the shift to “some” fun from “maximum” fun, which is how I often lived in Akron, has been challenging). I commented that I am seeking out great joy, but this joy has seemed at best elusive, at times nonexistent.

And then I read I Peter. And the Word truly for me became the Living Word, speaking directly to me, my situation, my arrogance, my insecurities, my longings. It spoke of a “living hope” and how after brief trials that refine our faith we would be ‘filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.”

And my eyes matched the skies.

I have been in Philadelphia now for over 4 weeks, and all this time I have been searching for this “deep joy,” when all along it has been here, the goal of my faith, the salvation of my soul. And I can recall reading this passage at an earlier time in my life and wondering what it meant. I reasoned that our souls were already saved by Jesus on the Cross, yet now as I look upon these words once again and contemplate my own situation (and more than likely the situation of the recipients of Peter’s letter) I have come to understand that we are indeed saved by the work of Christ on the Cross, but moreover (and how much more glorious) we are continually brought into salvation, as we continually die unto ourselves.

And what is salvation? Looking and living like Christ! What an inexpressible and glorious joy!! “For though you have not seen Him, you love Him; and even though you do not see Him now, you believe in Him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.”

May you too be filled with the inexpressible and glorious joy of living as Christ, whatever the cost.

Grace and Peace