An Illinois New Year

I could rave about my wonderful time in the States. I could post oodles of pictures that prove I have the cutest nieces and nephews in the world. (And I do, by the way. Don’t try to argue.)

It was wonderful: a belated Christmas celebration, lots of food, church and friend fellowship, a helicopter ride, little people love, morning talks at the breakfast table, evening talks snuggled in fat couches, warmth, dryers, carpet, etc.

But the truth is, it’s also good to be back in Spain. It has taken a full week of not-so-good days to be able to say that.

I watched my friend frying donuts by the dying daylight. The banished cat made a puff of white against the patio door with each complaint. We ignored him. The air was heavy with the spitting oil when my friend asked about my trip to America.

“Wonderful” didn’t suffice. Both the warm fuzzies and tears were part of the wonderfulness.

So I told her and she listened.

In that sacred moment, my two worlds married, reminding me that who I am in America is who I am in Spain too.

Christmas comes to Almería

“Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.”
Luke 2:10

Good news.

Great joy.

All people.

Yes, that means you, my friend. Do you ever feel anxious when someone brings you news? Even if it’s “good” news from their perspective, it may not be what you wanted or had hoped for.

But in God’s good news, we can find rest, whether or not His news fits into our tidy (and narrow!) plans. Why? Not because He is predictable, easy-going, and safe, but because He is good.

This Christmas, may you find rest in God’s goodness and find great joy in the reality of Immanuel, God with us.

kings day light show — Unexpected light show with the 3 kings’ crowns.

A little of nothing

It’s one of those “Oh, it’s Thursday!” days.

“What should I write about on my blog?” I asked my roommate as I mopped the floor.

“I don’t know. Guys hitting on you? Buying fabric at the market today?”

Neither topic really inspires me to write. Although, please note, that when you’re trying to find good deals at the market, GO WHERE THE NORTH AFRICANS ARE. Not one or two, but LOTS. When they crowd around a booth, it’s bound to be a juicy find. Of course, you may have to elbow your way in to see what it is, elbow your way to the vendor to pay, and then elbow your way back out. You’ll have to decide whether or not it’s worth it.

I’ve almost finished Christmas shopping. I shouldn’t have bought much since our family has a simplified version of Christmas this year… but the babies! All seven of them! Nephews and nieces all need a little love from Spain.

Speaking of Christmas, my roommate is trying to turn my life into a Hallmark movie. I’ve assured her that whatever corny plot she dreams up has already been filmed. She says it doesn’t matter because repetition fits the Hallmark genre. Who am I to contend with truth?

Did I tell you that I have a ticket for a short trip back to Illinois over the New Year? If you want to see me, come find me. I’ll be holding a baby.

I guess I could write about how I bought three kilos of rice yesterday, or met four new ladies this week and ended up with three invitations, how I changed my diet in an attempt to battle fatigue, how I’m still wavering between chocolate chip cookies and cinnamon rolls to make for friends for Christmas, or who to share Christmas with this year.

But nah, that’s all for today. I’ll try to do better next week.

Well? What are you thankful for?

Well? What are you thankful for this year?

Thanksgiving is one day that we set aside to be thankful for our blessings.

Of course, we shouldn’t only practice our thanksgiving sitting down to a feast of roasted turkey, mashed potatoes, homemade dinner rolls, and pumpkin pie. We know that. And I hope we practice that. But it doesn’t hurt us to recap a year of thankfulness before every Thanksgiving feast.

I look back on 2019 and see things I wish had not happened, things I wish I had done differently, and things I wish others had done differently.

But even though we bumble through life, getting a few things right and a lot of things wrong, the “High King of Heaven” is always in control. He’s not up there sweating bullets that we will mess up His plan. In fact, He is letting us be part of His plan. Our sin and sorrow are never too big to be turned into a beautiful redemption story in His plan.

As this year closes, I am thankful that after all I have done and faced this year, the Father blesses His child’s prayer:

“Thou and thou only, first in my heart.”

Be Thou my Vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art;
Thou my best Thought, by day or by night,
Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.
Be Thou my Wisdom, and Thou my true Word;
I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord;
Thou my great Father, I Thy true son;
Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one.
Be Thou my battle Shield, Sword for the fight;
Be Thou my Dignity, Thou my Delight;
Thou my soul’s Shelter, Thou my high Tow’r:
Raise Thou me heav’nward, O Pow’r of my pow’r.
Riches I heed not, nor man’s empty praise,
Thou mine Inheritance, now and always:
Thou and Thou only, first in my heart,
High King of Heaven, my Treasure Thou art.
High King of Heaven, my victory won,
May I reach Heaven’s joys, O bright Heav’n’s Sun!
Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,
Still be my Vision, O Ruler of all.
Attr. Dallan Forgaill, tr. Eleanor Hull

No one understands me!

