uprooted

it's the last day. thank God! because i'm done. i'm ready to begin again. the thing about being linear, limited by time, is that time matters. dates matter.  we mark our lives with them. like flags or buoys in our life. we can have newness. we can begin. 

there was a reading today in the celtic book of prayer, from Edith Schaeffer, a founder of l'abri fellowship, that resonated with me.

a completely new work … would never have been possible if we had not been uprooted completely in every way, and if in that uprooting we had not decided to pray for God’s solution and leading every step of the path as it wound through unknown territory.

i get this. the unknownness, the uprooting.  and i'm ready for a completely new work. i'm hopeful, eager. actually i'm more than hopeful, i'm anticipating, because this is what God promises. and often our greatest works, grow out of the uprooting, the struggle.  out of our comfort zone, in our chaos, God shows up with grace and mercy. and if we are quiet and patient and listening, if we can sit still and suspend our ideas and let go of our plans, if we can trust and turn it over, if we can wait, if we can be led, beautiful big things happen.

this is what i want.  to fill my life and my days doing the work that my story has led me to do.  and i don't want to miss out on what could be amazing because i'm too busy or too scared or too comfortable or too uncomfortable to pay attention. i want to walk through the unknown territory, on the winding path, led by the One who knows the way.  i want to ring as a bell in the darkness and grow stronger and embrace the change. i want to be the wine and the mystery and the meaning, and say: i flow, and speak: i am.

Quiet friend who has come so far,
feel how your breathing makes more space around you.
Let this darkness be a bell tower
and you the bell. As you ring,

what batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.

In this uncontainable night,
be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.

And if the world has ceased to hear you,
say to the silent earth: I flow.
To the rushing water, speak: I am.

Sonnets to Orpheus II, 29

Maria Rainer Rilke

landing at the beginning

We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time. 
                  T. S. Eliot "Little Gidding"


there is something about this- our endings and our beginnings and how they are related and where we find ourselves. and about exploration internally and externally. 

it is almost the end of the year. the beginning of another. the world moves and spins so quickly now, faster with each year. i am here, or there, or elsewhere in my beginning.

i am here in new england, the place of my beginnings, a cold december night 44 years ago, my birth organized- orchestrated so my father could be present. my squeezing out was squeezed in between on-call schedules.  my birth, like all births everywhere, organized and orchestrated by the Divine One who knows the number of hairs on my head, the number of my days, and how my days will be spent- before even one of them began. 

God is so far ahead of us. i can't imagine knowing what my children's days will be like- it would be too much- today is enough. if i knew of their suffering, what lay ahead of them, i think i would do anything in my power, which isn't actually much at all, to prevent it.  to save them from it. to avoid it. protect from it. take an alternative route, or at the very least, prepare for it.  but God allows it.  it's part of our journey, it's part of our exploration. it's even essential to get where we are going.  we can live very deeply inside, or we can live superficially, either way, we are still breathing and eating and sleeping and even loving. but real searching, real seeking, real exploration, if we are willing to go there- brings us deeper and closer to God and the warmth and truth that is there- closer to complete love.  that path will have suffering, i'm pretty sure it's a guarantee.

we spend a lot of time and money on running from our suffering. and if we can't out run it, we try to push it away or ignore it.  we don't want to feel it and we certainly don't want it to stick around for long and we really don't want to share it.  it reveals our nakedness. it shows our wounds and our vulnerability- those things that we are good at pretending no one else feels- those things we think we should hide because we are alone in them.  but we are not.  we all share it, we all know what it feels like, even Jesus knows- because real love, is feeling it and knowing it and staying with people who are in it.

maybe the place where we end, is the place with in ourselves where we began, before the world took bites out of us.  before we fell and scrapped up our knees and took bangs on our heart, and drummed things into our minds- false things, about who we think we are and who we think others are and who we think God is.

i want to return to there.  i want to take what is given to me on the path- to embrace it, even if it's uncomfortable or painful or feels like it's too much. i want to be available, to be aware of what i'm feeling and seeing and coming to know. i want to show up for myself with compassion and gentleness. i want to be real, authentic, and whole and open.

maybe these years, however many we have, is an exploration that leads us home to that safe internal place where we started from- before life happened.  and maybe from that place of centering, of stillness, of experiencing the Love that made us, we can then reach out for each other. 

I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope of the wrong thing; wait without love
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.
                                      T.S. Eliot East Coker

advent

it's the first sunday in advent.  there is snow on the ground and the trees are naked.  the colors here are browns and grays and some dusky greens, and white, the ground and the sky. i miss the warm sun and the bright greens and the sounds and smells of uganda. we are back in new england. we are back on furlough- for a time of renewal.  of restoration. a time of remembering and of forgetting, for looking back and for looking forward.  a time of rest.  a time of drawing near to God and each other.

i arrived on yom kippur- the day of atonement- the holiest day of the jewish year. i came to take the medical boards, and to be with one who was sick. one who was like a second father to me, one who has now passed. i'm so thankful to have been near him in his transition- to see the freeing of his spirit.

now it is the first day of advent- the season we await the coming of Jesus- the birth of Love- the divine touching humanity- hope.  we await the promise that we are not alone in our brokenness - that we are loved even though whatever- that our God of second chances is really a God of seventy chances- that we fall into His arms and they catch us. how deeply beautiful is that?

this is not the time of the year that i would choose to be here. it's cold, i'm cold. the kids are cooped up in the house and the sun goes away at 4:30- there are more hours of darkness than light.  but we await The light. The light that shines, glows, brings forth, radiates joy and hope and renewal.  and in that light is warmth and safety, goodness and wholeness. 

this is also my favorite time of the year- no matter where i am- i am with the ones i love- and there too, is warmth and safety, goodness and wholeness.

here

“wholeness is brokenness owned and thereby healed” 

i'm here. in the USA family-less. taking the medical boards in a few weeks. missing africa and lego pieces and little faces and dirty toes and barking dogs and walking that dog with mike and about a million other things. i'm freezing cold and wanting red dirt and bumpy roads and green leaves and that equatorial sun- i'm. so. homesick. it. hurts.

your destiny

 "the degree to which we will fulfill our purpose on the planet, is largely determined by the decisions we make today about our yesterday." chris caine  (from gabi )

what is life? it's nothing more than a compilation of our bits. our moments. our nows and our yesterdays and our tomorrows, if we have one.  all of life is like this. everything is make up of other things- smaller things- pieces and parts. a beach is made up of it's sands. a field is each peace of grass. everything can be broken down and broken down again until we are left with carbon molecules. that's all.  and our life can be broken down into it's pieces too.  we like to think big- what we will do and who we will be or become- and where we will live and where we should live- and when we should do and be these things. but all those questions are answered in how we live our minutes- right now.  this second- this sliver of a day- is my life. i am made of my decisions - not just the big ones- all of them- even the small ones.

