happy summer!

Hello, people!

Just a little word from us on the last few months...

I (Lindsay) started the first part of a series of 3 practicum semesters in spiritual formation this past semester and enjoyed every minute of meeting with my two students. This is just the beginning of sitting down and practicing spiritual direction one-to-one through prayer, listening, and reflecting.

Randy had a very intense quarter filled with 8 units of Hebrew and a preaching class. He enjoyed both topics, we both got through with good grades and now he's in Israel for 12 days! What he loves about this stage we're in is that the classes he takes and the Dikaios Project go hand in hand. Most of what he's learning (and me too!) is directly applicable to the development and editing of our Biblical Justice course.

In Israel, he is taking a class on Peacemaking, specifically focused on the conflict between Israel and Palestine. We are so excited for this opportunity he has to glean from literally the BEST scholars in this topic right in the middle of where serious issues are still being handled in the Middle East. I can't even begin to imagine how this class and experience will enhance and give perspective to the Dikaios class session on issues from that part of the world, let alone our worldview and lives.

The beta-testers we had this spring all reported back with great feedback and positive stories of how their students were impacted by the Scripture, discussion, and teaching they were able to give through the class. Next year, we will continue beta-testing while making more revisions, edits, and adding components to enhance the class in it's depth, versatility and ability to reach more students.

We love that young people who are hungry for God and/or seeing justice in the world can now better understand how related these two are and begin to live out their spirituality in a more practical and socially responsible way.

We pray God is showing himself to you in new ways this summer!

We wanted to let you know about a couple of things happening in our little corner of the world. :)

1) I (Lindsay) had a great time visiting my old group in Pomona. Those Cal Poly students are still close to my heart and it was a joy to share some new things God has been showing me. God has provided for them where graduates left gaps in leadership and on the worship team. Under the covering of another Southern CA campus pastor, they have maintained the ministry and continue to draw in new people. As I taught from the book of Jonah, I shared reflections on the not-so-popular part of his story where he expresses anger at God for showing compassion on the undeserving. As I received feedback from students, I saw that God was able to show at least two important things from that story: 1) that God delights in showing compassion even when the recipient is undeserving and 2) that God can handle his people's honesty, even in expressions of anger. Students picked up on the fact that we are all the "undeserving" recipients of compassion and that God is not a God who condemns honest expressions of the heart.

2) One of our beta groups is just about finished with their series of class sessions on Biblical Global Justice (what Randy has been working so hard on for so long now) and the feedback we have received is so good! Students are really grasping the issues, Scriptural understandings, and are hungry for more of this type of academic/practical/spiritual dialogue. This particular Chi Alpha group is a sort of campus-church and while students are gone for the summer, the whole church will be going through the material again.

3) We ask for your prayers. Randy has been through quite the life/world change in the last year -- moving across the country, starting a new school, working this new/different chi alpha assignment, being married, etc. The combination of both of our academic work, as each of us have a full-time load of classes, and ministry along with other adjustments with being married and doing ministry together presents new and different challenges (and blessings). We appreciate your prayers for continued strength to carry on faithfully, energy for the full life we have, and wisdom as we daily discern where and what to focus our time on.

4) Lastly, please continue to pray for me (Linds) as I keep learning and practicing spiritual direction. Currently, I have two directees and though I have so much to learn still, God is proving himself faithful and consistently showing up in the lives of these dear women entrusted to me. For confidentiality's sake, I am not able to give specific testimonies -- but know that God has been moving in undeniable ways in the lives of these young ladies.

With deep love and gratitude,
Lindsay and Randy

"Who Are We to BE"

Ahhhhh… Finally I (Randy) can breath a sigh of relief. Midterms are over and I have a couple of weeks before things ramp up again for finals. That allows me time to catch up on a few neglected tasks, including our discussion on the distinctives of a biblical understanding of justice.

Justice falls under the broader topic of Christian ethics, and if biblical justice is unique, it’s because the broader topic of Christian ethics is also.

2. Christian ethics, of which biblical justice is one aspect, is primarily concerned with the question, “who are we?”

Unless you are an ethicist, you won’t catch the strangeness of this at first glance. It is odd in that since the enlightenment, all western secular ethics have instead wrestled with the question, “what do I do?” For those who follow Christ, this is to be a secondary question that flows from dealing with the first.

