Christmas +1

I loved Christmas eve. I spent the evening with my mom, grandma, and two aunts eating broccoli soup and watching the Nativity. It was a ladies night in (my dad had to stay at home to take care of his pastorly duties). Christmas day evening was relativeful. Seventeen of the roughly forty members of my grandmother's clan gathered at her house to eat "Thanksgiving" food and open presents. Now it is Christmas +1 and this day is almost as good as the last two. This morning my sister, my parents, and I slept in and then we ate breakfast until noon, after our long breakfast we took a walk near my sister's house. After our walk we ate lunch at 3 pm. Now it's time to eat supper. I just told my sister, "This is the best kind of day--we're just sitting around eating leftovers."

Post-Finals

The campus was quiet Monday since most the students were gone. But even with the students gone there was work to do! The school administration hosted a caroling session at lunch. It was something small, but it was nice to be thought of. I had work to do, but I couldn't help joining in. I kept saying, "Just one more song! And then I'll go."



My boss is in the left hand corner of the picture if you were curious.

Names & Places

Yesterday, after our Circle of Faith Bible study, the group of us gathered around and sang Happy Birthday to Kita, one of the nursing students at the school I teach for. As we sang I thought about the simple knowledge of a name. I wouldn't have known this student or her name if I hadn't moved to Orlando. After we sang I had to leave to attend another birthday party in Longwood. As I drove north toward Longwood, I thought about place names: Apopka, Longwood, Maitland, and Altamonte. All cities unfamiliar before, but now a part of my daily geography. There are names too that I didn't know a year ago that have become important to me as well.

A year ago this week I landed in Orlando and checked into a motel. I didn't know anyone in the city except my work contact. The city seemed so large then, foreign and unknown. I felt afraid. In all my travels, arriving in a US city alone seemed more scary than anything I'd ever done. I was overwhelmed. I spent my first couple of days looking for an apartment and getting hopelessly lost. I went to church that week and I got invited to a Christmas party and I went. I met some of my closest friends in Orlando there.

It's hard to believe a year has gone by so quickly. I've been so tremendously blessed. I'm grateful for all the place names I know now. I'm grateful for all the names of friends that I can say. The people in my phonebook who weren't there a year ago.

A Good Prayer

"Father, I thank You for the people in my life who seem to bring more pain than joy, for I believe You have let our paths cross for important reasons....Thank You too that You love these people, and that Your love is adequate to meet their deepest needs and to transform their lives, however willful or unwise they may seem to be. Thank You that You care for them deeply, and that each of them has the potential of being a vast reservoir from which You could receive eternal pleasure" (88). 31 Days of Praise

I was moved by this prayer. While I'm lucky to have very few difficult people in my life, I loved how the author viewed each frusterating person as possibly becoming a "vast reservoir" of God's eternal pleasure. I want to think of each person I see today in that way--even the people who aren't irritating!

English Teacher Cop

People assume that since I'm an English teacher I'm always on the look out for grammatical errors. In fact, an acquaintance recently confessed that he was scared to email me for fear that I would judge his language.

I'm usually amused when I get placed in the role of grammar cop because, as some of you know(yes, you know who you are), I can be a little footloose with grammar and spelling (am I the only teacher that wishes that whiteboards came with a spell check function?).

Today though I finally did it. I succumbed to the stereotype of the English teacher cop and asked a colleague about a phrase I hear him say all the time. Whenever we eat together he invites everyone to "eat some munchkins". I find his invitation to eat munchkins amusing in macabre kind of way as the only thing that comes to my mind is a group of us munching on children (mmmmmmmm...tasty). I asked him if he used the phrase as a joke, and he said he didn't but that in Caribbean English munchkins was a word used for food.

This is why I love English. It's great to speak the same language and have no idea what the other person is saying.

A Promise in the Stars

"He took him outside and said, 'Look up at the heavens and count the stars--if indeed you can count them.' Then he said to him, 'So shall your offspring be" (Gen. 15:5).

I wonder how Abraham felt when he looked at the stars. Did he often sit outside of his tent counting them? Did he look at them with holy awe wondering what plans God had for his descendants? Did he talk to Isaac about them?

The promise God gave Abraham in the stars grew out of his faith. Abraham had trusted God to leave his country and God entrusted him with a blessing so vast it could not be counted.

God has stars for us too. They might not be the promise of a nation. They might not be a covenant, but he has promised to honor our faith. When we look at the stars, we see God's promise to use us; we see God's promise to leave through us a unique spiritual legacy.

"Commit your work to the LORD, and your plans will be established" (Proverbs 16:3). "Those who are wise will shine like like the brightness of heavens, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars for ever and ever" (Daniel 12:3).

If you get a chance some night soon, go outside and look at the stars. Can you count them? Can you count what God will do with your faith?

Out of Nowhere

The perfect place to nap is under my desk. If I'm tired at work, I'll turn off the lights in my office, pull up my floor heater and snooze a little on the floor under my desk. I don't mind confessing this, but I don't want to get caught. Yesterday I was napping when I realized that a student was at my door. After waiting awhile to make sure she was no longer at my door, I got up and went to the lobby to see if she had lingered there. She had. I approached her and said, "B, can I help you?" She looked up at me startled and said, "You came from nowhere." I smiled but didn't give an explanation.

One of My Favorite Places

Over Thanksgiving I got to go to one of my favorite places, McKay's bookstore in Chattanooga. It is a booklovers dream: a warehouse full of used inexpensive books! I only looked thoroughly in two main sections of the bookstore (Christianity & economics) before I called it quits. There were other parts of the store that I dabbled in, but left quickly for fear of the ill effects on my wallet.

Thanks K. for taking me! I like our McKay's tradition.

Pieces

I sit on a park bench watching the sunset over the lake near my school, and I say to myself, "A thing of beauty is a joy forever." I walk back to my office and watch the ducks as I go. A couple of lines from an Ogden Nash poem come to my mind, "Behold the duck...it does not cluck...and for supper its bottoms up." I walk a little more and the glow of sunset makes me think of a line from Tennyson, "Sunset and evening star and let there be no mourning for me when I have crossed the bar."

I'm grateful for poetry, for the fragments that remain of all that I have read.

Lakes

I miss mountains, but I'm blessed by lakes. There are oodles and oodles of lakes in Florida. I live near a lake, I exercise near a lake, and I work next to a lake. I especially love the lake I work next to. The college I work at is actually on a peninsula between two small lakes. So I can see a lake on my left when I walk to class and then look at a different lake from my classroom. Sometimes if I can't think straight I'll go outside and look at lake W. Or sometimes (like today) when I have a bunch of grading to do, I'll go to the library and grade since (unlike my office) I can sit in the library and gaze at the lake.

Here are two pictures of my favorite lake from the library. The pictures I took are quite ordinary, but some days I can watch flocks of ducks, toy sailboats, or boaters on the lake.

Success

I prayed my student would forget her Monday morning appointment to see me. I pointed out to God that I could really use an extra hour to be ready for my 11:15 class but at 10:00 am she showed up ready to discuss commas and semicolons.

She sat beside my desk and must have sensed my stress because she said, "Are you okay?" "Yeah, I'm fine," I told her. I pulled out a worksheet, and started discussing such scintillating topics as prepositional phrases, dependent clauses, and independent clauses. When I was finished, I handed her a worksheet to correct for comma mistakes. She got each sentence right!

