Lisa Borden

Of Christmas and How it Comes (an Advent poem)

Lisa Borden — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 07:39:37 -0800

It's hot in East Africa

press down, weighty

hot

The clouds billow up

and plod along the horizon

rumbling

(empty threats)

And I

I don't feel like

putting up

this spindly

branch called

tree

I am saddened

by memories

of Christmas babies

and boys with

gleaming faces

taking it all in

Still

we decorate

(perhaps a tad too somberly)

But in the quiet

morning

Bare feet on

cool tile

I am greeted

by our evening's work

So simple

our selections

so home-made

And joy

breaks in

Unannounced

suddenly present

Oh, dear truth

endlessly modest and

unassuming

You stand there

in the stillness

This

this is the

mystery

Christ

dwells

Emmanuel

Turning on a Dime (from thankful to lustful in sixty seconds)

Lisa Borden — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 11:21:06 -0800

I've just been perusing news about the violence among bargain-crazed shoppers in the U. S. yesterday. "Black Friday" is a national phenomenon when retailers push sales to move themselves out of the red and into the black before the end of the year. It happens on the day after Thanksgiving.

So, we pause. We give thanks. We look around the table and say we're thankful for our families and our friends. We recognize that we are blessed. We say, "I am so thankful!"

But, apparently, it's not enough. It doesn't actually fill us up.

The very next day, we go absolutely mad over manufactured stuff that we HAVE to have.

I'm not above loving a good sale, but the whole thing strikes me as incredibly gross.

We are gross.

And the worst part of it is, we are willingly led down this path. We're told we need this stuff; that our other stuff is outdated and ridiculous.

And we believe it.

Water Like Gold (only much more valuable!)

Lisa Borden — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 09:21:30 -0700

Peter Ole Kukan is a long-time Maasai friend of ours. He sat on our porch yesterday morning and, in the process of chewing the news, let us know that women in his village are walking 2 hours each direction for water these days. They fill jerry cans on the backs of donkeys then begin the 2 hour journey home again. Over the next couple of days, the water is doled out like the precious commodity it is. Not a drop is wasted.

Have you ever seen how dirty your hands get milking a cow? Or handling a goat? Or just living life in a place where water doesn't flow out of taps on-demand?

I wonder how many times I wash my hands in the course of a day...

I'd like to think I'm pretty careful with water. I consider myself aware. I'd like to believe I'm good about electricity, as well. We don't leave lights on that don't actually need to be on. We've changed most of our bulbs to energy-savers.

Still, I've never walked 2 minutes for water, let alone 2 hours. It's there. I take it for granted. It's a basic human right, right?

Actually, no.

These days, when I'm brushing my teeth, I'm more aware than ever about not letting the water gush down the drain as I stand there luxuriously working on oral hygiene. I turn the water off quickly, not just because billions of people are without the basic provision of clean water. I turn the water off quickly because I know these women. I know their names, not just their faces...

I turn my tap off as an act of respect.

Transformation through Empowerment

Lisa Borden — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 07:19:52 -0700

I was freshly out of surgery and in recovery mode at my parents’ home during the final week of The Oprah Winfrey Show. Every afternoon I would sit in my jammies on the sofa and watch the countdown festivities. After 25 years on the air, Oprah was wrapping it up.

What I was most interested in was not the huge hoo-ha of celebrations, fun as they were to watch. No, I kept tuning in because Oprah had promised to reveal which story, of the thousands she had covered, was her number one most favorite story from her entire 25 years on air. The final days of the show were building toward this culmination when Oprah would revisit the story that had most moved, inspired and thrilled her.

Imagine my surprise and delight when the story Oprah chose was that of one African life. The “Queen of Daytime Television” and arguably one of the most powerful people on the planet was unforgettably moved by the tale of one woman whose life was transformed when someone came along and empowered her to reach her dream. This woman was married against her will as a child, kept from the education she longed for and beaten when she talked of hoping to go to school. When she came back to the Oprah show for this final-week episode, she had just completed her Ph.D. Initially denied the opportunity to attend even primary school, she now holds a doctorate degree and is returning to her home community to start a school for children like the child she once was.

