Home from home

i mean, how can you not love that, right? Coming home to Cape Town was an easy one.

But leaving Oakland was also a less easy one than we may have thought. It was surprising to both tbV and myself just how much like home it felt to us. Which was great.

And had a lot to do with the people and some of the places. Especially getting to stay for a month with Aaron and Sarah Postma-Ruff who we had invited to live with us for about 7 months when we were here last. With a lot of stuff that previously belonged to us [furniture, home-made wine box book shelves, purple cushions and towels] being incorporated into their new home, it certainly had a bit of an ‘ours’ feel. When Aaron met us at the airport dressed in his home-made Hello Kitty suit, it was like game on. We had arrived home.

Favourite Indian restaurants and board games and boss’ new hot tub and weekend away with housemates and blockbusting movies and Netflix and Frosting-in-a-Can and giant Chocolate Bacon Peanut Butter Cups and visiting old church family and baptism-and-barbecue day and all-night-snack-fest-board games and sunsets and radio podcasting and hammocks and of course the reason that allowed us to get over – a sequel to last year’s Houseboat Youth Group Camp speak on Lake Shasta:

So really just an incredible time and a month felt just about right. Opportunity for two more book share launches and conversations on church. Being in the winning city of the NBA championships as it happened.

But i think mainly just the people. We really love a lot of the people there quite a lot. Which is why i guess it feels a lot like home.

Took a moment to think about Philly today. We were there for the same amount of time as Oakland. We loved the place and loved a lot of the people. But i’m not sure for me that it would have that same kind of feel. i guess maybe cos the setting for Oakland provided a lot more space to be real and honest and challenged and to challenge, and the freedom to be ourselves.

The last night pretty much summed it up. Meant to be finishing off our stay with board games with Aaron and Sarah and never got round to playing the games because we just got so caught up in life-transforming wrestling-filled conversations about life and money and being church and changing the world and stuff. And then my mate Dave [one of the 4 Horsedawgs of the Apocalypse] came round after working til midnight to help me sort out some stuff on my new computer before we flew away. That is family right there.

If you want to get your signature on the ‘Get Brett Fish and tbV back for Houseboats 2016’ petition then maybe we will see you all again next year, same time, same place. After all, Americaland may need a lot more African missionary types to head that way before it can feel completely caught up with the rest of the world. Or something.

Oakland, we will miss you. But Cape Town? It is GOOD to be back…

‘i, church’ – gather round for conversations about church

For those of you who have been following the book launch tour we have now had four different launches: one at Vovo Telo and one at the Warehouse in Cape Town, one out Stellenbosch way and recently another in Durban.

 

What i have discovered along the way is that my favourite part at every single launch was the Q & A time we scheduled in the middle of it. Opportunities for people to ask questions about church. Absolutely any questions without fear of judgement – in fact for the Durban launch, Barry who was MC gave out his phone number and people could ask questions live or text them in anonymously. Such great conversation and engagement.

And that has got me pretty excited to do more, which is where you may come in.

i realised in conversation last night with some mates that for the most part, those of you who bought the book because you know me are largely going to be in the metaphorical choir and while the book hopefully has some good stuff for you, there are likely people you know who it would be much more helpful for.

What about considering the opportunity of hosting a Q & A time of your own at your own home [or somewhere else that might be fun] where you bring the crowd [or roomful of people] that you feel may be wanting to ask questions about church and not have many places to do so – friends who are struggling with what church is about, people you know who attend regularly but don’t live it out, generally curious folk – and i come along and we create a space to ask some questions and wrestle with some things and then at the end give people an opportunity to get hold of a copy of the book if they would like.

If this sounds like something that might be interesting to you, get hold of me and we can chat.

We are going to have some books in Oakland, CA in June and are hoping to visit Pretoria/Joburg side of the country some time after that so if you are in any of those places, that would also be fun.

If you’re looking to get hold of this on Amazon in the meantime, you can do so here. And if you are on Goodreads you can find it over there.

