The Face of Jesus

I have been praying over the last few days to see the face of Jesus. One would think for a seminarian this would be a rather regular occurrence, but for some reason the past few weeks my eyes have been preoccupied in looking at the whole new world that I am living in rather than where Jesus might be within it. Yes, I have reflected on the church and Jesus working in and through the church through the different ways they are engaged in the community. I have even been wrapped up in what Jesus seems to be doing in this place. But I have been yearning to see Jesus and really praying for that. Today I saw her.

This morning I spent my time with Phakamisa Ministry at my church. The word Phakamisa means "to lift up, and let grow" in Zulu. The ministry does many things but primarily trains women to be preschool teachers and caregivers in their townships. The ministry runs five days a weeks and four of those mornings begin with a time of worship. The worship time is spent in singing, prayer request, and the lighting of candles (a candle is lit for every person they might know who has died in the past two weeks, six candles were lit today). In the service today Jesus was sitting next to me. She was small and had the most beautiful smile that was laced with wrinkles on both sides. Her eyes as well were painted with the wrinkles only brushed on by wisdom. Between every prayer there was a song and during each song she would rise and slowly walk to the music and pray as though she carried the world on her 75 year old shoulders. This Gogo (a name used for woman who are older and caregivers) took care of eleven children in her small home.

In our closing song I began to think about this Gogo and also began to think of Jesus, and his words in Matthew saying, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these." In that moment I knew Jesus had shown up for me! And also that Jesus shows up everyday to the eleven children she gives care too! In that same moment Gogo's cell phone went off with some obnoxious tune and she quickly grabbed it out of her shirt (many people keep it there so no one will steal it). The ring abruptly shattered my highly spiritual moment. Yet, after that we both laughed and hugged, and she held my hand through the closing prayer rubbing it gently as could imagine Jesus did when Matthew says, "when he had placed his hands on them, he went from there." I started to tear up during our prayer, for in her touch I realized that I was simply a little child who needed a touch from Jesus, and as Jesus always does, he showed up!