Success. I was so excited I stopped caring about how ready I would be for my 11:15 class, and I scheduled her to meet with me again on Friday.

For the rest of the day, I felt satisfied with my job. Sure, I will never be done grading papers, but one person learned one thing from me this week--even if it was how to use commas.

Yours

In the condensation on the wall from my shower, I scribbled the word, "yours". I had just been praying and musing. "Who do I want to be?" And the response came quickly, "yours." There is not much more than I can ask of God than to be securely his.

This simple scribbling on the wall, my morning's heart longing came partially from a mediation on the following words:

"While on earth, Jesus lived as one with the Father, with an infinitely secure attachment to him. Jesus was able to trust the Father with his life, even if that led to death. With that much confidence in his relationship with God, it is no wonder Jesus was so free of anxiety that he was able to do all that he did: heal, turn tables, speak with wisdom and conviction, calm stormy weather, withstand torture, and snuff out the sting of death through the power of his own death and resurrection.

But we, viewing the universe through the lenses of our insecure attachment, have a difficult time believing that God gives us absolute security as well....[We tend to] respond to him in ways that leave us disconnected from the life of joy Jesus describes in the Gospels.

How is it that despite our 'belief' in God's love for us, we don't experience that love transforming our inner lives or our relationships with our friends, parents, children, spouses or neighbors?" p. 139,140 Anatomy of the Soul by Curt Thompson

My scribble is a prayer for the love of Christ to transform my heart and all my relationships. My heart and my relationships Lord are yours.

When Victory Makes Me Feel Weak

Funny. I was thinking about this paradox this morning: sometimes spiritual success makes me feel more weak than failure. The best example of this is appetite. If I'm eating, to say, not feel depressed, and I actually get my frontal lobe in gear and refuse to overeat--I've won a spiritual victory, but I still got the blues to deal with, and those blues might make me feel weak.

Right now, I'm experiencing a spiritual victory that is spilling weakness into my life. By refusing to commit a certain sin, I'm being confronted with why I run after that sin. I'd rather pretend that I'm perfect. I'd rather sin and repent and sin and repent than get to the root of my behavior. Cutting off the behavior means that all that drives that behavior has no where to go until I'm healed.

And this is why I serve an amazing God. My weakness drives me to Him. In fact, my weakness is a gift. Continued victory will only come out of throwing myself completely on Him. How blessed I am to know my own incapacity and His strength.

When I was a kid we used to sing a song that gave me courage it still gives me courage today. Here it is below:


He’s still working on me to make me what I really ought to be.
It took Him just a week to make the moon and stars,
The Sun and the Earth and Jupiter and Mars.
How loving and patient He must be, He’s still working on me.


There really ought to be a sign upon my heart,
‘Don’t Judge Me Yet There’s An Unfinished Part’.
But I’ll be perfect just according to his plan,
Fashioned by the Master’s loving hand.

Seasons

One of my students told me today that she might leave class early Friday because her family would be celebrating Diwali. My first thought was, "it's that time of year already?" While I never celebrated Diwali in Thailand, I did celebrate Loy Krathong (which is a related holiday). I have a happy memory of standing on a bridge at APIU watching the krathongs, candles ablaze, floating in the waters below.

It's my second year in America and I'm still adjusting to my new holiday schedule. It's no longer Loy Krathong, the King's Birthday and Songkran. It's Thanksgiving and Christmas, and spring break.

There's a certain melancholy in losing seasons,and maybe even more is a sadness in forgetting those same rhythms.

Sacred Memories

The first time I ever conciously decided to follow Christ was in a bathtub. Yes, there are more glorious places to make that decision, but this is the simple beauty of how the where of my choice to follow Him has affected my life. Almost anytime I take a shower, I think of God.

In college, I had the glorious task of cleaning the dorm kitchen. (I can still smell the cleaning spray I used on the grease splattered stove.) My kitchen-cleaning job was about forty minutes a day, and I usually took that time to pray. I vacuumed and prayed; I scrubbed down the sink and prayed. I recently revisited that kitchen, and I felt like I was returning to hallowed ground.

So much of life is intertwined with memory. For example, the smell of a certain bush at my college can take me back to my life in California or a Chris Rice can make me relive my first couple months in Florida.

I want to consciously overlay my life with memories of God. I want the smells, sights, tastes, and sounds of my ordinary day to be so ingrained with sacred memories that everything I encounter will turn my heart toward Him.

If you don't know the answer, amuse your teacher

Don't Feed the Cats

When I travel I love to go around a place on foot to get a sense of where I am. I have many happy memories of first days: my first days in Bangkok or my first days in Paris. There's just something delightful in soaking in the details of a place (the people on the street, the food for sell, the smells etc.). Monday I realized that I hadn't explored my own neighborhood on foot and so I did. While my neighborhood might not be Bangkok or Paris, it has its interesting points. I found this sign, and I had to laugh about it. I hope the lady who feeds the cats feels special that she has been singled out.

Teacher Nightmares

I have teacher nightmares. They range from the ridiculously trivial like showing up to class in casual clothes (gasp) to experiences that have actually happened (a completely out of control classroom).

Last night I had a nightmare that my class was about ready to start, and I wasn't ready. I was desperately trying to figure out what to teach when I heard word that 19 people had been murdered at a summer camp that I used to work at. In my dream, my reaction was relief, "Oh, it's so tragic that I must cancel class."

I hope you don't take me to be heartless. I do think that the death of 19 people carries a heavier weight than not being ready for class. But really we teachers can be just that desperate!

Hannah: Lessons in Waiting

Saturday for Sabbath School we studied about Hannah. The lesson study focused on how Hannah struggled with her self-worth because she did not have a child (a point I can't argue with), but I wished that the authors had delved a little more into the basic struggle we humans have when our desires are not met.

Year after year Hannah prayed for a son and year after year her rival tormented her. What does it mean to wait and to wait some more and, oh, just when you thought you were done waiting get another full serving of wait? "Hope deferred makes the heart sick. . ."! (Proverbs 13:12).

Hannah is not the only person who had to wait in the Bible. There's Abraham longing for a son, Jacob waiting for his wife and then waiting some more to be free from Laban, Joseph waiting in the prison, the Israelites waiting four hundred years as slaves in Eygpt, Moses working an insignificant job, Jesus waiting in the carpenters shop, and John the Baptist languishing in prison.

I also need to mention the women in the Bible who, like Hannah, had to wait for a child. There's Sarah, Rachel, Ruth (see Ruth 4:13), Samson's mother, and Elizabeth.

If we can derive anything from these stories is that God knows something about waiting. In fact, it seems some of the greatest spiritual success stories are grounded in people who had to wait.

I find that few people get praised for waiting. We wouldn't want to read a romance that ended with and she waited happily everafter. Nor do we often hear testimonies about people who lost their jobs and are still unemployed. And while, as a society, we might be tempted to judge a person who has not been blessed with temporal gifts, who knows we might just be judging a Joseph, a Moses, or a Hannah.

"He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your fathers had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD." (Deuteronomy 8:1-3)

Lord, make me a good steward of my disappointments; take my waiting and make it yours.

Beauty in Busyness

I have been given a season of busyness. My work never seems to end. I am on an overloaded schedule, and I teach a night class to boot. But even in my busyness I'm trying to not forget the beauty around me. I notice small things: three birds flying in formation over the highway, the sunrise in my rearview mirror, and a sunset over the lake next to my office.