Looked at the stars

Look at the stars,
Look how they shine for you,
And everything you do,
Yeah, they were all yellow.

tbV and i have been home [back to South Africa after a three year journey in Americaland starting in Philadelphia and ending up in Oakland, outside San Francisco] for just over a week now.

after a really frustrating trip involving two and  half hours of fighting to try and get me on to the plane i had a ticket for, having to leave a box of paintings behind in SF, having the airline leave a bag of ours behind in Washington, losing movie capability for the last 8 hour flight after the refuel in Dakar…

and after a fairly frustrating week of disconnection in terms of trying to get phones and internet unlocked and set up and working [which we still largely haven’t, besides my dad’s old doesn’t-even-have-predictive-text-capacity Nokia which we have managed to get some air time on]…

we had the most excellent 5 year anniversary celebration at a place called Monkey Valley, which looks something like this:

but even more specifically, something like this [containing my very special someone]:

while there was both good and bad [and fun and difficult and crazy and amazing and ridiculous] about our time in Americaland, one interesting thing that stood out to me in both Philly and Oakland was the lack of stars… now i’m sure Americaland has stars [and i DEFINITELY got to see them in boatloadsfull on the houseboat trip i got to do on Lake Shasta] but i remember every time i came back to South Africa [which was twice during our stay] it was the biggest thing that stood out to me [besides the edible and tasty mayo, of course] – the fact that i could see a whole lot more stars than when i was over there.

i imagine it had something specific to do with the two places in Americaland we ended up staying, but it was one of the things that i remembered missing a lot when we were over there. and so it is so good to be back – and this weekend was ridiculous because we were high up on a hill and had a huge window next to our bed and so could lie in bed and see an amazing array of stars.

i have my own star constellation called ‘The Horse’ [because it looks like a horse, duh!] which a few of us discovered about 15 years ago on a youth camp [beyond ‘The Horse’ i seriously know Orion, the Southern Cross and on a good day can maybe point out the Big Dipper so not big on the constellations] and as we arrived back from our meal Friday night to the house we were staying in, i looked up and immediately saw it, and even better, the beautiful Val [tbV] looked up and spotted it straight away too.

just so good to be back. still not connected or plugged in or properly transported. and those things might take a while to get right. and missing a lot of people from Americaland for sure. but the stars are back. and so everything seems just a little bit more alright.

It’s true,
Look how they shine for you,
Look how they shine for you,
Look how they shine for,
Look how they shine for you,
Look how they shine for you,
Look how they shine.

Look at the stars,
Look how they shine for you,
And all the things that you do.

 

Stay off these roads [aka How I learnt to stop worrying and love the bike]

‘I buckle my helmet, check both ways, and pull out slowly into the intersection. As I do a car comes out of nowhere, breaks hard and I swerve. We miss each other and I pull around so I’m on the right side of the road. And then I am assailed by the swearing, the shouting, the angry words pouring out of the car towards me. I am called names and the driver threatens to kill me, moving to force me off the road as she does so. I pull onto the sidewalk and she gets out of her car. I keep cycling. She catches up with me at the next intersection where I wait for a red light. As I make to cross she whips her car in front of me, cutting me off. I avoid eye contact but the barrage of hate directed toward the “f-ing white bitch on the bike” crashes into me. I wait silently and as she pulls off she swerves in again to hit my front wheel. She speeds off and I cautiously cross. I’m shaking and a tear runs down my cheek. Once again I am caught up in the dramatic and chaotic fallout of an emotionally volatile and unstable community.’

[my beautiful wife Valerie, aka tbV, excerpt from yesterday’s blog post titled ‘On passivism and peace.’

She left the office after morning prayer to go and work at home [the incident happened on the way to work] and i stayed til 4pm and then cycled home.

As i am cycling i come up to this four way stop or at least i think it is. Before i have even figured out if it’s a stop the other way or not the car coming from my right to left slows down completely so i figure it must be and start to cycle across the intersection. Then he starts to go and I’m like, ‘What?’ but i am pretty much across now and so he stops again and i cycle past. He hoots [honks his horn for the Americanese among us] loudly and shouts as he drives away and i point at my eyes in a ‘Look where you’re going dude’ way and continue straight. i am very aware the whole time of what happened with Val this morning and as i pull up at the following traffic light there is a car behind me and i start to semi panic but surely this guy can’t have followed me [he went straight so it would have meant a whole block turn]. but the truck next to me at the lights is dark blue and the one i had moments with was white. crisis averted.

