Trial or Triumph, You Choose

A single missionary friend of mine, is single no more. As a seasoned traveler to orphanages in Mexico, Argentina, and Bolivia, she was equipped for most adventures, but are any of us really prepared for the metamorphosis when two start to become one?! 

In her recent state of confusion, she sent me this note, "How do I know that my relationship with God is in good balance while at the same time, having Joe in my life? What have you learned about both (having your spouse AND God) being priorities, but keeping God number one?"

At first glance, it was my instinct to remember how strapped I was for time when I brought another person into my world, first Angie, and then Jon. It was easy to focus on the balancing act of making time to be alone with God, when you can't even find time to go to the bathroom with the door closed. Scheduling was a very real challenge, but then I remembered that the closest I've ever been to God may have been in the first few months of doing life with Angie. And that's when I noticed this line a bit later in my friend's message, "I am enjoying the added peace, love, and support Joe has brought to my life..."

Maybe it's not so impossible to make room for God when life get's full, as it is difficult to seek Him with the same passion in the absence of desperation. Why don't the words pour out of us as freely in praise of all His wonders, as they do in cries for His comfort and rescue? Why do we find ourselves on our knees so much more in the desert than in abundance?

One year ago, I was navigating the fresh waters of matrimony, while Angie was drowning in a sea of unwanted change, as she wrestled with leaving her native land and losing the exclusive rights to her mom. She acted out mostly with words, albeit words who's marks were sometimes hard to erase, even with the understanding that she didn't mean most of them. 

Two years ago, she hadn't quite honed the art of self control, and she dealt with the ongoing changes of being part of a family by busting holes in her door, leaving claw marks on my arms and chunks of my hair on the floor, cutting the walls, and slicing gaping holes in my window screens. 

This year, you could almost call her reasonable. She makes mistakes, says things she shouldn't, thrashes about sometimes, but you can talk her down now, her fits are shorter, fewer, and farther between. She's learning what it means to live with people who love her.

Guess, in which of these times I was closest to God. In which year did I shed more tears, each one like incense rising to the Lord? Of course, when my knees were the most raw from the time spent pleading for a reprieve from the wildness and violence.

“You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and His rule. You’re blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you." -Matthew 5:3-4 TM

"The Lord is close to the brokenhearted; He rescues those whose spirits are crushed." 

-Psalm 34:18 NLT

"My ears had heard of You, but now my eyes have seen You." -Job 42:5 NIV

A couple weeks ago, I spoke at a Christian Camp about the rubbish we fill up our lives with. Like the child who can't hold the next gift you have for her, because her hands are already full with what she thinks is the good stuff.

"...everything I once thought I had going for me is insignificant—dog dung. I’ve dumped it all in the trash so that I could embrace Christ and be embraced by Him." Phil 3:10 TM

I shared about emptying ourselves of all the credentials we wear so proudly, and the possessions we cling to so tightly, to have room to embrace Christ and be embraced by Him. And at the end, a missionary to India asked, "so what's it like when you've let it all go?"

I think I spouted off something about greater intimacy with God, but I'd been about as transparent as one can be with strangers in this workshop, so why put on airs now, "I don't really know," I admitted, "I tend to fill up my arms again as soon as God helps me empty them." 

After all, the humility/pride I get from freeing myself up to embrace Christ is accolade enough to keep Him at arms length. The feeling of significance found in the praise of men, the security in the riches of this world, and the lightness of companionship are enough to convince anyone to seek worldly prosperity over the deprivation that draws us into His lap. 

Job had heard of God when his cup was brimming over with treasures, but he didn't truly see God until he had lost everything. 

Would I choose the closeness with God I had when I wept in my bed alone while my child raged against me, or the relative peace and happiness I cherish now with my dear supportive husband and the more docile daughter? Would I ever take a season with the Lord alone on my knees, when I could be frolicking and laughing with my family?

Am I strong enough to wish for more adversity? Am I capable of coming to the end of my rope, without tragedy taking me there? Would you ever trade a day of ease and pleasure for one marked with trials and suffering that lead you to Jesus? 

Until we're there, may we at least, appreciate the closeness we have when we're allowed  pain, and "when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy." -James 1:2. 

Newlyweds No More?

Celebrating our first year of wedded bliss!

Marriage is one of those strange strange creatures you cannot completely fathom until you've captured it. Even then, it is an elusive beast to wrap your head around. Although it's as common as the flu in January, just like motherhood it's extraordinary in almost every way. In one of my favorite books on the subject, "The Meaning of Marriage" Tim Keller quotes Stanley Hauerwas,

 "...we always marry the wrong person. We never know whom we marry; we just think we do. Or even if we first marry the right person, just give it awhile and he or she will change. For marriage, being the enormous thing it is means we are not the same person after we have entered it. The primary problem is...learning how to love and care for the stranger to whom you find yourself married."

Growing together on the high ropes course at family camp in the California Redwoods.

One year ago, Jon and I started changing each other for better or worse, for the rest of our lives. We've changed in some monumental ways. Where I was repulsed by hunting before, now I cook and eat the game he brings home, and maybe even look forward to restocking the freezer as deer season approaches. Jon now often cheers for UL with nearly the enthusiasm of those of us who truly bleed Cardinal Red as opposed to his natural UK blue. We've also changed in almost undetectable manners; now I separate the lights from the darks in the laundry, and he puts the toilet seat down. We've rubbed off on each other in negative ways. I start my day much later than I used to, because it's just about impossible to get out of bed when he's snoozing there all warm and cuddly. His diet now includes many more simple carbs than it probably ever has. But we've sharpened one another as well. Because of his influence, I'm gentler and calmer with Angie even when I'm not feeling gentle or calm at all. He's becoming more direct and more open about what he's really thinking. I might be a little more patient, he might be a bit more driven.

