Awakening to Reality

Three Saturdays ago we were on the last day of our "there and back again" visa run. It was a loooong day, but I felt mostly good, even praying in my heart as we drove through the beautiful valleys that our accidental detour took us on. We have driven on the road we were supposed to take so many times before, but there is so much construction and we lost the landmark to the turn off, so we completely missed it and found ourselves on our merry way to Lijiang, the nearest town to us, but in a slightly different direction than Shangri-La itself. Oh well, longer, but less mining trucks and the road actually has a shoulder, which is a huge bonus, seeing that Chinese roads are built about a meter off the ground. The last hour of our trip was a little less fun, with Alianna screaming from the back "my bum hurts, my bum hurts, I want to be home, I want to stop (seriously, you cannot have both, but this does not compute in the mind of a travel weary five year old) and Ezra just doing his banshee shriek because he wanted to say the same as Alianna, but cannot speak yet. So, I was not a happy mama when we finally got home, but we were safe, which is a huge grace.

On the Sunday I found myself tired, cold and mad. At God. Because that makes a lot of sense. Our good friends stopped by to say hello and ended up staying for lunch and most of the afternoon. At one point I blew up with my annoyance at how I feel God is ruining my life. Making promises of healing, guidance and provision and then just not making good on them. My daughter's skin is worse than ever, we have blown through our savings with having to make these idiot visa runs (and hello, He hasn't provided a visa yet!) and He is basically as talkative as a stone when it comes to guidance. Bless Phil and Bren, they are so gracious. They listened, saw through the anger to have compassion with my pain and disillusionment. I would probably loose my faith if not for saints like these. In the end it turns out that God is hard at work chiseling away at my idol. The one I made and called "God". The one that makes everything tick along smoothly and do what I ask after I do my version of killing a chicken, doing a rain dance or making a pilgrimage. Turns out I am more animistic than I thought. And God, the real God? Well, turns out that He is a lot less predictable than I hoped. What with not being stuck in time, having an eternal perspective and being a lot less selfish than me. Also, He is a lot more faithful than I bargained for. I have prayed so many times in the past that I want my life to be reflective of who He is. I want to experience the fulness of a real, living relationship with Him. I want to live a sacrificial life, a life in a sharing community. But to experience that, so much of my way of thinking (and consequently my way of living) needs to change. I would love to see the signs and wonders of Acts (especially when it really benefits me or the ones I love), but I realise that the thing that changed the world right from the beginning was how the Christ-followers loved and cared for each other. And a greater sign of power is the wonder of a new heart, a new nature and a new inheritance. Somehow through all the un-fun things that I experience, He is making the freedom Christ died for a reality in my life. Freeing me from my debilitating fear of what others think, from the despair of feeling that I have nothing to show for my life and all the things I "feel" I sacrificed (what, after all, did Jesus have to show at the end of His?) and from the hopelessness of the deep pits that my immaturity and issues bring in my life and the lives of those around me, especially my children.

So, to make a long story short, I feel better. It only took a few days and several tantrums... and a few ups and downs over the past three weeks, but I feel a bit more back on track. Grace alone. Thank God He does not loose His temper and leave me the heck alone like I have asked Him to do so many times. Thank God that He is the only God who calls the prodigal home, who always forgives and restores. And always, always brings hope, even when my circumstances scream "HOPELESS!!". Most times I don't experience this as reality, but it doesn't change what is. So, I guess most of life is a process of growing into what is already true, what has already changed, what has already been accomplished. I think. Or something like that.  

Now I am trying to maintain some sense of peace while I frantically do laundry, clean our house and pack for our big trip to the US. We will be in Coeur d'Alene in December, then in Park City around New Year's and a little after that. We also plan trips to eastern and western Washington, but are not sure about dates yet. In there somewhere Karl also plans to go to Denver. We fly back out to China at the end of February. We still need a vehicle for our time in the US, so if anybody has something with four wheels that doesn't need a horse to pull it and that you aren't using, keep us in mind.

We are praying to connect with people and share what is really in our hearts. We need more support - for us and the work we do. Our deep desire is to partner with people with whom our vision resonates. And we would love to keep things real and open. Karl and I are both, uhm, proud people, and it has taken us a while to realise that we do not do a good job of making our needs known. Now we are learning to communicate our very real needs while trying to give people the freedom to meet them or not. It is a hard journey, one I have resented many times, but now am learning to embrace. It is part of our journey after all, and as with many things, necessary, but not evil. I am actually even getting excited about the whole need for support thing. That somehow, if it is a partnership of people that feel their hearts stirred by what we think He laid on ours, we can all be mutually blessed. Anyway, good things happening in my heart and attitude, which I am thankful for.

I know that many people are wondering what is happening with the olive farm, our projects here, the goats, etc. I will hopefully get to writing some about that soon. And yes, I know that you can post pictures on these fancy bloggy thingies, but just updating it is a huge step for me. So, once this technically challenged mama doesn't have to ask my hyper busy husband to post these things for me, I will work on the photos.