“Wow!” I thought, leaning back into the sofa pillows. “Wow! Oprah was blown away by what we get to do every day.”

OK, we haven’t seen any of our African friends earn a Ph.D. We have, however, seen dramatic

transformation as lives have been empowered. God’s love is transformational and empowering. Discipleship is transformational and empowering. A decent wage is transformational and empowering. A poverty-breaking small business loan is transformational and empowering. An education is transformational and empowering. Taking the time to listen to someone’s dreams and figure out how we can fan those into flame is transformational and empowering.

Why are we in Africa? Because the Lord has led us AND because we get to see

transformation through empowerment. What a joy!

http://www.wildhopeinternational.org/

Greener Grass and Following God

Lisa Borden — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 07:38:54 -0700

I'm newly back in Africa after 3 months in Southern California and as I traveled back this direction I was keenly aware of the groups of young people I saw along the way who were obviously setting out on summer mission trips. Their excitement was easy to see and totally justifiable. I have to admit, their enthusiasm made me reflect a little on how I was feeling as I headed back to East Africa. Twenty-seven years after first coming this way, my perspective was, well, what's the word? Let's see...

Shortly before leaving California this time I found myself considering all the things I wasn't looking forward to about being back in our home in Tanzania, lovely as it is. I thought about power rationing (we have power less than 50% of the time) and cockroaches and rats and showers that don't work and other things I'm prone to whine about. Each of them seemed worthy of complaint as I enjoyed the very clean, very orderly, very comfortable home of my parents where going for a walk is calming, cheering and easy in the lovely neighborhood of their setting and where there are two Trader Joe's nearby! Two! I admit to feeling a little grim about some of the downsides of this African town.

Just a few days after this pondering, I sat at Mom's perfect little table looking out from her astonishingly clean kitchen to their very tidy garden. It's just crazy how clean everything seems to stay there. The difference between their city and mine here is ridiculous. But what to my wondering eyes should appear but a fat rat just a-waddling down my parents drive way. What on earth? In the middle of a perfect Pasadena afternoon he was just strolling along as if he owned the place!

The humor of it was not lost on me.

Turns out, there is no perfect place. There is only my choice to find the joy wherever I am.

And there's a good plenty here.

Truth be told, I am overwhelmed with happiness when I get back to my parents' home and I revel in the apparent ease of life there. And I cry when I leave, even though I'm all grown up. But equally as true is the fact that I cried when I got back to Africa as well; hello tears that reminded me how much I love it here. I love that I am part of big and little efforts that struggle quietly along to make a difference on this vast continent.

What's a cockroach, or even the occasional rat, compared to that?

Female Friendships and the Art of Swimsuit Shopping

Lisa Borden — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 18:19:46 -0700

Well, today I had breakfast with a friend from long ago. It was delightful to catch up. I don't think we'd been together since 1993. Yikes! Really? Allow me to recommend having breakfast with an old friend. It was a pleasure.

After breakfast I had a list of errands to face. But guess what the first errand of the day was. According to my own instructions, it was "Buy a new bathing suit." Noooooooooo!

Buying a new bathing suit is not a task that faint hearted women should face. Men are TOTALLY different. I know this because I have 4 of them in my life and they couldn't care less what they swim in. They swim in the shorts they have on, their boxers, torn and faded board shorts from a hundred years ago, or, most favorite of all, nothing. Left to their own devices, they would definitely swim in nothing. Dorks.

(Maybe I'm just jealous.)

Here's the thing: I bought a new suit today and it was pretty much a painless event. I was SHOCKED.

Was it painless because I just look so great in a swimsuit? Oh, no. Nothing could be further from the truth. I look, pretty much, DREADFUL in a bathing suit. Especially today. Due to having 2 types of skin cancer cells removed from my face a couple of years ago, I've kept my body out of the sun so my legs are white, white, white. And soft. Yes. I'd love to be able to blame it on having exercise severely restricted for the past four weeks since surgery but, really, they were soft going in. My doctor told me very sternly that my abdominal muscles were on vacation for 6 weeks after the event but the real truth is that they've ALWAYS been on vacation. So, there you go. Whatever! I'll try to be better. Tomorrow, maybe. Or some time. Right now I still have 2 weeks of vacation time left.

