The beauty of a mess

At the end of the month I was feeling down.  Praise Him that I had an update to write, to remind me of all the things that happened in May and all the ways God was faithful. Part of my being down related to the fact that I didn't really develop any new relationships this month. It felt like failure. That being said, I tend to recognize lies when I see them and, looking back over the past few weeks, I realize that while I may not have made new friendships, the ones I do have are beginning to reach a depth that only comes with time and investment.  And through the deepening relationships, I am reminded...

                                                                                                   ...real relationships are messy.

But they're worth the mess.

There's the 20 year-old girl, married less than 6 months, who is already experiencing the heartache of divorce. There's the friend whose father is terminally ill and watching him live his last days in suffering. There's the friend who has been waiting with the expectation of pregnancy for the last 2 and a half years and continues to come up with disappointment. There's the young friend who is feeling the loss of her best friend and love, due to cultural rules that cannot be broken.

I weep over these ladies, over their heartaches and difficulties they are facing. What can I even say, what can I possibly offer them?

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too." 
2 Corinthians 1:3-5

And oh, how I've experienced that comfort.  I was given assurance through the Holy Spirit that part of my job is to comfort the broken, hurting, seeking people that he has placed in my life. Some of these ladies don't know Jesus and the love and comfort he gives, but they all desperately need him.  And, as I continue in 2 Corinthians, I see that no comfort I give is of myself. God alone gives me sufficiency to minister to these ladies who are broken and hurting.

And at the end of it all, I recognize that a handful of deep, meaningful relationships will likely impact the kingdom far more than a sweeping, surface-level relationship with everyone. I pray that it would be so, that God would make a crown of beauty from the ashes, oil of gladness from the mourning, and joyous praise from their despair.

{my bloody adventure}

Last week we decided to go hiking up a rather gigantic mountain. The view from the top was incredible, which was good because I was able to conclude that the sweaty-out-of-breath-exhaustion was worth it. 

But, before we even got started, we encountered several of these little guys milling around on the road up. They looked as though they may have been a bit hungry, so we fed them little candies that someone had. 

However, a combination of a vehicle coming down the road and one of the guys walking up behind it resulted in the horse giving a not-so-friendly "get out of my way" kick to the leg of said guy. Thankfully he was fine, but the unrest caused us girls to jump up off the road into the brush until the horses continued on with their journey, past us.

The hike then proceeded without problem. Besides breathing and all that.

I did say breathtaking, didn't I?  But the fun doesn't stop there.

As we were reaching the top of the mountain, I realized that my foot was bleeding quite a bit. Thankfully there was water nearby and we had a handy first aid kit, so we doctored it up and headed to the top of this insanely scary spire.

As we made our descent, I realized that my foot was still bleeding and the band-aid wasn't sticking. B and I went to doctor it up once again, this time with tape and gauze. I found it odd that it wasn't hurting, but was thankful, as we still had to hike down the huge mountain.

As B and I waited for the rest of the group, we looked down and noticed that her foot was bleeding too. Except hers was way more bloody. At this point, we began to suspect more than mere "sandals rubbing in the wrong place" and as she pulled her pant leg up, only to reveal another "wound," we realized that we must have been attacked by leeches.

Leeches. 

Gross, I know.  We never actually saw the leeches, but it dawned on us that while we were sparing ourselves from horse kicks, we must have jumped into a lair of leaches. If there is such a thing. Anyways, we must have been giving them so much blood from our hearts pumping up the mountain, that they got too full and fell off before we got to the top.  We bled the whole way home, through gauze and all, but we made it out alive.

Oh, and that's not even the grossest part. [is "grossest" a word??]

 

If you look closely at this picture, on my left foot near my big toe you can see the ugly bloodsucker. I hope this picture is too small and you can't actually see it, but it's there. And I was so unsuspecting.

So there you have it. My bloody adventure.

{eating adventures}

This is an embarrassing story, but not so embarrassing that I won't share.  Circumstances like the following occur more often than you would probably think, and give good insight into what living abroad does to you. Well, living abroad HERE, that is.


You see, what happened was that B did an amazing thing. On her most recent visa run {a trip out of the country, required after an allotted period of time in order to renew your visa and thus be allowed to return to said country} she brought back Krispy Kreme. Yes, the manna from heaven that is a soft and delicious doughnut.

And so, as we went for the box to indulge in our long-lost craving, we opened to find our worst fears realized. The ants had arrived first.

 

We each quickly grabbed a doughnut, hoping that ours was one that had been spared. And, although they were mostly free of ants, we did have to do a bit of picking to make sure. 

And then...

...we went for it. 

And if we happened to get a little extra protein, so be it. I'm sure it's not the first an I've eaten here, nor the last.