“Watch your thoughts; they become words. Watch your words; they become actions. Watch your actions; they become habits. Watch your habits; they become your character. Watch your character; it becomes your destiny.”

sometimes when things feel hard and overwhelming, when life itself seems like there are too many overlapping ven diagrams to possibly know what to do, sometimes when the kite strings of life are all blowing around in the air knotting themselves up, i stop paying attention to my moments.  i just do my moments. i just go through the motions of my days.  i am not present, not thoughtful, not even sometimes aware of what i'm doing- i'm just doing what i can in that minute- un-reflectively.  i'm not watching my thoughts, or my words or even my actions.  sometimes i'm not even noticing my habits- until suddenly- something i'm doing regularly is not inline with what i think my character is or should be. 

then i take pause. then i stop and remember that i should have been watching.  that not paying attention to my feeling and my thoughts- leads me to say things i don't really mean- or shouldn't say.  and then i do things i shouldn't do, i yell my words and make an angry face at my kids- or i don't do something for mike that i should do. and then because i'm not watching - i keep doing these things until they become a bit of a habit. and then every day i'm shouting and scrunching up my face and not hearing and responding to the needs of the ones i love the most. oops.

but it's important.  it's real.  because i don't want to wake up one day on the other side of who i want to be. i don't want to make the people i live with and love, miserable or even just not as joyful, because i wasn't watching- because i wasn't listening to my life- because i wasn't active- i wasn't choosing- because i was sleep walking through my moments.

i read an article the other day from the UK huffington post written by a woman who had just died 3 days earlier.  yes, she wrote it as she was dying. as she was writing her funeral and her goodbye letters to her kids.  it was a plea of sorts. it spoke to me.  it said, basically, "wake up! this is it- this is the time you get in this skin- so BE in your life. live it how you really mean to live it.  pay attention.  tell people you love them. show them. hug them. don't waste it.  don't become knotted in your own kite strings. "  she said basically what beuchner said, " listen to your life. see it for the fathomless mystery it is. in the boredom and pain of it, no less than in the excitement and gladness: touch, taste, smell your way to the hold and hidden heart of it, because in the last analysis all moments are key moments and life itself is grace."

that is it. life itself is grace. our nows matter.  and they matter more than those big possible decisions in the future that we can obsess about- get lost in- forgetting our now over.

so today, i'm slowing it down. today i got up and said, "help". today i sat with myself in the kitchen at 5:30 and i stayed in the kitchen- meaning i mentally stayed with the task at hand- i was present in the toast making.  and because of that, i asked nicely what kids wanted on their toast, i told rose of course she could change her shirt if she wanted, i help bryn with his shoes, and zoe with her tooth brushing.  i lived the breakfast-brush teeth-shoes on-bags packed-get in the car time, instead of just checking it off my list.  because it matters. because those things become my destiny. how i walk, where my feet take me, that decides who i am- whether i'm fulfilling or not fulfilling my purpose in life.

we find ourselves in unexpected ways and places. we find God this way too- in light and sound and in a word and a view.  i don't want to miss out on God or on me.  i don't want my husband and my kids to miss these things either.  may i make wise small choices.  may i lead by example.  may i be present here, now, only. may i teach this and see the fruit of it. may i, through my moments, fulfill my purpose on this planet.

how does erin brewster do it?

how does my dear friend erin brewster do it? that girl has 7 kids. seven. 7 kids under the age of zoe, and 5 of them are in school- i think from grades 1-8.

i'm talking about homework.  i'm taking about that questionably necessary evil that exists and is supposed to be completed between after school and the insane dinner/ bath/ bed time hour.  i'm talking about what i hated as a kid and what i possibly hate more as a parent. i mean come on. 

i have only 4 kids- and right now only 2 of them have homework, the 2nd and 4th grader.  thank God kindergarten is still sacred.  thank God that zoe has a full-time teacher/assistant who knows that homework with zoe would be a big mistake.  so how can i complain?

but i will.

my kids get up at 5:45 and leave for school before 6:30.  they spend an hour in the car- then they are at school for 8 hours, then they drive home at least an hour, then between 4:30 and 6:30 they are expected to have a snack- do homework- play- relax- do a few, actually only one chore and then wash up for dinner. then after dinner, they have to do their reading log- which apparently is somehow separate from homework, but requires about as much time.  they need to read and then record what they read, for how long and what they thought about it.  i mean come on!

this week, now that they have thankfully settled into some sort of routine, mike is away.  away deeper in the heart of africa- he's in congo- leaving me to manage the above scenario ....alone.

he left on friday morning early, as in before the kids were up.  let the games begin and they did.  it was raining torrentially.  our giant beast of a dog,  out of fear of the thundering rain storm and shear hunger, had wound himself around the front porch pole so tightly that he couldn't move, but he could bark and whine - so that is what he did.  there i was in the rain, trying to unwind this soaking wet, muddy animal who weighs more than i do, while he is trying desperately to climb on me, get away from the storm and get to his food.  the kids found this way more interesting than eating breakfast. the cat found this the perfect time to make a run for it and come inside herself.  thankfully i wasn't driving that morning.  thankfully no one had peed her bed.  but still.

i had promised the kids that because they had been working so hard all week with above said schedule, and daddy was away, i would take them to KFC after school.  yes. kentucky fried chicken.  let me pause to say that KFC in uganda is a BIG DEAL.  it's "american"- only better.  it looks like america,  smells like america, and tastes like america- only better. it has kiddy meals and prizes and soft serve ice cream and the 'original recipe'- only it's somehow all better.  and unlike america- it's expensive.  so it's a BIG DEAL.  they had been looking forward to it ALL WEEK. 

because it was still raining and traffic can be disastrous, i got in the car a bit early for pick up.  and it was dead. the car was completely- not turning over- dead.  oh dear.  i considered my options.  i could call a driver to get the kids- but that is expensive- and worst of all....the KFC plan would be out the window.... and i'd promised.... and truth be told... i REALLY wanted KFC too.  so i called some friends for a jump- no one had cables.  eventually i got my friend who is a mechanic to come and jump it and refill various empty car fluids and i was off.  late, but quickly forgiven because of KFC.

on saturday morning, the cat, in thanks for her safe refuge from the storm the day before, delivered a huge disemboweled rat on the front porch.  good times. it rained again most of the day and when the afternoon sun came and we ventured outside, the car was once again, completely dead, so we battened down the hatches, made cookies and watched some movies.

sunday passed relatively uneventfully- except for a birthday lunch at a neighbors house which we attended empty handed and with zoe in her full sticky glory, announcing that she knew she couldn't handle it and why had a made her come.  there were looks of sympathy and forgiveness saying wordlessly, 'wow i'm glad that's not my life...and it must be so hard to single parent that."

now it's monday.  our mechanic thankfully jumped the car at 5:45 and we headed into the city.  the kids got to school, the car is in the shop- and it's going to cost waaaayyy more than KFC. the clinic has called 4 times about my patients who didn't know i had car trouble, oops. the marketing will have to wait because i don't have the car, so it's looking like breakfast for dinner....again.  i called mike and he told me with words, 'wow, i'm sorry about the car, and i know how hard it is to single parent all that!' 

now i'm gearing up for the impending drive home, in the rain with six kids, and the delightful few hours of homework, which will be crammed into one hour because i need to give a lecture at 5:30- which will perhaps be the calmest hour of my day.

back to homework....really? isn't 8 hours enough? what about the "home-learning" that isn't prescribed? what about dirty feet and tree houses and slingshots and bike riding?  what about family time and chores and untangling dogs and cleaning up rat guts? i think those things have value too.

so hats off to erin brewster! i just have two questions.....what's your secret and what's for dinner?  (and ohhhh i miss you so!)

