The Fishbowl and the Ocean...

Before this white man touches on thoughts of fishbowls and oceans I do want to just briefly make a clarification to those of you who might wonder why my particular thoughts and reflections find their place under the title of "white man's world". I probably explained this when I started this blog but I didn't bother to go back and check, for it is just as timely to remind you again of the meaning behind "the white man".

When I first became a part of the Vietnamese Evangelical Church some 12 years ago many of the youth and young adults there, who I would eventually be most privileged to pastor, fondly commented on the fact that I stood out in their midst as a "white man in a yellow man's world!" They even would tease me about the fact that I was turning into a duck egg - white on the outside but yellow within! And this sentiment caught on and remained with me for the duration of my ministry in the Vietnamese Church across Melbourne. For Vietnamese youth and young adults across many Vietnamese churches I had involvement in, I was THE white man! So if you are new to reading my blog then please understand that I am not a white supremacist or some kind of evangelical xenophobe! Far from it! I guess what is interesting now, having left the Vietnamese church and returned to my spiritual roots at The Salvation Army Camberwell is that the "white man" tag doesn't have much meaning left to it anymore because I blend in fairly seamlessly within the fellowship I now serve. The yellow man's world is, in some respects, all but a memory...fortunately my home is still blended with yellow!

The fishbowl and the ocean? These two realities have been nibbling away at my mind over the past two weeks since commencing my new role within The Salvation Army Camberwell. Why you ask...Because in my "past-life" as a pastor within the Vietnamese Church here in Australia often times I felt pretty much like a fish in a fishbowl. In a small place, confined, looking out into the big wide world but never really having much opportunity to leave the fishbowl. I guess I felt a bit like Nemo, that clown fish in the Disney-Pixar classic animation Finding Nemo. He was caught from the ocean and placed into an aquarium where he could see out of his tank, through the window to the ocean. And it grieved him to the point of plotting his escape, desperate to be reunited with his father. The point is this...he came from the ocean and his perspective was defined by the freedom of living in the ocean. Other fish in the fishbowl may have lived there for most or all of their lives so they have never known any other reality other that the glass walls of that place. Well I came from out of the ocean because God needed me, for His appointed time and purposes to live in a fishbowl. And while I lived in that fishbowl I became quite accustomed to life within it. It became a refuge, a place of security...A place tucked away from the larger workings of the greater community with it's own peculiarities and practices. And I was surrounded by other mostly contented fish more than happy to live out their Christian lives and experience within that bowl. And so, in many ways life in the fishbowl wasn't completely negative and bad - it had it's affirming moments and served a rightful and holy purpose. But it was a fishbowl nevertheless and whilst I grew familiar and used to it's perimeters and depth I still always recognised it for what it was.

And now, by His divine fish-scooping net God has lifted me out of the bowl and it feels like He's lowered me back into open waters again! One of the real transitions I have encountered through this process is realising just how vast an organisation The Salvation Army is. I grew up in the Army as an officer's kid and thought I knew the basic machinations of the Army but I never fully appreciated the scale of who the Salvation Army is and the measure of what is does on such a massive scale. I never appreciated the level of respect the Army has in the community and just how powerful a presence the "Red Shield" is when it turns up to events such as natural disasters, grand openings of casinos and even Sexpo conventions. I had grown up in an ocean of a movement, a movement called an Army but never fully realised the limitless potential and resources that the Army has. Didn't realise it until I was stripped of it. It doesn't mean that this white man has changed to this rose man with some newly acquired rose-coloured glasses to wear. I'm far too weathered in my life experience to be so idealistic about all the plots and sub-plots at also provide for treacherous and dangerous waters in Salvationism. But I tell you, when you've been swimming around in a fishbowl for 12 years it is very liberating right now to be feeling the movements and currents of an Army that is moving in a promising direction. Sure it won't last forever but I'll ride those currents freely while I can!

So this white man is being expanded...stretched if you will. Stretched to serve and fulfil God's purposes right here where He needs me. Stretched to re-discover the deep spirituality of "others", "the last, the least and the lost" and the three S's "soup, soap and salvation". Stretched to swim in open waters...I'm learning how to swim again!