Surrendering Praise

It has been almost a month since my dad died.  Two days ago I found out my cousin was being hospitalized and they couldn't figure out what was wrong with her.  I was and am suddenly overwhelmed with fear. Fear that something else will happen to a family member or a friend. Fear of being so far away, so out of control.  Over the past couple of days I have been contemplating my level of surrender to the Lord.  Have I not fully surrendered the possibility of more tragedy? Today, as I was thinking about it all, the song “I Surrender All” came to my head. Wanting to be reminded and encouraged, I began to listen:

All to Jesus I surrender,

All to Him I freely give.

Really? The lyrics echo in my heart as empty words, false words. Can God ask me to give him my mom? My sister? My brother? My niece? How can I be okay with that?

Then, I remembered a different song:

Though you slay me, yet I will praise you

Though you take from me, I will bless your name

Though you ruin me, still I will worship

Sing a song to the one who is all I need.

I was reminded this morning at church as I partook of the Lord’s Supper that Christ’s body was broken for me. His blood was spilled for me. 

Lifted high upon that day

Behold the Lamb that was slain

And I'll know that every tear was worth it all

Telling God that I fully surrender all to him, when my heart tells me a different thing, feels like I am pretending. I know everything is in God's hands, everything happens with His permission, but today, right now, I just can't let go of those I hold most dear in my heart. 

Though tonight I'm crying out

"Let this cup pass from me now" 

You're still more than I need

You're enough for me

You're enough for me

I know that whatever he puts in my path, every pain and heartache, every hurt and affliction, has purpose. As John Piper puts it,

"Every millisecond of your pain from the fallen nature or fallen man, every millisecond of your misery in the path of obedience is producing a peculiar glory you will get because of that." 

One thing I will always surrender to the Lord is my praise. I will bless the Lord at all times, his praise shall continually be in my mouth. Even in the midst of difficulties, I know God is with me. Even if, in the future, God does slay me, take from me, ask things of me that I don't think I can handle, I know that the Lord is near to the brokenhearted. I have experienced it firsthand. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all (Psalm 34:1,18,19). 

Even in the times when I find myself too weak to surrender all that I hold dear in life, I know he won't keep me here. In the meantime, I will surrender my praise. 

P.S. You won't regret checking out this song: 

Doing the Dirty Work

Forgiveness.

It's difficult, right? 

For me at least, I have been finding forgiveness to be a struggle.
You see, when I zoom out and see the big picture of life, I can see God at work.  I am able to find time every day to be thankful for His working and interventions.
It's when I zoom in that I struggle to move past the hurts, and sometimes the anger. There are specific memories that I can call to mind for which I am withholding forgiveness.
Can one truly forgive and still feel hurt and anger? I don't know the answer to that question, but I tend towards true forgiveness being a letting go of those feelings.  And as long as I hold onto unforgiveness, those memories are still there, haunting me. That chapter, whatever it may be, is still open, when it simply needs to be firmly shut.

I can think of it this way:
My life is a diverse flower garden.  There is life and beauty there.  But what happens when the weeds spring up? They choke out the life, kill the beauty.  Each memory, each "offense" that I choose not to forgive is like a weed in my garden. It has such power over me, to choke out life, to kill my joy, to prevent new beauty from springing up.

What to do?
It's time to put on some gloves and get down on my knees. I have the hard, dirty work of pulling up each weed, one at a time. That means taking each memory, the hurt, and the anger--examining it for what it is--and discarding it to a place outside of my garden, my life. Once I do that, it no longer has the power over me like it did when it was allowed to choke out my joy.
And it's an exercise I will need to perform regularly in my life, to keep everything growing.
For me specifically, it means handing it all over to Jesus, one by one, and asking him to fill the void, the hole, with something new and beautiful. I choose to forgive. And it means I get to move forward, no holding back, with joy and contentment, to see what else God has for me in this life.

Forgiveness.

It's beautiful, right? 

Falling apart, to be put back together

Lord I come, I confess

Bowing here, I find my rest

Without you, I fall apart

You're the one that guides my heart

                                                                                      (Lord I Need You, Matt Maher)

These lyrics so accurately describe what I was just thinking. I love the way that music has the power to make beautiful my thoughts that can be oh so ugly. When left alone with just my thoughts lately, I have the tendency to be pretty depressing. The enormity of our task, of all that lies ahead of us, weighs heavily on my heart. My own inadequacies and weaknesses seem so overwhelming.  When I forget about God's presence, about God's call to be here, that's when I tend to fall apart. I guess it's that whole taking my eyes off of Jesus in the midst of the storm--I just plain sink. And some days nights, I'll just be honest, I feel as though I'm drowning.  But it's in the LORD that I find my rest. He is the one that guides my heart, and my steps--NOT my emotions. 

