Keziah Psalter

She came out with a homemade gun, handcrafted with a clothespin and an elastic headband. The idea was perhaps brilliant, as she has been quite the little artist as of late, making doll clothes by cutting up her old dress-up attire and fastening them together with scotch tape. This time, though, I didn't squeal in delight over her new idea. In a moment of ardent anger, my five year-old sneered at me and said in a devilish voice, "I'm going to shoot you." She had spent the prior fifteen minutes hiding under my bed, saying things like "I just want out of this house..." followed by "You don't even care about me..." followed by "STOP saying it in ITALIAN!!!" as I read "1000 Words in Italian" to her little brother.

Lashing out at the girl has never worked...and to be very honest, her fits have NOTHING on her older brother, so keeping my cool is always pretty easy with her. So I simply said, in my sternest voice..."Keziah, I better NEVER hear you say you are going to shoot ANYONE again. Do you understand me? You need to go in your room and think and pray about your attitude."

This sent her into a complete other tirade as somehow I "scared" her with my uneven tone and she became quickly "scared" of her room, using this as her excuse to go to round three in tired, angry five year-old land. Things carried on for a few more minutes as I went about finishing the book with her brother and thinking in my mind how much she reminded me of my little sister Ali, at this same age. In my mind, I smile in those moments... because Ali, all grown up, is so dear to me... and yet, I can still see her as a little girl, scrunching her face up, running off to her bedroom....me following close behind, knocking on her door and being allowed entry once I stated my identity. I would lay next to her and comfort her in an attempt to fix all the things that were somehow not fixed in myself at her age.

And I blink. And I'm here. On my couch. Staring at my DAUGHTER...and feel as if I just finished hugging Ali and telling her how beautiful she is and how "...they didn't mean it like that... they love you Ali..." When all of a sudden, there she is, my sweet Keziah, staring at me...and in a final attempt to prove indeed she is right about the world being against her, she states, face still scrunched, bottom teeth out to look very serious and mean: "You don't love me." Here's where what I am really good at comes into play. Because I had years of practice on Ali.

"Yes, I do Keziah," I say, staring at her, helping her understand the seriousness of it all.

"No you don't." She says it, hoping to stay angry but desperately wanting to hear my next words.

"Keziah, I love you more than ice cream... and cake and Hot Tamales...and..."

"NO YOU DON'T!" She shouts, still holding on for the ride... "You hate me."

"Keziah, I love you...I don't hate you..."

"Tell me you love me. Tell me." It's getting really dramatic at this point... and I'm thinking this girl could easily be making some serious money on the big screen.

"I love you." This time I motion for her to come to me. She has so desperately wanted to come to me this whole time...I've seen it in her eyes. But she had to get this mad...had to...just to see if I'd still invite her to come to my lap, even when I've seen the ugliest parts of her.

Her face morphs and I recognize the sweetest little girl I've ever known...she comes and sits next to me, blanket in hand, thumb in mouth. I hold her. I coddle her and let her be the baby she needs to be in this moment. I ask her if she wants some water and she follows me to the kitchen and then to her bed.

Later on, while laying next to her in bed, after giving an unprompted apology, she begins to tell me how much she loves Jesus... and how he lives in her heart...and we talk about forgiveness and I confess how I was mean to her daddy today and how every day I have to ask for forgiveness too. I tell her what a big thing she did by saying sorry. She asks me if I love her all the time. "Haven't I told her this a million times?" I think to myself.

"Yes, Keziah, I will always love you... there's nothing you can do that will make me stop loving you...ever." I hear my mother's words echo in my mind as I say it. And I understand her words more than I ever have.

