Some of those closest to me remind me that fewer and fewer people check in on long blog posts and that instagram and twitter are the new favorites. Short and to the point, fewer words more pictures...instant information. We have joked in the past about words like "Rom-Com" to describe a movie characterized as a romantic comedy...that somehow we just don't have time to say the entire phrase, or that the listener doesn't have time for so many syllables.
It's possible then that I struggle through the documenting of our days here on the blog for myself alone, or perhaps for the sake of what will someday become our history . There was a time, the first few trips, when our coming to Africa was a novelty to us and blogging was the journal that friends and family enjoyed in nearly "real time"...replacing the age of living room slide shows that used to follow someone's vacation or trip abroad.
It's possible that followers of the posts have also grown accustomed to the events that become the stories of our days here. Our shortening attention spans and the quickening of one out-dated communication style for the next may very likely mean that the characters of this type of page will remain lonely for an audience.
Ah, but here we are forced to sit down and speak and often go round the same block several times to ensure there is understanding. Discussing the temperament of a child, behavior, or sensitivities often have such subtle nuances that the right words don't come from someone who is using a second language It takes time and lots of the "almost right" words to finally really understand...and even so, maybe not accurately. But the end is worth the struggle because food, house, schooling are not nearly enough to be called "caring" for a child. Meeting his physical needs, yes, his academic desires, probably and his protection from the elements, easy to do. But addressing his heart in a way that brings wholeness, healing and trust requires so much more.
We've had to wrestle through some difficult choices this trip. There has been great excitement with the land, lots of fun with the kids and tomorrow baptism of some will be wonderful and fulfilling and there will be great joy. But we have also found that supporting Janet in raising up some mighty strong children who love Jesus and want to follow him above all else..well it involves rearranging priorities for all of us just like it does at home. The world everywhere broadcasts its temptations and Satan wraps them in attractive packaging, luring us in whispering lies to vulnerable souls.
And so we sit and listen to understand, add the weightiness of a culture we've only barely experienced and lay it all in a big heap before Jesus, asking him to sort it out and show us the way. Not the US way, not the Ugandan way, but the unique way that brings life and health, the courage to trust and be loved and then to learn what it means to serve and love others. Its a universal challenge and that element we get.
Chayah did not begin in a village or the plan of a servant. It began in the heart and mind of a loving God. What He begins, he completes, that we know...its the middle that brings us to our knees asking which way to turn and what His will is. The middle that will make us look in the mirror and question how on earth we could be qualified or entrusted with such responsibility all the while knowing we don't qualify at all.
So what God does really, really well is to work in a hundred different necessary ways all at the same time, using brokenness to minister to brokenness. Relationships grow, God is honored and glorified and his goodness so dwarfs our best efforts that we have no other choice than to submit and surrender it all to him again and again.
There's no sense in a twitter account...a single photo on instagram couldn't describe our great need... but if I had to try I guess my tweet would be...
He is just so very faithful.
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