The light changes colour and i start cycling and the blue truck goes past and i am just down the road from the turn off to our street. Suddenly i am aware of another vehicle next to me and the next second i hear a loud bang and something has hit my back wheel.

That’s right. Two bicycle attacks in one day. This dude has driven around the block and come up alongside me so that his son [aged maybe 14 to 16] can throw his half full Arizona iced tea bottle at me on my bike. As they drive away the kid is repeating his action out the window [like a cricket player replaying at attempted shot] probably showing off to his dad how he accomplished the deed. Great parenting technique dad.

So mine was a lot funnier than Val’s for sure. More a case of ‘What the flip? Did that just happen?’ But it was just bizarre that both happened on the same day. And just seeing the level of aggression that exists with drivers in this area.

Val showed a lot of sensitivity and care for me when i got home and recounted the story of my violent street attack. Well, once she stopped laughing, that is.

Warning: Tea may be closer than it appears.

 

 

where my trust is without borders

tbV and i have not really been in regular consistent church services for the last two years now and so it’s been really refreshing to find one called Re:Generation that we both enjoy and love going to. in particular being a part of corporate worship has been so refreshing and since we haven’t been around for a little while there are a bunch of new songs to discover which is great.

one song in paricular connected with where i was at last nite and so i hastily scribbled down the words of the chorus and i think the bridge, as these were the two verses that particularly moved me:

Spirit lead me where my trust is without borders
Let me walk upon the waters
Wherever You would call me
Take me deeper than my feet could ever wander
And my faith will be made stronger
In the presence of my Savior

I will call upon Your Name
Keep my eyes above the waves
My soul will rest in Your embrace
I am Yours and You are mine

= = = = = = = = = = = = = =

i have been feeling quite distant from God and detached of late and i know a bunch of that is me needing to put more time and energy into my relationship with Him and also dive more into the Bible which really does fill me, but also is related to me not being involved in much hands on ministry vibe outside of work and online stuff and just really drawn to this call to move beyond what is safe and comfortable and to really be able to just trust God and jump. knowing that He has me.

quick Uncle Google ask and turns out the song is called ‘Oceans’ and it is by Hillsong United and so i sourced the rest of the lyrics which are here:

= = = = = = = = = = = = = =

“Oceans (Where Feet May Fail)” by Hillsong United

You call me out upon the waters
The great unknown where feet may fail
And there I find You in the mystery
In oceans deep
My faith will stand

And I will call upon Your name
And keep my eyes above the waves
When oceans rise
My soul will rest in Your embrace
For I am Yours and You are mine

Your grace abounds in deepest waters
Your sovereign hand
Will be my guide
Where feet may fail and fear surrounds me
You’ve never failed and You won’t start now

So I will call upon Your name
And keep my eyes above the waves
When oceans rise
My soul will rest in Your embrace
For I am Yours and You are mine

Spirit lead me where my trust is without borders
Let me walk upon the waters
Wherever You would call me
Take me deeper than my feet could ever wander
And my faith will be made stronger
In the presence of my Savior
[x6]

I will call upon Your Name
Keep my eyes above the waves
My soul will rest in Your embrace
I am Yours and You are mine

being still, and knowing, this Easter…

i feel like the previous few Easters have kind of passed me by with not too much impact – being the easily recognised dreadlock wearing Easter Bunny at the Simple Way is all i can remember and i’m not sure where i was the year before but in the middle of preparation to leave for the Simple Way and so life was a fair bit chaotic…

the last Easter that comes to mind was when my good buddy Mark Baker encouraged us to watch ‘The Passion of the Christ’ by Mel Gibson with our Sunday nite enGAGE congregation in Stellenbosch. i feel like i might have initially done it more to humour him than because i thought it was a good idea, but remember being powerfully affected again by the very violent depiction of Jesus’ flogging and death [i really feel like the cross can become this fluffy comfortable symbol we hold to but lose all meaning of if we forget the very violence and real sacrifice it depicts]

so as we started heading towards Easter in Oakland i really wanted it to be meaningful and so spent some time this week reading the end of John’s Gospel and some of Jesus’ last acts, words and prayers. last nite we jumped at the chance to join some new friends of ours to head to a church for a ‘stations of the cross’ experience where we walked around in small groups [we joined a family of five with three cool young kids] and then read scripture, reflected and did an action and a prayer connected to different aspects of Jesus last week leading up to His death.

i find it interesting that when the one station invited us to kiss the figure of Jesus on the cross [i chose not to] that it felt more weird for me than later when we were asked to spit at the figure of Jesus on the cross [i chose not to do that either, but more following the lead of Val] – as if the betrayal hidden behind a kiss seems somehow so much worse than the outwardly open betrayal of showing your true colours through spitting.

