pausing a moment for reflection
in the past week our support has gone up almost 8%.
As I look around now, we’re nearing 90% of funding, it’s sinking more deeply in that we’re leaving.
I’m having a great conversation with my dad and in my brain I hear “you won’t be doing this next year” and I start to tear up.
I’m looking at my nieces and cousins and having fun camping and thinking “you won’t be doing this next year” and choke up a little.
I’m hiding zucchini at my neighbor’s house and I think “this is my last practical joke in America for a few years” and I start to get melancholy.
The tragedy of this process is that it lets the pain linger for a very long time.
It’s like attending a wake for a year. No person should have to prolong these emotions.
There is a definite sadness to this process. I would be negligent if I didn't mention them in the blog.
You ask yourself questions like, "how long will it be before I see them again? What if something happens? Will I ever see them again?" In every person's case there are specific details and difficult to cope with emotions.
There is sadness on the side of those watching us go.
My dad explained it to someone like this "it's a joyful heartbreak."
This blog is about the process of becoming a missionary, and so I have to include these harder parts, even if they make it seem less...what's the word.. "glamorous" doesn't quite fit.
We aren't guaranteed that if we follow God's orders we will have a happy life. It is a temptation to believe that in following God all will be good. We know God desires good for His people, but we are prepared for bad to happen as well. Modern day martyrs are rare, but the heart still needs to be prepared.
So what do we do during these sad times? Do we complain to God, do we try to bargain with God and ask for Him to let us off the hook? No, because He jsut might (-;
We turn it, through discipline, into worship. Sacrificing our emotions of sadness and turning them into tears of praise because we know that following God is our goal in life. We don't know what the outcome will be, but we know, we need to be obedient, even unto a broken sadness that is leaving loved ones.... even further than that.
A mind like mine, asks "what if" a lot.
"what if you lost a child because of this?"
"what if you died and your wife was left in the country with 2 kids?"
"what if your grandmother got sick while you were gone?"
"what if your best friend marries and you weren't around to be the best man?"
but there is a what if question that trumps them all:
"what if, you didn't obey God?"
What would our lives be like if we decided to turn our back on what we know to be God's direction for our lives? We have very clear marching orders, He's confirmed it to us time and time again. To refuse to go, would be a clear case of ignoring God's specific will for us.
Living life after rejecting God in that way, would be a path we don't want to go down. God has set a banquet before us, and invited us, we're going.
We have fields and committments we're leaving behind, but that is the price we pay in order to live a life of obedience.
It's not all sad I don't mean to concentrate on that too much, it's mostly joy. Because knowing we are doing what God wants, is more comforting than anything, and it is also what comforts our family in our absence.
There is great honor and joy and comfort and hope and excitement and anticipation and love in knowing that we have been asked to do a small thing for God.
