Reading, writing, and Ramadan: What’s been happening recently

#1

Recently, I read through the four gospels. While Matthew, Mark, and Luke focus on what Jesus did and said, John focuses on who He was. As I read John, I began underlining references to Jesus’ deity. A lot of people proclaimed that He was the Son of God. Although we have no record that Jesus said, “I am the Son of God,” His references to His own deity (e.g. being one with the Father) were enough to make His accusers say at His trial, “…he ought to die because he has made himself the Son of God” (Jn. 19:7).

#2

Ramadan was a socially slow month for me. Even though I wasn’t fasting, most of my friends were. So I decided to prayer walk the streets of Mytown. All of them. “How hard can this be?” I wondered.

One neighborhood’s streets wound around and around, making it impossible not to circle back again and again past those same elderly men on the park bench or that delivery man slowly unloading at the café door. I told a friend I should fill up my market cart with junk and haul it with me because then onlookers would have a mental box to put me in! Alas, I did not finish this project during Ramadan, but I’m at 198 kilometers and counting!

#3

I took advantage of the quieter days to get ahead in planning English lessons. I’m finally one whole unit ahead. Plus, I’ve added “work on curriculum” to my weekly schedule. Not that it wasn’t there before, but this time the rule is that I can’t gleefully erase it each week.

#4

My sister and I have been doing a writing challenge. Writing is another one of those things that is easy to erase from my weekly schedule. But it feels more important with accountability. This year, I’m also attempting to help write a VBS curriculum which mostly leaves me feeling very, very green.

#5

One Saturday, I scoured my shower with an abrasive powder and simultaneously inhaled the powerful aroma of the toilet bowl cleaner. Dizzily, I wondered if there was a better way to clean my house. I began researching and testing. Do these DIY cleaners actually work? Time and grime will tell. Although research shows that the DIY ingredients are less harsh than typical cleaners, I still have nightmares of peeled laminate flooring and warped countertops.

#6

Familiarity breeds contempt. Perhaps I wasn’t contemptuous yet, but I felt the constant pressure to dedicate unreasonable chunks of time to a friend, even when I had many other things to do. She wasn’t respecting my boundaries and I was worn out and indignant. Then I realized that I was the one who had stopped enforcing my own boundaries. I had pretended to be more flexible than I was. Essentially, I told her that I was always at her disposal and she believed it.

So, I’m back to square one with this boundary thing, and the times we’re together are farther apart but more enjoyable because we manage miss each other on the off days. 🙂

These are the less social bits of what has been happening recently. I could drone on, but I’m tired of writing, and you’re probably tired of reading. So what’s been happening in your life recently?

Leaving behind our fish

My writing prompt this week is about letting something go. What have I let go?

A couple of years ago on another blog, I wrote a lament about living far away from family. I understand the sacrifice of “letting go” theoretically and even theologically but not always emotionally. Now and then, especially when I’m homesick, I renew my lament. Yes, I love the life God has given me and the deep and beautiful blessings that come along with it, but it doesn’t mean it’s always easy.

Sometimes even the wonderful, valuable gifts in this life are things we must let go, things God asks us to miss out on. So we watch from afar with palms pressed against the window pane that divides something we long for from our reality.

We all have laments, don’t we? Things we miss out on because we have counted the cost and decided to follow Jesus.

I won’t elaborate on this particular lament. I’ve done it in pieces on my blog: here, here, here, here, here, and here (oops, I didn’t realize there would be so many “here”s). The writing prompt reminded me of a passage I recently read, a passage I still need time to think through. Below, I have retold the story from Luke 5:1-11. I hope the story touches a dark corner of your heart like it touched mine. What do I need to let go? Really let go? Can I believe that Jesus is worth it?

May the victory of Jesus’ death and resurrection fill your life to overflowing.
The Lord is risen!

They were tired when Jesus came. It had been a long night with no fish. No fish meant no market. No market meant no income. No income meant, well, not much of anything.

He was a bit strange, this Jesus, climbing on board Peter’s boat to talk to the crowd. A few people began to splash into the lake to be close to him, and it was then that Jesus quietly asked Peter to push out just a little from the land. Peter gladly gave up his task of washing the fishing nets to hear for himself why so many people were following this Teacher around.

Jesus taught in language that was both simple and profound. The crowd pressed against the shoreline, engaged, spell-bound even. When Jesus was done teaching, he turned to Peter and said, “Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.”