too much

it's crazy rain right now- and i love it. i love it in every way except one way.  except that all four of my kids are on the road in it and that is scarey because i can't imagine the what if's around that. i can't imagine, nor speak, nor write the fear that i could feel if i thought about the what ifs.  oh. dear.

life is full of the stuff that wasn't supposed to happen.

this week i went to see a friends baby, born three weeks ago, with severe hydrocephalus.  born with a head so big, it's hard to lift him.  born with so much fluid and pressure that his eyes roll down under the lids- he can't see his mother, and she can't look into his eyes.  they don't have those moments- those long staring moments that i remember so well.  that wasn't supposed to happen, was it?

when i went to their home to visit after they'd returned from the hospital 3 hours away that specializes in pediatric neurosurgery, i wasn't prepared.  i knew he had hydrocephalus.  i knew what that was, as a doctor and as a parent of a child with that diagnosis, but i wasn't prepared because it was, as his father kept saying, "too much."  it was too much. too much fluid.  too much swelling.  too much to look at.  too much to process.  too much to ask about.  too much to carry in your arms.  too much to carry in your heart.  too much to imagine the future about.  just. too. much.

i didn't mean to- like at all- but i started to cry when she brought him out and set him in my arms and i looked at his tiny face underneath that massive head and tried to find his little eyes and all i could see were the little white parts of eyes- like milk marbles.  he waved his tiny little perfect hands and it all became blurry because i couldn't stop crying.  i was so sad and so afraid and so thankful and so in awe of what i'd been spared and so undone for what i could possibly say or do- that all i could do was cry.  i was supposed to be assessing and supporting and offering advice and guidance and instead i needed a kleenex.

but there it was- all too much of it. 

sometimes all you can do- sometimes what you maybe should do- is just feel it together.  that is what i remember anyway.  i remember our good friends coming over the night that we had heard that jude was likely not going to make it past 6 months old.  they brought chicken cooked with prunes and olives and some wine and after putting it in the kitchen, because no one was really hungry that night, they cried with us.  because that is what everyone should have been doing- it was just too much. it wasn't supposed to be happening- but there it was- happening in the middle of my san francisco thirty-something life. 

when i put the baby down and took a breath- i asked his mom how she was doing....really.  not in the stoic, ugandan woman way.  not in the super Christian 'i can bear all things...' way.  but in the middle of the night- my child is crying and looks like his head might explode- and i just want to look in his eyes but i can't- way.  and then she started to cry and told me how this was all just too much.

because there it is- too much.

'yet this i call to mind...' as i have over and over again... as i have for years and seasons and moments when what shouldn't be happening is happening.  as i will again and again for the rest of my life because as much as it shouldn't happen it does.

'and therefore i have hope...' and i do- despite the what if's and the not supposed to's and the 'it's' of life. because we have to or how do we go on? because we are can remind each other and we should, that tomorrow is another day anyway.

'because of the Lord's unfailing love...' love- love even though life is messed up and we are messed up. love even when it's turned upside down. love even in the broken of it, and the sick of it and in the thick of it.  unfailing- it will not go- it will always be- that is promise and miracle and forever.

'we are not consumed...' there will be something left- something.  even if only one thing- even if only one tiny kernel of a piece of us- of hope- of life- of anything- we will not be completely swallowed.

i say that as i am about to go pick up my now healthy nine year old boy from school where he does not just okay- but very well.  i say that and he doesn't have a shunt, or trouble walking or thinking or speaking or learning. i say that and his precious not so little head has never been operated on or drilled into- but only blessed.  i say that after coming out of the darkness.  i say that when hope grew and blossomed and bore fruit. and my not supposed to happen- turned into what everyone wants to happen- health and healing- real miracle.

but i can tell you that those same words were true the night we eventually ate the chicken with olives and prunes. in that darkness was perhaps the bigger miracle- that we were not consumed....despite...the great unknown. that night  and several other nights that week- with our friends who were not afraid to sit in the dark with us- who showed us a piece of something- of togetherness- of community- of love and hope and promise- we understood that we would not be consumed.  those people who gathered around- in body, others in words written and spoken, and some just in spirit- they were the hands and feet of God- the unfailing love- the givers of hope.

so maybe in too much- we are given just enough.  enough to bear the nights of unknown- enough to hold on for that day- and that is what i asked for.  that was what i prayed on that couch - as i cried and she cried and we held hands- this woman i'd never met before- but whose pain i knew- because we all know it in some form or fashion.  i asked for the same miracle of health and healing that jude was given. but i also asked for enough of whatever was needed to get through too much.  that maybe tomorrow it would feel a little bit smaller, this weight.  that maybe tomorrow his body would grow more than his head and his eyes would open just a little so she could see more than just white. that maybe tomorrow he would eat better and cry less.  that maybe tomorrow it wouldn't feel so much like too much.

despite

i am at the gardens across the street studying in a little hut named 'jinja' where i have taken to studying for the medical boards.  i'm sitting here wondering how in the next 5 weeks, i will get all this information into my head in order to pass.  i am sitting here studying hematology/ oncology while my friend, family member, mentor is at home "living" what i'm studying.  living hematology/ oncology- fighting it.

it's these times when i hate being here. when it seems impossibly hard to be separated by an ocean. when all i want to do is sit in an infusion room with the people i love, while they experience what i'm cramming into my brain. it just feels wrong.

today buechner's reading was about not having anxiety- about paul's words that in everything- the good, the bad and the ugly-with prayer and supplication - we need to lay it all before our God- no matter what.  it was about the promise we are given- not that "it",  whatever "it" is, no matter how awful or painful or unfair or unfathomable "it" is- not that it will be taken away, but that we are promised peace in "it".  despite "it". that even cancer and loss and suffering and our own internal deep darkness- there, buried perhaps, initially obscured, is peace.

i know this to be true. a peace that makes no logical sense. a peace that can only be given- allowed to be found and clung to and dug into- if only to keep our near drowned head above the raging water of "it".

because what can you do, when there is nothing to be "done"?

i know this to be true because when jude was a baby and i was told he had 6 months to live and the only thing i should have felt was consumed and angry and empty and sorrow- i somehow felt a very strange and unexplainable peace- despite.  i still felt empty and a lot of sadness and some anger- but i crawled on my bloody knees to God.  i fell in the shower and poured it all out in tears and words and maybe loudest of all in silence- where i know the spirit interceded with groans that even words could not express.  there was nothing to "do" with "it".  "it" just was and i was just stuck with "it".

maybe that was when i first caught a brief glimpse of the trinity- that impossible idea that life and God are not so black and white- that it's not just good and bad- it's not so simple- its actually incredibly and unfathomably complex and other worldly. it is in fact, magical and mystical and beyond what we can grasp.

somehow it's these "it"s, these moments when our world is turned so upside down that our logic falls out and we are left only with our rawness, our spirit- we are almost forced to stop trying to contain God and allow God to hold us. this is Grace.  somehow, we need to move toward it, we need to fall, or crawl, or open our clenched up fists just even a finger, even if all we can do is ask for help to pick up our lead foot- that, because of Grace, seems to be enough.

and to the rest of the world it doesn't make sense.  to everyone else who in our moment, isn't having a moment, it sounds crazy, and probably because it is.  it is miracle- it is the divine touching our days, or maybe just our hour, or minute of greatest need, so that we can then get up off the shower floor.  so we can get dressed and change a diaper and nurse a hungry 3 month old- even if "it" is true- because today, he's hungry.  even though i cried the whole time i fed him and watched his little face blurry through my eyes- knowing that the pain of him not being there would make the pain of this knowledge seem like nothing- because today, he was in my arms.  even in all that ugly- was somehow- Miracle- the peace that passes all understanding.