I spend a majority of my thought life in guilt mode...thinking of all the things I could be doing for my kids, with my kids... all the ways I have probably messed them up in some psychological or physical or spiritual way. But tonight...perhaps tonight was a glimpse into the way Jesus cares for me and perhaps this is why when I understand my depravity, my desperation, my utter sinfulness, I come to Him so easily. Because He's willing to receive me. He's willing, even when I'm flailing about in my mind and in my heart, to take me into His arms and hold me, dispite my words or deeds...dispite my five year-old wants and complaints and fits. When everything is going well, as it was for my daughter until that moment this evening, I don't sense my need for grace, my need to hear that I am loved unconditionally. But as I lay in bed tonight next to Keziah, I couldn't stop thinking about these parallels...about her heart and how exposed it was and how she allowed me to see that and how Jesus, in this proliferation of sorts, wants to see my heart. How He hears me out when I throw a fit and when I'm finished welcomes me to His table, to dine with Him in peace and in the security of knowing that I am His child, His beloved daughter.

The Morning...

While having mentioned it before, I feel the need to express again just how much I abhor mornings. I awake in a tizzy, hearing my name in my dreams…whiny voices all around, like a house of talking mirrors… and then suddenly I awake with harsh taps on my sleeping arm to find someone, a person around three feet tall, staring at me, demanding that I get out of bed at an hour that I once thought only professors of a ridiculously early class could require of me… and even then I had a choice whether to get up and go to class or not… settle for a C or strive for an A. And even if I was striving for a D- in parenting, little people still wake up. They still need to be fed. Of course Go Diego Go is something to be grateful for at a ludicrous hour, but when I’m up, I’m up. Thomas can somehow stumble to the couch and fall peacefully back asleep, ignoring his ardent little ones, dozing in and out of talks of Cocoa Wheats and school snacks and homework and un-brushed teeth and untied shoes. But not me. The weight rests heavily on my already aching shoulders as I carry a little person to the toilet because he is about to pee his pants and has successfully waited until the last possible second to tell me before his bladder explodes into the only clean pair of pajamas I could dig up the night before.

And while on the weekends there is no set schedule or place to be at 8:30 a.m., it’s almost worse. I wake up with ADD, pondering all the possibilities of the day: Should we go to the market? The mountains? Ikea? The mall? Oh, maybe we could stay here and paint Elias’ room. Perhaps I should make a nice breakfast and we could sit down together as a family. The bathrooms need cleaned. The laundry needs done. Oh…everything is closed on Sunday and today is Saturday. Maybe I should get groceries…

And then, added to my rat-like skittishness, are my children. They begin fighting. One is tired. The other won’t eat his eggs. The other keeps saying, in a very, very whiny voice, “Will you please have alone time with me in the bedroom…. and watch me make stuff… and have tickle time?” This is the true test, as I am now guilt-ridden and unable to please anyone, and still am running around like a headless chicken in my mind. And of course the “one” isn’t going to handle it well when I try to rationally explain just why locking ourselves in a room won’t go over so well with the other two, namely a certain two year-old who screams at the top of his lungs when not getting what he wants WHEN he wants it. Did I mention we live in an apartment building? In Italy? And that our neighbors underneath us have comically mentioned hearing “the scream?” While they say the don’t care if they do hear us, I don’t think anyone enjoys waking up to a screaming child, especially one that isn’t hers, on her only day off in the week.

“Oh I haven’t taken my medicine. Maybe that will help.” I down 10 mg. of Lexapro and a glass of Diet Coke and think about the easy days--- about the days when I had one child and had the time every morning to read my Bible and ponder philosophical and theological ideas. Time to write in cute little homemade journals… time to read a parenting book here and there… time to pick my nose, twiddle my thumbs, clip my fingernails…without the demands of children filling my subconscious brain at all times. It’s not just their voices…and it’s not just in the morning… it’s just the idea of three people depending on me…sinful, immature, self-centered me…at all hours of the day. I understand why women keep their full-time jobs. Losing one’s identity in mothering, while it is made out to be such a harrowing thing on the covers of Parenting magazines…and such the morally “right thing” in Christian circles…is not exactly my idea of fulfillment.

Do not get me wrong. I have these moments when I truly see the fruit of my attempts at parenting. I see my son care for his little brother in a way that I know has somehow, between all the yelling and screaming and bickering that his parents do, been emulated by our underlying abundant love for him. I hear Keziah in the kitchen, spinning in circles and singing about Jesus and about how much she loves him (and about Satan and how she wants to kick his butt…but that’s another story). I see her bring me her misfit toys and tell me that they are for “Africa people.” And then there’s Ezra. And God love him, the two year-old kid is so incredibly wrapped up in his own wants and desires it isn’t even funny. But even when he’s innocently squeezing the life out of our pet bunny, I see love in his eyes and a desire to do what is right.