They had already tried that. All night, actually. So Peter said, “Master, we worked all night and caught nothing! But if you say so, I will let down the nets.”

The nets slipped in the water with the familiar creaking of ropes. A creaking of familiar hopelessness.

And then their nets were breaking, splitting with the load of fish! It took a moment to understand what was happening, so astonished were they. “Help!” they cried to a nearby boat. Soon both boats were overflowing. They began to take on water.

Excitement and wonder were thick in the air. Peter and his companions, James and John, stared at this Teacher, this Master, who seemed to have power over creation. Overcome, Peter fell down at Jesus’ knees. “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.”

“Do not be afraid,” said Jesus. “From now on you will be catching men.”

They rowed to the shore as their boats sank lower and lower in the sea. Those from the crowd who had not yet dispersed stood on the shore, gawking as the water lapped at their ankles.

Fish meant market. Market meant income. Income meant, well, anything.

But they left their boats, their nets, their fish and followed Jesus because He was everything.

Photo by Cassiano Psomas on Unsplash

From a family of writers

It was 2:30 a.m. and I was wide awake, when suddenly it struck me: I’m from a family of writers!

My mom, my siblings, and I all enjoy writing. Of course, we’ve had our share of mishaps. Like the time my mom sent a cheerful email to her siblings proclaiming “Hell to you all!” (she’d forgotten an “o”). Or the time when I was a child making a birthday card for my aunt. The card contained a hidden message cleverly concealed under a square of paper on which I had inscribed “Open the flab.”

Despite these unfortunate skeletons, we continued writing and continue to this day.

Mom comes from a family of unusual vocabulary, a vocabulary which still seeps into her everyday speech and writing. Before having children, she used to write poetry and keep a journal. Since children, she exchanged writing time for reading aloud: tales of Ira, Francis, Ichiro, and a little later, Narnia. Now her main writing occupation is optimistic emails to missing family members.

My older sister and I have stacks of journals. Hers go way back, to when she recorded observations from our childhood such as “Tricia eats like a horse and looks like a string bean.” Even now, she writes captivating emails recording events and people that waltz through her married life.

My older brother is the nerdy, theological writer of the family. When he asked me to help edit his Bible school thesis, I read a bit then stuck to editing grammar, not content. Instead of “This deep point of doctrine would be more indisputable if…” I was penciling in things like, “Maybe this sentence structure needs help???” Of late, most of his writing seems to be going out from the mailbox to a certain Ohio address.

My younger brother kept a journal of our family trip out West. The several pages, which gave a snapshot of the vacation in that moment, also gave some humorous insight to the workings of a 12-year-old mind. It was delightful to find his journal in my stash of papers years later… and give a copy to his wife to read! Now he gets to write sermons rather than record who is eating candy and what music we are listening to.

It was on another vacation long ago that my little sister, wrote an adorable note: “Dad, why do you let your whiskers grow?” Her thoughts have run down deeper lines since then. She maintains her own blog now and is more dedicated to her writing than any of us other family members.

At 14-months, even my nephew scripts his feelings quite clearly (see photo above).

Why do we write? Maybe it was due to those years when our parents instilled in us a love of reading. Those evenings that Mom would take us to the library and we would walk out with 40+ books that we started to read on the way home. The librarian told Mom that we were “good for circulation.”

Regardless of the reason, I’m thankful to be from a family who expresses through writing. For one, it makes living overseas more possible.

Listen

Sometimes, I imagine I’m a well-known writer. The truth is, however, that I have a hard time expressing myself. Emotions often don’t translate well into prose.

But tonight I’m thinking that maybe that’s not such a bad thing. Expressing myself doesn’t have to be my notable character attribute. What if I were a good listener instead?

My time of training in New York brought out reflective questions: Do I listen with my heart? Do I hear the longings behind the words people are saying? Or am I too preoccupied with finding an avenue of expressing myself?

God used New York for my “ah-ha!” moment. The real training has started since I’ve been home. So many people need listening to. What have I been missing out on all these years?

Today I had lunch with a lady from church who shared some of the struggles of being a mom. In class tonight, a student told me about the discrimination she sometimes faces as an immigrant. Just when I thought I’d used up my daily quota of compassion, another acquaintance expressed concern over potentially losing her job over a moral issue.

So, I listened. Now what? What exactly does “weep with those who weep” (Rom. 12:15) look like from day to day?

I guess I’m still learning.