that is not found in my reading- in my pages of books on cancer and everything else that can go wrong with the body- that is not taught in medical school or residency- but it's seen in the shadows and corners of all our lives.

it's not that God is for the weak or the stupid- it's that when life breaks us- our eyes pop open a little wider and sometimes we can see a lot more.  when we reach the limits of our knowledge and are left with little and see how small we all really are and finally we mutter, or whisper, or in silence scream 'help', then we become in a way free and able to bear "it". the beautiful awful reality of the hardness of life- to accept the mystery, to sit with the discomfort of not knowing- to even just be held- despite.

despite the fact that we are oceans away.  despite the terrifying unknown. despite all limitations and unfair and 'what ifs' - when we lay it down- there comes miracle. and to see for even a moment, the wing of an angel- to feel the shelter of the everlasting arms, to hear the breath of something so much bigger than we ever imagined- that, that is something.

neera

right now i need the mountains- to place me. i need the woods- to hide in.  i need the lake- to hold me buoyantly.  i need to sense the physical boundary of where my body meets the water- the shelter of tall trees and the perspective of heights.  i am closing me eyes. i am seeing this.  i am breathing the air of my years. i am feeling my history. i need my past to call me forward.  i need remembering.  i am longing for these things that have made me and led me.

three years ago on this day, we packed it up and boarded a plane with our years packed into 15 bags and three wide-eyed children who were stuck with us- moving their little american city lives across a large ocean to the great unknown of africa. i remember that day in bits.  it was full of piles of 'coming' and 'not' and 'trash'.  it was full of last minute gathering and hard goodbyes. the weighing of bags, the stashing of random scraps in pockets, the checking of lists. and it was full of lasts.   

the last time i see this basement playroom that we worked on every night for a week as the kids big Christmas gift.  the last time i sit with my friend sara on this bed, in this city, in this life that i'm leaving.  the last time i hear this floor squeak. the last time i sit on this porch and look over these great water oaks.

i remember thinking those things- but i didn't know how real it was. i didn't know what 'last' really meant. i didn't know that coming back was forever going to be different because i would become different.  i didn't know that things i thought were important - wouldn't matter anymore.  i didn't know that it could never be the same again because a part of me would always be somewhere else- here.  you can't go back - it's like imagining your life without kids now that you have them.  it's like what karen blixen says to denys in out of africa , "you've ruined it for me, being alone." this place has become a part of me- a part i can't imagine not being in me. all of it. the deep green and the forever red dirt and the way the rain sweeps in and then goes fast followed by the sun- never a day of only rain. this place of undone and unkempt and often broken, but generous.  full.  always the same- growing, blooming, starting over, getting back up, going on, persevering. hoping for better, trying. and those parts make sense to me. those things play out the realness of our lives- that sameness, that hope, that effort, that falling, that starting again. and again, and again, and again, neera.

tomorrow we will celebrate our three year anniversary here.  we will eat cake and hear from those three-wide eyed children and now a fourth- about this place that they know as home- more now home than they knew the last place to be. and we will talk about here and there- and transitions and living and who we are and who we are becoming and what home really means and how there are mountains and woods and water almost everywhere.  and how that same great God made all of it- and even the ocean that separates us from our old days.  and we will talk about how we are part of both now and always will be- and in that is a challenge and a blessing.  and that it's okay.  it is okay to miss and love both- that it's good to hold the tension of those opposites- to allow and embrace what makes us and leads us.

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“The Sun will rise and set regardless. What we choose to do with the light while it's here is up to us. Journey wisely.”
― Alexandra Elle

a beautiful rain

it's a beautiful rain. a beautiful day. quiet on the inside, loud and full and moving all around me outside.  the sky is shouting and the water is falling and the ground and the leaves are nosily receiving it- all slap and muffled at once.  it keeps things in place- keeps me in place. still. i am receiving it too. it's what we do. we take life as it comes to us. each day- we don't know what it will bring or take or give or ask- we don't. 

today i look at my life, but i can only see it from now- from where i am here. today at 1:39 pm in uganda on my porch with my big dog and a mother red tail monkey and her babies in the tree in front, in the rain drowning out all and any other sounds.
today, two days shy of having lived here, in this place, for 3 years. today, with my kids all back in school and the routine and adjustments that go with that.
today after 21 years of marriage to a man who still amazes me. today when we have power after 3 days with none.
today when i am checking my email every hour for updates on a loved one who is awaiting pathology results, on the other side of that ocean. 
today, after clinic and studying for the internal medicine board re-certification exam, even though i feel to old to be studying.
today with the laundry just pulled of the line and strung now around the house.  today with a cup of coffee and fresh banana bread. 
today when i woke up rose and she smiled and said, "i didn't pee my bed mama!" today where zoe gets up more easily than last year and we see the small shifts and changes as she grows up on her own trajectory, following her own path.
today when i kissed my kids heads as they left for the long drive to school and breathed a prayer of protection over them. 

today, which is only half baked.  today which still holds beautiful and awful things maybe; cuts and falls and sweets and playing; and hugs and maybe tears; and homework and dinner and feeding animals and doing dishes- all those things that are precious- just because they are.  those moments- those people- those smells and sounds and feelings- they are precious.  when we stop and listen and notice, when we pay a bit of attention we are so richly blessed.  because even the sad parts are valuable.  even the hard parts can bring us somewhere- can move us and give us shape. we are being carved here- worn and whittled- smoothed and softened- and made hopefully, to be more gentle with each other, more understanding of what we find so different in our todays, to be more like the one who made the rain and the ground that receives it; more noticing, more holding, more open to what comes, more giving of what we can, and more able to love and be loved.

again, the everlasting arms

here is the beautiful truth about God.

He does make beautiful things out of our messes- but He really wants our hearts- our truth- our obedience.  no matter what. that's what matters to Him.  if our messes happen to get in the way  of His beautiful truth- he makes it amazing- but sometimes it's just our mess.  sometimes it's not pretty and it's not fixed and it's not anything but our mess.  sometimes we just sit in it- the messiness of it- and we wait- and we hope and we want the everlasting arms to reach down and hold us and cradle us and rock us back to okay. to painless okay.  to fixed. to magic. but often- there in the thick of it- is just us and our choices. us and our broken. us and our trying. us and our mess.

and time happens. and life happens. and we cry or get annoyed or blame or run or turn around or beg or all of those things- and there He stands- solid as a rock (because that is what He is- unchanging- unwavering- all promising- permanent- steadfast- but true- true in the realist sense of the word and and the world- true).

so we are left with what to do with it.  our mess. whatever it is.  we are left with the pieces that we've made- the parts that we've split off- the bits and the un-wholeness and the fall out from it.  and that is hard and real and unchanging.

we are allowed to go through whatever it is, to get where we need to go. we are given the grace and the strength to get there. we are given the tools and the people and the small moments and the few words and the hope- to move, sometimes only one step, to be closer to the truth- the beautiful, life changing, promise of peace and joy truth- that we've fooled ourselves into thinking we can find and get to on our own.

we all have our things. our little idols. our little or our big pulls that pull us away from the quiet and clear center - that place that we know is best- and right - and whole and as close to perfect as we will ever know this side of things.

that place that when we close our eyes and think back through our lives- we have - at some point- known. even and only if for a minute or a day or if we are lucky, a season.  our tea field hours. our joy in the basement of the MRI suite. our relief at the non-diagnosis.  our yes when we thought it was a no.  our hope in the place of deep darkness.  our light in a place of despair.  those times that we swore we'd never forget- never turn from- never because of them, make messes again.

but that is what we do. we can't help it. we muddle and waddle and dive into places that we promised we'd ever see again- because we are so small and fragile and we so easily forget- even if our minds and our hearts don't forget- our feet forget and back we walk.

but because of those years- those 33 years that our sweet Lord walked on dusty dry roads like the ones under our feet- because He knows the paths we follow and the fragmented lives we live and the broken bits and the tears and the mis-alignedness of our nature- we are gently called.  we are prompted and reminded and in the soft whisper of the voice of one who loves us like nothing else- we are told- "come back".

we are held and we are motioned to - "be still."  "and know.... I am."

