The Tangible, Sobering Kingdom

It's been nearly 3 weeks since I posted about Cynthia, an artist living on the streets of Golden Hill. I created an online store to help sell her bookmark-sized original works of art, put the word out to friends, and those first sevens pieces of art sold in a single day. It was more than a little bit awesome.

I couldn't wait to see Cynthia and tell her the good news. It took though nearly 3 weeks to track her down. The cell phone number I had for her didn't work, and I hadn't seen her in the neighborhood.

On Saturday afternoon though, while I was in the front of the house watering the grass, I heard a "hello." Looking up, there she was. "Hey Cynthia! I've got some good news for you." I can hardly describe how good it felt to say those words to her. Sophia and I invited her inside, talked a bit, and gave her the thirty dollars from selling her work on Etsy. She hung out for awhile, met our girls and my mom, and told us some more about our home "back in the day," when it was a run-down drug house. She's been in the neighborhood for many years, and has seen a lot.

On Sunday night she came back with over a hundred new works of art for me to look at, and choose which to post online. As we spread them out on the table that night, and looked through every single one, we were amazed both at her talent, and the hope that this seemed to represent.

She was back over again Monday night, signing the ones we're going to post online. We had a good conversation, heard a bit more of her story, and got to finally pray with her. It felt good, hopeful, and right. I also saw though some of the pain in Cynthia, hearing a bit more about some of what she's up against, some of her pain and loss, and how her life has been—in her words—on a decline for a long time.

She told us of her Van Gogh dreams, only unlike Vincent, she'd like to earn the money from her art before she dies. I don't know what will come of selling her art online. Really though, I'm not sure this is really all about money and selling art. That's part of it. There's something though about getting to know Cynthia and hearing her story. She's part of my neighborhood and the pain of it's past. And in a small way, I guess she's becoming a part of my family's story. I still don't know her well, and we had to have some sobering conversations with the girls about the realities of entering into the lives of desperate people who are hanging on by a thread. I've been involved in the lives of people struggling with homelessness, addiction and other demons, and it can be a really sticky, uncomfortable, difficult mess.

I also know though, that that's where Jesus is. On the street, in the pain of addiction, loss, and struggle. He's also in the passion and hope of cool art, and what it represents. He's in the good news of thirty bucks when it's really needed, a glass of cold water and a listening ear. He's in the eyes of Sophia, my mom and girls, as I watched them invite Cynthia into our home, treating her just like any other friend we might have over.

I know a little bit more of what Jesus looks like over these last few days, and it feels really, really good.

If you want to check out Cynthia's art, you can visit her Etsy store here.

/jon

A Glimpse of the Tangible Kingdom

G
I picked up the book, "Re Jesus" by Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch this week. Chaz, Rebecca, Peter, Derek and I had started reading it together when we all still lived in LA. It was one of those books that got shuffled around in our move to San Diego and I'm not sure that any of us had a chance to finish it.

This morning I experienced something beautiful of the tangible Kingdom of God. Frost and Hirsch say, "...we are never alone when we do a holy deed because we partner with God in the redemption of the world. In other words, a deed done in His name is a means of Grace, a sacrament........and grace goes two ways: such an action pulls a person away from their own self-involved concerns and directs them missionally toward other human beings in such a way that they, the person acted upon and the person acting find God in a new way." (p.152)

Right after I read this quote and the words surrounding it, I heard someone yell out from the street in front of our house, "Ken, wait! We have something for you! Its a surprise!" I quickly looked out our window to see who it was.

Ken is a homeless man who walks by our house in the morning and evening every day. He wears all black and carries three large canvas bags. I've seen the couple who live across the street from us talking to him once or twice but this morning they stopped right in front of our window so I got to listen in.

The husband stood and talked with Ken while the wife rain into their home to get her "surprise" for Ken. I so enjoyed watching them interact....tears filled my eyes as I felt God was revealing Himself to me through this couple's act of love toward Ken. The wife ran out of the house with a new pair of jeans, nicely folded, and a banana. Ken had a big smile on his face in responded in gratefulness for the jeans and said, ".... and Bananas are my favorite."

I haven't met this neighbor couple yet but I want to. I don't know if they know Jesus yet. And I want to tell them that they encouraged me with their act of love toward Ken.