Do you ever feel misunderstood? Like the big, bad world is judging you by circumstance with no desire to understand your motive?

The truth is, we can never understand each other. Not fully. We have tools, like personality tests, that, on their best days, help us offer grace when we don’t understand each other. Living together helps too. But we just don’t quite get each other. Even those people who confidently nod and give you a smug smile when you do something predictable.

You’re not the only one who feels misunderstood. Ask God about that. He even had His people write about it in the Psalms and later in Romans.

“The LORD looks down from heaven on the children of man, to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God. They have all turned aside; together they have become corrupt; there is none who does good, not even one.”
(Ps. 14:2-3.)

“…as it is written: ‘None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God.”
(Romans 3:10-11)

We humans, in our fallen brokenness cannot fully fathom a holy God. So, if anyone is allowed to complain about being misunderstood, it is God.

Because, guess what else. You are understood. By the One who is least understood. He has searched and known you and discerned your thoughts from afar. He is acquainted with all of your ways. You cannot speak without Him knowing exactly what you will say. (Ps. 139:1-4)

You are understood. May that knowledge be too wonderful to wrap your mind around! (Ps. 139:6)

Sometimes, I wonder if I’m two people

Sometimes, I wonder if I’m two people. How can I feel so alive in a field of green with no one else around when I feel just as alive walking down the street of a busy little town?

The green grabs me and pulls me in to whisper, “And God said that it was good.” I see His hand in the great green and blue of creation.

But as I walk down the street in the middle of humanity, I hear the same words, “And God said that it was good.”

city street with blurred lights, burger king and fountain

Here in town, surrounded by manmade structures and, well, manmade everything, I long for the moments I can slip away and just be by myself with nature. Or even without nature. Sometimes, what I’m really longing for is anonymity where I can step out of my house without someone reporting it to someone else somewhere along the line.

I’m a country girl at heart, but I know that should I ever move again to the country, even under that vast starry sky, I would miss the connection and relationship of the daily ins and outs with humans.

I would miss the Spanish pop blaring from someone’s front window that puts a spring in my step. I would miss the evening chamomile with a friend who has invited me into her inner circle. I would miss the cars that stop as I approach the crosswalk. And the store owners who ask how I’m doing because we’ve been around each other long enough to care. I would even miss that dog yapping at me just because I walked past. Or the neighbors drilling into their wall when I want to be sleeping. And that little boy greeting me as if he knew me and then turning to his friend and saying, “She’s the one who visits Khadija.”

It’s the living and breathing together that makes me aware of God’s Presence. But it’s also the furious ocean waves and the placid Midwestern cornfields that make me aware of Him.

I can’t explain it. Except maybe to say that God’s Presence transcends our preferences and breathes life wherever we are.

(But I still sometimes wonder if I’m two people.)

Are you a people-pleaser?- Part 2

Last week, I wrote about my struggle with people-pleasing. And I’m still learning how to deal with this fear of man. (By waiting a week, I was hoping to be so much wiser!)

On my journey, I’m learning how much my thought life affects my everyday life. My thoughts aren’t as private as I think. Jesus was right, of course, when He taught that sin begins on the inside.

I know how critical and dark thoughts can be because I think them all too often. But when others think those thoughts about me, I am panic-stricken. Could I be the object of disdain rather than admiration or affection?

My negative thought patterns subtly place others as the wrong doers and me as the victim. (As if!)

How do I get out of this negative rut? Pep talks? Surrounding myself with positive friends? Hardly.

By asking God to redeem my thought life.

Notice I said “redeem” rather than “distract.” When I catch myself slipping into my “nobody loves me, everybody hates me” rut, I confess and surrender that thought. But rather than leave my mind as a gaping hole (which is impossible for women, by the way), I work to fill that hole with worthy thoughts and praise.

One day, I specifically asked God to help me take every thought captive. While dwelling on a wrong thought, I suddenly jabbed my hip into a doorknob (and Spanish doorknobs are sharp!). In pain, I managed to laugh and thank God for the not-so-gentle reminder. Other days, I, in essence, tell God to go away and leave me alone to think my negative thoughts.

Sometimes, we write off negativity as discernment. But they’re not the same. Negativity eats at your soul. Discernment can see and analyze the negative aspects of a situation without being controlled by them.

When your thought life is redeemed, you can be discerning without being negative. People may still sling unrealistic expectations at you or think mean things about you, but when you don’t dwell on it, it can’t control you.

