Being a slacker

So I'm in Virginia for 7 weeks "learning how to be a missionary." I am still amused at all of the people running around like crazy looking for books and such to read (that were assigned by their regional offices). I also feel like a slacker because I'm not doing anything. Props to my regional office for sending me our books 6 weeks ago!

"But the Cross is final. There is no turning now, no halfway stopping place." Journals of Jim Elliot, June 18, 1948
I am having to remember this these days -- that the Cross means death. Either death to myself and my desires, or death to what the Lord is doing in me. If I die to myself, God can produce fruit in my life. But if I do not die, there will be no fruit. (John 12:24)

Hope is a good thing

Psalm 51:4: “Against You, You only, have I sinned and done what is evil in Your sight, so that You are proved right when You speak and justified when You judge.”
(The end of the Portuguese version translates “Your sentence is just and You have reason to condemn me.”)
I have sinned in such a way that God’s sentence is righteous and He has every right to condemn me. This is the gravity of sin – He is right and has every reason to condemn me! But I can also ask for mercy; because Jesus died and was raised again, my sins are gone. His spilled blood takes away (leva) my sin, so that I do not have it anymore.
That is the message that He wants me to take to others – our utter defeat because we have disobeyed God (we cannot obey Him perfectly, for no one is perfect) and the hope that we have because Jesus stepped in to take away the punishment for that disobedience.
The message of hope can break down barriers.

Tenderness

Treating my femininity and delicateness (which some days I am sure I don't possess) with care, not out of fear, but out of respect and awe because of its otherness.
I am beginning to realize that my view of someone caring for me is steeped in provision of my physical needs (food, shelter, etc). I also know full well that it's not the whole story. The Lord is opening my eyes to what that really means through His caring for Israel.

"To wait open-endedly is an enormously radical attitude toward life. So is to trust that something will happen to us that is far beyond our imaginings. So, too, is giving up control over our future and letting God define our life, trusting that God molds us according to God's love and not according to our fear." --Henri Nouwen

Thank God for small favors

Just read the following article about the national shortage of pharmacists:
Pharmacist Shortage Worsens Nationwide
Boy, am I glad I'm not going back to the US to work (quite yet)! I leave Brasil on Saturday and will be at home visiting family and friends for 6 weeks before I am off to Richmond, VA for a 7-week training course that all new IMB missionaries have to go through. God willing, I will be back in Brasil in March for another 2 years. That's more than enough time for the shortage to pass, right?