I wonder sometimes why couples who've been married fifty years can still be two such unique individuals. Why haven't they basically morphed into a male and female version of one another; two perfect fusions of all the good qualities each offers? If Jon and I could combine our passion and unflappable-ness, our energy and clearheadedness, fervor and tenderness, ambition and persistence, our perseverance, tenacity, thoughtfulness and charm, all on their best days, we'd be a duo to be reckoned with for sure! 

So I pray that we will continue to improve each other by watching one another reflect Christ in various ways for decades to come. Softening one anothers' edges where they need to be softened, sharpening them where they need to be sharper.

The happy-couple-pose in a two-person kayak after we sunk the one-man kayak in the middle of the lake,
 in one of life's impromptu crash courses on relationships. 

I'm reading Ann Voskamp's incredible book One Thousand Gifts where she quotes C.S. Lewis as saying,"If you think of the world as a place intended simply for our happiness, you find it quite intolerable: think of it as a place of training and correction and it's not so bad."

 It made me realize why I've been so pleasantly surprised by this first year as a wife. Many people think of marriage as an arrangement simply intended for their happiness, and thus find it quite intolerable. But as a 32 year-old tying the knot for the first time, I was fortunate enough to come to it with a little more realistic perspective. I looked at marriage more as a place of training and correction, as Tim Keller says "a way for two spiritual friends to help each other on their journey to become the persons God designed them to be." And as a result, it has exceeded all my expectations. 

Now, to see if it can get any sweeter, as we embark on year #2 determined to stay "newlywed" for a long long time....   

Retraction

If you receive our prayer updates by email, you may have read today that we're prepping for our trip to Bolivia. If you haven't, you might want to catch up here before you read on.

And now, let me unsay everything I said, sort of.  You see, just after I submitted that letter for printing, posting on my website, and emailing to all of you, we found out that we can't go to Bolivia just yet. UGH!  I could go into all the gruesome details of the visits and phone calls with immigration officers that lead us to this untimely realization, but that'd be excruciating for most of you, and humiliating for me as it was my own failure to understand the system that got us into this mess.

The simple version is that at this point in Angie's process toward permanent residency in the U.S. we can't leave the U.S. or they likely won't let her back in. Whoops. To defend myself just the tiniest bit, we really have sought legal counsel, as you'll know if you're a lawyer-type in our sphere, but our adoption and immigration case is REALLY complicated and unique, hence I've been deciphering most of the legal jargon on my own.

So, now we're stuck with plane tickets we're not sure we can transfer due to black out dates and such, plans for parties, appointments, and meetings to be rescheduled, and about 70 pounds of goods, shipped from around the States, ready for us to haul to Bolivia, including a tablet computer, a keyboard, an ultrasound machine, a birthday package for one of our new vets on the field, Bible study workbooks, candy, bubbles, and gifts for the kiddos at the orphanage, the list goes on.....

If you had the misfortune of accidentally calling the day this news came to us, you know I was pretty devastated to say the least. And a sense of deja vu started to set in as I remembered a similar realization almost exactly one year ago, of exactly the opposite nature; we HAD to go back to Bolivia for U.S. immigration purposes, five days after our honeymoon, for four months! You can brush up on that fun news here.

But this go around, I recovered a little more quickly, because my nostalgia didn't end at the awful day when we learned of our fate to spend the first month of our marriage in separate countries, and the next three in Bolivia's hottest season, without any of our stuff. By God's grace, I also reflected back on just how trustworthy the Lord was in those four months. Instead of being a newlywed disaster, it turned into a sweet time of bonding and ministry together, maybe not something I'd recommend other bride and grooms try right out of the gate, but a period I wouldn't trade in our history. Check out all the blessings that experience brought us here.

We can all say that we trust God, but I'm the first to doubt His sovereignty when things start to fall apart. I wouldn't say that of course. I'd pray, "Lord, we know You're sovereign..." But when the airline we purchased tickets with to move home from the mission field last year shut down taking with them all of our money, when a nationwide census in Bolivia ruined our long awaited travel plans, or when Angie started puberty the month she turned ten and one month before we turned her world upside down with our wedding, my panic would reveal my true feelings, that God has let me down, that He wasn't looking out for me on this one. So, it was super generous of Him to teach me this lesson in such a remedial way. First, He allows a mess, He allows me to choose to trust Him or doubt, next He shows up in that mess and makes His purposes obvious. Then, He sends a follow-up mess so remarkably similar that even I can see the parallels, and again He allows me to choose. This time, even as dense as I am, I choose to trust Him.

August 2nd, we have an interview with immigration. Lord willing, we'll be granted Angie's permanent residency and be allowed to travel. And again, if God permits, we'll try to make our trip back to Bolivia for all the things listed in the prayer letter above, just before she starts school late August. Please, join us in prayer for all of this. And feel free to learn from the lessons God's teaching me, so maybe He'll spare you your own teachable trials. The disciples doubted Jesus could feed the thousands, even after He'd just proven He could a few weeks before, in the gospel of Mark. So, I guess we're in good company even if it takes a few attempts to get through to us...