Real Life Christianity

The link came sometime last Thursday with email instructions from Phil to let him know what I thought of the idea.

His friends would be visiting this weekend from New York and one of them had sent the email, alerting us about the newest fad in spa pedicures. Apparently, a salon in Alexandria, VA had just been featured in the New York Times for offering a “doctor fish pedicure.” By the time I got the link, beauty blogs were already raving about the experience and Diane Sawyer had hailed it as feeling like “tiny, delicate kisses” on Good Morning America.

So, on Sunday morning at 10 a.m., Phil, Josh, Ting, Danny, and I walked into Yvonne Nails and Tanning to decide for ourselves.

I’ve always been a proponent of trying anything (OK, almost anything) at least once, so into side by side tanks Ting’s and my feet went. Tiny silver fish swarmed our toes in a display more analogous to crabs scavenging detritus than a therapeutic beauty regimen. While I slowly lost feeling in what felt like gentle tickling turned prickly numbing, the men stood by dutifully photographing the experience.

(Special thanks to Philip Bacchus and Joshua Li for the photographs provided in this blog.)

“I can’t believe people pay money for this!,” Phil commented.

He’s an avid scuba diver and snorkeler and spends a considerable amount of his vacation time in the warm, tropical waters of St. Vincent (where our families are from). Swimming with gentle, beautiful fish who playfully take a nibble is an occurrence Phil is used to. I grew up in South Florida, but by the time I was in high school, I understood the fearful realities of undercurrents, seaweed, and invisible sea creatures. I was definitely not fond of anything besides water touching me while swimming. The only finned creatures likely to take a little nibble in Florida are sharks.

Isaiah 11:6 says that one day, the “wolf will lie down with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and yearling together.” I’m looking forward to a world where experiencing the feeling of friendly fish won’t be a novelty priced by quarter hour increments. Peace and harmony among all of God’s living creatures will be gloriously commonplace. It will be only natural that we want to cuddle with cobras (Isaiah 11:8) and lie with leopards (Isaiah 11:6). And, as Phil pointed out, we can save our $50 too.

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In general, I’ve gotten a bad rap for being a “bad liberal” in the Adventist church. I have been known to guide wayward youth to their demise by telling them blatant untruths…such as, kissing before marriage is not a sin. I believe that homosexuality is no worse than other infractions on the eternal gauge of naughty and nice. And, worst of all, I actually talk about topics like sex, dating, and abstinence openly. The nerve, really.

If you’re wondering if my wholesome West Indian family is shocked or embarrassed, I assure you that they are both. They brought me up right—with fear and trembling and an implicit understanding that certain things are not talked to be talked about. Then, I went and started hosting relationship advice seminars using the “s-e-x” word in the sanctuary and causing the holy angels in heaven to turn away from my sad, disrespectful ways.

So, imagine my shock and concern that I am somehow being labeled as a staunch, conservative Adventist over on the Adventist Today blog. Someone even called me a Pharisee. Me! The twenty something sex and dating blogger who is supposed to be the liberal voice of young people everywhere!

If you’re wondering what happened, I’ll just admit to being brazen and misguided enough to use the Bible as my basis for the guidance I am providing. I know, you almost had to close your web browser in shame.

If you’d like to weigh in on what is becoming an incendiary discussion about pre-martial virginity in modern culture, head over to Adventist Today! You can also add your comments to Pastor Russell’s thought-provoking “Peculiar Institution” article and sign the petition to abolish race-based conferences. If you comment on either, don’t be afraid to defend our bad liberal personas. Mine was sort of growing on me. (My newest blog, In Defense of Single Parenthood, will be posted on Thursday.)

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As the flight attendant passed my aisle, I made eye contact for the first time since boarding an hour earlier.

“Can I have some more napkins, please?,” I asked, between small gasps unsuccessfully controlling the hot tears dripping onto the open Bible in front of me.

A small pile of soaked tissues had already accumulated on the fifth book of Matthew and now, tiny salty stains were forming from the unbridled stream of tears. Without comment, the flight attendant returned a few minutes later with four napkins in hand.

I had forced myself to wait until I was at least on the plane to have a breakdown. I mean, nobody likes to be that random stranger weeping in the airport. In the darkened cabin of the night flight back to Washington, DC, though, I felt secure in relieving the hurt welling up inside of me.

The hour preceding my flight had been spent at the gate in (phone) conversation with a romantic interest who had just returned from the Caribbean. In an ill-intentioned attempt to misalign my character (for reasons not worth discussing here), his uncle had stood before four generations of his family to offer advice to the nieces and nephews (of whom my friend is one of) at a large, family function. His pithy and profound directive was not to date anyone from a broken home…like me. If it sounds random and confusing, I assure you that it probably was. Except when placed in context.

Like most children of divorced parents, thirteen years after the fact, the character of who I am, who I will be, and the kind of wife I may potentially make is often concentrated down to a single event between the two people who gave me life, and of which, I had absolutely no part of. My education, personal accomplishments, and spirituality are masked by presumptions about my obviously innate emotional instabilities…based only on the fact that my parents are divorced. It is discouraging, disheartening, and blatantly unfair.

Matthew 5 reminds us that there will come a time when all of us will be insulted, persecuted, and accused of all sorts of false evils because of who we are–Christians (verse 11). Matthew 5:11 says to rejoice in spite of our hurting, though, and Psalm 37 encourages us over and over again not to “fret” about “wicked plots against the righteous” because it leads only to evil. Psalm 37:28 says, “They [God’s faithful ones] will be protected forever, but the offspring of the wicked will be cut off.”

I wish that discrimination based on idle gossip and factors outside of our control was an occurrence exclusive only to me, but it is an event that plagues all of us. Sometimes it’s nearly effortless to dismiss ignorant and misinformed people. Other times, we realize that we have never truly healed from our pain and find ourselves fighting battles we already thought we won.

In light of this week’s events, I would be remiss to not encourage all the single parents (and of course, other singles!) to treat themselves to the A.S.A.M. (Adventist Single Adult Ministries) weekend that will be presented next week right here at Miracle Temple! The cost is only $15 for lunch. We are inexpressibly proud of who you are and who you have made us.

This week, you can also hop on over to Adventist Today, where my relationship advice blog on Wednesday will be titled, In Defense of Single Parenthood (sorry, I got a little riled up this week!). More importantly, our own Pastor Fredrick Russell is gracing the cover of the July issue with his (thought-provoking and on point!) commentary, “Peculiar Institution” about segregation in the church.

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