Noticing nature is just one way I praise God. I think it honors him to say, "the creation you have given us is beautiful."


The walk to my office at sunset

Never the Same

One of my friends, a student from mainland China, has recently taken a great liking to onion rings. He really really loves onion rings. The other day we were eating together, and as I looked at his plate full of onion rings, I told him that he was in trouble. He was never going to be the same. He had crossed a culinary line, and there was no going back. Since he has now lived in two different countries, he'll never be satisfied. Wherever he goes, he'll miss something from another country.

I miss mangosteens (I actually count the months--17 months since I ate a mangosteen last, sigh).
I miss lychees.
I miss hot soy milk served on the streets in the morning.
I miss mangoes and sticky rice.

I miss the markets and the people in them.

What I Have Saved on My Computer

I have a PDF file called "Proud vs. Broken" saved on my computer. Some mornings I turn on my computer and go through the list I have saved and pray it. Here is just an appetizer of the file...I'm posting the link so you can retrieve it yourself. :)

Proud Vs. Broken

Proud people focus on the failures of others.
Broken people are overwhelmed with a sense of their own spiritual need.

Proud people have a critical, fault-finding spirit; they look at everyone else’s faults with a microscope but their own with a telescope.

Broken people are compassionate; they forgive much because they know how much they have been forgiven.

Proud people are self-righteous; they look down on others.
Broken people esteem all others better than themselves.

Proud people have an independent, self-sufficient spirit.
Broken people have a dependent spirit; they recognize their need for others.

Read the rest at:

http://www.reviveourhearts.com/pdf/uploads/TheHeartGodRevives.pdf

Heaven's Society

I'm a pretty big fan of the social sciences. I fantasize that someday someone will just give me lots of money so I can do things like study economics, geography, history, sociology, anthropology for fun!

Sometimes I like to think about heaven in relationship to social studies. I think about the economics of heaven (I am pretty sure there will be an economy--just a vastly different one), and I think about the sociology of heaven. What will a society look like where the primary impetus of everyone in that society is love? How will it be to live in a place where everyone's interest is in the pleasure of the other people around them?

To live in such a place will be safe and fun and growable (I make up words--but really isn't being loved is one of the greatest ways to grow?)

Sometimes I imagine walking down heaven's main street and seeing the faces there. I imagine how each face will be unique but there will be a kindness blended into each person's features. Maybe there will be even a certain pleasure-to-see-you expressed by each person I see.

When I'm having bad days, when I've encountered a particularly unloving person, I try to think (not always successfully I must add!) about heaven, and I think about how the unkind person might just one day by God's grace be transformed into the most loving person I know on heaven's main street.

One Year Ago

One year ago I was on a plane heading toward Orlando wondering if I was going to get the job I had applied for here and wondering if I did what would happen next.

I've been slowly filling in the details of the life I wondered so much about. I'm blessed by a great community, a job, and friends.

Thank you Father for answered prayers and new chapters in my life!

Beyond Imagination

As a child I took verses like "Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us" (Ephesians 3:20) as a personal challenge. I felt that if I could imagine something wonderful God would have to beat me at it. If I imagined a three bedroom house in heaven, he'd have to make me a five bedroom mansion.

Today I ran across this statement in the writings of Ellen White, "All heaven awaits our demands upon its wisdom and strength."* It made me think of my childhood trying to outimagine God. I want to outdemand (if that is possible) God. Not only do I want to take every challenge of my life to him, but I want to stretch my imagination to ask for great things.

*Patriarchs and Prophets p. 554.

What do I have?

What do I have? I have work today: classes to plan and papers to grade. I have food to eat: cafeteria adventures for lunch and fruit for supper. What do I have? I have mostly an ordinary day. But as I have been sitting here in my office trying to write a to-do list, I've been distracted. It is the best distraction in the world. I'm distracted by two simple questions. One, what do I have today? I have the omnipotent power of God to rest on. Two, what do I have today? I have the love of Christ reaching out and encircling me right now. These two questions and these two answers are the gift for my day. God is mixing himself into ordinariness. I'm blessed!

His Power is Made Exquisite

I woke up feeling spiritually weak and physically tired. This is not exactly the way I want to start a week, but as I got into my car this morning I remembered a verse from 1 Corinthians. "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness" (12:9). As I thought about the verse, I thought of the word perfect and how sometimes we describe perfect things as exquisite. I changed the text a little to: "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made [exquisite] in you."

According to Webster's Online dictionary the word exquisite means to be marked by flawless craftsmanship or by beautiful, ingenious, delicate, or elaborate execution.

My weakness marks the spot where God is working. He is taking my flaws, my very humanness, my dustfulness (for he remembers we are dust!), and He's making something beautiful. The beauty that He will bring out of my weakness is no small thing; it will be a refined excellence that only a master artist can sculpt.

Grammar

I used to be fragment blind and comma optimistic (i.e., I'd put commas wherever I felt moved to put them). Now I teach grammar. I find this to be life's little irony.

In a way, I'm discovering I like grammar. Oh, the joy of a sentence (that was a fragment!). The delight of parsing (shiver, another fragment). The pleasure of concrete nouns (yes, you can see it, you can touch it, and you can feel it).

I hope when we get to heaven we have numerous langauges to speak. I'd hate to master one grammar. I want to delight in all the different ways words can come.

More Hungry

My brother and I were talking about pastors last time I saw him (he belongs to that tribe). He said someone once told him that a pastor didn't have to be more righteous than his congregation--just more hungry. Now here's something I wouldn't mind being competitive about. Who can be the hungriest for God? If my friend's hunger for God makes me yearn more for Him, all the better for me. And if my hunger for God makes someone else even more hungry than me, I would be pleased. "And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds" (Hebrews 10:24).

How a Blessing Began

This spring my friend Ruth and I slid into the tiny opening in a pew at church. We were late and woe to the one who comes late to our church (for he will lack a seat!). The sermon was about how God doesn't always work in the way we expect, and that we should be open to where God will lead us. After the sermon, Ruth started talking to an acquaintance of hers who was sitting beside her. They started talking about Bible studies, and I realized that if I didn't leave soon I was going to end up leading a Bible study so I quickly excused myself from the conversation before I got asked to help. I went and talked with a friend and returned to fetch Ruth. Ruth and her acquaintance were still talking about Bible studies and then the question I had hoped to avoid come came up. Her friend asked, "Would you mind helping out in a Bible study?" Now, I had prepared myself for this question. I knew my answer. My answer was this, "I will only work in ministry that is connected with my college. I need my primary focus to be on helping my students." It was that simple. But then Ruth's friend elaborated, "We are trying to start a Bible study for the college students." Gulp. What!? That's exactly what I'd been praying for for the last couple of months. (I guess I should be careful with my prayers!) As I talked with Ruth's friend, I realized that he worked at the same college as me. In fact, we worked in the same department, but somehow we'd never met. We decided right there to start a Bible study. It took us a couple of weeks to get the Bible study going and by the time we really got it going, I had to leave town and was gone for a month, but out of that little conversation has come a group called The Circle of Faith. I've been so blessed by this Bible study group.