"I am God."

"I am enough."

"can you trust me?"

now it's up to us... is He enough? do we trust? will we be still? 

underneath whatever it all is, are those arms- those arms that only know forgiveness and love- arms that promise wholeness and redemption and peace.


.

as you are

i'm back. not sure where i've been, but i'm back. 

i've started to write about 10 times in the past month and then life happens. half of the times, i've gotten half way there before life happens- the internet goes down- someone cut their finger- the dog got loose- whatever it is; and the other half of the time i'm so ready to write and life happens before i even get started.  either way, i am gone. either way, i am quiet.  either way, i miss out on the beauty of showing up for myself and allowing the time and the space to feel my days.

i could, i should, push through.  write it all out and save it until the internet works. put the band-aid on and return to the page, get the dog back and write again.  but somehow, somewhere inside myself, i haven't been able to do it.  somehow, somewhere - i think i feel defeated.  not unhappy, not depressed, not hopeless- just like i've lost the little battles of life here. just like i'm sitting in the reality of things broken and i'm living in the unworkingness of it all- so i succumb- i let it swallow me.

writing was the way i escaped being swallowed by zoe's challenges 4 years ago. it was a beginning- i gave myself a voice when i felt voiceless and alone.  i could pause and see humor and beauty instead of just crazy and pain.  i could step away from the day and feel the tiny bits of us growing- movement, healing, happening.  writing is a way, a place, and the very thing that saves me from defeat, from being consumed.  so here i am- because i need to be- because it's where i belong- because i deserve to do what i need to do to stay sane- even and despite life happening.

yesterday, when i was driving on a bumpy road and missing mike who has been visiting with his family for 2 weeks, and wondering what on earth i would make for supper, and how i would walk the dog during the making of the supper, and i was generally feeling sorry for myself and reflecting on my job as a single parent for the past two weeks, and thinking about how i should do most of my life better - i had a moment. 

it was a moment of God showing up.  it was unasked for.  it wasn't being looked for.  i wasn't praying for it.  i was just driving and feeling like a failure and wondering how a missionary can get it so wrong all the time.  i was thinking about how i can be such a jerk to my kids and people who show up on my porch and need things- and how i have an ugly voice that comes out too much- and that i should generally be more thankful and cheerful and encouraging.  and i should definitely be less angry. 

and there it was. it was just God holding out His hands and saying "you are loved". 
and then what was even better was what came next, "you are loved-as-you-are."  and i started to cry, because deep down, i know it's true and that is a freaking miracle. 

one of the things i learned in the womens fellowship last month was that we can run away from the peace of God, but we can't run away from the love of God.  we can choose to forget to wake up and say "help!" or we can remember but choose to not say it because we're pretty sure we are fine on our own, and we can try to do our lives on our own and work really hard at 'being better' and less angry and yell-y and jerky- but for me that ends up never working and leaving me with very little peace. but. even then- even at my most failing moments- even when i've tried and messed it up and it's only breakfast- even when i have no peace inside at all- i am loved-as i am.

so that is a beginning.  in my car, on that bumpy road home to the crazy time of the day, when everyone is tired and whiny and done with each other, remembering that i am loved, as i am, even though whatever- and no matter what happens - that was enough for me to begin to come back.  to see and feel and know that - i am loved, so i'm not swallowed completely.  i am loved, so i can love myself enough to be still when life is happening- to sit and pause- and find myself again- here or there- or where ever i am.  i am back.

hard dark places

the sun is out. it's hot and beautiful. i'm again on the porch- this time only with rosie and i made a discovery that may change things.....earphones.  i can be here- outside with the kids- and the lion king playing through the open window behind me and the dog even barking- and i can feel mildly undisturbed and i can think.  it's fantastic- who ever invented these things was brilliant. 

it's the little things- it has always been the little things.  a cup of coffee.  new lip balm.  a song.  green apple soap. one flower picked for you by little hands.  a shell.  a smile.

here comes my husband- walking up the path from work.  that man i've loved for 25 years.  his hair is now white and silver, his skin is tan and tastes like salt. we become our surroundings- time and place change us.  we don't know anything different than the movings- than the process- than change.

i'm reading a book called learning to walk in the dark it's about the importance of and the value of allowing ourselves to be in the dark- physically and spiritually and emotionally.  to not run from the things we fear, to not avoid the uncomfortable, to not hurry to always turn on the lights-whatever they are for us- but to begin to understand what we can learn in those places- from those seasons. 

one of my most vivid experiences of darkness was about 4 years ago, in lalibela ethiopia where the churches are dug down into the earth- carved out of the rock- instead of built above the ground.  they are connected with paths and tunnels.  the tunnel connecting the last two churches was very long and completely without light.  the guide spoke of this as a metaphor - walk this path in total darkness and then emerge on the other side into the light- like coming to know God.  i so wanted to do it- but after about 10 steps in, when i could no longer see any light at all, when i could only feel the darkness touching me, when i had no sense of where i was or was going or could escape- i became terrified and i backed right out to the light. 

i couldn't walk in the darkness. i couldn't even be in that kind of darkness- not then.  it was a hard time- a hard season- when i felt swallowed by the darkness of having a child with special needs.  i was trying to home school her- i was trying to understand her totally differently wired brain- i was trying to make it okay- i was trying to turn on whatever lights i could find- i was terrified of the darkness.  it was all encompassing.  it was 24 hours a day.

ironically being in lalibela, being in ethiopia- with my dear friend and not with my challenged child, helped me begin to breathe and to acknowledge the darkness i felt. and when i began to feel it instead of just running away from it, i began to see the truth in this: "that it is sometimes hard to tell whether you are being killed or saved by the hands that turn your life upside down." (barbara brown taylor)  at that time, it just felt like i was being killed by zoe who'd turned my life upside down- but there was saving in it too. they can go together- the swallowing and the saving- losing somethings and finding other things.  the hard dark places teach us what only they can- lessons that light can't teach.  hard dark places grow us, and change us just like time and the sun. there is transformation- (followed often for me by stagnation and regression- but still....)

