Finding My Life in His

This post is kind of a summary of the last months, I suppose. There are the pictures – the moments of joy and beauty and colour that we tend to isolate and hang on our walls. But there’s also the string of words, the unbroken prayer, the daring to live in the hard, hidden times that weaves it all together. 

I found this beautiful Puritan prayer… and I marvel at the mystery of how He really does fill all of our lives: the boring, the repetitious, the terrifying, the sorrowful, the difficult, the stressful are all just opportunities to be filled to all fullness in Him. I marvel at how He doesn’t stop at being the Father of good gifts (and we get such good gifts here – just look at the beautiful faces below!), but He creatively involves Himself even in the messes we make to form this glorious radiance of holiness in everything….

acting out Palm Sunday

Lord, high and holy, meek and lowly, Thou hast brought me to the valley of vision, where I live in the depths but see Thee in the heights; hemmed in by mountains of sin I behold Thy glory.

Let me learn by paradox that the way down is the way up, that to be low is to be high,

Let me learn….that the broken heart is the healed heart, that the contrite spirit is the rejoicing spirit,

Passover: we “killed” our lamb puppet and applied the blood

let me learn….that the repenting soul is the victorious soul, that to have nothing is to possess all,

that to bear the cross is to wear the crown, that to give is to receive, that the valley is the place of vision.

Lord, in the daytime stars can be seen from deepest wells, and the deeper the wells the brighter Thy stars shine;

let me find Thy light in my darkness, Thy life in my death, Thy joy in my sorrow, Thy grace in my sin, Thy riches in my poverty, Thy glory in my valley.

Amen.

Give us Grace, Not “Normal”

Her eyes lock mine. Her wrinkled face is contorted, and her statement comes out as a question; “God will help us…?” I glance down at her daughter suffering on the hospital bed, recovering from an operation, and then back at the face so close to mine. The eyes begging an answer. I say the one word, the yes. Anna she sings, and I play my flute. We try to bring the melody of grace to this one girl in a bustling hospital full of hurting people. It is His faithfulness and mercy to the girl who wears fresh wounds deep in her stomach. She will scar and there will be no more smoothness, just a memory of the suffering. The floor is cracked, the walls are dirty, people are shuffling past and a baby is wailing but we pray that now, like never before, she will know His presence. Because sometimes pain drives us into His presence, into His peace.

—-

Half an hour later, we are sitting at another young lady’s home, enjoying the cool shade under the thatched roof of their sitting-place. Little girls play with piles of pebbles, and a chicken wanders through puddles of sunshine dancing on the dirt floor.

As the talk continues, we get into deeper subjects. I hear the story of the little girl sitting on my friends lap. How she was brought when a tiny baby, dropped off by her mother who left and hasn’t come back. How she had an operation and my friend stayed with her at the hospital for all those days. How she drank juice and sugary tea and water, and now was just beginning to eat. How she saw my friend as her mother. The story keeps coming, but it’s so similar to the ones I’ve already heard so many times from girls my age. So many have little girls or little boys who they “mother” in whatever way they think best. The little ones are almost entirely spoiled with instant gratification of their every wish. I think of the article I read this week about how the lack of a father affects children and I swish my water in the tin cup and pray in my heart for the children of Congo.

I ask if it doesn’t break the mother’s heart to come back and find her baby attached to someone else? Doesn’t it hurt a mother to be constantly working and return in the evening to find her children distanced from her, to find that she cannot talk to her daughters anymore?

Oh, but it’s normal, they tell me. Parents mostly want to get their children to university and get them married/settled down somewhere, they tell me. Parents know that university will ruin their children, and many don’t check out the integrity of their child’s spouse as long as there is enough money in the marriage to make them feel important.

They say it like this hard fact. So many parents figure their kids are ruined anyways by that age that they don’t even try to salvage them. Maybe the parents themselves don’t have anything else to offer their kids, I think. 

After all, it is normal.

“How can you ask if someone regrets that they only eat with their mouth, and not with their eyes or nose?” they ask me, “They don’t even know that another way exists.”