Yesterday at the end of our Bible study we put our arms around each other and sang two songs. I stood there thinking that I once thought that it would be impossible to love another ministry as much as I loved my ministry in Thailand. But I looked around at these Florida students (in so many ways different from my students in Thailand), and felt blessed.

All this to say, that if you check my profile page, you'll find a new blog. It's the Circle of Faith blog. My friend, Karla, has done most of the posts on that blog so far, but I'll be posting stuff too. Check it out. It's a place where God has blessed us and continues to bless us!

Why the Semicolons Were Missing

A student of mine recently got marked off a couple of points for some grammatical errors on his paper. He told me the reason why he didn't have semicolons.

The semicolons were missing because the semicolon key on the computer was broken. The key was broken because the cat threw up on the computer.

I like good vivid reasons for grammatical errors.

I Go First

In Thailand, people would often dismiss themselves from a conversation by saying, "I go first." Tonight I was thinking about that phrase: for one I simply miss it hearing those words. "Okay. I go first." But then I was also thinking about the significance of the words "I go first". How powerful they would be if I applied them to my life not just as a way to say goodbye, but as a way to live?

I go first. I'll be the first to show that you matter to me.
I go first. I'll be the first to forgive.
I go first. I'll be the first to admit you're right.
I go first. I'll be the first to let you know that I need you.
I go first.

Musings on Self-Sacrifice

Tonight the pastor of my church spoke about John the Baptist. John the Baptist is one of the most amazing characters in the Bible. He gave so much of himself and really received so little a reward from an earthly perspective. The part of John the Baptist's story that moves me the most is when his disciples complain to him that Jesus was stealing John's followers. John responds, "He must become greater; I must become less" (John 3:30).

John makes me think of another favorite character in the Bible: Jonathan. Jonathan had nothing to to gain from his friendship with David. In fact, Jonathan, in essence, befriended his rival. How many of us would befriend a person we knew would make us lose our job? (It makes me wonder if David's love for Jonathan took this into account. David knew the cost that Jonathan paid for friendship with him.)

These are male examples of self-sacrifice. From what I understand about men, success and reputation are key components of their self-esteem. It's difficult for Christian men not to compare their ministries (at least that's the word on the street from my pastor dad). I won't deny that success at work isn't important to women. Yet I don't think we invest as much in our success as men. John and Jonathan sacrificed their core hungers (honor) for someone they loved. What might women sacrifice? The answer, I think, is relationships. Could we ever sacrifice a relationship (or our stake in a relationship) because of love?

Let me illustrate. Years ago when I was becoming friends with one of my best friends now, Melissa, I remember having a conversation with her best friend, Monique. Monique said about my friendship with Melissa, "The heart can only get bigger." I was shocked. Monique was generous in an area of life that is profoundly difficult to be generous in: relationships. Other women might have felt jealous or protective of their best friend but not Monique; she welcomed my friendship with Melissa. (An act, by the way, that earned her my undying loyalty and love.)


I want to be like John. I want to be like Jonathan. I want to be like Monique. I want to be generous with my reputation, my career, and my friendships.

Ultimately, I want to be like Christ who "Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped" (Philippians 2:6) and who "laid down his life for his friends" (John 15:13).

Wiggling in the Presence of God

It's amazing the number of things I can do while praying instead of actually praying. Sharing my burdens with God transitions into making lesson plans for the day(a teacher's job never ends!)or intercession turns into simply thinking about the person I'm praying for. I constantly have to redirect my thoughts to prayer, and I often pray to remember that God is listening.

This morning while praying I was meditating on the text. "Be still and know that I'm God." As I meditated on that text, the thought struck me, "You are wiggling in the presence of God." I had to laugh. I'm God's wiggler.

What I do

Jogging Park

One of my little pleasures is a park that I can jog in near my house. The park is basically a sidewalk (and at times a boardwalk) that runs around a lake. I love jogging there at sunset. I love the lights on the lake, and I love watching all the people. There are so many different kinds of people at this park: parents with young kids, couples, old men, teenagers walking their dogs etc. There are languages to listen to and conversations to eavesdrop on (I shamelessly eavesdrop on strangers' conversations). Here's just a small sample of what the park feels like:

Still

The lake is so still today that you can see a reflection of the clouds. I walk back from lunch looking at the lake and wishing that I could share this walk with my friends abroad. I wish for one day I could bring people from my most recent past to my present and introduce my life to them. I wish to share the small things: southern food (grits for breakfast!), my commute to work (ahh...I-4 is crowded again), and the grocery store I shop in (yeah for Publix!). I wish to share the big things. I want to introduce them to my Florida friends. These new silly deep thoughtful friends that God is bringing into my life. I want them to share a Sunday tubing down a river and eating Vietnamese takeout while watching a movie or a Saturday night spent swimming and talking late into the night. I want to connect my worlds. This has always been my desire. There are so many places and people I love. I belong to too many worlds.

Fresh Spring Rolls

I love eating at a local vegan restaurant in Orlando called Loving Hut. One of my favorite dishes there is their fresh spring rolls. I had no idea how easy the fresh spring rolls were to make until my housemate introduced me to rice paper. Here are some of the spring rolls I made the other day.



I took rice paper and soaked it in water for about 3 seconds. Then I put lettuce, carrots, crushed peanuts, tofu, soy sauce, and agave on the rice paper and wrapped it up. Wow. It was so simple, but it was delicious. I also fried up some tofu and wrapped rice paper around the tofu and some seaweed. This dish was also tasty. The biggest plug I can give for these spring rolls is that I (the one who typically forswears vegetables) simply consumed the lettuce I bought.

The rice paper. You can get it at any Asian market.

Blessings

I've seen some amazing God-things these past couple of months. I can't go into details here, but I do want to share what I've learned from my experiences.

1. God wants to bless us!
2. God wants to bless communities. He doesn't just want to bless "me" or "you," but he wants to bless "us"...That's how He loves to bless the most.

Here's what I mean by number 2.

This summer someone I know was sharing how God had blessed him. Another friend was so moved she started to cry. I was doubly moved. Moved by by my first friend's blessings and moved by my friend who cried. God took one blessing and drew three people closer to Him. But it didn't end there. He took one blessing and drew the three of us closer to each other. By sharing with each other how God had blessed, we found our relationships enriched and deepened. True, I might have loved both of these friends before, but I find my heart even more drawn to them now.

This morning one of the friends mentioned here texted me to tell me that God has blessed her and she wants to share. I can't wait to hear! When it comes to God's blessings, we can never be too greedy!

Random Things You Would Most Likely Not See in Thailand

This weekend was sales tax free weekend in Florida so people were out in the stores in droves. As I walked around Target trying to get what I needed without bumping into people, I mused how like Tesco Lotus the moment felt. All I needed was a loud Thai song with the words 'squeeze California' in English interjected into the middle of it to make me feel at home. Over a year ago I tried to record the differences I noticed between Thailand and the US. It was my strategy to cope with leaving. The things I saw weren't necessarily profound. But here they are:

Cereal aisles

Baseball diamonds

Arrowheads (This is just a chance for me to show off my arrowhead collection.)

Streets without motorcycles. I was amazed how few motorcycles I saw on the roads in the US.