Anyway, I took 5 suits into the changing room, narrowed it down to 2 and then bought one. It was a close call between the final 2 but I decided that the one wasn't $40 cuter than the other. Best stick to the less expensive one. And I don't really know why it was painless today. I just looked at myself and said, "Yea, fine. This is cute. Great. Done!"

Here's what I think. I'm 48 and I know a thing or two. I know I'm not the sum total of my parts or the presentation of same. I know life is good and precious and terribly, terribly fragile. I know that I sat with a girlfriend today and we talked about things that matter to us. My spirit and soul were filled by our conversation. Our meeting came in a string of days of beautiful visits with other precious women in my life; women who hold me in their hearts and allow me to be myself there.

My conclusion is this... Meaningful connections restore proper perspective. With heart all full, I understand what it really means to feel fabulous.

Bless you, ladies. You know who you are.

Taunt not the foe (a response to a death)

Lisa Borden — Tue, 03 May 2011 10:54:51 -0700

Taunt not the foe
perceived or otherwise
taunt not the monster
with the cold blood heart
slain villains
felled cretans
murdered murderers
may have well deserved what came
but life is life
and her violent end
though justified
cannot be celebrated

Is it "Christian" to Care About Art?

Lisa Borden — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 05:27:29 -0800

The psalmist tells us that Creation speaks of her Creator and that her voice is loud everywhere. I was raised to understand this as the reason no one can say they didn't get the message about God's existence. In my recently released book, "Approaching God," I wonder about God and art and how He feels about His creative expressions... and ours.

"Is the only purpose of God’s art to point us to him? I believe that God’s art is also for our enjoyment because God values art, beauty and the aesthetically pleasing. God likes things to look good...

God designed us to appreciate and benefit from beauty and art. It is pleasant to be surrounded by loveliness. There is inherent value in the wellbeing that the natural environment and man-made beauty produce in us. Beauty and art feel good...

...We were made to enjoy beauty, nature, and the artistic gifts of others. We are not only spiritual beings butalso sensual beings that are made to find pleasure in good things. When we see God as an artist who values all these forms of beauty, we are released to value them ourselves.

The freedom to enjoy and value art and beauty can be stifled by many different things. In Africa, where life is so difficult for so many of the population, the hard work of daily life can reduce people to a focus on hand to mouth survival. The people who are literally struggling from one meal to the next are not always inclined to cherish the artistic. Life is simply too hard and that value has often been crushed in them.

In the West, where life can be one long rush toward material gain, art is often appreciated but frequently for the wrong reasons. The cash value of a piece of work is, at times, what causes a Western person to enjoy a piece of art. In the West, then, there is a need to return to the simple appreciation of the way a branch moves in the wind. Wherever we find ourselves in the world, we need the Creative Spirit of God to renew our appreciation of these things.

In my line of work, I can easily be overwhelmed by despair. Living and working in Africa can easily dishearten me when the statistics alone threaten to stop me dead in my tracks...

...My heart and mind are balanced by simple expressions of beauty around me. The sculptures my friend Mieke creates, the flowers my daughter brings me; these things are good and lovely and valuable. They help me."

Approaching God, published by Monarch in the UK and released through Kregal in the U.S., is available here on Conversant Life under "Resources."

Who Notices When a Homeless Person Dies?

Lisa Borden — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 04:31:54 -0800

My son, Jesse, lost a friend on Friday night. Shaky lived in one of the parks in Santa Barbara and, as I understand it, was a bit of a legend in his community. He and his friends were together Friday evening and he decided to go to sleep before the others. In the morning, Gator, Shaky's best friend and constant companion, went to wake him but Shaky was gone.

Jesse didn't get to the park until Shaky's body had already been taken away. He was told they'll cremate him and wait to hear if there is something that someone somewhere wants done with the ashes. Jesse gathered Shaky's earthly possessions from behind the dumpster where he had been asleep and brought them to Gator and the others. There wasn't much.

Gator had a number for a woman he believed to be Shaky's mama. He didn't want the coroner to contact her about the death so asked Jesse to please make the call. Jesse did. He found out that she was actually Shaky's grandmother and he explained to her that he had some bad news. Of course, she was very upset by it but Jesse let her know that Shaky had been well loved.