And I have to say that while I may struggle with depression at times, especially when in the midst of change (like now…just for example), children bring a certain joy that is unexplainable and strange. As completely cheesy and unhealthy as it sounds, they give me a reason (albeit not always the reason I want) to wake up in the morning. I know. I know. I should WANT to get out of bed. I should WANT to be joyful in every situation and so LOVE life that I desire to hop out of bed like Snow White and skip down the road to tell people about Jesus’ love for me. After all, I’m in “full-time ministry,” whatever that means (Insert Record scratching here).

But the reality is that I’m in a new place, enduring culture shock and a new language and no cheap fountain drinks and no Target…which have slowly found their replacements in yummy cappuccinos and the American-like mall…but still…

And then there are those actual important things in life—like relationships…and in this new home, in this new country, there are not those things that are familiar…like my mom and dad, my sisters, my friends… you know…all the things that give one a sense of identity and recognition

A pity party is not in order. Really. I chose this. At the end of the day, I love this. I’m always learning to embrace change, to try to have a good attitude toward life and its challenges. And I wouldn’t have it any other way. (After all, I am living in ITALY!) Following God is fun in that He truly does provide what we NEED. Perhaps not what we want always, but His provision is immense when we sojourn with Him. Sure I’m tempted to give up some days. And if it weren’t for my kids, there would probably be those days that I wouldn’t get out of bed.

Redemption lies in these moments, wrapped up like the gifts under my tree right now. These moments are change and the gifts are my children. While their demands suck every last bit of energy from me, I don’t know what I would do without them right now. They give me a glimpse of the past, as I remember their small helpless bodies juxtaposed against the individual creative and passionate (and completely stubborn) little people they are becoming. And they give me a peek into the future, as I try to live accountable for their knowledge of grace. I love watching how God uses all of this change to shape their lives…to help them embrace the difficulties that come with missing friends and cousins and grandmas and grandpas. And I have the opportunity to parent them through it all…to give hope even when I don’t necessarily feel hopeful.

My house is quiet now. Ezra is watching Thomas the Train on the computer, Elias is making a card out of magazine cutouts for our teammate, and Keziah is busy creating something with scissors and tape in her room. Dinner is on the stove (thanks to another teammate who has become like family to us)… and the smell of cider apple candles engulfs my senses. All is calm. All is bright.

Until the morning, that is.

And it was good.

I'm in one of those perfected chemically imbalanced post mentrual meloncholy but not depressed moods. The ones that beckon me to do something creative with what little time remains in this night...

I scanned through pictures of mammals and amphibians and explained to my seven year-old that we aren't the same as monkeys even though we both have opposable thumbs, I read a chapter of "One Hundred Dresses" to a very whiny, very unamused and unappreciative four year-old daughter, and then went to the kitchen to check my e-mail and stalk random people on Facebook who I haven't seen in years. While looking at an old friend's pictures and listening to a C.D. my sister gave me the day before I moved to Italy, entitled "The Saddest Day of my Life," I decided something creative must be regergitated in a way that would allow me to see on paper or a screen or in a 4 x 6 image, the passion that flickers inside me, between wiping a two year old's butt and breaking up fights over whose room the new guinea pig will sleep in tonight.

And thus I reached for my camera, scurried around my apartment to find my card reader, slipped the card in and shoved it all into the computer in order to make sense of the images I see in my head that must in some way, be captured with my camera. If I don't see in flesh these things in my heart, I fear they will fade or drift away, like an old friend... an image... a friendship once so bright and vivid that now only holds a shell of memories and silent laughter.

I'm remembering one of those friends even now. I can see her laughing but the sound has been silenced by time and new memories, ones both beautiful and heart-wrenching...

