I'm Expecting!

As any hopelessly romantic girl would dream, my thoughtful husband made reservations at one of the finest restaurants in the Jordan Creek Area for Valentine’s Day. We both dressed up for the occasion and I excitedly awaited the evening agenda the hours prior to our date.  It's the kind of restaurant that checks your coat for you and offers you the option to buy your water in case tap isn't to your liking.  The menu is exquisite and my eyes wondered down the list as I meandered through the choices to find one that delighted my palette. Interestingly, as I studied the menu and sat in the ambiance of "love," I found it all a little hard to swallow this year. You see I have found that once I have become aware I can no longer become unaware again.  Once my eyes have been opened I cannot force them to not see.  I am now waist deep into exposure and I am no longer ignorant or innocent.

Over the past three years I have been taken on a journey where a consistent message has been threaded into so many situations that have caused awareness, seeing and exposure to infiltrate my perfectly Americanized Christian lifestyle...and as I sit in the elegance of the sweet longings of a princess heart all around me I feel nothing but disgust.
 

The journey began when a dear friend spoke frankly to me about my selfishness as she saw me so focused and stuck on mountain of sorrow in my life. FYI, when I say good friend I mean like a sister. I wouldn’t recommend this with just any friendship it might end up in a parting of ways for many.  This friend and I had pounded the pavement together for years each morning where we had some of the best church I’ve ever been to and tapped into much free counseling one from the other; not to mention butt kickings when we wanted to quit training and the best sweaty hugs when life’s struggles had us in hand. So to say the least she had spent much to earn my trust to come to a moment where she could state her case with me and I wouldn’t slap her and want to pull her hair out.  She said, “You know you really just need to get the focus off yourself and go do something for someone else.  If you take your focus off of your problems and give to someone I think it will do you good.”  “Well La Ti freaking da,” was my first thought but I kept that one to myself until, well, right now.  There was a silence as this was an evening phone conversation that I thought had the purpose of planning our run for the following morning.  I was way off.  The spoiled- brat- strong- willed- get –her- way at all costs little girl inside wanted to tell her what for, while the self- controlled new woman emerging within through the grace and healing work of The Holy Spirit Inside gave a listen.  Interestingly enough at our church earlier that day a woman had come and spoke about an orphanage in Jamaica she had started.  There was a group forming from our church that would go work at the orphanage in January which was over six months away and cost over 1200 dollars.  At church I had thought what a cool opportunity if you had the money but I was a single mom with three boys and a demanding full time job so it was out of my realm of possibility and had shut the door as soon as it had opened in my mind. But now I was seeing a light through the little crack under the shut door that wouldn’t go away as my friend’s words began to sink into my heart.  I told her about church and promised I would check into it with much doubt and apprehension but at least got her off my back for the night.  So I did check into it and all the spots were filled. “Whew!” I was off the hook! Until a few days later when the trip coordinator called me back and said they did have one more opening.  I said yes.

That Yes was not just a yes to go to an orphanage and think about someone’s trouble other than my own but a yes that would begin a gradual trickle of The Life living Gospel of Jesus coming into the literal life sphere of my time that would begin to make me question and rethink everything.  The journey took me to the orphanage in Jamaica where I became a human jungle gym and giant Kleenex box to 30 plus orphans that Jesus calls the least of these.  The journey would take me to a rocking chair at that orphanage where a precious little “orphan” would kneel at my side and wash my feet with a white cloth silently without a word that would blow me out of my selfish ocean of thoughts about my sorrow and transport me into the same place as her- the least of these. It is there that I am taught that orphans have names like Zoe and Ricardo and Matthew and Neo.   And Orphans have personalities and talents like playing soccer and basketball, and orphans have beds that they sleep in each night left untucked in and not consistently prayed with and not smothered with hugs and kisses from a doting parent.  I am suspended here in this time and place where orphans get sick with a fever and just want to be held but there aren’t enough hands to go around for them to consistently be snuggled until the fever breaks,  where random volunteers cart little ones to doctors appointments without knowing their birth dates, last names, or medical history.  It is there that my heart begins to break. It is there that I get a glimpse and I don’t see the least of these anymore.  These aren’t orphans these are God’s kids, just like me. And so I go home changed on the inside yet still an American Girl prone to her American ways and habits of variety and excess and indulgence.