Jesse and the men and women he knows on Santa Barbara's streets were not the only ones who loved Shaky. There's a whole group of them who have made friends with this community that hasn't quite made it in mainstream life. They were happy to meet a woman chaplain who has also been involved, folks who work at the homeless shelter and others who turned up to offer comfort and support. That night a number of them sat in a circle around Shaky's wheelchair, lit candles and sang hymns. It was not a long gathering, but one that gave friends an opportunity to cry together.

I had been hoping to have a chance to meet Shaky because Jesse had so often spoken of him. "He was a really strong alcoholic, Mama," Jesse would say, by which he meant that alcohol had a very firm hold on him. Life had been pretty brutal and Jesse knew about some of the bitterness and hatred that he had come out of. Shaky's body was pretty much destroyed by his drink and he smelled really bad because he was in a wheelchair and couldn't ever shower, but, "He really, really knew Jesus," Jesse told me. In all the hardship of life, he had encountered a living Grace.

I'm not sure why I'm relating this story today except that it really hit me hard to think of someone storing their belongings behind a dumpster in a park. He was curled up next to them when he passed away. Behind a dumpster. Behind a dumpster!

Some how that image just puts so much of life in sharp relief.

It's Advent (or what are we longing for?)

Lisa Borden — Wed, 15 Dec 2010 01:54:33 -0800

Advent: coming or arrival.

The Advent Season is about anticipating the arrival or birth of Jesus.

Anticipation: looking forward to, expectation of; foreknowledge.

Yet there is something more than just a looking forward to or an expectation in our Advent, and in that original Advent Season more than 2,000 years ago. Far deeper than expectation, there is longing--deep longing, like a soul-ache.

Longings… Sometimes they are things we feel so deeply we can’t even speak of them. Sometimes they hurt as they lie silently there.

What are some things we long for? It’s pretty obvious, really. We long for meaningful lives, peace in our time, a healthy economy and a thriving earth. We long for food, water, shelter and education for all. We long for cures to every form of cancer, to HIV, to the crippling social ills that stalkour cities. We long for freedom.

The Children of Israel were longing as well. Under the control of the Roman Empire, they longed for the self-respect and self-government of political freedom. They longed to be their own successful, secure and significant nation. And they hadn't heard from God in a very long time. For 400 years, and several different occupying empires, there had been no prophet and no inspired writer. Four hundred years of silence from God. They had longings, alright!

These would have been their communal longings, but as individuals, I’m guessing their longings were just like ours. We’re longing for so many things, but at the most basic heart level, we’re longing for love. We’re longing to know and be known. We’re longing for someone to peer past our foibles and failures into our true selves and smile at what they find there.

Love… How totally messed up our images of it have become. Hollywood, Bollywood… blech! These representations that we find in the mediums of our culture are, truly, rubbish.

So, here we are, a people who, from ages past till now, are heartbroken and looking for the real deal.

Well, it turns out that God is longing for love too. In the expansive heart of God, though the Trinity already shares perfectlove together, there resides another longing—the longing for love shared with us.

God is longing for love with us and so he has acted on his desire.

For God so loved us, he sent his son.

His son is the Word that John 1 says was with God from the beginning; the Word that became flesh that he might dwell among us. This One is Love. In I John 4 we read, “God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world…”

Jesus is the Word. The Word is God. God is love.

Our longing for true love and God’s longing to express his love for us, meet in the person Jesus. Jesus is the living love letter that God sent by way of introductions. He wanted our longing and his longing to find each other.

And so it is that our deeper than deep ache for the most real love is actually a longing for Jesus.

This True Love casts out fear. This True Love covers over a multitude of sin. This True Love never fails.

Charles Wesley, almost 250 years ago, penned it well.

Come, Thou long expected Jesus,

Born to set Thy people free.

From our fears and sins release us,

Let us find our rest in Thee.

Israel’s strength and consolation,

Hope of all the earth, Thou art.

Dear Desire of every nation,

Joy of every longing heart.

Our "Dear Desire"... Jesus!