But not even pictures or words can express one's soul. It's all just an attempt to beckon something to come forth...to make sense of the beautiful mess that lay before us here in this strange and yet familiar planet. I wonder if God felt that way before He spoke it all... and I wonder how He felt (not what He SAID, for "and it was good" are just words desperately trying to convey this deep emotion that FATHER GOD FELT) when He stood back and looked at it all. Not even the best cinematographer can tuck that feeling in his gut and make it appear on a big screen. The Father's expression of His emotions came in the form of long shadows cast across mountains at sunset... of waterfalls flowing from endless heights...of the body of a woman... the crest of the ocean. How amazing that his creatures get their inspiration from the very medium of art, namely Creation, that Father God sculpted with His mind.

That's neat.

Delicate

Well.

It's been awhile.

After my last attempt at a post (see Thrashing, but don't read past paragraph three...it's quite lame), I concluded that I would do best to lay my creative flow aside, as, well, I didn't have much of an option given that the orange was squeezed to its max and i was left looking like a shriveled old lady.

But today as I was watching a Subway worker (as in sandwich artist) feed some geese in the field of sorts across the street from our house, next to the interstate, I thought that perhaps it was time to write. After all, how desperate must I be to have been inspired by geese. It's just that they were rushing to this man, like they were starving. And the sun was setting and it was my favorite hour of the day because things were getting all orange and the trees were getting all black. And I had a McDonald's Diet Coke in hand. And I was thinking about Africa. About a very dear family we know there. I was thinking about how I just got an e-mail from the woman who was humbly asking for money because they didn't have any and their son had recently been chased home from school because he didn't have black shoes.

And I was alone. Talking to Jesus. Thinking to myself that I should probably write.

I was asked for the hundredth time today when we are leaving (for Italy that is). I wish I knew that answer. I sometimes wish I was one of those people who made these very solid plans and actually saw the whole thing unfold just as I had dreamed and planned it would. But alas, this has never been the case in my life. And as much as I'm up for adventure (i.e. I was dumb enough to ride the Diamondback at King's Island last week despite the post-three-children-nausea factor), sometimes I just wish I could know how it's all going to play out. At least how the next few months are going to play out. Living in limbo is not fun. And what's worse, sometimes, rarely but too often...too often as in a few hours ago, I get the dreaded question:

"So what will happen if you don't raise all the money???"

I really don't like this question. It really makes me feel kinda sick when someone asks me this. And I mean sick, like to my stomach.

And then I pause. Deep breaths, I tell myself. I can handle this. After all, we are living a life that is a lot different than the get a good job, have 2.5 kids, move further out of the city (where it's safe you know), eventually get a puppy, and put down some roots, kind of life...

Not that this is bad. In fact, some days it sounds pretty darn good. And if I ever do live in one of those neighborhoods, gosh darnit, I will find one with a neighborhood pool.

There. I said it.

A couple of deep breaths later, I found myself answering with my standard answer. It goes something like "Well, if God has brought us this far, I don't think He's going to just drop the ball. I can't even think like that because it takes away from everything He has done and has called us to do. Eventually, we just have to get out the boat."

And in the pit of my sick stomach, the six year-old in me begs Jesus to not let that answer be in vain. To not let us be put to shame. In that moment, I cling subconciously to David's words, the ones about God's favor. About not letting him be put to shame.

Shame and guilt have very unequivocally become my brain-mates over my lifetime. So any time I am risking them being enlarged like a helium balloon in the confines of my small brain, I am tempted to jump off of a ledge. I think this could perhaps be the reason as to why I feel sick to my stomach when faced with rejection or harsh tones, or mean people or the idea that what we thought God was leading us to was just some whim of the imagination and that surely we are losing our minds, thinking God would actually speak to us, lead us and guide us, and work out all the details so that we could follow Him to wherever it is that He has asked us to go.

Oh, that's a little deep. But since I started...

When I'm honest with myself, I'm not so sure I'm living the reality of truly following Jesus...not when I know there is a man in India who has prayed for a bicycle for ten years so that He can go tell people about this Jesus who didn't remove him from the burden of living in poverty but who gave Him eternal life and who is a best friend to Him. That's a reality that I will probably never know. But I do know that even though I am a privelaged white girl from the suburbs of the Midwest in the richest country in the world, my reality of following Jesus carries a sort of heaviness to it. When you are given more, there's more to abandon. There's more to risk. And with risk, there's a sort of impending shame that haunts me like an evening shadow.