Yet the trickle remains to drip into my pulsating spiritual veins.  I am later led to the book Crazy Love by Francis Chan where he asks the question, “Are you excited about going to heaven because you will walk on streets of gold, live in a mansion, and all your tears will be wiped away and there will be no more night, sickness, and death…or are you longing for heaven solely because Jesus is there?”  Ugh… going to my core I had to be honest it was both.  But mostly in my tangible and hard life because I get tired of tears, sickness and death. Even though I love Jesus I look forward to a life with those things removed.  With this thought process set into motion a second question formed in my heart, “Do I give to the needy because you love Jesus or because it makes it easier for you to sleep at night and because you want to be and be known as a good person?”  Ugh…falleness wins again!  I am disgusted and I honestly face these hard facts with Jesus and run to him in my selfish fallen state. It is here that he teaches me “Child its OK I never expected you to love even me without me.  So I learned, to love God, I needed his love, and to love others I needed his love to love him and then him to love others through me.  Wow what a truth and perfect timing too because smack dab in the middle of that lesson a little boy follows my youngest son into our restaurant one day after school.  After a little conversation I find that he is eating Doritos (or as I adoringly refer to them as Dirty Toes) for dinner tonight because that’s all that they had in their house to eat.  What are you kidding me? This is Webster City, Iowa not some third world country for crying out loud.  And that’s what I did that night after sending the little boy with a sack full of food, cried out loud, Lord what am I supposed to do with all of this?”

Life went on. We served a community Thanksgiving meal at our restaurant Whooptidoo! (Pun intended but that is the name of our little eatery) Kudos on the community good citizen ship status right?  Well I guess but it only opened up my eyes more to the need and opened my heart more to the longing to give.  Which soon lead me to Wells Fargo Arena on one of the coldest January Nights I can remember where I walked the sky walks filled with mass amounts of energetic teenagers who ignored the cold and chatted toward the arena as if they were walking along Daytona Beach in North Face clothing.  But it was there as the night came to a climax at least for me, that a message was spoken into my life about being a hurt healer or a hurt dealer based on the story of the Good Samaritan in the bible.  By this time I’ m like OK Lord I’ m beginning to get it, I’ll buy the book, I’ll read it and OK I’ll do what it says. So I did just that went home and worked my way through the book, “Hurt Healer,” by Tony Nolan.  When I finished the book I began praying for God to give me a literal opportunity to be a hurt healer like the Good Samaritan was to the beat up man alongside the road.  Sure enough it came on a blustery morning as I was running errands with my oldest son in tote.  A young woman with two little boys and an adorable puppy were walking alongside the road.  Rose and her two sons changed my life in the 14+ hours of life we shared together.  I learned that women on the side of the road are not pretty little pawns for me to complete my Christian girl duty on.  They are messy, out of options people in need of love, care and truth, lasting truth and a healing Savior.  I don’t know what happened to Rose but I know she experienced Jesus in those hours we shared and it blew us both away.

And so life went on and it became harder to be this nice little Jesus Girl that attended church like clockwork, small groups, bible studies, prayer groups, listened to worship music and had her daily quiet time.  Why was this no longer enough?  Why?  The other side of me still was indulgent in culture, choice and thinking I deserved the blessing.  Why was this no longer filling the void and leaving me emptier each time I tried?  Oh how God’s word can reveal the answer to my ever asking heart.  Isaiah 58 began to be my weekly meditation “This is the true fast I have chosen, to loose the chains of injustice to untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke.  Share your food with the hungry, provide the poor wanderer with shelter, when you see the naked clothe him, and do not turn away from your own flesh and blood. Then your light will break forth like the dawn and your healing will quickly appear…. Do Away with the yoke of oppression, the pointing finger, and malicious talk…spend yourself on behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed then your darkness will become like the noonday and the Lord will guide you always, he will satisfy your needs and strengthen your frame.” This is exactly what my beautifully sassy friend had told me, to spend yourself on someone else and your healing will begin, this is what my heart had experienced in helping Rose, in helping the little boy that came into Whooptidoos; light came and satisfaction filled my ever craving heart when I gave when I looked after others in Jesus name.  It was no longer enough to gorge myself with Christianity, I had to share Jesus.