there are things that i love about the old testament (like God choosing to use total screw-ups to lead his people- like them continuing to screw-up even when they can actually talk to God- and Him still loving them). and there are things i hate about the old testament (like the long lists of peoples names and tribes that i can't pronounce or remember, like the long lists of rules that can seem like way too much attention to detail- and the battles- the killing- the wars- and that God seemed okay with this even thought He made it pretty clear that we're not supposed to kill).  but there is one battle story that i do love. it's the one against the amalakites where God tells moses that as long as he holds up his hand, the israelites will win, but if he drops it, they will lose.  it sounds like a pretty good deal, but battles can go on for days.  how long can you hold your hand up? it may have felt like a lot of darkness, a lot of responsibility, a lot more than just obedience. but guess what? God was fine with moses getting help.  God didn't make him walk in that darkness alone.  his two friends stood on either side of him and held up his hand. 

and that may be the key. togetherness.  support.  gathering around. holding a hand. hearing a word.  giving a word.  because standing beside in the darkness means more than turning on the light.  joining in the place of fear- entering the unknown- being in the uncomfortable places with each other- that is love- that is friendship- that brave and courageous and life giving. that is part of how we are saved by the events that turn our life upside-down.

someday i want to go back to lalibela and i want to walk that dark tunnel- i want to be okay feeling it- one foot in front of the other- until i reach the other side.  maybe if i'm walking behind that guy i've followed for 25 years- maybe if i hold his hand......

broken halleluiah

i'm outside on the porch. i haven't written in a month-i'm using mikes computer because mine has basically failed to find the internet- three of my four children have followed me out here- dinner needs to be made- people keep calling for things- my neighbor just left after 10 years living under the most beautiful tree in the world up the hill from me- brandi carlise is singing her version of broken halleluiah. maybe this- all this- the leaving, the noisy kids, the constant interruptions- my non-working computer- the unmade dinner-maybe this is my broken halleluiah.

i'll be honest- their little voices right now, are driving me nuts, and i'm so tired that i don't even want to eat dinner, let alone make it - and this non-mac system is not familiar to me, and really i am very small and can't fix anything.  i don't mean mechanical things- although i can't fix those either- i mean people and their problems, and systems, and histories, and myself.  i can't.

i can sit with it- with people or problems and histories and i can try to sit with myself.  i can try to be in it- in the leaving- and the broken- and the noise of my life and i can try to embrace it- all of it- even the seasons that are really dark- and i can even try to look at the stars and the moon instead of running to turn on the lights- because the dark is just as important as the light.

a few sundays ago, i was at a women's fellowship- the one where we have been talking about the names of God- and we were talking about Jehovah Shalom- God of peace. and that shalom holds a fullness that goes even beyond what we might think of as peace.  it's like God of all goodness- peace, satisfaction, joy, lack of strife and stress and conflict- it's an all encompassing peace. it's more than enough- it's everything we want.  then we were talking about how if this is true- why did the Israelites walk away from it all the time? and why do we?

why do we so easily forget the joy- that deep kind- that kind of pure satisfaction- that we find when we hold on to the everlasting arms? why do we let go of them, and run away and try to find our own solutions, our own answers, our own idea of deep and real satisfaction - that usually amounts to something possibly amazing but short-lived and followed by some sort of darkness- in the form of regret or loneliness or the need for more or bigger or better ways to find that thing we are looking for.

these days when i'm feeling the heaviness of things and my own longings- if i can escape i drive for about 10 minutes out of town and there i can see tea fields.  and in the green and the hills and the paths woven between the tea bushes i remember what i, and maybe you, and almost always the people in the old testament keep forgetting- Jehovah Shalom.  that all-encompassing peace is promised and given.  i remember it in the tea fields because that is where i first remember feeling it so intensely and for no real reason.

i mean i wasn't asking for it.  i wasn't in a crisis and in particular need of grace and peace- but i felt an incredible exuberance as i walked through those tea fields in kenya- because i was walking closely those days with God.  i was listening- i was hearing the still small voice and i was obeying it- even if it seemed small or the request insignificant- i did it. send that person an email and tell them what a good job they did.  or don't send that person that message- wait.  i wasn't steering the ship of my life- i was following instructions- in very small ways and that is, i'm realizing, perhaps what matters most.

because not doing this- is way too easy. which means that doing it- is actually hard. because i don't want to sit down and write that email. because i do want to send that person a message. because i'm annoyed- or i'm angry- or i'm lazy or i'm lonely- and i'm pretty sure that i can fix the feeling if i steer the ship. and there it goes. i let go- slowly by slowly - i release the everlasting arms- and with them- my shalom.

it's very easy for me to justify the not listening- because of all the noise and stuff - because of my broken halleluiah.  my life- my kids- the mess of things here-the loss- the constant interruptions- the non-working everything- come on! let me just do what i need to do to get by here! and God in Her infinite wisdom and patience and love says-  go for it- and good luck with that.  i'll just be here... waiting.... and (way) underneath (where you can't see them for now)...are the everlasting arms.

that is how it happens- for me anyway.  and then of course i wonder why i'm so out of sorts- why i'm so exhausted and ready to ring everyone's necks.  because it doesn't go as planned- and i end up not just with out Shalom- but empty. empty and wondering.

thank God for those arms.  thank God for the freedom to return to listening- (which usually starts with learning to hear the stillness again- and slowly by slowly - responding).  and all of this we bring.  all of this is our broken halleluiah's.  in pieces and parts- we can lift up our little small shaky hands and say praise God because of the returning and the waiting and the reconciliation and the redemption. 

and in that broken halleluiah of our lives and our days- we begin again, to find, Jehovah Shalom.

never the last thing......

"resurrection means the worst thing is never the last thing." beuchner

that is it.  that is truth.  there is hope. we go on.  we get up and breathe and make coffee and bathe.  we work and laugh and take out trash and share our stories. we remember and we cry but our smiles can still be as big and our lives can still be as full as before that day, whatever day it was, when the world as we knew it, fell apart.  when the worst thing that can happen, happened to us, whatever that was.

i even have proof.

yesterday was the birthday party for our friend precious.  she turned nine and it was her first birthday without her brother timothy.  it was one of the first times i've been back to their home since he died. at home. in his moms bed. the first time my kids had been back to sit on that bed since losing their friend.  it was hard and sad and beautiful and heartbreaking and wonderful and just as it should have been- all those things at once- because that is what life is- all those things at once.

i think it was in december last year when i began to disappear.  to feel the weight of loss and suffering and my real inability to do much about most of it. timothy died.  a few days later, lilian's baby was born- hope, promise, beginnings- a few days later he died too.  two funerals in one week.  two coffins that shouldn't be that small.  two women who shouldn't have lost their babes.  there was darkness.  i felt it.  and there was light too and there was lamentations 3:21-22 and underneath there were the everlasting arms.  but i was sitting on the outside of the circle of that given grace- that promised real palpable grace that comes only when really needed and only to those really in the need.  it wasn't my boy who died.  it wasn't my child i buried- i was on the edge, feeling the ripples of it.

but something inside of me shrunk- something began to fade away. something became a bit lost- i know this because i became quiet in my writing words. yet the grace comes in other ways too for other people who might not be so close, but still get burned by the fires in each others lives. it takes time and process, and there was grace in yesterdays party.  grace in seeing the goings on. grace in eating cake together and juice and chapatis. grace in the sun being out- grace in gathering with no tears- grace in singing happy birthday and many more. grace in the community- that we were there- that we were not consumed.

this is beatrice and lilian yesterday at the party.  they are whole.  they still smile and cry - but they are ok.  the worst wasn't the last. 

this is precious- see she is precious :) her smile is real. her joy is there. as tim would want.

this is jude at the party- my second born- my story of sitting in the center of the storm of grace- he just turned nine like precious. 

this is the house where we sat 6 months ago and cried over tim's body, and couldn't imagine eating cake and celebrating- but.

but the worst thing is never the last thing.
even when we feel it really will be the last of us.  even when we can't imagine another step.  even when we don't want to get up the next morning- or we get up and forget for one moment what it was we cried ourselves to sleep over- only to then remember. even then. 

it's never the last.

the grace comes as remembering this- the moments when we see someone smiling big again, despite.  the grace is given when we can pick up our pens or our paintbrushes or the phone, and we can slowly return to who we once were, except maybe even bigger, or wiser, or better. when after a while- transformation comes- and from that- a new wholeness. so let us remember.