"Don't doubt in the dark what he has revealed in the light." 

God is SO so good. His blessings and affirmations are abundant, when I choose to see them. Therefore, I will share just a few stories of ways that God has worked and affirmed me in the past months. 

One day, after praying for opportunities to share while we were out, we met a cute family that were super interested in us strange, white Americans. However, instead of going out of our way to walk with them, I hastily said my goodbyes as I turned to go do some pre-planned errands. Only afterwards did I realize my missed opportunity, and asked our gracious God to give me another shot, even if it took me off course. And answer he DID! A few days later we were on a bus, on our way to head home, and we sat next to two different ladies. We both struck up conversations and they happened to be friends, going together to visit a sick father in the hospital. However, they were so excited about meeting us that they immediately invited us over to their house for tea.  So, I silently thanked the Lord, and we completely changed our course for the day! It was a sweet time of meeting and getting to know a family, sharing a story of Jesus as healer, and praying for them. My plans were completely different, but His plans were infinitely better. 

Our sweet new friend

My second story involves our awesome local dress, pictured below. It's totally adorable, right? And honestly, very comfortable.

 But sometimes I just miss wearing my American clothing. On this particular day, I was expressing my thoughts to Becca, as we were walking to a tourist shop to buy some Christmas gifts. I was asking, "Do you really think it makes a difference, that we dress differently?" I mean, our skin reveals our foreign-ness, we can never hide that, and we will never truly fit in. Right? As we arrived to the store, I set aside my questions, and began to shop. But God didn't forget my questions. 

As I was checking out, the cashier sweetly asked me, "Do you live here?" (As opposed to visiting)  I happily responded that, yes in fact, I do live here. Her response? "I can tell. You look like a [local] girl." 

Go ahead, tell me "coincidence." 

Lastly was our most recent jaw-dropping, God moment. First, we have been praying for where we should live and Second, we have been praying for direction with language, as we've lost one helper to wedding planning and the second is just wholly busy.  We were visiting our *potential* future apartment, just to see what the area was like on a different day, at a different time. As we were walking away, a man in the house next door came out and asked us if we'd like help (apparently, two white girls wandering on a dead end road up a mountain says "lost").

As we explained to him that we were considering renting in the area, he warmly invited us in (in a totally not creepy way) to chat.  He gave us advice, told us about the area, talked about the country in general, and told us about his family. Did I mention he is part of our people group?? The people group that feels elusive in our city sometimes? Not only that, but then he drove us down the mountain (it's quite the trek), showed us his jewelry shop, and introduced us to his assistants. Did I mention that his assistant is "an expert" in Tamil and could even give us lessons?? 

Go ahead, say "coincidence." 

The Apartment! 

God is GOOD, people. He answers us when we call on him. He is gracious and compassionate when we fail. When we doubt him, he doesn't walk away frustrated. He gives us rest and comfort in the midst of the storm. 

Being your bride

I don't understand. 

I don't understand how you could ever want me as your bride, when I have been so unfaithful. It's like I have arrived to the wedding scraped and tattered, my dress, once sparkling white, is now stained with spots, dirty from sin.  My head hangs low, shamefully, the smile that was once so brilliant and eager for my groom has been replaced with quivering lips. A river silently runs down my tear stained cheeks, giving away my unfaithfulness. But, before I can even attempt to explain, to make excuses, to apologize--you, the radiant, spotless groom--you rush down the aisle and take me into your arms, with not even so much as a question on your lips. You sweetly whisper in my ear, "You will call me 'My Husband' and no longer will you call me 'My Baal.' For I will remove the names of the Baals from your mouth, and they will be remembered by name no more...And I will betroth you to me forever. I will betroth you to me in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love, and in mercy. I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. And you shall know the Lord." You gently wipe the tears from my face and exchange the dirty, torn gown for a brand new, spotless white dress. 

I don't understand. 

This is humbling--a picture of grace that baffles the mind. Is this a deserved response? Absolutely not. Is it right that you should accept me, take me in, after I have turned to so many places outside of you? No. 

Yet you do.

This is grace. It's taking what is unclean and making it pure and spotless once again. It's redeeming love, restorative, selfless. When you look at me, you don't see my past, my mistakes, my failures. You see your beloved, your bride, that has been washed by the blood of Jesus--holy and consecrated--before you. While I was still sinning, you chose me. Knowing I would sin again and again, you chose me. Knowing that I will continue to sin, you choose me. 

Your love, your forgiveness, your grace, is truly incomprehensible to me. But, in faith, I accept it. In faith I say "yes" to being your bride.