See, whether or not someone means offense in a comment, you can leave it. You can walk away because when you do, that comment–whether intentional or unintentional–is between that person and God. When you take offense, suddenly the the relationship is much more complicated. Suddenly, the comment is between them and God, you and them, and you and God. And that takes a lot of clarification, repentance, and forgiveness.

But when you re-calibrate your focus– take it off of whoever you are allowing to control you, and place it on God– your world begins to bloom. You can hear advice without letting it dictate each decision. You can hear criticism without being in the depths of despair. You can love those who think little of you, even if their opinion never changes. And you can hear praise without feeling like it is watering the thirsty soil of your starving soul. Affirmation becomes a blessing rather than a necessity.

And you– I should say “we”– can be content in our identity in Christ rather than our identity in the eyes of others.

Are you a people-pleaser?- Part 1

I was sweating under my blanket and it wasn’t because of the leftover summer heat.

How could I have made the situation different? How could I have walked away without leaving a bad taste in their mouths? What should have I done to make them like me?

The night hours ticked away as I fought a bloody battle with my thoughts.

If you haven’t caught on by now: I have an overwhelming fear of man. I want people to love me and delight in me. I want to be the desired friend, the confidant, the one to diffuse tension in a situation.

But that night, my heart was pounding so hard that I could feel the bed shaking along with it. And all because of a negative reaction that felt like a personal attack.

More hours passed before I was able to stop “problem-solving” and surrender. My heart, now guarded by God’s peace, relaxed until I could no longer feel the oppressive beating. And I fell asleep.

Not every wave of people-pleasing is like this for me. Sometimes, I feel invincible to others’ opinions because I’m too tired or too stubborn to bend anymore. Other times, I never surrender and spend days or weeks in agony, enslaved to another’s opinion and trying to think up ways to wriggle myself back into their good graces.

Can you identify? Are you a people-pleaser too?

I don’t have a once-and-done solution for us. Or even five easy steps to follow.

Recently, in talking with a friend, I realized that this area of my life is slowly changing. It may always be a struggle for me, but by God’s grace, it will no longer be my prison.

Next week, I’ll tell you a bit of my ongoing journey. And maybe you can tell me a little of yours too.

Quiet servant

When we serve, how many of us are merely serving ourselves?

We maintain such a publicly busy schedule that people praise us when we do some act of service. What a sacrifice to give of ourselves and our schedules! And we are gratified when our sacrifice is acknowledged.

But what about those who are quietly serving, who don’t trumpet their schedule so that others ooh and aah? They may be sitting with the dying, tending to the sick, helping to clean another’s house. But quietly, and without verifying that the whole world knows what a gem they are.

When these quiet servants show up to serve at a church function, we assume it is as it should be because they probably had nothing better to do anyway. After all, they’re not busy. The ones who should receive the praise are the ones who sacrifice their busyness.

Maybe you’re the busy one, declaring on social media or to your small group at church just how busy and important you are… and how sacrificially you gave of yourself today. Maybe your attempt at service is much more about yourself than God or those you are serving. (I know how this goes because I find myself here far too often!)

Or maybe you are the quiet servant. May God bless you. Your love for the Lord has placed you in the woodwork and you’re courageous enough to stay there.

Overseas aunting

Family is such a part of who I have grown up to be that leaving home was like ripping out part of my inner being. Especially when I think of the little nieces and nephews who may never even know me well. They are the ones who don’t understand why they receive lots of cuddles one day and the next day I’m gone.

Overseas aunting stinks.

I miss birthday parties, new words, and pretty much everything else. And I become known as the person who talks to them on the screen. (Which they love because sometimes they get to hold the phone.) I read them books (especially when Albert and Clark beg for “more books!”). And I quiz them, “Where is Carissa’s hair? There it is! Where is Carissa’s nose?” We play hide and seek with a stuffed kitty.

There is nothing quite like little people in your own family, knowing that their blood is also partly your blood. Knowing that they might have poor eyes or be tall just because it’s in the family.

But there is also something beautiful about being removed from a family–utterly alone in a great big world of strangers–that makes me open up my heart a little wider and allow for a broader definition of family. It may not be quite the same, but it’s still beautiful when:

I meet a friend at the market and look down to see her little girl throwing her arms open to receive me
A three-year-old invites me over for the evening
I wipe away toddler tears as I head for the door
Little children tell me stories like I’m an important part of their life
A one-year-old gives an excited “Ooh! Ooh!” when he sees me coming
Little people want me to babysit them
And…
And…
And…

And one day, my friend’s almost-two-year-old called me “auntie.” I couldn’t stop smiling all day because it felt like God had given me back a piece of the preciousness I’m missing at home.

Photo by Krzysztof Hepner on Unsplash