Self-tanning solution


Unfinished war memorials

American Perceptions

I always get a good laugh at people who get fearful whenever they hear someone is going abroad. "Oh, be careful" they tell their friend traveling. Somehow life outside of the US is dangerous and chaotic. You never know what might happen while abroad. But after being gone for so long, I find America scary. Yesterday, I was outside getting ready to go for a bike ride when a helicopter flew over. The police were making the following announcement via a loudspeaker, "Attention Seminole County residents. If you see a white male wearing an orange shirt and beige pants please call the Sheriff's office immediately." I don't know. How's that for making me feel peaceful?

Come to find out the man was not a criminal. He was just someone who suffered from memory loss. I guess he just didn't know how to get home.

The Manatee

Of Manatees and Dolphins

Tuesday night my roommate knocked on my door and said, "Do you want to go to St. Petersburg tomorrow?" I said, "Sure." And then I had a good chuckle at myself because I neglected to get the details. She quickly informed me that we would be going to the beach. So Wednesday morning we got up a little too early for my liking and headed out to St. Pete. I brought my towel and some good books to read thinking that we would spend the day lounging on the beach. We met up with her friend's family south of Orlando and then followed them all the way down to St.Petersburg. I was surprised when we pulled into a marina and not a beach. We got out of the car and they told us we were going to rent jet skis. (Yeah! I've never been on one.) After getting our fill of jet ski rules, we (six people on three jet skis) got on and took off for the gulf. The guy I was riding with asked me, "So how adventuresome are you?" I made the mistake of saying, "Well, let's just say I don't mind getting tossed from the jet ski." He took me at my word and went delightfully fast down the river toward the ocean. We didn't go fast long though because to our right a dolphin surfaced. We paused and watched it for awhile and then took off. I think I was happiest at that point. I looked at the blue blue sky with tufts of white clouds and the moon still showing behind the clouds; I watched as the motels on the beach got smaller and smaller and just felt that God was good. We raced my roommate and her friend on the other jet ski and then took to jumping the waves. Then Michael, the guy driving, did a really tight left turn and I went flying into the water. After we relaxed in the water for awhile, he offered to let me drive the jet ski. I said no at first, and then I couldn't resist. I'm glad I said yes. It was a blast driving. The only problem was I didn't realize how quickly jet skis can slow down and I gave Michael whiplash two times (I think his head actually knocked into my life jacket). I figured that it was probably a better idea to let him drive since he went faster then and didn't inflict as much injury as me so we traded places. We were nearly done on the jet skis when another dolphin came up out of the water. Wah. Happiness.

After we came in the family we were with rented a boat. We got on the boat and ate lunch as we traveled to a small island near the coast. Once we got to the island, we anchored and just sat around on the boat and chatted. As the group of us were talking, a couple walking on the beach said, "Look a manatee is swimming right toward you." We watched its dark form in the water and then it popped up right beside us. I couldn't believe it.

I've had an incredibly relaxing summer. I think the most free time I've had in ten years. I was 'supposed' to go back to work Wednesday, but my roommate's invitation ended up being one of the nicest 'detours' of my summer. It was a very pleasant way to end the summer.

A Writing Assignment: Indulge Me

If you're one of my former students, you've probably seen this writing assignment before. It's one of my favorite writing assignments. I like it so much that I'm assigning it to you dear readers of this blog. You never would have known that reading a blog came with homework! So get out of piece of paper and answer the following questions.

When was a moment you felt really loved?
Who have you felt 'most' loved by? What did he/she do to make you feel so loved?

Now write. Write for five or ten minutes. Don't worry about grammar or punctuation or even if anyone is going to read what you say. Don't worry that you have to write the 'right thing.' For example, you might feel that you should say you felt most loved by a spouse when actually it was your pet canary that really filled your love cup the most, (okay, I jest!), but you get the picture.

When you are finished writing, you may then (ahhh...I love the authoritative sound of this) come back to this blog and check the comments section of this post. There I'll tell you what to do with this writing assignment. (Don't worry I will not ask you to share what you wrote. But there is a painless part II of this assignment.)

New Place

I handed in the keys to my old apartment today. Finally, I'm out. I've been moving very very slowly. I can attribute my slowness to having plenty of free time and being so close to the old place that I have no real motivation to get it all done in one fell swoop. But there's another reason why I've moved slowly. I kind of feel sentimental about the old place. Hey, I have very special memories of sleeping on the floor for several weeks there. I'd hate to say goodbye too quickly.

Despite feeling sentimental about my old place;I'm very happy about the new. Last night I did my usual prayer time which inevitably means I moved from a kneeling position to supine. I laid on the floor talking with God while looking at an oak tree from my top window and listening to the cicadas. Now there is happiness. I've been given the small gift of nature sounds.

Thank you Father, for small things: for being able to see the stars and hear the cicadas.

E.M. Bounds

When I was sixteen someone handed me a book about prayer by E.M.Bounds. Next to the Bible and the writings of Ellen White, Bounds has had the greatest impact on my spiritual life. Every time I read his writings on prayer, I yearn to pray more. Here are just two samples of his writing:

"The Church is looking for better methods; God is looking for better men. . . .What the Church needs to-day is not more machinery or better, not new organizations or more and novel methods, but men whom the Holy Ghost can use—men of prayer, men mighty in prayer. The Holy Ghost does not flow through methods, but through men. He does not come on machinery, but on men. He does not anoint plans, but men—men of prayer." from Power Through Prayer

"The more praying there is in the world the better the world will be, the mightier the forces against evil everywhere. Prayer, in one phase of its operation, is a disinfectant and a preventive. It purifies the air; it destroys the contagion of evil. Prayer is no fitful, shortlived thing. It is no voice crying unheard and unheeded in the silence. It is a voice which goes into God’s ear, and it lives as long as God’s ear is open to holy pleas, as long as God’s heart is alive to holy things.

God shapes the world by prayer. Prayers are deathless. The lips that uttered them may be closed in death, the heart that felt them may have ceased to beat, but the prayers live before God, and God’s heart is set on them and prayers outlive the lives of those who uttered them; outlive a generation, outlive an age, outlive a world.

That man is the most immortal who has done the most and the best praying. They are God’s heroes, God’s saints, God’s servants, God’s vicegerents."

From Purpose in Prayer

If you want to read more of his works, you can access them online:

Last Words

I was in my twenties when my great-grandma died. She lived a long life unlike her husband who died in a car accident when he was fifty-six. Recently, my grandma was telling me about my great-grandfather's death. She told me that the night before he died he and his wife had made a bonfire, and while they sat around the bonfire together, he quoted this poem to my great-grandma:

"This little strip of light twixt night and night that we call today. If tomorrow never comes at all, at least we've had today."

Favorite comments of the week

My favorite conversations of this week.

My mom to my six-year old niece: Our foreheads are together in this picture.
My niece to my mom: But I don't have four heads.

My three-year old niece to my dad: Popo! I monkey.

Happiness

I woke up to the smell of pancakes and the sound of my family eating breakfast. Ahh..happiness. I'm spending several days with my grandma, parents, siblings, siblings' spouses, nieces, and nephew. We aren't doing much. Our mornings are lazy and our afternoons are spent mostly at the beach. I like this slowness and time together. I like that I get to go lizard hunting with my four-year old nephew, and have a nice conversation with my niece (she's almost thirteen now). I like relaxing in the water with everyone. (Even my 86-year old grandma got in the water.) I like trying to keep up with my brother on his swim (he's training for several triathlons right now), and I like helping my sis-in-law take pictures of her family (I feel like paparazzi--especially taking the huggy/kissy pictures--eoooh..j/k). Life is simple for me this week; simple and good. I'm blessed.

