Behind the Picket Fence

She stood there, cautiously baring her heart to me. Her words said to me that she thought I had it together. She thinks I know what the heck I’m doing every day when I wake up and all the things from near and far are calling my name. 

Instantly my mind went back to a few days ago when I found myself weeping uncontrollably under the covers and pillows on my bed, my bedroom door locked to the demands of my kids, and my heart physically aching in my chest because I miss my jungle family so much and the loneliness is sometimes too much for me to stand under, so I cave. 

Turns out, I’m human like the rest of ‘em.

My house has a white picket fence. It’s quintessential irony calls to me every day when I check the mail or take out the trash or mow the lawn in the monotonous day to day. 

I gave this all up once, you know. Willingly. Joyfully. I turned it all in for a life overseas. All that I had been called to became my reality. 

And then Jesus said, suddenly and unexpectedly, it was time to sacrifice a different way. 

It was the harder to say yes that time. 

Now I find myself at Walmart and still, two years back on this side of the border, I fight another anxiety attack because the aisles seem so long and toilet paper options seem like a task of decision making prowess that I’m just not equipped for. 

But those are not the photos we put on social media are they? Of our struggle to reconcile broken dreams with the beautiful life given. Of not being able to relate or not being understood because suddenly you are thousands of miles from everyone who knows you best. 

I never post an instastory of me losing it with my daughter because the lies seem insurmountable and never ending and five years into this confusing and refining role of adoptive mom to a child with a hurtful past, I still feel as lost as ever many (most?) days. And there are harsh words and apologies and lies followed by truth revealed and lessons learned for both of us. Tears and hugs and another step forward after two steps back. 

It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do to face myself in this mirror of adoption. And it’s a lonely road when others just don’t get it. 

And I have never snapped a selfie when I’m crying on the bathroom floor, shoulders slumped because I feel so inadequate and useless under the weight of raising awareness for the many tangible needs of our jungle family. I struggle to find the balance of here-meets-there, where kids are being abused on every corner and we need funds to reach them but also laundry is piling up and my own kids need me to teach them math and reading and how to tie their shoes.

These just scratch the surface of the social-media “non-worthy” items. 

All the while Jesus whispers to me every day, “Cease from striving.” I can almost hear it as though it were an audible voice calling to me. 

And I don’t know yet what it looks like to live that out. 

So I wake up early and lean in hard. I physically open my hands, achy heart and shaky knees, and ask Jesus to show me He is real here, too, in what feels like lonely loss. He wasn’t only real back when I thought I knew His plans for my life. My preconceived and naive ideas of who He is and what He has called me to isn’t enough. He is bigger and better and His ways are true and good. 

My calling is not to know all the things. It is to trust Him. To look to Him alone.

Even when I feel lost and inadequate. Even when I see another Facebook post that reminds me I’m here and not there or this way and not that. 

I shut out the voices that can't see my heart and I trust the One who can.

It still leaves me breathless in tears many days. It’s ok to grieve what was lost (or perhaps just reassigned). 

Most days, I choose to run back into hope and gratefulness. And you see it. 

Other days, I collapse in sadness, fear, doubt. And you don’t. 

So when I post a photo on Instagram and it appears that I’m living a perfect life, remember it’s my highlight reel. There is a behind the scenes, too.

But instead of focusing on all that feels taken, I focus on what is given. 

Rather than honing in on what makes my heart ache inside my chest, I hone in on what makes my soul glad. 

In place of what appears to have been lost, I look for what I know to be found. 

Because wouldn’t you know it, that adorable white picket fence doesn’t close properly. You have to lift it up and pull it ever so particularly for it to shut all the way. Life’s like that, too. No matter what it may look like on the outside, it’s always harder and more finicky than you think it should be. 

Don’t believe the lie that says anyone has it all together. They don’t. You don’t. I don’t. We are all just humans with struggles. 

And really, if you think about it, that’s good news... because it is precisely why we all need Jesus.

These Demons are Pretty

“Go watch Elliott,” Richard said to me very seriously.

I stepped into the kitchen in our tiny wooden jungle home and looked out onto the back patio where Elliott liked to play in the big water basin. He was three and a half and full of imagination and wonder at all the things the world had to offer. I watched as he played contently, then glanced up into the virgin jungle behind our home. Then a smiled spread across his face as he waved enthusiastically. That’s when my own smile faded.