But then, I look back. Beyond the shadow. Into the darkest moments of my life. The moments in seventh grade when I really wanted to die. The moments when I was sure my marriage would end. Moments when relationships lay in shambles. Moments when I prayed to find money on the ground. Moments when I just didn't know how it would work out.

And I see it all. Like a movie. Like a good movie.

I see the light creeping slowly into the picture. And I see Jesus sorting through the muck, finding something beautiful to make out of this mess. I see Him taking it all...the harsh words, the depression, the loneliness, the fear, the shame, the guilt, the desperation over finances, my marriage, my future, my children, my relationships... and gently kneading it all together, leaving it alone for a bit...letting it settle into just the right texture.

And then, when the time is right, usually about the time I've given up, he picks up the big messy clump of clay and sprinkles some water on it. He takes it back and forth between his hands, sorting out all the lumps, softening it just so. He puts it on the wheel and very slowly, very gently, begins to spin it, holding that clump in a way that looks as if it would just slip out of his damp hands and onto the floor, adding to the mess it is already.

His hands are cupped around the clay now, as it cautiously makes its way into what simply resembles an okay-looking bowl.

He holds the bowl, like he's holding a baby, and he lifts its sides, moving so slowly that I don't even realize he's doing anything at all.

The wheel continues to spin. The bowl is getting taller. And much more delicate. A few times I think that it will surely fall to the ground. But it continues to grow. Upward. Outward. With a rim that looks as if it's reaching to the heavens. Every piece of what is now a rounded vase is perfect. Every ounce of every lump has been smoothed into this piece of art that now has the capabiity of holding its own. Holding something else even.

And perhaps in that redemption of all things broken is the capability of holding those who are broken. Holding people who are withering. Dying. Those who are hopeless. Ashamed. Abandoned. In need of Light.

This is my vase. It's the beatuiful mess I have to offer. It's the willingness to be broken and formed into something new. Even if it's not as delicate.

Because it's not my life.

I do not have the answers. But something tells me that's a good thing. That this "not knowing" is preparing us for something greater.

And for that reason, I'll find the rest I need. I won't stop begging Him to not be put to shame. I won't stop pleading with Him to make this calling a reality.

But I will find hope in how he redeems it all. How he forms it into something more beautiful, more useful, than we could ever have imagined.

Thrashing

When you are married with three small children, having a date night is something like a child arriving at an amusement park and staring at the mountains of steel that will soon move his insides in ways he never thought possible but which are surreal and exhilarating. Just the thought of getting to sit at a table and have food delivered to me, just me, especially when it comes in the form of Lettuce Wraps from PF Chang’s, gets me excited. And staring at my husband, even when we have nothing to say, gives me a new appreciation for silence. (And I’m quite aware after re-reading that paragraph at how it could be taken in a sensual way…I assure you that Lettuce Wraps are sensual in their own tofuey, soy saucey, crunchy noodly way.)

Last night, sweet Laura came to our rescue once again after receiving an e-mail that perhaps forcing us to have a date night would be a good thing, given that I really, really didn’t like my husband at the time the words were emphatically typed. Mentioning, “If we haven’t killed each other” always helps too.

After going out to eat, we went to Wal-Mart to get an iron (which I am realizing at this moment, we forgot to buy). While standing in the car isle, trying to decide which refrigerant to buy for our leaky air conditioner in our ghetto van, I found it necessary to have Thomas massage my very achy neck. As I was making the oohing and awing sounds that may have left quite a few employees wondering what was going on in aisle 17, for the first time in about a week, I felt whole. As Thomas compared products, I stood there, peacefully, allowing the humor and seriousness of our evening to ensue in my mind, recalling the conversation we had over dinner. I had shared with Thomas how I doubted God’s goodness and provision for this “calling” He has both burdened and blessed us with. How I was feeling “done” in the sense that we are slowly moving to our destination, all the while living in limbo of trying to embrace the present while longing to be in the future. I am finally to a place where I really, really want to get to Italy, set up camp, and get to work. But here we are, awaiting His timing, His provision. In the meantime, thoughts of doubt and guilt and very earthly frustrations have been nearly drowning me. Here is a word picture of this:

