Your courage asked me what I'm afraid of

Bear with me.  This is kinda long.  I am starting to thaw and feel again.

God's Mercy Shop - need some?

I heard a Sara Groves song today called "I saw what I saw."  It is meaningful and speaks to our situation very well.  One line from it was "Your courage asked me what I'm afraid of and what I know of love."  Now I am not saying that we are super-courageous or better at loving than anyone else when saying the song speaks to our situation.  We are walking the path that was laid out for us.  This is our adventure to live out and no one else is supposed to be us. But when you see someone living bravely and doing something that you don't think you could handle [first of all don't be so sure they are "handling" it as easily as you perceive them to be] doesn't it beg the question above? 

this is much larger but a similar style home to where my boys are now

My boys are living courageously right now.  They don't have a Mommy or a Daddy and haven't as long as they can remember.  They had parents for a few weeks and we left them 10 days ago and they haven't seen us since.  They have a photo of the 4 of us all together and they are told that we'll be back but 2 years olds aren't very good at having a concept of time so I don't know what they understand.  The Ugandans live so differently than we do.  How much faith does it take to live my 1st world convenient way-more-stuff-than-you-need-to-survive-the-day life?

           con·ven·ient/kənˈvēnyənt/Adjective

1. Fitting in well with a person's needs, activities, and plans.

2. Involving little trouble or effort

Ugandan convenience store: that's a bag of milk she's holding

Until recently my illusion of control was firmly in place and I didn't feel needy (yuck...I hated to even type that word) So my daily life didn't take much faith trust or dependence (another dirty word).  Need is ever-present and dependence is reality in Uganda but so are DEEP VIBRANT FAITH and STRONG SUPPORTIVE LOVE.  hummm... is it worth the trade off you may be asking yourself.  We would of course choose "no" which is why we have be be pushed against our will into situations like I am in now. 


Talking to your friends helps you process what happens in your life.  They give you insight and if they are good friends they encourage you to see your life in the best light and help you to move forward and see the purpose in things that just seem hard and confusing.

My friend, Dorothy, is one of those people for me.  We have know each other since freshman year of college and have done a lot of growing up into grown-ups together.  Her first born son was very sick before he was born and 7 years later he still is.  He was taken from her minutes after he was born for surgery and she didn't get to hold him for months after that.  She had to go home at night and leave him in the hospital and come back the next day.  I walked some of that road with her but couldn't feel the depth of it of course.  She has quite literally gone for years of her life without once sleeping through the night. 

Daniel, The Brave

She doesn't feel brave.  I know for a fact that neither does her son.  BUT HE IS!!  [they both are and her husband is too!]  Just living is harder work for him than it is for lots of other little kids.  "But he's doing so much better now and he didn't even have to be hospitalized this year during flu season" was a part of our recent conversation.  He lives so exuberantly and zestfully and he fearlessly tells 8th graders who pick on him at school just what they can do...[hee hee hee! GO Daniel!]

Being her friend helped me grow and gain perspective and be more thankful and compassionate and less judgmental etc.  I know she didn't go through that just for me.  However, I was able to benefit from it and I am thankful.  I hope it is not 7 years from now but I look forward to the day when she and I are having our "remember that hard time but now look how great things are" talk about my boys and our situation like we did about Daniel yesterday.  Faith tells me we WILL have that talk.  But in the meantime, what can we learn from what is going on?  How can it be at least useful besides in a what-doesn't-kill-you-makes-you-stronger kinda of way?  Dare I say "let's not waste this pain?"

Why is this happening to our family?  I mean our whole entire family...even the ones who don't spring to mind as CLOSE relatives or who aren't related by blood are experiencing this with us and we feel their love from Pennsylvania and California and Iowa and New York and everywhere else that they live.  They are carrying a little bit of this burden or a LOT of it depending on how close to the pain they are willing to come.  I have not asked that "why us" question--honestly--I just have done what was right here in front of me to do and completed that task and move methodically on the the next one.  Analysis, a favorite pastime of mine under normal circumstances, has not really been going on.  But Faith tells me that this is happening for a good reason and simple faith is all I have had lately.  Not faith PLUS anything else.  My inner dialogue has been just something simple like.  Is God good? yes all the time.  Does He love me?  yes that is His nature.  Are His plans for me good even when I am in this much pain?  yes they have to be because He cannot go against His own nature.  Ok then I am going to keep trusting and wait for the day when this makes more sense.  And that is really it.  But as my friend Dorothy pointed out.  That is enough.  Faith is enough right now.  Other seasons of my life may be for deep thoughts and hours of studying the big heavy truths but faith is enough for now.  *exhale*

bff's Dorothy & Rachel-holding Rueben (Dorothy's youngest)