Trips Blog

Sara Miles, an Episcopal priest and an extraordinary theologian of earthy spirituality, calls it “the most important word in the Bible”: with.

Seven or eight years ago I came across her short essay, entitled with those words, and it deeply impacted me. It echoed what I have learned after 111
mission/vision trips: the most significant thing we can do when we travel to encounter God’s work in another place is just to “show up” …to be with.

Coming back from Aalma Ech-Chaab after worshipping there yesterday, I have struggled for a way to frame our Sunday. Upon waking up this morning, it came to me from Mark’s sermon about his friend Barnabas, from Acts 4:32-36. Check it out along with many stories of Barnabas and Paul as Luke tells their stories in Acts. And there was my frame: Luke. When I did a brief foray into a master’s program on ministry, I loved my New Testament professor who had spent much time in Syria. When Dr. Brubaker was teaching us on Acts, he asked if we could be a character in those stories, which would we choose. I chose Luke himself, because he was the recorder/storyteller, so to speak. That has been my joyful task on this journey.

It came to me this morning after a good night’s sleep: how to tie together the morning and the afternoon of Friday, and I have come up with a new parable.

The kingdom of God is like inside kittens on the fresh grass...let those with ears hear.

We spent the latter half of the day up in the mountains at Hamlin Hospital, a care facility and rehab center that began life over 100 years ago as a hospital to treat patients with tuberculosis. It is run by Sana Koreh, who bears the legacy of the woman who founded this place, Dr. Mary Eddy, and the woman who trained Sana as a nurse during the Lebanese war (1975-1990), Mrs. Winnie Nucho. The parable is about all three of these women who have imbued Hamlin with a spirit that exudes from the walls.

The brand new door was ajar and awaiting our arrival (the old door had been blown away by the August 4 explosion in the port). We caught a glimpse of a picture of Jesus on the wall within and noticed a sign on the door. It announced that tailoring services could be found here, and soon we would meet that tailor/seamstress Jacqueline, who lived here with her special needs sister, Lodi.

We had come here with partners from the Synod who work for the Compassion Protestant Society, the Synod’s diaconal arm. I had met Joyce Sakr over Zoom but this was my first encounter with CPS’s new executive director, Fadi Riachi. Both combined caring and competence in equal measures, and as we walked the street where the nearby blast had crumbled building facades and left a “carpet” of glass inches thick upon which to drive, I was grateful that Outreach had joined with this ministry, within days of the explosion, to provide resources for more needy families to begin repairs in their humble homes.

Compare Jesus’s words in the book of Mark, tenth chapter, fourteenth verse, and echoed in Matthew and Luke, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these,” to the words of a juvenile court judge in Beirut speaking of street children: “Why do you care? They come from the streets and they will return to the streets.”

We spent the morning at the Home of Hope Beirut, a ministry of the Lebanese Evangelical Society, which also oversees Blessed School, which we spoke of earlier in our trip. The words “home” and “hope” are linked together here in the most blessed way. Home of Hope is a one-of-a-kind ministry in the densely packed city of Beirut and its surrounding area. Abused children – sexually, physically, emotionally – who have been living on the streets, many trafficked, are placed by court order in their loving hands. There are currently nineteen here, ages 7-18.