I’m in the ocean, in the midst of drowning…and there is this life-saving device attached to me. As I frenziedly try to stay afloat, the little ring moves with me, waiting for me to notice it, like my friend Joy’s dog. My to-do lists push me under…the calls and e-mails and meetings. Worry and anxiety push me further down. I try to swim, but guilt comes in the form of a giant wave and I’m barely making it to the top.

Little lifesaver, gently knotted around my ankle, bobs up and down, wondering why I haven’t noticed it by this point. It stays on top of the water, moving this way and that as water fills my mouth three feet below. We drift along, moving toward the shore, as the Wind takes us where only It can.

My arms: flailing. Lifesaver: riding the waves like a tanned surfer.

Just as I start to give up, realizing my destiny at this point is to die a sad and lonely death in the middle of a murky sea, my toe catches on something. My other toes begin to feel it too. My feet and ankles are now immersed in this familiar squishy feeling. I press my foot down, as this is my last hope for survival. Sand meets my feet and I straighten my tired body. My head comes up from the water as quickly as it immersed from the womb. I look down and notice that not only is my head above the water, but my neck and shoulders as well.

I look to my right and notice the tube. I grab it for fear that it will float away. It must have drifted out here from the shore. Then I notice it is attached to something and that the something is me. I grab onto it, as I am very weak at this point. It guides me, nearly pulls me, to the shore.

It was my destiny all along. Oh the needless and ridiculous thrashing about. The questioning. The missing out on all of the blessings right in front of me. The exchange of the quiet drifting only to be inundated by waters too chaotic for my helpless body to endure. The Holy Spirit alongside me, pushing me ever so slowly to the shore. Jesus, my companion, never leaving me, attached to me, for that is His promise. The Father, the ground on which I stand when alas I have been too ignorant to receive His Helper and His Son.

And this is the cycle in which, day in and day out, I find myself.

But in that dinner conversation with my newfound friend Thomas (a.k.a. my husband), he reminded me that this is our life, not someone else’s. The way Jesus moves in our lives is not like the way He moves in your life…or the life of your best friend or your brother or your mom. Each of our journeys is so unique. And each story is meant to bring glory to Jesus in its very distinctive hurt, pain, suffering, laughter, joy and contentedness. We cannot take what works in someone else’s life and replicate it in our own.

I was talking to this guy at our friends’ wedding last weekend. He is an actor who has been in a couple films. The one he just finished is about the early years of Billy Graham. He talked about what an incredible opportunity he had to be light among some very broken people in Hollywood. But he also mentioned that the film lacked something because of its secular take on a very spiritual figure. “It lacks the Spirit of God…. it’s told like a story rather than what it really is.”

This is so true in our lives as well. When we try to be someone or do something or live someone else’s life that we were never intended to live, something inside of us dies. Suddenly practicality and earthly comforts and anxiety rush in to meet us in our shirts that are too baggy, our shoes that are too small, our hair that is too long or too short or too pink or too green. Something is off. And I believe others can feel it when we aren’t living a life guided by the Holy Spirit. We thrash about like a tired two year-old.

This past week, I’ve tried to force myself and my family, mostly my husband, into a plan that was my own and not God’s. Sure, my plan makes sense to me. And I bet I could get a list of a hundred people who would agree with my plan. But if Jesus isn’t on the list, what good is it? I only get the wonderful opportunity of becoming a nagging and bitter woman with whom I wouldn’t even want to live (and I’m pretty sure there’s a Proverb about that one…something about it being better to live on the corner of a roof than with a bitter wife. Too bad we don’t have an accessible roof).