As it should be

I am out on the porch in a rain storm. All I can hear is the rain and the sky. The world is closed and quiet- I am quieted. As it should be. Silenced by what is bigger than i- made small again - so small- as I should be. I have taken long with out writing - with out being here - called out in a message yesterday - 'you are lost' - yes gabi I am. Lost in certain ways from certain places- found in other ways- I hope- or at least searching- at least on a path- moving slowly somewhere. As I guess it should be- for all of us.

Sometimes I feel so unbelievably lucky- like last night - putting children to bed- knowing they are safe- when so many aren't. Thankful for their stories and their little lives that become bigger all the time. Hearing what they love and fear and wait for- so different from each other.

They just got home and piled out of the car in the exact order I would predict. Jude of course was first- organized- ready for what's next - seatbelt off at the gate- hand on the door
- bag on his back. Then Rose - eager to please- small and quick. Then Bryn - takes his time- somewhere in thought- purposeful. Long pause.....then Zoe. Always last- always operating in her own time-  bless her- unbound by our impositions - dancing to her own song- one that only she can hear. One I wish I knew - if only to remember - that it's different but beautiful- perhaps like nothing I've ever heard.  sometimes I wonder if it's the song of the angels- sung sweet and constant and available but only listened to by those special unbound ones. It is usually through Zoe that I can see my constraint- my limitations.

The rain has stopped. The sky is quiet and the world again is full and loud- as it should be. And slowly i am coming back.

what you look for and what you find

i am in greece. i am not in africa.  and those are equally significant.

i am at at medical missions conference- the same one i was at 2 years ago in kenya- and once again- i am learning that God's ideas of what i need are so not my ideas of what i need and God's way is the way to go.

i came here stumbling.  i came here desperate and grappling and worn down and looking for answers. i came here with a list of what 'i needed'.  i needed repair and reminding but i had my list of what that looked like.  and it looked very specific and orchestrated and complete to me. 

i came here with questions like:

'what should we do about zoe? about her schooling? her special needs? and our needs around her special needs?'

'how is all this sustainable? financially? emotionally?'

'how long should we be in africa?'

'what exactly is our mission?'

and i was pretty sure that on the first day i would be blown away- because i know that is how God works.  because i know that surely we are not the first missionaries on the field with a special needs child. because God is big and knows this. because it was all on my list.  

so i was pretty sure  that God would seat me next to a missionary who had been there and done that.  that i would connect with someone who had a zoe.  that someone would tell me the secret of how to do it.  that miraculously i would hear of a perfect school for her- that doors would open- someone would 'get it'- we wouldn't be alone with it- answers would come. 

i figured the topic for the week (there is a speaker who leads the morning service each day) wouldn't be talking about special needs children, but perhaps be talking about missionary sustainability- or burn out- the other things on my list. the list i had showed God.  the list God knew i needed checked off.

and i waited. i went to the morning talks, and i talked with various people at meals and breaks and on the boat trip we took...and i waited.  but.

but no one i spoke with said anything about special needs or schools or anything like that, and the topic of the week was not about missionary burn out. it was titled 'Jesus is God...so what?' 

so i listened.  i listened to the speaker and to the stories of those around me, and to mike, and to my parents who are also here.  and do you know what? i did get answers. 

i got big, much more valuable and important answers to questions that are much bigger and more important than my little list of questions.  and what is more important, is that i was asked some questions that demanded my answers.  questions that had become small and tucked away. questions that have resurfaced periodically in my years- but questions that need to sit with me daily. questions that when they sit in the forefront of my life, make all my other questions become appropriately small and almost insignificant.

questions like:  if God is God, if Jesus is God, am i willing to serve even when it's costly?  even when it's harder than i thought? even when the answers to questions aren't obvious and resources are scarce? even when i am away from my support system and my family? because Jesus said that it would be costly. following God is not supposed to be easy because life isn't easy and obedience isn't easy.  following God is costly when we take it seriously because of what we are asked to do. we are supposed to love our enemies.  we are supposed to take care of the poor, the widows and the orphans.  we are supposed to give our money, our time, our resources to help each other in this world- and we are supposed to do this to whatever level we are asked.  we are not all asked to give up everything we have- but some people are.  we are not all asked to leave our homes- but some people are.  we are not all asked to have special needs children- but some people are.

and questions like: if God is God, if Jesus is God, am i going to trust the promise that God will give me everything i need to do anything He asks me to do? not somethings, sometimes, maybe.  but everything. always. to do anything.


so i got a life that involves a challenge that i didn't necessarily sign up for.  so i didn't think i'd have a child who probably will not go to college and will live with us for the rest of our lives- does that give me a pass to not be where i feel God has asked me to be?  am i going to trust that God will give me everything i need to raise her, where ever that is? even when i can't see past one year ahead? even if i don't have a perfect plan for the rest of her formal education? even when i want answers and i want them now, and the answer is 'wait' and 'trust' and 'be in today'.

one of the things mike learned over lent was that obedience is the place to begin the path to understanding.  we all teach this to our children all the time, usually for safety.  so i decided a good place for me to start was to read my bible, because God said i should.  because God wants to be known and that is one way to understand Her.  so i started in Genesis and i decided to read it like a book instead of little chapters. the first chapter is the creation story- and what surprised me was how much it focused on time.  God made day and night and then morning and evening and then seasons and years.  God made time and God talks about time right from the start.  

i think the reason for this might be because He knew that i would come along a long time later in the history of the world, and that i for one, would need to begin again. like every day.  or even every morning and again every evening. that i would need a limit- a setting- a period that could be possibly manageable- or at least not entirely destructible.  i think He knew that if given anymore than 12 hours- with out rest and sleep and darkness and change and a moon and stars- i would surely be destroyed by my days.  because He doesn't say "pick up your cross and follow me"  He says "pick up your cross DAILY and follow me" because any longer would be impossible- because the weekend is too long- and a month? and forever? no.  bits.  pieces.  moments.  choices.  this is where we live.

can i get through breakfast and be gentle? can i help zoe in the bathroom and not kill her? can i practice love and patience until dinner? GOD GETS US! She does. this is the grace.  this is part of the provision.  

i don't need to know all the answers.  i need to know the right questions.  or at least i need to be okay with the day i've been given.  

in our lives we are asked by God over and over again if we will trust and love and follow Him....despite whatever is in our days.   you just lost your best friend.... am I still God?  your child has autism.....it's so hard....am I still Love?  you can't get pregnant....am I still worthy? you have everything you ever wanted....do I still matter?  

