Familiar Faces

Well it has been good to get back in the office again and catch up with my friends and co-workers. I found out that one of the guys in my office who had just started going to church at the beginning of the summer is getting baptized in a couple of weeks!! I am so excited to go watch and celebrate with him. We have had many good conversations about Jesus and it is cool to see him turn his life over to his Savior. He has become a good friend and always provides some amusement during the long 9-hour days in the cubicle.   

It has also been fun to see my 4-year old buddy Billy again at my house. Sometimes we get to read the Jesus Storybook Bible together at night and he always has good questions for such a little guy. He often says the most candid and honest things and a couple of nights ago he made me smile. I told him that we could talk to God any time we wanted and asked if he wanted to pray. He grinned, nodded his head and earnestly asked, "God, why are you so big and I am so small?" If you spend enough time with Billy, you will begin to recognize that he is always concerned about getting as "big" as mommy and daddy. I am sure the omnipresence of God seemed a little beyond the extra vegetables we always encourage him to eat to help him get tall. :) On another note, it sure is humbling to remember just how big God is and how vast his love is for us despite how small we sometimes feel. You can learn so much from a little child. Jesus was so right when he told us to have a child-like faith!

Last weekend I was blessed by a visit from my mom who was able to stay with me while Michael and Annette were on vacation. She is constantly finding ways to show me that she loves me and helped me make lots of yummy dinners to freeze and pull out after a long day at work. We relaxed, explored a little of Seattle, and joined the rest of my family when they came in on Monday. I took the day off on Tuesday and we got to spend a full day together in North Cascades National Park. It was wonderful. Times like that seem to get fewer and farther between but I tried to soak it all up. They continued to travel around the area while I worked but we got to have dinner on Thursday night with Michael and Annette before they went back to Grand Rapids. 

My family at North Cascades National Park

It was so fun to be able to share a little of my experience here with them in person! With only 4 days between the end of Seattle and the start of Peru, and then only a week between the end of Peru and the start of the spring semester at Wheaton, this was a special time to be together as a family.

Susan and I on the snow-covered Pacific Crest Trail!

I attended two days of Environmental Justice training at EPA headquarters this week and learned so much about its historical roots and the agency's approach to addressing "EJ" concerns in their work. There mandate flows from an executive order authorized by President Clinton in the 1990s which requires all government agencies to understand and address disproportionate impacts on low-income and minority communities. "Environment" in this case should be understood as a broader concept than just the natural world and as one presenter put it, how you define EJ dictates what kinds of issues you want to acknowledge and which ones you are willing to ignore. Needless to say there are countless perspectives and approaches to "environmental justice" and there is a challenge to incorporate it into everyday work efforts. 

An easy example of an EJ issue would be a current reality in South Chicago. In Little Village one of the oldest and dirtiest coal power-plants in the country is operating in an underprivileged and overburdened community causing significant human health impacts on the most vulnerable including children and the elderly. There is no way that coal power plant could have opened up and continued their hazardous operation in a wealthy and primarily white suburb because the community would have fought it with their power and their money. Why then should we exploit those whose voice we refuse to recognize? What is the EPA's role as a regulatory agency in a situation like this one in Chicago? They are mandated to provide permits "to pollute" but also to make sure that justice is served by protecting the most vulnerable. What does justice look like tangibly and from the perspective of these affected communities?  There is a lot to wrestle with and think about. It will probably continue to be processed as I work on climate change issues here with tribes and in Peru in the slums. 

Time is certainly flying by. I now have less than a month left in this coastal city before I move to another one. My remaining weekends are packed with fun trips around the area to take advantage of all that I can. I already know that I am going to miss the relationships that I have built here and just as most HNGR students do after 5 months on their internships, I am going to have to start the goodbye process after only 2. But I pray that these experiences will only continue to enrich and inform and compliment my sure-to-be awesome time in Peru. God allowed both doors of opportunity to be opened for a reason and I know He is using them both for His glory.