Letter to friends on witchcraft, revenge and gospel

Hello Chris, Jim:

I've got theological indigestion or constipation, however you'd like to consider it. This context is so engaging, so stimulating, so challenging, that I'm daily looking and looking again at the gospel and what I'm proclaiming and teaching.

Maybe it's because whenever we re-entry after being away, there's always a slew of crises that hit you in the face...this person killed, this house burned down my street thugs, this person robbed Gonzalo, so and so is out of jail and terrorizing the neighborhood, etc.....

More than ever we're looking directly into the face of evil; in the form of what I'm referring to now as the trinity of evil here: DRUGS, WITCHCRAFT and REVENGE. These seem to be intertwined, in a depth that we're only now grasping. Witchcraft is utilitarian, used to work revenge on the killers of your son, drugs creates conflicts and enhances the violent behavior.

We're finding out that people we've known for years are, in fact, BRUJOS (witches or shaman). One of the women that was baptized under Mike Wells' ministry just became a witch; thru the influence of another woman that we didn't even know was a witch. In a recent email prayer bulletin I ramble on about a family that we're getting inroads into that seems to be a dark stronghold of witchcraft in Barrio Pedro Camejo (where we now live).

I've been greatly inspired of late by the example of James Lawson, a Methodist pastor who, in 1959 began training young, black bible school students to love their enemies (they practiced by spitting in each other's faces before going into Nashville to do the very first sit-ins at the front end of the civil rights movement). In short, I'm convinced that Christians need to be "trained to forgive" and seek reconciliation. That's in essence what my recent mentoring visit with Gonzalo became. I feel a bit like James Lawson. Gonzalo has gotten accosted 2 times in the last month by a young man that everyone knows from Pedro Camejo. He's a street kid, without parents, who's now an adult and basically robs and kills people (they call him CALIMERO -- please pray for him. He's also the one that robbed several of our team members in April / May. Quite a dangerous guy.).

The first time, CALIMERO's buddy held the gun to Gonzalo's head, while C robbed Gonzalo's shoes. The second time, they exchanged punches and C chased Gonzalo home. Gonzalo feels humiliated by these experiences and knows that given the right (or wrong?) circumstances, he could literally kill the guy out of rage. Or he could just move his family back to the countryside.

Corrie made this last visit to Gonzalo with me and wrote up the experience, as she saw it...it's not a polished piece of writing, just her raw journaling after the visit:

I’ve never before seen the deep smile on Gonzalo’s face that I saw when John gave him those shoes. To replace the ones that had been stolen from him several weeks ago...there couldn’t have been a more different look on his face when John asked him how we could find a way to tell Calimero and Chino that they are more loved by God than they can imagine. That the day they were born, the angels were rejoicing in heaven with singing and dance because of the joy of it. John said that’s what he wants to share with them. But he’s – honestly – afraid. How do you get close enough to them to tell them something like that? Something they’ve never heard before that would catch them enough by surprise to make them think. But it’s terrifying, because they could kill you at any moment, and getting friendly with them is no promise that they won’t. John said that’s what he wanted more than anything to share with them… then he asked Gonzalo, “But how can we do that? How could we get close enough?” Like there might be an answer. And the pain and sadness on Gonzalo’s face as he looked away seemed to me as much as saying, “I can’t believe this is what you’re asking of me as my friend. When a moment ago you were making up for my loss and humiliation, now you’re asking me to care enough about them to risk my life to tell them they’re worth something. That they’re loved.”

This is when loving your enemy ceases to be cliché. Is this the cost of following Jesus? Is this right here what it means to be like him? To risk your very life to share the father’s love with your own enemies. That was Jesus. This is no small calling… for any of us.

Praying together at the end, hand in hand, I felt the spirit powerfully present, as we were all facing much the same fears and dangers. I wish I understood even a word of what Gonzalo prayed, but I know what he said was coming from his heart, and I felt him agree with John and with me as we prayed for protection and strength and God’s love for these two boys, especially, whose fates seem to be sealed, but whom God is dying to redeem (end of corrie journaling).

Have you ever noticed how prophetic Jesus' vision for the Church was? Matthew 5, the beatitudes, are so radical in their call to go the distance in making peace, doing justice, serving Christ at any and all cost; rejection, persecution, even death for the sake of peace, justice, showing mercy, living humbly. Paul's vision in Romans 12 is equally radical and prophetic. To point Gonzalo to a life with God and his neighbor that does not repay evil for evil, but overcomes evil with good -- is very prophetic. Very counter-cultural. Very difficult for Christians to accept. For the Church to actually embody this teaching in an environment so volatile and dangerous is to be very different, very out of step with the law of the street.

I'm going to stop rambling here. Hope this makes sense, or that you can appreciate the depth and the emotion involved in these reflections. This is stuff of life and death for barrios like these; for forgiveness, in this environment becomes a social force, capable of breaking the cycle of revenge and violence. Forgiveness, cast upon the social landscape of revenge and violenct, becomes the difference between a Church that lives the gospel and a Church that opts for a non-threatening religious status-quo. This transformational vision stuff comes with a high price. It's costly. And we are feeling it, if only in anticipation of what could come down the pike.

God's peace,

John in Venezuela