Jacob Davis
hello
so… i guess this is it… the beginning of mission year.
awesome.
If you would like to see my reasoning for joining this wonderful program, please read the sermon on the mount in Matthew 5 through 8.
Love at any cost, and be at peace.
Jacob
About Mission Year
Mission Year is a year long urban ministry program focused on Christian service and discipleship. We take teams of young people, place them in an area of need, and help them to serve people and create community. We are committed to the command of Jesus to “love God and love people,” by placing the needs of our neighbors first and developing committed disciples of Christ with a heart for the poor. Learn more about our first year program…
Jacob Davis's Blog
the somethings that we can't explain / Nov 18, 12:09 PM
what is it that drives a G-d to give His life for His creation?
what is it that drives a person to give up every thing he has?
what can explain something that can’t be comprehended?
if there is one thing this week that i feel our entire community (all three teams in new orleans) is learning, it is empathy. this has been a week in which unspeakable pains have been presented to us- in ways that we would never wish to experience. i hurt so much right now from a weekend that has been split into such an interesting dichotomy. i can’t even compare it to the hurt that my loved ones feel.
yet i do not hurt alone.
i guess this is why we’re here, to not only love on people like Christ would, but to love each other like He would have us do. every day i find more and more this growing sense of solidarity. the best part is that it’s with both my teammates and my community, and Christ. i don’t think i could handle anything i’ve seen, heard, or experienced by myself, and i don’t think that alone i can handle the pain that i’ve seen in my community, and- as of late- in my team members.
tragedy is such a sudden thing sometimes.
but we do not hurt alone.
if you’re reading this- and you know who you are, you do not hurt alone, either.
you do not shed tears by yourself,
you do not mourn alone.
we will lift you up, and gently transfer you into the hands of a loving Christ
we suffer together, for the joy set before us.
we suffer with you, because we love you.
when one part of the body aches, the whole body feels it.
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the concerto changes tempo, but the Composer knows where it is going / Nov 13, 11:10 AM
this is the life.
this city is beautiful- wondrous, even, and even better is the fact that it is constantly changing. the buildings on my way to work vary in size, age, damage, and story. each one of them holds something new every day. one of my favorite spots is in the wreckage between two brick buildings. the bottom floor has been completely gutted out, and dense foliage is starting to break through concrete and stone. wood hangs down from the half-destroyed floor above, and light breaks through like fingers to touch the floor below. this was once a building, a place of bustling commerce; now this building is only a place of silence and serenity, full of nature and consistent change.
when i first walked into urban impact leadership academy, i was greeted with apprehensive looks and distrust from the students. it makes sense that this would be the first impression, after all, i was intruding on their time, their space and their normalcy. i was the foreigner. the first couple of weeks were uncomfortable. to be sure, i felt out of place and out of element.
then conversations started to take place, and even yesterday, i found myself playing basketball after lunch with a mr. kentrell mcgee, one of the students at uila.
“alright, here’s what i’m going to do,” he said, bouncing the ball from one hand to the other.
“okay.” i responded
“i’m going to go to the right.”
“uh-huh.”
“then i’m going to fake left.”
“uh-huh.”
“then i’m going to take it to the right and score.”
“okay.”
“right now.”
he started to the right, and i followed him. then he faked to the left, though for a time much shorter than i was expecting, and shot back to the right. he blazed past me, and took it to the hoop.
he did exactly what he said he was going to do, yet i interpreted things by my standards, and got left behind. kentrell laughed, and i smiled sheepishly.
“good game.”
i got my butt kicked at basketball, but i now have a relationship with one of the students. we’ll probably play again today.
i know that this blog has gone in many directions, but it’s just like music, or even life, isn’t it?
the notes change, the melody lilts and lifts and goes one way that leads the ear to one conclusion, and then suddenly there is a shift and the music is headed again in a different direction.
i may think that i know where this concerto is going,
but G-d has the music in front of Him.
“The mind of man plans his way, But the LORD directs his steps.” -Proverbs 16:9
on presidents, priests, and King / Nov 5, 02:08 PM
let me start this by saying that i voted with a clean conscience yesterday for ron paul, a man who is consistently pro-life, anti-war, and all around someone i agreed with. i enjoyed sitting outside and watching a large exodus of people go to the ymca across the street to exercise their right to vote. this is my first election, and after much prayer and consideration, i made the decision that felt right for me.
that being said, i give much congratulations to our president-elect, barack obama. there is absolutely no question that he won, and it was something to watch an election that was ended so decisively (being as the past two elections were drug out more). i do not agree with everything that our next president has to say, nor do i necessarily think that he was a better choice than john mccain- though many would argue with me. yet i experienced something last night that i have only experienced one other time in my life in a very different way.
the first time that i actually felt like i was a part of history was on september 11th. i was horrified, scared, and sad, but i realized that this would be a moment that would go down in the books.