But grace and redemption have once again met me in the form of a new day and a very forgiving husband (of course, I must say there is always forgiving to be done on my part as well. For those of you who know us… and I mean “us” in terms of the messy, catty us, you know that my husband needs lots of forgiveness and grace. Almost as much as I do. See, I couldn’t just be the quiet, humble wife that many wish I were. I had to go and insert my pride in here).

Church at Ikea

In Italy it isn’t uncommon to share a table with someone you don’t know. So today at the café at Ikea, when a woman pulled up a chair next to us and set her bags down between Thomas and her chairs, as a divider of sorts, we thought nothing of it. We continued eating our couscous, pasta and very yummy “dolce” (Italian for dessert).

As I was nearing the end of my chocolate crunchy cheesecake bliss, I asked the woman, in Italian, if she spoke English (I had a very important question to ask her). She said, “yes” without so much of a hint of an Italian accent and so I asked her if she knew if the mall next door was open today or not (apparently most things are closed here on Sundays). She answered me with a wonderful British accent, which took us into the next question travelers always ask: “Where are you from?” We exchanged our answers and then began asking (and answering) the next set of questions regarding marital status, children, work, length of time in Italy, etc.

This all spawned our conversation into something of a very spiritual and intense nature. It was way beyond the moment. I knew just by what felt like a force field around our table that this was holy…this was Jesus answering this woman’s cry for help. She didn’t go into detail but told us that she and her (Italian) husband of twenty years were separated…that everything had seemed to fall apart as of late. This very beautiful and kind woman who looked like a friendly sitcom wife said that in the car on the way to Ikea she had been questioning whether or not she was “possessed” because everything in her life had been going so terribly. She couldn’t believe how strange her encounter with us was, given the conversation didn’t start with this intention. Given she was seemingly desperate for some sort of answer to the questions burning in her soul.

We shared about our marriage and God’s redemption and Jesus’ love and abundant grace. At the beginning of the conversation, when it started taking on a more spiritual tone, she mentioned that, having grown up in a home where one of her parents was Catholic and the other a mix between Protestant and Jehovah’s Witness, she thought it was ridiculous that people would fight over little things regarding this one “God.” She mentioned Buddha and Ala in all of this and so we got the opportunity to share the difference between these religions (which was fresh in our minds given we talked with a Muslim man on the plane for about two hours regarding the differences in our faiths). We talked about the assurance of salvation Jesus offers because of his death and resurrection on the cross. The man on the plane said that by doing good works, he “hoped” to get to heaven. In this moment, with this woman, I re-lived my salvation experience, realizing that I really am sure that if I died this very moment, I’d be with Jesus. Not because of anything I’ve done, but because God chose to send His only Son to die for me. It’s because of this that there is anything holy and good that dwells in me and allows me to do “good works.”

At the end of the conversation, Thomas asked if he could pray with her. “Please do,” she said, a woman not too proud to pray in this very unreligious and overcrowded restaurant of sorts. We all closed our eyes and Thomas put his hand on her. We all felt it. I know. It was a rare and beautiful moment of the sweet presence of God. When we opened our eyes, hers were filled with tears. She got up from the chair and we rose to hug her. I felt like I was hugging my sister.

We exchanged information in the midst of all this and I told her that we should keep in touch. “Yah,” she said. “I’ll tell you in an e-mail why this is all so strange.” With that she turned to leave and looking back, she let out a deep breath, as if weight had lifted from her and said, “Well. I’m going to be thinking about this all day.” She smiled, her eyes dry now, and walked away.

I believe she walked away knowing that God is big enough for her questions. Big enough to seat her next to two foreigners who simply wanted to know whether or not the mall was open. Foreigners who God has asked to go to this place, to encounter people like her, to give answers to those who are seeking…to harvest these seeds that have been planted in the hearts of His people. His sons. His daughters.

This is church. Yes, even at Ikea.

Train Ride

Everything I could possibly say about Italy seems incredibly cliché’ and rather asinine. I could talk about the beauty or the culture or the history, but who hasn’t seen the pictures of the Italian villages hanging on every wall of every “Italian” restaurant in the U.S.? Who hasn’t heard about the rich history here? The wars. The fashion. The wine. The cheese. And the bread. Oh, the bread. Foccocia has an entirely different meaning here. Though I have to say that, after eating at an oddly inviting (and a bit dirty) Italian diner of sorts, the only very small glass of wine I ingested left me unimpressed.