I close my eyes to stop the pounding in my head. I see the face of that girl in the hospital. So that’s where she’ll end up? I open my eyes and see the happy little girl still playing with her pebbles and it makes me sick to think of her future. I see the toddler cuddled in my friend’s lap and think of where her mother is….where her father is….I think of how girls from nine and up are put in charge of rearing babies and toddlers – they do not know how to raise them. Oh, the children of Congo!

In the evening friends come to see me, and they speak of all the same issues. One says that when she’s a mother, if she doesn’t want all her children, she’ll just ‘give some away’. Speaks of how she’s trained her younger siblings to love and obey her instead of their mother.

Pray for this new generation, that there would be a new mentality, that they would have new hearts….

Grace has begun, we see healing in families. There are always exceptions to normal. But there is still so far to go….

Pray for the parents of Congo.

The Adventure Continues…..

On Saturday, we covered one of the subjects in our Leader’s Training: A Gentle Heart: Being A Servant. We asked the girls doing the leader’s training to come to this lesson, as it was especially for them, and….over half of them did.

some of the girls coming for leader's training: r. to l., Nono, Anyesi, Marie, Grace

The ideal was that we know by now who is going through with this Leader’s Training, but we have girls with conflicting schedules and desires and are waiting on God and them to see who’s going to really do this. I know it’s frustrating to pray for girls when you’re not really sure who you’re praying for, but it’s frustrating for us, too. We had our first lesson Friday, and although the girls came over an hour late and half didn’t come at all, it was a really good time together laying out what we believe, our goals and vision, and the cost of being a leader. After the lesson we did the last “interview” with a girl who came late. The questions we asked them ranged from “what is your favourite colour?” to “are you committed to purity until marriage? Are you a good example for young children? How does one get to Heaven?” It was fascinating seeing those girls, in all shapes and sizes, answer the questions!

One girl coming for the Leader’s Training that I want you to meet is Marie:

I only met her last Thursday, but I love her already! She is a sweet, bright sixteen year old and (this is AMAZING in my opinion) she asks questions!!! She actually tries to answer questions, and asks more, too! Please pray for her, as her mother is sick with malaria. She’s fasting from food and water every day (except for a little in the evenings) in prayer for her school exams. But she still comes a loooong way in the scorching sun and then back again in the evening to be part of the leader’s training! What an answer to prayer this wonderful young lady is!

For any faithful readers, the name Nono should be recognisable to you. All along, we knew that she would be one of the first to do the leader’s training. She is the most faithful girl I have ever seen, and is miserable if she misses a meeting of BBP. She is so sweet and sensitive. If someone voices a need, she is the first to jump to fulfill it. On Saturday, someone saw a mango (the season’s almost over, so they’re scarce now) and for the next fifteen minutes, she was throwing one rock after another to knock it down.

Someone finally got a stick. (look for the one dot of yellow – that’s our mango!) FINALLY she got it down:

After all that work she INSISTED we take the mango – she got it down for us. And, believe me, it was a big mango!

We are so grateful to have Nono with us!!! We are really asking these girls for a lot. I didn’t think many would want to make the sacrifice, but there are eight girls considering and about three to five girls who pretty much know for sure. Once again, I’ll wait to post about them when I know.

To finish up….here’s some of the little girls who came Saturday for the lesson and the neighbour kids (who came to watch the mango drama unfold!)

Have a great week!!!

Thursday Teaparty

On Thursday, we all had a blast. It wasn’t particularly a BBP occasion, but some of the girls who came have attended Bana Basi ya Kopela meetings. We had intended for it to be a girl’s teaparty, but we ended up having some boys mixed in, and over twenty kids, most of whom were tiny little toddlers! We had fun making bracelets together, painting nails, playing soccer, drinking tea, and laughing as we all became good friends!

Before we drank our tea, we read some verses about the incredible, passionate love that God has for us, His daughters (and sons!). Please pray that each of us who were there that afternoon would continue to grow in the knowledge of that amazing love!!

If you want to see the little kids, go to http://www.shoutofjoy.wordpress.com . It’s a new site that I created to post some of the pictures we take of this beautiful country that wouldn’t fit in the posts.

lots of laughter, lots of smiles!