The American [Bad] Dream

We are "living the American dream". [By we, I mean Richard and me.]

We have what people work for and dream of. We have what people leave other countries and move here to pursue. We own our home [or at least we're buying it from the bank]. We have a beautiful, healthy baby boy. We have an awesome boxer dog. We have two vehicles and a [semi] fenced in back yard with a big front porch. Our family lives close and we see them often. We enjoy our jobs and make enough money to do the things we like at least occasionally. We are debt free and have traveled extensively in our short 24 years of existence.

But it's not enough.

If this was all we had to look forward to, if all we hoped for was a raise so that we could take a better vacation next summer, if we were striving for a bigger house, a newer car, a nice retirement.... I'd be depressed. Like, prescribe me some meds because I'd be perpetually down in the dumps.

Why? Because the American Dream is a lie from the devil himself. And it's a powerful lie that is permeating the church and burying itself deep into modern Christian culture until it's even become a part of doctrine among some believers. We teach it, sometimes unknowingly, to our children and from the pulpit on Sunday morning. We diminish missions to a program and pat ourselves on the back for "exposing" people to missions. And it's wrong.

And satan smiles.

We buy our children toys and games and movies and cell phones and electronics and the latest gadget that starts with a lower case "i" and cars and prestigious education and the list goes on.

We build our churches with massive steeples and fancy buildings and cushioned pews and the latest in sound and video technology and our toilets flush themselves and the list goes on.

And then we encourage our kids to put a quarter in the Salvation Army pail at Christmas time and to fill a little shoe box with cheap toys from the dollar tree for a poor child in Africa and we pat ourselves on the back.

And we take up an offering and give it to missionaries and if we're really bold we go on a mission trip where we stay in air conditioned hotels and come back and have presentations to talk about the "great" work  we did and we have mission "conferences" to display the missionaries that we support and we say things like "Wow, I could never do that!" and we laugh and return to our comfortable, easy, complacent lives.

And Jesus did none of those things.

We tell our children to be thankful that our parents work so hard to give them nice things.
Jesus said you must hate your mother and father to follow me. (Luke 14:26)

We say that we are blessed to live in such a great nation.
God says not to be prideful about our "riches".(1 Timothy 6.17)

We want well-rounded children and smart children and healthy children and children who have opportunities that we don't. Meanwhile thousands of children die everyday of starvation while we save up for our children's education and "opportunities".

And satan smiles. He smiles because that's exactly where he wants us: comfortable and self-absorbed.

As we prepare to sell all that we have to move to a far away place, my heart is very full of many different emotions.

I look back on the journey that has brought us to this point and it's been a lot of things that I didn't expect. It's been challenging and growing and stretching and even painful at times. But it's been so very, very good as we learn to release control of our lives to God and watch as He orchestrates a beautiful picture of His love for all mankind. And to think that we can be a small part of that picture... well, that's true joy.

Two years ago I thought we were ready to go. I thought we could pack up everything and head to this foreign place, but God in all His wisdom knew we weren't ready. So we've waited, and we continue to wait. We wait on His timing because we know it's perfect.

We've visited dozens of churches and shared the vision that God has given us about the uncontacted and lost and dying and most of the time it's fallen on deaf ears. But it's those few seeds that have taken root that put us on our knees in humility before God, thanking Him for putting together the team He has. Thanking Him that only He can take the credit for the literally hundreds of stories of His provision and direction in our lives.

It's God that has brought us to this place where the American Dream is more like a bad dream. It's God who has taken off the blinders and revealed to us that there is so much more to this life than our comforts and our dreams and our goals and our needs and that the eternity of billions is at stake. And that we will have no excuse before God one day when we had the resources and time and money and health and breath to do something about it.

And so we pray. We pray that God will continue to take the blinders off the millions of Christians that are still believing the lie that God wants us to be comfortable and happy. God wants to give us joy unspeakable, but it doesn't come from what this world has to offer. It comes for surrendering all to Him, whatever that may look like.

And we pray that He will keep our hearts and minds focused on Him. We know that there will be distractions and "voices of reason" telling us to find an easier way, to look for something a little "safer". But that's just it: this is the safest place we could possibly be.

And we pray that in all that we do and all that we pursue, our lives will bring glory to His name.