last night was a different story. our first african-american president… wow. i didn’t vote for obama, i don’t agree with obama one hundred percent, but to ignore the historical importance of last night in our country is ignorant. talking with people in my neighborhood about obama even before the polls opened gave an idea of how beautiful of a thing this was for them. this is not something i can’t pretend that i get. if i cannot celebrate the outcome of the election for policy reasons, i can at least celebrate it in a way that my neighbors and collogues see it. for reasons i can’t understand, a little bit of oppression has been lifted from a people. that is something that reaches across societal divides. that is something that unifies.
i would also like to take this opportunity to remind everyone that he’s a man. Isaiah 2:2. people who are afraid of this country’s welfare should pray and do something to fight off policies they don’t agree with. people who think that the change that is coming is good should pray as well.
none is good but G-d.
peace... dear G-d, bring us peace. / Nov 3, 04:23 PM
a mother cries out in the city.
today katie, braxton, joy and i went to martin luther king jr boulevard today and joined a peace pilgrimage, a march led by mothers of those who have been killed by the violence in new orleans which speaks out and exhorts the neighborhoods for peace. we marched alongside supporters, friends and loved ones of the victims, and the mothers themselves. we marched for two hours, holding up signs with the names of victims and quotes about the necessity of peace. we talked with many people, all of different backgrounds, all there for the same reasons.
we want to see guns put down. we want a different world for our children. we want to see our young men and women have a chance to live and change the world. we see pain, we feel pain, and we will suffer together until the violence stops.
the parade came to a stop at the corner of daneel and josephine, where five young people had been murdered. we all stood around the truck that had sound equipment and had a moment of silence in memory for the children and against the brutal violence. a single women began singing a song, and it lifted up over the buildings, up to Heaven, and sank straight into my bones. she mourned:
“soon i will be done with the troubles of the world
the troubles of the world, oh, the troubles of the world.
soon i will be done with the troubles of the world,
going home to be with my Lord.”
half way through the song, one of the mothers nearby fell into the arms of another and broke into heavy sobs of loss and anguish. i walked towards the group of women trying to lift this women up from her pain, and put my arms around them.
i looked at the group of women and choked as i said, “my heart cries out for you.”
how does one comfort a mother who has lost a child? how does one pray for a city that is destroying lives? G-d is always good, and can always lift us from our problems, but that does not prevent a mother from crying. that does not prevent a mother from missing the face of a child, the face of a young one that will never be more than a memory.
they hugged me one by one, and finally the woman who had broken down wrapped her arms around me and wept bitterly into my chest. i had no words. how does one speak to such a despair?
i wept with her.
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many paths to tread / Nov 3, 04:22 PM
the false self is found and faced in solitude. we tread a dangerous path when we walk in solitude, for it is in the quiet and solitary places that our secular self comes out to pull us from a silence within which G-d resides.
today we had the chance to spend a day in solitude at the audubon park here in new orleans. we started at a labyrinth located in the park, which is a design on the ground painted on stone or made of edged grass. it’s like a maze of sorts, but unlike a maze, it has no dead ends, but rather twists and turns that take you from being inches away from the center (your destination) to the outer edge of the design.
so from ten thirty to two thirty, the seventeen of us left the labyrinth and separated from each other to spend time in the presence of the Lord.
needless to say, i found myself being challenged and distracted at almost every moment. G-d showed me beautiful things in His Word about His love, His care for the needy, and His heart for justice. every moment was another moment to turn from the world and focus myself on G-d. His Grace has finally been proved to me in my utter failure to remain focused on Him for more than five minutes.
for the last hour, after many things were revealed to me in silence (which even if i had this blog for over a year, i don’t think i could write enough to scratch the surface of this amazing practice), i headed back to the labyrinth and began to walk its path. to be honest, in the steps between the starting point and the center, i had a spiritual journey. it brought me near to the center, and just when i thought that i had figured out G-d’s will, i was turning and heading in the opposite direction. the entire time i whispered in my mind and tried to find what G-d wanted to show me.
He responded, and to be honest, i didn’t like what i had gotten for an answer. thank G-d that the labyrinth was much bigger than it looked. i continued to walk, turn, circle, move towards and draw back, the whole time yelling in my head that the things that He was asking of me were more than i could bear. it was painful to follow like He was asking me, and i quickly started comparing other people that i knew to what He asked. then suddenly, my heart was overtaken with a flood of love, and my mind went to the verse in which G-d tells a suffering paul: “My Grace is sufficient for you,” followed quickly by the end of John’s Gospel, in which peter asks, “what about john?” to which Jesus turns and replies, “If I want him to stay until I return again, what is it to you? YOU FOLLOW ME!”
looking down, i realized that i had reached the center, and i started crying. Jesus had looked me in the eye and cried, “You follow Me!”
there is such weight to the things that G-d has confronted me with. i would not by any means say that He has given me a greater burden than anyone else, but i would argue that my sin is rooted so deep in me that it hurts me to follow Him like He asks me to. but i will follow Him. that’s what He’s called me to do
i have come to the end of one labyrinth, only to find the entrance to another.
all praise be to G-d!