Psalm 35

It has been quite awhile since I have put something down here that I feel is "of substance." I hit a wall today, yet the Lord opened the floodgates and gave me this:
The Lord is opening my eyes to know what kind of battle is going on for my life. He knows that He already has my soul, and so the true fight is to see who I am going to live for -- myself (or Satan) or for God? I am coming to the realization that I am not the only one fighting that battle, and that is such good news to me! I have tried and tried for so long to conquer the enemy and have been so unsuccessful. Watchman Nee’s The Normal Christian Life is helping me to understand that my efforts, no matter how well-placed, are efforts of the flesh. The Lord is teaching me that sometimes I am to stop fighting and let Him do the work. That brings new meaning to Psalm 46:10 -- “Cease striving, and know that I am God.” Instead of living in the flesh, I am to live in the Spirit. What does that mean? Sometimes I am not even sure; however, I do know that all of my fleshly efforts must stop to let the Holy Spirit work in and through me.
I have been going through David’s feelings in Psalm 35 -- I am feeling them too! He begins with a plea for the Lord to contend with those who contend with him and to fight against those who fight against him. Not only that, but to come to his aid and to brandish the spear and javelin against those who pursued him -- to threaten his enemies and scare them off, even. Now, David was the mighty shepherd who struck down Goliath with a sling and a stone, who killed both the lion and the bear with his hands. Why should he need the Lord to fight his battles for him? Yet he did. How much more do I need to rely fully on the Lord to fight for me! He needed to hear that the Lord was his salvation -- he asked the Lord to hear that phrase.
As it was with David, there are those who seek my life and plot my ruin, though they are not people. They are the powers of darkness, set on my ruin -- set on taking my trust away from the Lord and putting it in myself (or in them, even). Set on cutting me off from the vine, when that is my source of life. I see this battle as one where I have fought and fought and when I have just about given up all hope, the Lord comes in and saves my hide. I didn’t weaken the enemy in any way for Him to be able to handle (you know, like loosening the lid of the pickle jar for the next person). He allows me to fight so that I can see my own weakness and fall into despair. I know that sounds funny, but there is good news at the end of that -- He rescues the poor from those too strong for them.
Verses 11-18 describe somewhat my current wave of feelings. The enemy sends forward ruthless witnesses who ask questions that have nothing to do with the real issue. I entertain them as if they were worthy to be thought on; I take them into my mind and my heart as if they were family, as if they had always lived there, as if they are truly at home there. I do know that if I am not careful, they will take up residence and stay. They are only waiting around to watch me fall, which actually gives me new motivation to stand firm. Verse 20 really hit me because it’s the culmination of those other verses -- if there is nothing to accuse, then they make something up. As I was reading that verse, another one came to mind, Romans 8:33 -- “Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies.” Wow. No matter what the enemy accuses me of, I am justified in Christ. Of course, if I am living in sin, then the Lord has to search my heart and show me that. But accusations that are solely of the enemy are what I am talking about here. He has accused me of many things that I have taken to heart, but the scales are beginning to fall off and I am beginning to see them for what they are -- lies.
David pleads with the Lord to awake and rise to his defense, to be not silent. He wants to be vindicated, not in his own righteousness, but in the righteousness of the Lord. He pleads the Lord not to let his enemies think they have won; he asks the Lord to put those who gloat over his distress to be put to shame and confusion, to be clothed with shame and disgrace. And as for those who delight in his vindication, where does he turn their praise? To the Lord. And to top it all off, he praises the Lord. A song that begins in distress ends in praise. Let mine be so as well.

Chile, Day 1

We started off with the easiest check-in ever at the airport -- no one was in line when we got there, so we had plenty of time. The flight was very uneventful, and very empty from Rio to Sao Paulo. When we arrived in Santiago, there were men from the travel agency waiting for us and a few others. We found it very difficult to speak with them, because they spoke a breed of Spanish that is very difficult to understand (or if they were speaking Portuguese, a breed of Portuguese that is very difficult to understand). We had spoken with our agent in Rio, and he said that we should mark our passeios (outings) with the agents when we got to Santiago. However, they were already marked for us. We checked into our little hotel and went to sleep after a long first day.

Chile, Day 2

Well, we started with breakfast, as any sensible traveler does. We discovered that the coffee in Chile is not nearly as strong as the coffee in Brasil, so we had to live with weak coffee all week. We also found the wonderful delicacy of pan chileno (Chilean bread) that melts in your mouth. I could have eaten it for every meal!
We took a city tour around Santiago. We drove by several historic landmarks, and I understood little of our guide’s “Portanhol” (that would be Portuguese mixed with Spanish). We went into a coffee bar (around Santiago some of them are called “café con pernas” which means “coffee with legs”) and were a little shocked at what we found inside. It definitely was not a place for ladies -- there wasn’t even a women’s bathroom! There was one man in our tour group who insisted on talking politics with our guide. We got to see the Chilean army marching in a park, and the man made some very obnoxious comments about how the army was a job for people who couldn’t find any other job. That was just the beginning, but our tour guide finally gave him what for with a 5-point speech. The rest of our group was eternally grateful.
At the end of the tour, they dropped us off at the mall, where Amy and I got some great shopping done. I was very surprised at the number of American (and worldwide) brand names that were in stores. We had walked around the mall for a good while and lo and behold, there was a Starbucks! We don’t have Starbucks here in Brasil, and so it was a great taste of home for us.
After we left the mall, we took a metrobus to the metro station. It was amazing that we could get on a bus (we weren’t really sure where it was going but it said metro on it), get to the metro station safely, and get on the metro and get home, all without worrying about where we were or whether our purses would get stolen.
For dinner, we went to a fun little restaurant called “Aqui Esta Coco.” It’s apparently really popular and we should have made reservations. We showed up at 8pm (Chileans eat late) and they had a table left in the wine cellar. Apparently that’s where they put the tourists. We didn’t mind, though. I had a wonderful dinner -- a swordfish steak marinated in black butter with capers. Mmmmm! When we were finishing our meals, the man at the next table asked if he and his friend could come to sit with us (because they were in the corner and it was apparently cold and drafty). The man was from Belgium, and his friend was Russian-Italian and lived in Buenos Aires, Argentina. We didn’t mind a bit, and we stayed and talked with them while they ate. We got into some very interesting discussions and thoroughly enjoyed exchanging ideas with people from other parts of the world.