I have to add to Frost and Hirsch's quote.... not only does the person acted upon and the person acting find God in a new way but maybe the people looking out their windows get to find God in a new way too. :)

Articles on Golden Hill History

I found these articles in Espresso (tell me what this means - an independent newspaper for café society). One is on Judy's "Big Kitchen" Café and the other on San Diego History:

Big Kitchen - 29 years in Golden Hill

San Diego's 240th Anniversary Goes Unsung

nearly haiku

Jasmine, originally uploaded by hallywood.

Summer morning sun
walking. praying. laughing. listening.
A Jasmine blooms, and I stop.

telephone

telephone, originally uploaded by hallywood.

Chaz and Rebecca recently moved into an apartment complex, South Park Villas, on A street, and have already been making some stellar connections with the neighbors. They conspired with a neighbor to throw a mini block party among some of the families in their complex last weekend. Hilda, who lives in the apartment just below Chaz and Rebecca, speaks no English, and Rebecca speaks no Spanish, but that didn't stop anyone. Somehow, they figured it all out, made great food, and got everyone to the same place at the same time.

The South Park Villas (a misnomer on a many levels) has a bunch of kids living there. Seeing as how we've got kids, Rebecca and Chaz invited us to join the shindig. It was a great time. Food, jumprope, tag in the park, and even a game of telephone.

After the brutal beating I took in a game of freeze tag (old and slow don't begin to say how bad I was at this game), I sat down and soaked in the scenery. Chaz was playing soccer with some of the local latino guys (he's really good). Rebecca was coordinating a game of telephone with the kids (she definitely has a way with kids). The afternoon was perfect, and I realized how blessed we are to have opportunities like this. Hanging out with friends. Making new friends. Playing games. Submerging into the neighborhood. Being the church. Whatever you want to call it, I sensed God in all of it, and it was good.

/jon

Hope for 2009

Walking Golden Hill

We spend a lot of time walking the streets of Golden Hill. The community is geared that way. There's small markets close by, some great food joints, coffee houses, and friends close by. I can even easily walk to Hamilton's Tavern for a pint and a Charger game. A number of mornings every week, we also prayer walk. Walking and talking, to one another and to God. Listening. Seeing. Those are fast becoming some of my favorite times in our new neighborhood. There's something about getting out and walking. Seeing and hearing, even smelling the neighborhood. I get a feel and a sense of the place that, well, I just can't get any other way. And God seems to use those times in powerful ways, to connect us to Him, to this place, and to one another.

I usually bring along my camera and snap a few photos. The sky. The architecture. And the sidewalks. The sidewalks here are amazing. Many are crumpled and in disrepair. Dates are usually stamped on them, proudly by contractors from past eras. Many go back more than a hundred years, I wonder the stories these sidewalks could tell. The glory says after the turn of the 20th century, when Golden Hill was a neighborhood for affluent businessmen working downtown. The chicano era of the 60's. The gang-run days of the 70's-90's. The people and the families that have lived here and walked these streets.

— Jon

terranova heads to the border

The Russian Novelist Leo Tolstoy once wrote, “Everybody wants to change the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.” Maybe we're a little over ambitious, but we want it all. We want to change our world and become a changed people.

NieuCommunities are unique missional communities scattered around the world that are developing a new generation of leaders to follow God in the way of Jesus. Each year we invite a bunch of young, emerging leaders to come and spend time with us as we pursue our God and engage our world. Some come for a few weeks, some for a few months, and others for a few years. But no one leaves unchanged.

Through an integrated mentoring and missional experience our apprentices and staff are challenged to make God the center of their lives. They are shaped in the crucible of community, and they are formed for mission through real-time ministry in the neighborhoods around us. The trajectories of our lives are changed as we reimagine what it means to follow a missionary God, and along the way, so is our world.

Since the birth of NieuCommunities in 2002, our approach to missional formation has been both holistic and rigorous. We meet almost daily for training, coaching, worship, prayer, common meals and shared ministry in our neighborhoods and beyond. We’ve met in barns, homes, B&Bs, church buildings, and coffee shops. We’ve lived under one roof and we’ve been scattered across town. Through these diverse experiences we’ve learned how powerful it is to be submerged in a place that will help stimulate an environment of discovery and transformation, and to create a hub that serves as a place of hospitality for our neighbors. And this month we are setting out to establish NieuCommunities in another new city.

