I bummed this blog...

I bummed this quote from a friend's blog, and it has really spoken to me this weekend about friendships I've developed here and in the past, about relationships I've been in, about children I've lived with and worked with...

"If forming friendships with exploited people is important to us, we will be drawn into some complicated situations. We will probably get splashed with some of the ambiguity and uncertainty. Can we really be friends of war criminals and girls who abuse their unborn children? What does it mean—for us, for them, for mission?Ambiguities often cause us to pull away. The circumstances are too tainted, too unclear. We worry about becoming complicit in the evil, about facilitating the wrong or being personally corrupted. It’s not just these very dramatic circumstances that challenge us—anyone who has a family member or close friend who struggles with an addiction knows about some of these questions.We want to fix things and people. As Christians, we long to bring healing to broken circumstances and to be instruments of God’s reconciling and healing work. Americans tend to take that a step further and expect to be able to solve problems quickly, on our terms and with our tools. But that assumes a level of power and control that is sometimes unavailable and often inappropriate."—

“Friendship at the Margins: Discovering Mutuality in Service and Mission,” by Chris Heuertz and Christine Pohl (IVP, 2010): page 96

I've always desired to love those who are living on the "margins," the ones who are among the "least" of us. The ones others may say are unlovable. The broken. Or the people who I feel like I can "fix." These type of relationships have the ability to be very tricky, to say the least. Not to mention, we all are broken in so many ways. But I do feel a strong leading to live on the margins. To be available to all people. To be translucent and open, and not fearful of people and cirsumstances that are somehow different than how I was raised, or how I believe. But this is not always so simple...it's hard sometimes to trust, and hard not to place my desires for these people above what God desires for them. To surrender my efforts to fix something or change something, and instead realize that it's not by me, but only from the Holy Spirit that change can occur. Or love can flow. It's through the Holy Spirit, by God's grace. Not anything Emily can accomplish by befriending someone. But even though these relationships sometimes scare me, and sometimes I worry about what others may think, I know that I'm in the right place, and I pray to God that he continues to show me things and reveal things to me through these relationships and friendships. I need patience and strength and a deeper love than my own!