Where I Work

This is me in front of the office I work in.

Bless the Hands

Often I hear people pray over a meal, "Lord, bless the hands that made this." Today as I ironed a new shirt I prayed (almost without thinking), "Bless the hands that made this." As I ironed, I thought about something I heard on the radio yesterday. The man said, "We can't all be financiers and lawyers. We must make something too."

My shirt was made. Some woman or man sewed the shirt. They might have made a five hundred shirts that day, but still this shirt went through their hands.

Several years ago after seeing dozens of "Hello Moto" advertisements I finally realized that Moto was Motorola. My grandmother spent most of her life working in an Motorola factory assembling their products. Who used the products she touched? Who could appreciate that the person who made their phone was artistic, funny, and odd (sorry, dad for the last one).

Bless the hands. Bless the hands that made the products I use. Bless the people behind all that I touch.

Two Prayers

There are two prayers that I pray. The first is, "Lord, please help me to know myself as I am. Don't let me be blind to my faults." The second prayer is, "Lord, please help me to see myself as you see me." It is the second prayer that gives me courage. Yes, I want to know where I fall, I want to know the weak places in my life, but more than anything I want to know the strength God's love. I want to know that God sees not only who I am now but who I am becoming in His love.

Everlasting Love

One of my earliest memories is a trip to the store with my mom's friend to buy potato chips. (I must have been three or four.) Why that little slice of memory (the coil spring in the back sticking through the chair, the bags of potato chips, my car seatless state) stays with me I'm unsure.

But tonight I was thinking about the text "I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving kindness" (Jer 31:3). And I thought about my first memory. His everlasting love was there. His everlasting love touched my life when I was small (how I needed it then) and it touches my life still (how I need it now!). His everlasting covers before I was born, my first memories, my early childhood struggles, my teenage years, my young adult life, this moment, tomorrow morning, ten days from now, and into eternity. Every place, every day, every moment is marked by love.

Sometimes I think about us humans. I think about our struggles to love and be loved. His everlasting love has entered that struggle; it is breaking the cycle of our brokenness and leading us into an eternity of His love.

Family Friends

This morning Laura, Kristen(my sis-in-law), and I walked around Lake Junaluska in North Carolina. As we walked I soaked in the beauty of the place (the rolling hills and the fog on the lake), and I thought about how precious time can be sometimes. It's a small thing walking together, but I know what a privilege it is just to have that moment to be together.

This weekend was special. Laura and her husband are friends with my brother and his wife, but we've never all been together at the same time. It was also special in another way. I've known Laura since I was three years old, and our parents know each other from the time they were missionaries together in the Marshall Islands. This weekend I got to see her children play with my nephew and niece. This makes three generations of our respective families that are friends.

Kristen says we should make meeting in North Carolina a tradition. I think so too. It is so nice to be with friends that are almost family.

Odd Prayers

Today I prayed for pregnant mice. Okay, I prayed for a friend who wants to do research project on pregnant mice. That has not been my oddest prayer. My oddest prayers are the ones that come when I'm half asleep. Like the other day I was nodding off and praying for a friend. I prayed, "Please bless X and the state of Arizona." I woke up just enough to wonder why I was praying for my friend AND the state of Arizona. Then the other night I prayed, "Please help me to understand my limitations, please make me a better friend, and please help me to buy more comfortable shoes." Again, the last part was an accidental addendum to the prayer.(Maybe my feet were sending a message to my subconscious, and my subconcious made sure to slip that thought into my prayers.)

I'm thankful for odd prayers and a God (I hope) who laughs at them.

Your Heart Will Be Free

I was sharing with a friend recently a small struggle that I have been having. I said, "You know even though I struggle, I surrender everything to God." My friend looked at me and said quite emphatically, "God is doing something special for you and if you keep surrendering this area of your life, you'll find that your heart will be free." I loved that line "your heart will be free." The words were a promise. My friends words stayed with me all day yesterday and even into the night. This morning I struggled to get up not only because I was sleepy but because my sleep had been so peaceful. It was as if God had come and stayed near me through the night. I wanted to linger in bed in His precense.

Sounds

I love house noises: the dryer and the dishwasher running are small comforts of sound. I don't own a TV, I infrequently listen to music, and I don't have a cat to keep me company.

Sometimes coming home is difficult (for some reason it is always most difficult after a social event), but it is not always lonely. I take a certain pleasure in puttering around, in doing my laundry and washing the dishes, in putting things away, and in reading my books.

One great pleasure is weaving prayer into all these things. I have a list of names that I keep handy so that this "time alone" is given to prayer. My house is made somehow less empty by prayer.

Catch and Release

I recently finished reading a memoir on friendship called Same Kind of Different as Me. The passage below moved me so much I had to read it twice.


"I been thinking a lot about what you asked me."
I had no idea what he was talking about. "What did I ask you?"
"Bout bein your friend."
My jaw dropped an inch. I'd forgotten that when I told him at the Cactus Flower Cafe that all I wanted from him was his friendship, he'd said he'd think about it. Now, I was shocked that anyone would spend a week pondering such a question. While the whole conversation had slipped my mind, Denver had clearly spent serious time preparing his answer.
He looked up from his coffee, fixing me with one eye, the other squinted like Clint Eastwood. "There's somethin I heard 'bout white folks that bothers me, and it has to do with fishin."
He was serious and I didn't dare laugh, but I did try to lighten the mood a bit. "I don't know if I'll be able to help," I said smiling. "I don't even own a tackle box."
Denver scowled, not amused. "I think you can."
He spoke slowly and deliberately, keeping me pinned with that eyeball, ignoring the Starbucks groupies coming and going on the patio around us.
"I heard that when white folks go fishin they do something called 'catch and release.'"
Catch and release? I nodded solemnly, suddenly nervous and curious at the same time.
"That really bothers me," Denver went on. "I just can't figure it out. 'Cause when colored folks go fishin, we really proud of what we catch, and catch. . . in other words, we use it to sustain us. So it really bothers me that white folks would go through all that trouble to catch a fish, then they done caught it, just throw it back in the water."
He paused again, and the silence between us stretched a full minute.
Then: "Did you hear what I said?"
I nodded, afraid to speak, afraid to offend.
Denver looked away, searching the blue autum sky, then locked onto me again with that drill-bit stare. "So, Mr. Ron, it occured to me: If you is fishin for a friend you just gon' catch and release, then I ain't got no desire to be your friend."
The world seem to halt in midstride and fall silent around us like one of those freeze-frame scenes on TV. I could hear my heart pounding and imagined Denver could see it popping my breast pocket up and down. I returned Denver's gaze with what I hoped was a receptive expression and hung on.
Suddenly his eyes gentled and he spoke more softly than before: "But if you is lookin for a real friend, then I'll be one. Forever."

from Same Kind of Different as Me p. 106, 107

The Folded Page

Last year I sat in a faculty meeting at APIU writing in my journal. This is what I wrote:

Two months from today I'll be on a plane back from Cambodia. And then the States.. . We're in faculty meeting. Damrong is showing us a preview of a faculty retreat I'll never attend.