Many of us know San Diego as “America’s Finest City” with its great beaches, the zoo, the Gaslamp District, and Balboa Park. But there’s another side to the city that we sometimes miss. San Diego is a border city. Its economy, its social structure, and its politics are inextricably linked with its sister city—Tijuana—just to the south. These two diverse mega cities straddling the most trafficked border in the world create a very complex, and unique metropolis.

The city’s majority population is non-white, non-middle class. They often work 2 to 3 jobs a day to survive, and rarely visit the places that tourists enjoy every day. San Diego is also one of the United States’ designated “sanctuary” cities. There are significant refugee populations from Africa and Southeast Asia sprinkled throughout the city’s downtown neighborhoods, and these groups all face significant challenges.

The legal border between the United States and Mexico lies 15 miles south of the city center, but the real border lies about 1500 yards south of downtown where cultures from around the world collide. These are the neighborhoods we believe God is calling us to move into, to serve, and from within to develop young missional leaders to send all over the world.

And this month both the Halls and Yackleys are packing up and moving south to help create and form the leadership team of this new missional community and extend the global reach of Terranova Church.

A residents view of Golden Hill

Seen on the Reader website
by Subliminelle

Traffic. Sirens. Police. Firetrucks. Ambulances. Jet Planes. These are the noises of my neighborhood. It is no wonder the wealthy families who first settled in Golden Hill during the late 1880's eventually got tired of the racket and headed east, leaving behind large, elegant homes and wide open boulevards. Sadly, over time, the neighborhood fell into despair. A century later, Golden Hill had become a haven for street gangs, junkies, and transients- people who had bigger problems to worry about than decibel levels.

Today, the neighborhood is as noisy as ever. Although the gangs have been replaced by musicians and artists, a criminal element still exists, and the sirens of police cars never let you forget it. Although the homeless have been pushed to the outskirts of town, the clatter of shopping carts still echoes from the alleys.

The trendy East Village at the bottom of the slope is exploding with new sounds as well. Construction. Sports bars. Night clubs. Bowling alleys. The noise climbs further up the hill every day, creating a non-stop symphony of sounds...a chorus of commotion. Airplanes scream by, one after another, and conversations must pause for them to pass, like pedestrians waiting for the light to change. Freeways rush through town like rivers. Traffic ebbs and flows, not unlike the tides of the ocean.

Local residents know that if you live here long enough, you'll stop noticing the noise after a while. What you will begin to notice, however, are the more subtle sounds of life on the hill, sounds that can only be heard by those who are really listening.

Golden Hill is a musical place. Its southern boundary is a bridge which crosses over the 94 freeway. Built by a local artist, the bridge plays a tune if its rungs are struck while crossing. On the north side of the bridge is Golden Hill's bustling commercial district, which consists of a handful of food markets, restaurants, liquor stores, and one very stylish fire station.

Walking down 25th Street, you'll hear street merchants selling flowers. You'll hear a cacophony of birds and people perched on the patio of Krakatoa, our local coffee shop. You'll hear the sound of pizza dough being tossed and pounded over at Luigi's Pizzeria, and you'll hear rowdy laughter escaping the infamous Turf Club anytime its heavy wooden door swings open.

After dark, you'll hear the comforting hum of neon lights, the crackle of electricity, and the hoots of the night owls, awake and alive. When traffic dies down at dusk, you'll hear the whisper of the wind down the wide, empty streets, the seductive songs of the crickets, and the rustle of the palm trees swaying high above. These are the sounds that I listen for. These are the sounds of life on the hill.

Summer brings new noises to town as well. The ka-boom! of fireworks and the subsequent barking of dogs. The bittersweet wail of mariachi bands singing songs of amor! off in the distance. The angry hiss of sprinklers watering freshly mowed lawns. The ting-a-ling of the ice cream man's silver bell as he pushes his frozen goods across the street makes my mouth water in a Pavlovian sort of way.

During baseball season, I can hear the thrill and excitement of a home run. Just listening to the roar of the crowds gives me a craving for peanuts and crackerjacks. I can always tell whether the Padres won or lost simply by following the soundtrack of the game.

From my bedroom, I hear the approaching rattle of skateboard wheels, the whiz of a ten-speed bike flying past my house, or the slap of sneakers on the sidewalk as little kids run home from school. On Sunday mornings, I am awakened by church bells resonating from down the street.