So I decided to, or maybe the Spirit inside prompted me to get a little crazy with all this.  We planned a trip for our whole imperfectly blended family to go back to the orphanage in Jamaica over Christmas break.  I was really in over my head this time for crying out loud we were just learning how to get along with one another let alone go serve 30 little ones! Most days being able to agree on a restaurant or TV show would be a miracle of Divine Intervention, how are we all going to be able to go to a foreign country and not think of ourselves and work together while we spend ourselves on behalf of the oppressed?  This is where God replied, “SHHHHHHHH…Be still child and know that I am God.”  And so I listened as we all sat on many Sunday evenings nestled in our family room couches going through the book, “The Hole in Our Gospel” by Rich Sterns in preparation for our upcoming mission trip. As our teens and pre-teens sometimes with exaggerated sighs and obsessive eye roles studied and engaged in the specifics of poverty in our world.  The trickle began in them too.  There were no presents under our Christmas tree this year.  Heartless as it may seem, we needed to sacrifice our overindulgent life style of excess just one day for something greater and ones much smaller.  To say the least the presents were never missed and the gift those precious ones in Jamaica gave to us what money could never buy and I certainly couldn’t contain it in a box under my tree.  I humbly observed my children and step children spend themselves without thought of giving up their creature comforts, their light became like the noonday; a light that wouldn’t fizzle out when they landed back in their home country.  Adopt, became an overused word in the days and weeks that followed our arrival back home.  I certainly didn’t have the goal of adoption when I went into this.  My goal was to give our kids a bigger world view and engage their Spirits to begin to live out the command Jesus gave before leaving earth to Go into all the world and preach the Gospel. God’s goals were much bigger than mine as unified they begged, pleaded and willed to give up much in order to adopt a brother or sister. OK God, I’m listening.

I began reading the book,” Kisses From Katie,” by Katie Davis, in the Charlotte airport on our way home from Jamaica. It’s one of those can’t put down until your finished kind of books, I’d tell you what its’ about but you just need to read it for yourself.  It blew the little that was left of my girly girl, princess in a comfortable American lifestyle, sipping Starbucks, working hard and playing hard with a plan to retire and travel mentality out of the water, (sorry if that killed your desire to pick up the book)thankfully.

…And so there I was with my darling husband in the middle of this over the top dining experience trying to decide what to order and all I can think is, “This steak’s price could feed a Compassion child for a month, this plate could pay for a little girls chance to go to school in Uganda for a whole year…but I was here and I was thankful for my husband and love and Valentine’s Day…As attractive as he looked to me that night across the table nothing is able to top the pure enticement to see your man spending himself on behalf of orphans.  My Husband is one of those motivated, faithful, hardworking individuals who thrives on task orientation.  I think he learned to work before he could speak.  To see him at the Orphanage totally out of his zone of comfort and the only work be to have little ones all over him all day while he exhibited love and patience, taught them, and played endlessly melted this girl’s heart all over again.  To see a little boy beg him not to go the afternoon of our departure and plead that he goes with us as our driver arrives and we board the bus to take us on the jarring trip down the mountain as tears stream down his cheeks makes me take root deeper into the vows I made to this man beside me in this messy gospel coming to life before our eyes.  So to get you out of this dramatic suspense I ordered the small plate…a couple glasses of wine and astonishingly passed with much drama inside on the Red Velvet cake for dessert, and lived! 

So here I am this evening in the know that loving Jesus is awesome, being saved from eternal death and my sin is incredible, if I never do anything more God’s love for me is perfect until I see his face and into forever.  But now I know that I don’t just want him for me, I want to be like him, I want to get humble for humanity like he did and I want to do what he told me to in James 1:27 that says “..to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.” I don’t just want him for me I want everyone to have this awesome opportunity to know this amazing Jesus.  He has broken my heart for the least of these which includes me…there’s no turning back and so… I am expecting.  Our family is moving forward to see if adopting would be part of our ministry in this life for one or more of his precious ones…. I am expecting…for the Lord to continue to arrange and rearrange my thinking about living on purpose  and that I will stand up each day and do something different for his Kingdom’s sake.

I do not tell this story for a reaction of nice job, good for you comments.  I tell you this story because it is my story and the best one I know about the Gospel of Jesus Christ being specific and personal and real.  I tell you about this journey I have been taken on because for too many years I robbed myself of an incredible and adventurous life that fills that deep desire inside, the one I tried to fill with enough good girl Christian rituals (which I am not knocking, the foundation of my faith taught and brought me to this place) enough cute clothes, accessories, model perfect body, Martha Stewart cooking, and a home off the cover of Better Homes and Gardens-that was never enough.  I have not arrived but I have set sail and my hope is to sail with many others on this horizon.

P.S. Thank you sweaty running friend for if you had not spoken those precious words God placed in your heart to give me where would my life be today...What is God speaking to your heart, is there a gift you need to give someone with your words today..Is there a message inside that you  have ignored? It's worth a listen!