The idea is clearly seen in the New Testament teaching that we are to be citizens of a heavenly kingdom, a royal priesthood, children of the kingdom, and children of God. In each case, this identity is to give us a sense of what kinds of actions we take. Again, we could look to several texts, but let’s keep it limited:

1 John 3:1-3,7,8,10

¹ See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! …² Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. ³ All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.

⁷ Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. The one who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous. ⁸ The one who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work. ¹⁰ This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not God’s child, nor is anyone who does not love their brother and sister.

Here John clearly explains the importance of finding our identity as children of God

Because of this understanding, there should be a result in our actions. These actions reveal the underlying identity that gives rise to them. John goes on to point to Cain as an example who, committing a blatant example if unethical, unjust act murdered his brother. He did not do what is right, and revealed his identity by this. Moreover, it’s interesting to note that Cain was more concerned about actions (what to do) than being. He was angry that his actions, in this case what seems to be a twisted worship of God, were found to be evil and that his brother’s actions, which flowed from a right understanding of who God would have him be, were pleasing to God.

If this seems like a lot to work out, a more familiar example would be the Pharisees. They were highly concerned with what to do and made long lists of dos and don’ts, but Jesus made it clear they missed the point in not being the right kind of people. It’s easy to do the right things for all the wrong reasons. God wants us to be his children, and allow that identity to shape our lives, including what we do.

If you are wondering what difference this really makes in our everyday lives, think about the example of the commonly wrestled with issue of giving money to the homeless. It's easy to fling Bible verses at this from both a give and don't give position, but that would be approaching it from a, "what do I do?" angle. Instead asking, "who are we to BE to the homeless?" puts a very different spin on the issue. What does it mean to BE children of God to the homeless? Sure, that might result in gifts of some sort, but I think it runs much deeper than that. We'll come back to this in future posts.

Spend some time asking the Holy Spirit to help you in finding your identity in Christ, and then in letting your actions flow from that identity.

A Visit to Cal Poly Pomona

I (Lindsay) have the joy and privilege of reviewing and recording the faithful giving we receive as we continue in our work by the generous support of our loved ones. Tonight, as I was catching up on our records, I had a very fresh and personal reminder of just how blessed we are and how faithful so many of YOU are! We love what we do and we love doing it as a team :)

Speaking of what we do... just about a week ago, Randy was invited to speak at a university class on the topic of Biblical Justice. He did such a great job! I got to come along and document it and experience with him the delight in seeing light bulbs go on in students as they began to grasp the complexity of today's issues in light of our Christian values. We'll share more in our next newsletter (which will be SOON!)

Something I have been pondering lately is the story of Jonah... not just the fact that he lived in a whale's belly for three days, but the fact that he disobeyed God almost entirely because he knew that God would be gracious and compassionate to the "bad" Ninevites (check out Jonah chapter 4). I've been struck by God's grace to the undeserving paralleled with Jonah's anger at the undeserving receiving such compassion. I welcome your comments and would love to dialogue about this story!

The Cal Poly Pomona Chi Alpha crew has invited me to speak at their next XA service called "Encounter" on campus. I am so excited to have the opportunity to visit with some students and share some of these ponderings about Jonah that God has so graciously revealed to me.

Prayers are always appreciated --
*that God would come in power as I speak and that He would work in students hearts on Feb. 24th
*continued compiling and editing of the Dikaios project teaching material for the Biblical Justice Class
*the campuses that will be starting our "beta-test" of the Biblical Justice material in the coming weeks
*the spiritual direction ministry that I will be starting in my Master's practicum (I could be meeting with students as early as the end of this week!)
*and that Randy and I would continue to walk in obedience and faithfulness to the call in our lives.

Blessings and love <3

Against God?