After writing that entry I flipped to the back of the journal and folded a page. I wrote:

March 26, 2009

Father, I'm praying the unfilled, unknown pages into your hand. I'm trusting you now with these pages. I want to commit myself to your promises.How did God bless you between March 26 and _____________?

Tonight I finally reached my folded page: April 30, 2010. Here are some of the blessings I have received since I folded that page in my journal.

1. God gave me a job that doesn't consume my life. For once I don't work every night--I have a life outside of school (gasp).
2. I have found some solid friends in Orlando. (As iron sharpens iron friends, Prov. 27:17).
3. God provided a car, a place to live, and even a new bike :)
4. When the future seemed most unsure, God sent people to encourage me (my parents and the Redding church members).
5. God gave me a six months to reconnect with my parents.
6. God gave me some good colleagues to work with.
7. I have (as one friend mentioned recently) a rich life with things to do, adventures to have, and events to look forward to.

I'm grateful for my blessings and yet I'm not satisified. No, I want more blessings!! I love the idea that I read in Desire of Ages that God's blessings actually prepare us for more blessings. A larage blessing would be for a greater hunger for God and then (of course) there are temporal blessings I'm praying for. I'm so grateful for God who gives and keeps giving.

"But the gifts of Jesus are ever fresh and new. The feast that He provides for the soul never fails to give satisfaction and joy. Each new gift increases the capacity of the receiver to appreciate and enjoy the blessings of the Lord. He gives grace for grace. There can be no failure of supply. If you abide in Him, the fact that you receive a rich gift today insures the reception of a richer gift tomorrow. The words of Jesus to Nathanael express the law of God's dealing with the children of faith. With every fresh revelation of His love, He declares to the receptive heart, 'Believest thou? thou shalt see greater things than these.' John 1:50."
Desire of Ages 148

A Yellow Shirt

Someone recently asked me if I like her spent a great deal of time analyzing what to wear for the day. I didn't say much because I was too embarrassed to respond with how little I analyze what I'll wear. My criteria is: is it ironed?

Well, today I ran out of ironed shirts but I noticed my Thai yellow shirt hanging in the closest. I looked at it in its unwrinkled glory and thought, "What are the chances that I'll meet a person from Thailand today? Hmmmmm...zero." So I put on my yellow shirt and went to work. While I was at work, I got a phone call from a friend. She told me that she was on my side of town for an appointment and suggested we meet up for lunch. At her suggestion we went to Thai food. It wasn't until after we ordered that it hit me. "I'm sitting in a Thai restaurant wearing a yellow shirt that has Thai writing on it." What weird forang would show up at a Thai restaurant during a month when the yellow shirt/red shirt situation had gotten even worse than usual looking as she supported the PAD?

When we went to pay the bill, I stood in this awkward position trying to cover up any Thai writing on my shirt. I don't know, maybe the restaurant owners saw the writing on my shirt and thought of the time when yellow only meant loyalty to the King and not loyalty to a political party.

Observations

I've been playing host to a friend from Bangkok for about a week now. I've had fun hearing Thai words again and just getting a chance to talk about Thailand. I've also had fun listening to my friends observations about America.

For example, every time we drive pass a homeless person she says, "I can't believe Americans help so many countries but they don't help their own people."

Also, my friend is completely unimpressed with my apartment situation. "What you pay that much and they don't have a maid to sweep the halls or security guards?"

Life is different here. My friend says, "It's more convenient in America." I say, "It is more lonely in America."

I Love A Country

I fall in love with countries. One country that is foremost in my heart is Thailand. I tell people that God reveals parts of himself through different cultures and there is something beautiful about God revealed in Thai culture (their kindness, politeness, and funnness--I make up words---are just some things that I love about Thais). Thailand has been falling apart politically for the last couple of years. This month at least 25 people were killed in Bangkok because of the political situation. I read the news and pray for Prahtet Thai.

Conversation

I had a conversation tonight with a man who is just getting to know God. When I prayed over our supper he said, "I've never prayed over food before." Through most of the meal he shared with me the things he is learning about God, the prayer experiments he has made and the answers that have come because of those prayers. He kept laughing, "Coincidence or providence?"

At one point he shared with me the things he doesn't get about the Christian group of friends he has made here in Orlando. He said, "They only pray about people. They don't pray about animals." I thought that was the greatest and funniest spiritual concern I've heard. (He's a vet by trade so I could see why he might worry.) He's also disturbed that there is no salvation plan for animals. I told him what I shared with a friend recently: we really don't know about animals; God just might bring our pets to heaven.

I told my friend that God has His hand in his life. I pray for my friend and I pray for myself. I want to remember how God is working in my life too!

Homes

I sometimes think of all the states between California and me. I think of Alabama, Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. I think of the roads I'd have to travel to get back home. I think of airports, layovers, and I think of the hours I'd spend scrunched up in a seat to get back home.

I miss California. I miss Thailand. I miss my homes.

The Gift of Quietness

The music from the pool party beneath my apartment seeped into every corner of my home. I tried to ignore it but I couldn't completely shake the sound off.

The wind played on the water of the lake leaving interesting designs to observe, but I couldn't concentrate on the beauty since the radio playing over the park's loudspeakers distracted me.

The college shuttle was silent. It was the first thing I noticed when I jumped on it. I sat down and thanked the driver to myself. Unlike the other shuttle drivers, he played no music. "What a gift he has just given me," I thought. Do people realize that sometimes the greatest gift they can give is the gift of quietness?

What kindness it would have been for my neighbors to turn down their music so the whole apartment block didn't have to hear it. What graciousness could have been expressed if the planners of the park near my house had considered that possibly walkers might enjoy the lake in silence. It is a small thing to consider others' need for silence, but it's a gift beautifully given.

Two Short Thoughts on Love

1) I woke up this morning with the following thought:

I imagine that when God introduces his children he has special names for them. I can see him saying, "Over here is my daughter, Loved. Oh, and I want you to meet my son, My Pride. And over there my daughter, Cherished. And have you met Loved-with-Much-Laughter?"

2) This is something I wrote in my journal several months ago:

I'm loved into humility. I stop fighting for self-respect, my way, and my opinion when I come to find that love has surrounded and conquered my bruised and defensive ego.

Donnicate

I've been listening to a Chris Rice CD that I got for Christmas and there is this line where he says, "I'll donnicate and fly to your rescue." I was intrigued by this line. What the heck did donnicate mean? I relished the Latinesque sound of the word and imagined that since the author was saying he would fly to someones rescue then donnicate must be some kind of transmogrification. I thought about how to donnicate must be a real sacrifice for love (wow, to morph yourself for love!). Finally, I read the lyrics to the song. The lyrics actually go, "I'll don a cape and fly to your rescue." I liked my explanation so much better.*

The lyrics to the song I was confused about:

Love, how did I find you?
Was I even breathing before I knew your name?
Who could ever have planned this?
Arranged a whole planet to all turn out this way.
Hey, only Heaven knows
The dreams behind these things I'm asking
Even our angels look surprised
To bump their wings in passing
.........................
Hey, only Heaven saw
The tears I cried
On the day I met you
If the whole world goes wrong
I'll don a cape
And fly to your rescue.

Chris Rice, Let the Words Escape



*This is a paragraph out of an email I sent to Marlise. It felt bloggish so I decided to post it here too. I hope you don't mind Marlise!