[i wonder if that is because i can’t think of any time in my life when i have outwardly or openly joined the crowd in being against Jesus in any way or form, but there are countless times where my innocent looking actions have shown a deeper betrayal in what has been going on in my heart or somewhere else behind the scenes. a subtle hypocritical betrayal somehow feels so much worse… and so time and time again i hear the cock crow and have that moment of looking up and seeing Jesus’ eyes pierce through me as i realise once again i have done that which i said i never would, and i end up behind a wall somewhere crying out as Jesus is lead once more to the cross by my actions]

Pilot’s washing of his hands affected me deeply as it did my wife Val [which you can, and should, read here] as i took it on myself to explain it to the children who were with us, specifically Kayla, the oldest daughter. the idea of “making no decision” because the decision you know you should make has consequences which just feel too extreme for you. being reminded that ‘making no decision’ is always making a decision.

apartheid. racism. violence towards women. rape culture. discrimination. abortion. being reminded that ‘making no decision’ is always making a decision.

there are so many aspects to this story. i hope that you will make time this Easter time in the busyness of it all to slow down and choose a moment, or moments, to meditate on. and then reflect against the daily living out of your life. has what Jesus did on the cross affected your day to day life in any way, shape or form?

the story of this week, two thousand years ago, affects me on a daily basis. it is so good to be reminded of that. and to live it out well.

on why rape [and violence to women in general] HAS to be taken seriously, part 1: attack on my wife

my wife was attacked in the street yesterday.

fortunately not physically and thank God there were two Latino guys in a car nearby that she was eventually able to get to come to her assistance but even then they didn’t really know what to do and the [can only assume he was completely drugged up] guy continued to threaten.

many, many thoughts on this and the closest to the foreground is complete and utter thankfulness that she is okay… or as okay as someone can be who is verbally and otherwise assaulted…

Val recently shared two blogs with thoughts on related issues:

the first being this very hectic one where she shares a reaction to some of the music and attitude and behaviour we were confronted with when we lived in Kensington, Philly last year: On being woman [explicit]

and the second one in which she shared some situation she has been in where she got involved and took some kind of action to prevent the possibility of an attack or situation ending badly: on being my sister’s keeper

the solution to this is not victim-blaming, nor giving women a list of ways they can dress or act and behave that can “help protect them from being raped” – we should not have to go there.

but i really don’t believe the solution is man-bashing either – all men are not evil, potential rapists waiting to happen – throwing blame at the general male population feels completely unhelpful as well.

and personally, i’m not convinced that joking about rape is EVER helpful [although i know a bunch of people disagree with me on this one – see the next post for verification of that] – for me anything that makes light of or lessens the impact of how absolutely hideous and horrendous and just plain evil rape is, counts against finding a solution to the problem.

this thing is so much huger than any of those three areas – we are talking absence of strong positive role models and negative influence of the media and prisons being punitive rather than redemptive and desensitisation of both the word and the act and a hundred other things…

but just because it looks so huge and daunting, does not give us the freedom to continue with our heads buried in the sand on this one. we need to create safe spaces for people to share their stories. we need to be able to talk about this thing without using blame language on either side and try to figure out together what we can put in place in the short term to at least reduce the risk of it while we look at bigger solutions. we need to be investing into the young men and women of the future and training them up in the way they should go…

as evidenced by my new friend Magda’s letter to her children [aged just 11 and almost 8] that she allowed me to share parts of on my blog over here, that both deals with speaking about sex and rape with her young children and teaching them how to grow up to be young men that make a positive difference.

let’s get serious about working together to put a stop to this. this should not be something we are ever okay about having as a part of our world.

[to continue to part II which involves a confusing hashtag on Twitter which got me into a bit of trouble with a bunch of people]