Even as I’m riding the train through the mountains, I feel a bit removed from it all. I’m remembering an 18-hour bus (very old VW bus, that is) ride I took through the mountains of Eastern Europe some ten years ago. Recalling how I had to pee so bad and finally we stopped at the home of an elderly Albanian couple in the middle of nowhere, and I mean nowhere… and was directed to a little room with concrete floors and a drain.

I am, however, reflecting on the “aura,” if you will, that I got from our time in Genova the last few days. Our friends, the Paces, live in an apartment that, if you can make it to the top of without heart failure, is beautiful. It has a large balcony that overlooks the ocean that is only a couple of miles away. The day we arrived, Donna and I sat on the balcony, the sun warming our exposed arms, soaking in each other’s presence and awing over the beauty of the view that God has so amazingly given them day in and day out.

But last night, or early this morning rather (jetlag is killing us), as the Paces and we listened to my favorite worship song together (From the Inside Out), one lyric struck a chord in me, in a way that is not really profound at all, but which awakened my heart once again to the reality of people’s need for Light in this place. “Everlasting, Your light will shine when all else fades…” And in this place, after sojourning through the labyrinth in the downtown district last night, noticing the prostitutes and the street kids and the drunk men and the lack of children, I felt surrounded by darkness and admittedly felt a twinge of hopelessness in giving these people a message of Jesus’ love, as if any of us is “too far gone” for such a God.

And then, like the enemy’s nefarious clockwork, I awoke in a terrible mood and nearly hated my husband for a good two hours for no apparent reason other than he was acting a bit like a child. Donna could see my very obvious frustration building and she prayed with me that I could be kind and filled with love. “Deep breaths,” she kept saying, half joking and half not. Deep breaths, Holy Spirit, Zoloft, a meditative trinity of sorts, got me through the bus ride to the train station. Listening to my IPod and reading 1 Corinthians 13, the infamous chapter on love, got me through the first twenty minutes of the train ride until it stopped, at which point all other passengers exited. Then the train’s engine turned off and we were left on what resembled a ghost train, all alone, questioning weather or not sweet Phil put us on the right train or not.

Turns out, after the janitor guy came through picking up trash and noticed us sitting there like the ridiculous foreigners that we are, that this train was no longer running and indeed it was not heading to Torino and never was for that matter. So we got off and in the midst of waiting another hour for the right train, I began liking my husband again. Of course it helps that he was acting much less like a child and I had gotten a Coke Zero from the little man at the “Chef Express.” And he (my husband, not the little man) is wearing black. And his red hat. And jeans that make his butt look cute. That always helps a little. I overlooked the dog poop on his shoe and made peace with the multi-faceted, flawed but wonderful human that he is. (It seems I come to this conclusion a lot in my writing… much less expensive than a counselor…).

And now we are heading to Torino, our future home. It all seems a bit dreamlike. I mean dreamlike in the sense that most of my dreams are not wonderful, but odd rather, and sometimes scary and most of the time confusing. I imagine our experience in Torino, while wonderful because it’s like a first honeymoon of sorts for us, will be a bit like my dreams.

Our future is truly in the hands of God. It’s both fun and nerve wrecking to follow His lead. It’s fun when it all works out. Nerve-wrecking when we step out of the boat and aren’t really sure whether or not we will sink or walk. Turns out Jesus can handle it all, the days when I’m so sure He’s real and good and a God who provides, and the dreadful days, which make up many, when I ask Him if He’s really sure He knows what He’s doing… and if using us, ridiculous, over-sensitive, critical and melancholy us, is really a good idea. But then I put one foot in front of the other, like a baby learning to walk. Knowing all the while that I will indeed fall, but that God’s kingdom isn’t contingent on my perfection, rather His grace toward very flawed people like me.

And in minutes, I will get up out of this seat and step off this train into a land I know little of. It’s one step at a time…one little baby step will take us off this train and into another unknown.