On Wednesday afternoons, I hear the chip! chip! chip! of my father, carving marble sculptures in the backyard. On Friday evenings I hear the crash! boom! bang! of the rock band that practices in our garage. And on Saturday nights, I fall asleep to the steady thump! of hip hop bass coming from the people upstairs. We are musicians and artists, and we are people in motion.

When the air is thick and heavy, I can hear the voices of transportation- the far-off moan of a foghorn blowing in from the bay, or the last call of a cruise ship before it sets off on another bon voyage. I can hear the clang! clang! of a passing trolley or the whistle of a train pulling into the station, as if to announce, “I'm home!”. Whenever I hear these familiar sounds, I know that I'm home, too. For some folks, the noise of the city is too much to bear. But to me, the sound of the hill is “golden”.

Say it ain't so

Could the Turf Club be closing?

Two posts about it, here and here.

—Jon

The Garden

There's a blog I've been following by a resident of Golden Hill, that discusses some local goings in the community. For $30 a year, residents get a plot of dirt in the garden to grow their own produce. While this post seems to indicate not all is well, I love the fact that people in the community do stuff like this.

The post is here.

Golden Hill, Feb 2008

Spent the day yesterday in San Diego with the family, doing some exploring. Looked at some potential properties in Golden Hill. Had lunch at Luigi's. Walked around the neighborhood a bit. Had some coffee and goodies at Krakatoa (the cinnamon blueberry cake was incredible). Caught some street art here and there. Golden Hill seems filled with it, when you look for it. A chicken-wire sculpture hanging outside in front of a purple office building. Sidewalk stencils. Art hanging from a tree at Krakatoa, or high on a bathroom wall. The place seems full of surprises, and creativity.

Had our first encounters with some questionable locals during this day trip, which was a little unsettling for Sophia and I (the girls were oblivious, for the most part). Reminded me that I'm not in Kansas anymore. This is an urban area, not South Orange County, and requires an adjusted sense of awareness as I walk its streets.

Found out that much of GH has free wifi. Seems to have been started by a grass roots effort by some locals who put up powerful wifi repeaters on top of their homes and buildings. It's not clear to me how much of GH gets this free wifi, but definitely something I want to find out more about.

Visited the local Goodwill and Salvation Army thrift stores, just across the freeway from GH (within walking distance). Sophia is the thrift store queen, and gets a lot of our clothes at "segundas," as they are called in SPanish. I scored a very cool sweater/shirt (wearing it now, as a matter of fact), and Natalie got some stretchy-pants she's been wanting (the kid is all about comfort, less about style). The Salvation Army is a bit further into downtown than Goodwill, and the shoppers reflected that. Had a buff-looking transvestite in a short pink dress shopping the furniture section (whoa!), a couple of homeless-looking dudes, and a bicycle riding guy that could have been the poster man for eco-friendly living (do I read too much into appearances?). The people working there seemed to know most everyone. When one shaky guy—who looked to have just exited rehab—walked in, the lady working the register seemed to know him and asked "how ya doin'?" He replied, "feeling spiritual." Cool.

The girls had never driven across the Coronado bridge, so we did that. I've been across it a few times, but it was different for me this time, thinking back to our conversation with Jason Evans at Barrio Logan, in the park underneath this behemoth of a bridge. The large, unmistakable suicide-prevention signs were sobering as well. Once on Coronado, we stopped at a park along the bay for the girls to play at, then took them to the Hotel del Coronado for a look at that amazing, historical place. Only, my kids didn't really give a rip about the hotel. They saw some small dunes on the beach and rocks to climb on, so that's what captured their attention. For dinner, we decided to head back to downtown, and found a great little Mexican place at 5th and E street called El Panchos. Food was terrific, and the prices were real reasonable.

Made what seemed like a dozen potty-stops during the 90 miles home (in truth, I think it was only twice though). It was a good day.

— Jon

Luigi's

On my way home from Mexico last Saturday, I stopped off for dinner at Luigi's in Golden Hill. It's right across the street from the Turf Club. The crowd was a real mix... some younger, a few older, and a couple of families. The young lady working the counter seemed to know many the people coming in. Had a real small-town feel to it. The calzone wasn't bad either!

— Jon