I (Randy, here) have been repeatedly asked when telling friends about the Dikiaos Project, "what is biblical justice ? Is that just a Christianized term for secular ideas of social justice?" Simply put, the Bible has some very specific and somewhat unique teachings related to how we live our lives and treat others. With that in mind, I thought I would outline a few of the main teachings of Scripture over the next few blog posts. So let's jump right in:

1. Biblical justice holds all injustices (sin) to ultimately be against God himself.

While from a secular perspective wrongs are more or less committed against their recipients, the Bible teaches that any time we lie, cheat, steal, wound, malign, misrepresent, and the like we not only do so against the direct recipients of these actions, but also against the God who made and loves them.

Several texts could be pointed to here, but let's keep it simple and just look at one:

James 3:9-10: With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be.

The book of James is deeply concerned with those things that divide people and cause us to mistreat one another. While this verse is often cited in reference to gossip and the use of dirty words, there is more to be seen than just that. James points out that because humanity is made in the Image of God (Imago Dei - a theme we will cover more in a later post) every person has an intrinsic worth. James points to the absurdity of a moth that can both worship God and wrong someone made in his image because the two completely incomparable. To wrong another human being is to wrong our heavenly Father.

Next time you spend time in prayer, consider meditating on this teaching and ask the Holy Spirit to show you any areas that you have offended the Lord through acts not specifically directed toward Him.

Grace and Peace,

Randy & Lindsay

some prayer points and a ministry opp...

well, things are moving right along -- randy started his winter quarter at fuller jan 3rd and linds just started an interterm class at talbot (her semester will start jan 31). he's loving his ethics and theology classes. she's loving getting into the practicum series where she'll get to meet with students to give spiritual direction soon!

things to pray for:
*randy is not going to the student conference we mentioned last, however, he has created a teaching session for another chi alpha person to lead at the conference (so it'll be like we're there... kind of :). the session will teach students why Biblical justice is distinctive from secular ideas of justice.

*randy has been invited by a professor at a southern CA university to come and teach one of the foundational concepts of Biblical justice. it's called the "hermeneutical circle" and provides a framework for considering social injustice in light of Scripture. (if you're curious, ask randy to explain what the hermeneutical circle is!)

*our beta-testing campuses/chi alpha leaders -- they will be starting up their Biblical Global Justice classes in the coming weeks and need lots of prayer as they invite students and get the word out about the class (geographically, these campuses are in areas such as Washington, D.C., California, and New Hampshire).

*lindsay's ministry through spiritual direction -- this spring she will begin meeting with two undergrad students at biola university. we believe this ministry will bring wonderful depth to our ministry in chi alpha. (don't know what spiritual direction is? just ask! she loves to talk about it!)

blessings and love,
randy & linds

Happy New Year!

It's been awhile, but we thought it was time for an update:

In December, we finished our school sessions -- we each had four graduate level classes, so it was intense, but we loved what we learned! Our break from school was much needed and filled with family time in both Louisiana and California. :)

We chose topics to research and focus on for papers and projects that we will use as we continue piecing together the class. Randy chose racial issues to write a paper on and Lindsay chose to focus a big writing project on immigration-type issues.

The Justice class is coming along well! Randy is putting some of the sessions together as we speak because starting in just a few weeks, we have 5 campuses committed to be our "beta testers". These campuses are in different parts of the country and represent different kinds of demographics. These groups will try out our class with their students this spring and touch base with Randy regularly to provide feedback on what's working and what might be adjusted for future classes.

Our hearts are expectant and eager for the beta-testing to start. We will have direct contact with students from all over the country through our class leaders and we cannot wait to see and hear how they react to the message of Biblical Justice.

Please pray for the following:
*Health -- Both of us have been fighting colds and sickness and in order to stay on top of both school and chi alpha, we really can't afford getting sick!
*Randy's up-coming conference -- He is being flown in to share about the Justice course with students at a regional student gathering in early February. He will have a chance to lead an elective session and address students from many different campuses on the east coast.
*The rest of the class compilation process -- Almost all of the research is done, it's just putting things together and sending it to the testers.
*For students (and the class leaders) -- That God would touch and transform some hearts through this spring course. Last year, Randy had students share how deeply they were impacted by learning about this important aspect of God's character (his heart for the poor, marginalized, and for justice within our communities, etc.). Pray for more of these stories!

Blessings and grace,
Randy & Lindsay