today... two days before we leave, when i've been given the questions, i went to a talk on autism, on the DSM-5, the new definitions and criteria of autistic spectrum disorders.  it was helpful and incredibly humbling to be reminded of how my first born struggles through her days in a way i can't imagine. and it reminded me again of my need to be just in the hours not days not the months not the years...just the hours.  to trust the grace- the provision- the promise.   

i came to greece, away from africa and my kids and my life and my days, craving and empty.  i came with a list and desire for knowledge and a plan.  but i will leave with something different. i will leave with a readjustment. a bit of transformation and realignment. with an awareness that the answers are often in front of us-  what should we do about zoe? love her. really love her. what about her schooling, her special needs? our needs around her needs? trust in God's promise- that we are and will be given enough- just enough- for what we need, for what she needs.  that our sustainability is not something we can put into a spreadsheet- it is also found in obedience and trust and leaning into the everlasting arms.  that our time in africa is now- and that is enough for us to know.  that our mission exactly isn't about titles and positions, it's about serving in our day, even when it's hard- even when it's costly.

so we will leave greece.  we will go back home to africa. and the second one is much more significant.

finding peace

i am married to a very wise man.  he is many other things too, but perhaps what i value most is his wisdom. today he came home for lunch which was wonderful, but it was more than that- it was needed. i needed him- his presence- his words.

we are going to greece in a few weeks for a medical missionary conference. i so need this. we so need this.  it's been almost three years here and we need to reconnect with ourselves and each other and our mission. because there is this thing called burn out and it's real and it happens with time and multiple losses and being far away and more losses and stress- lots of stress. some of the stress would be with us anywhere (i won't mention any names) and some of the stress is unique to living as a foreigner in the developing world, and some of it is unique to this title of missionary and what that means, and raising our support to live and work.

on sunday the sermon was on peace.  on being at peace with God and with ourselves and with others.  i wasn't feeling very at peace with anyone- but maybe most of all, myself.  i was feeling mostly non-peaceful feelings- like restlessness and agitation.

so when mike came home for lunch- we talked about it. he was saying that this lenten period for him has been about learning to un-think.  that for him, and me, and our "types"- types who like to accomplish a lot and control things and fix problems and find solutions- we usually try to find peace this way- by thinking our way to it.  we try to identify the "problems" or create a mental list of all the good things, the things in our lives that should bring us peace, we try to be reasonable, to create plans and paths that will result in peace.  but it just doesn't work.  it doesn't.

"obedience is the path to peace."  that is what he said.  that was his lenten conclusion. 

we've been doing it wrong. 

our "types" tend to try discipline as the path. we identify what is preventing our peace or what we need to put in place to achieve peace and we do it- we are disciplined. and we are good at it.  it's in our comfort zone.  discipline has worked for us in the past. it's gotten us where we are today....(wait....that should perhaps be a clue that it's not going to be the solution... since where we are today is looking for peace...)   but the problem with discipline, is that it's still all about us. and control. we are the masters of our universe. we are solving the problem.  we are working our way through it. 

but true peace is found in the letting go.  real peace is found in surrender.  peace is found often and ironically in the seasons and times when we are most out of control, most vulnerable, most dependent.

and that is where obedience comes in.  being compliant or submissive to the will of another- a very unpopular concept today especially in the west.  obedience requires humility, it requires letting go of our agenda, it is giving up control.  for those of us who try to find and walk with God, it's being obedient to what we are called into or not into. it's still very active- it's still doing- but it's doing what God wants, not what we want. it's choosing in our day and our moments to be obedient - and in that we are choosing peace.

what does this mean? it depends.  i think it means finding ourselves in the mundane parts of life.  it means doing what is in front of us, instead of thinking about why we have to.  it means being the parent and making the sandwich and listening (really listening)  to the retelling of "secret agent cody banks" for the 100th time.  it means being kind and gentle when someone in clinic wants malaria treatment for sore on their mouth. it means saying "no" to our quick fix easy fixer-upers when they are not good for us.  it means being active and present with your partner at the end of the day, instead of just saying "fine" or "nothing".   it means trusting in the everlasting arms- finding the things in life that we really do have no control over, and giving them up. 

a few hours after our lovely discussion on finding peace, zoe came home from school- and God was like, ok- here you go.  she literally walked up the driveway roaring like an angry lion, stormed through the door, threw her bag on the floor, threw her water bottle, and her glasses and her ipod and went to her room where she proceeded to strip her bed and throw that on the floor, and then strip off her own clothes and come out to the kitchen butt naked and shout, "what do you think of that mom?"

oh dear.

really?? really??

i had a guest over.  rose needed a snack because she had just come home too. jude was in the kitchen wondering what he was supposed to make of his naked older sister.  it was 4 o'clock. 

i told the guest it was time to go, gave rosie a yogurt, jude said he wished there was a cure for nonverbal learning disability and made himself scarce, and i took a very deep breath, and went into the den of zoe.  i sat on her stripped bed and calmly asked her to get dressed, which she did. i calmly asked her what her day had been like, and under my breath i was saying to God....really?? really??

because in that moment i wanted to run like the wind away from my life. far away.  i wanted to be anywhere but in that room with that girl- (preferable somewhere with a gin and tonic and the sound of the ocean).  because in that moment i was looking at the rest of peoples lives.  i was looking at her life and my life and mikes life and i was seeing a whole lot of crazy.  i was seeing jail and mental hospitals and 5150's.  i was seeing cutting behaviors and anxiety and depression and suicide.  because in that moment i was tired and terrified, and i was about to ask why and why not something else  and how long, but i remembered- obedience is the path to peace.  not thinking.  not even asking why and when.  obedience. obedience in this. this is what you have been given and called into-in all it's messiness and challenge and heartbreak- so be in it, be in it with her- be present- be quiet- listen. 

and do you know what? we are given the things we need in the moment when we chose to be obedient. it's true.  i wasn't being asked to be obedient forever- to always chose correctly- to be perfect.  i was just being asked in that moment to not run away. to be still.

she told me that she'd struggled a bit in the morning with the new girl in her class (change is very hard for zoe).  then she'd had standardized testing all day (the first day of 4), then on the ride home she'd gotten mad because her neighbor didn't want to talk, and the whole thing was just too much she said- her brain started spinning- she was feeling out of control (ya think?)

it was a hard day- standardized tests are awful! especially for kids like zoe (even if it's adapted).  no wonder she felt so out of control.  the challenge is how to help her unwind her spinning head while remaining clothed and not throwing things. 

i thanked her for telling me about her day- asked her to please remake her bed- (which rose did with her) and we all ate popcorns.  i told her i understood how hard her day must have been- and that we are here for her- to help her -and to hear her- and to find with her, other ways to deal with feeling out of control.  thanks she said. and i went inside to make risotto. 

the funny thing was- i was at peace. the miracle was, by not screaming at her, by not running away, or avoiding it, but by being in my life- in the thick of it- in the mess of it- the rawness of it- i let go. in the admission of my inability to change her brain, or even her actions, despite all kids of discipline and routine, and in the grace i was given in that moment to be obedient, i found peace.

i am a very simple person, who despite multiple attempts, rarely gets things right- so i will just be thankful for that moment.  for the grace given to be there for someone else before myself.  for the strength given to stay put and listen.  and for the peace that followed.

obedience is the path to peace....