Imprecations

Imprecations. I'm mostly writing this because I want to use the word imprecations. I learned about imprecations before I knew there was a word for it. I was an innocent middle schooler reading through the Bible when I came across the following text:

"Oh Daughter of Babylon, doomed to destruction, happy is he who repays you for what you have done to us--he who seizes your infants and dashes them against the rocks" (Psalms 137:8).

Gulp. That was in the Bible? Infant dashing? I asked my dad about it. He said that just because someone prayed something it didn't mean that God approved of the prayer. He said, "they used human language."

I never really had a desire to pray an imprecatory prayer (a prayer to curse) until just a couple of years ago. The cyclone had just come through Myanmar and the junta did not initially let in any aid workers for fear of political instability. I was furious. And so I prayed my first imprecatory prayer. "Lord," my prayer went, "let the political leaders die. If it takes their death for help to come to their people then let them die."

This week I wanted to pray an imprecactory prayer once more. It happened like this: my co-worker's 83 year old father, who lives in Puerto Rico, was asked to help a couple. He obliged and as he was helping them they turned on him and told him 1) how much money he had in the bank 2) if he refused to give them all that was in the bank they would kill his family. He believed them. So he went into the bank and took out 20,000 dollars and gave it to them. There. What was left of his life savings--gone. (He was fortunate to have just bought a house in cash.)

I was furious when I heard this. I thought of the years he spent saving his money. I thought about how he doesn't have a job to bring in more income (though he does have a good family and a small stipend) and I thought about people who would be so heartless as to steal from an 83 year old man.

While I didn't have the courage to pray for their deaths, I did pray that justice would find them swiftly and painfully! Imprecations!

There is a time to curse in prayer. There is a time to pray for God's wrath to come. The Old Testament prophets were often impatient with how long justice took to come. I hope for the same impatience.

Imprecations. For all that is evil, for all that dulls the heart, for all the breaks the human spirit--let there be curses!

Ask, seek, knock.

"It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday
at the sea. We are far too easily pleased." C.S. Lewis in The Weight of Glory

If holiness is the renunciation of desire, than I'm not holy. I often pray for more desire. I pray for God to sharpen my desires. It seems a strange thing to pray. Especially since I constantly strive to keep all of my appetites under control. I know from experience that desires left untended can ransack my life.

Despite the dangers of desires, I pray for God to sharpen my desires because he asks me to ask. He said, "Ask and it shall be given. Seek and you shall find. Knock and the door shall be opened for you." How can I ask, seek, and knock if I have no desire? How can I begin to pray if I just sit on my hands and hope that something good will come of the little things I want out of my life? How many times has my attitude been "No. No. God, I don't ask too much. I would hate to inconvenience you--just give me something small and I'll be satisfied."

Could that attitude be offensive to God? Could my lack of desire reflect on my view of His character? If I believe that God is a generous God, then shouldn't I be in the business of showing that I trust his generosity?

Lord, I want to ask. I want to seek. I want knock and knock some more. Give me the desire to desire. Give me the yearning to yearn. Give me the passion I need to seek the good in life. And in seeking the good in life may I find You.

Shimmering Lights

For shimmering lights on lakes,
For clouds against the sky,
For quiet moments on busy days,

Thank you.

Everywhere I Go I See 555

Everywhere I go I see 555. I see it on addresses. It was part of my neighbor's address. I see it in on bills. Yes, the taxes on my possible (cross my fingers) new-used car will come out to be $555. (I wondered when I looked at the bill if the government was laughing at me.) I see 555 and I think of Thailand. It's a little inside joke that makes me smile whenever I stumble across it. It's good to laugh and remember.


*5-5-5 is ha-ha-ha in Thai.
PS Props to Deanna for introducing me to 555.

The Human Heart

I woke up last night around 3 am to the sound of a man and a woman fighting. I could not make out their words but I could hear their voices: loud than louder, growing quiet and than growing loud again. I laid there incapable of sleep thinking of the human heart. I thought of this couple (I assumed they were a couple) and how much they must need each other's love (who else would fight with such passion?). I thought about how we humans struggle to love each other. There is so much that comes between us and the people we want to love (our clumsiness, our selfishness, our brokenness).

I got up from my bed and sat near the window. I wrapped a blanket around my shoulders and prayed. I prayed that God would give the couple the love they needed. I prayed that God would calm them down (I did want sleep!). I prayed that they would be given the gift of unselfishness (this is what God's saves us from--our selfishness) and given the power to love.

Their voices died out around 4 am. I had crawled back in bed by then and I drifted back to sleep. It was a peaceful sleep. I slept thinking not of anger but of love and a God who was bigger than two people fighting.

The Boy

I remember how small he was when I held him in 1992. I remember that he grabbed my shirt and cried when I tried to set him back down in his crib. Haitian boy, it has been seventeen years since I sat in a rocker in an orphanage in Port-Au-Prince and you fell asleep in my arms. Are you still alive today?

Musings

Last night I sat in a Thai restaurant waiting for some friends to join me and realized that I had already forgotten how to order food in Thai. The little Thai that I speak is slipping so fast. My main use of Thai now is for remembering things. Somehow repeating to myself that I parked my car on ha level makes me remember it better than if I just told myself that I'd parked on level five (believe me after a long day of work it really helps to remember what floor your car is on!)

People in Orlando ask me where I've moved from and I tell them California since I have lived in California for the last six months. But I regret saying that because every time I say that I've just moved from California, it feels like Thailand gets erased a little more.

Last week was my first week of teaching at my new school. My students are great. I like them. I respect them. I even enjoy certain aspects of teaching better here than in Thailand (i.e., the American propensity to talk in class) and yet I can't imagine that these students will be as special as the MC students were to me. It's just a different school culture. We have 2,700 students and yet only a handful dorm. There's not a real campus life or a sense of belonging to each other (for better or for worse) that we had at MC.

I know that this is simply a different season in my life. I know that I needed a change from MC and yet I cannot help but miss the things that I loved so much about the place.

Gnashing of Teeth

Bank: We can't give you an auto loan until you have a Florida address. Bring in your Florida license and we'll change your address.

Florida DMV: You now must have two ways to prove that you live in Florida. Bring in a lease and a statement from a bank with your address on it or bring in a bill that has your address on it.

Me: Gnashing of teeth.

****
I'm currently up the red tape creek (too mix madly my metaphors!) because I can't be "officially" in Florida until I get a bill which might not happen until well much later this month. Oh, I could also show them a Florida voter registration card but oh wait...you can't get a registration card until (well) you have a Florida license.
I suppose red tape is inherently circular in logic.

First Days Here #1

I remember moving to a new home and how when we put our cat down he would have to explore the whole house. I felt like that cat last night. I kept walking between my bedroom and the living room. I opened draws and cabinents. I looked under the sink and turned the lights off and on. "So this is my new place?" I mused to myself.

Last night was my first night in my new apartment. As I walked around unpacking my stuff, I prayed. I prayed that my little place will be a sanctuary of God's love both for myself and for anyone who comes to visit. I prayed for blessings on my new life here in Florida.

Around 9:50 I decided to call it a night. My stuff was still scattered around the house, but I needed sleep. I unrolled my sleeping bag in the living room and found some sheets. (I'm furnitureless for awhile.) I sat in the middle of the room and felt scared to turn off the lights. Funny, I can travel alone in Ho Chi Minh and Delhi but I'm suddenly shy of turning off the lights in Orlando?