Chile, Day 3

We woke up early and had breakfast (more of that wonderful bread!) and set off to explore the city. Santa Lucia was our first stop. Cerro Santa Lucia is the hill that Chile was founded on, and it is named for the saint of the date that Valdivia arrived there (Dec. 13). On the hill sits a yellow baroque castle with a fountain and statue of King Neptune. From the top of the hill, you can see the entire city and the Andes mountains that surround Santiago. Our next stop was the Museum of Bellas Artes. There were several interesting exhibits inside, and the museum was small enough to walk through and not have what I like to call “art overload.” We found a restaurant right behind the museum that we had been researching, called “Atelier del Arte.” Their menu items are named after famous artists and the restaurant is in a bright orange house that is strikingly different than the rest of the décor on the street. The menus are artists’ palettes complete with paintbrushes.
After lunch, we headed to the central market, where they sell fresh seafood and fruit and vegetables. We were accosted by several different waiters from the market’s 2 main restaurants, which are in the middle of all the booths. We had a really hard time convincing them that we weren’t hungry and didn’t want to eat again. Walking across the river from the market took us to Rua Bellavista, where there are several tourist shops full of lapis lazuli, a deep blue stone that is only found in Chile and Afghanistan. Unfortunately, where we were, there were no tourist shops to be found, so we walked for quite a while in search of them. Upon not finding any, we turned up Pio Nono towards Cerro San Cristobal. Since we were there, we took the funicular (a cable-operated train) to the top of the mountain, where we were treated to the strange view of palm trees on a backdrop of snow-covered mountains. We finally found shops that were to our liking and got some souvenirs and headed back to the hotel.
For dinner, we went to Applebee’s (only open 2 weeks) with some missionaries that we know. It was a strange thing to be in Applebee’s in Chile, even though the food was the same (and very good!)

Chile, Day 4

Ski day. We got started about 8:45, and I didn’t think we were ever going to get out of Santiago with the morning traffic. The road up into the Andes is thin and perilous, and I’m glad our driver didn’t have a death wish! I kept wondering how we were going to get up into the snowy part of the mountains, because when we started up the mountain, it was all desert, complete with cacti. We made the ascent far away from the smog of Santiago, and the mountain view was beautiful. We stopped almost all the way up to put chains on our tires. It was a sort of party, what with 10-15 cars stopped on the road doing just that.
When we arrived at Valle Nevado, I was definitely amazed at the ski slopes. They were nothing like they are in the Rockies, for the Rockies have trees. There were no trees here marking the trails and there was a lot of skiable area that wasn’t marked as a trail. We got checked in and started skiing and I was right -- it’s like riding a bike -- you don’t forget how to ski, which is kind of nice, because I hadn’t been snow skiing in 15 years.
We skied until about 4pm with a stop for a light lunch halfway through. We realized right before lunch that we had forgotten to get the key out of our locker, but when we checked, our stuff was fine. It is a place so different than Rio. We arrived back at the hotel sore and tired after a great day.

Chile, Day 5

We headed to Starbucks (what a dream!) and spent an hour or so there reading about the history of Chile. Yes, after our trip was almost over. We had an uneventful flight back to Brasil except for the PF (Policia Federal) agent who told me that six months out of the year was a long time to stay in Brasil. I always get a little nervous when it comes to immigration. But favor won out, and we got through with no problems. All in all, the trip to Chile was worth it and I would recommend it (both Santiago and the skiing) to anyone who wants a relaxing vacation.

Vacation

And a well-deserved one, at that. My roommate and I, after 3 busy months of teams, are headed to Chile tomorrow. We are going skiing at Valle Nevado, the largest ski resort in the southern hemisphere, and will hang out in Santiago for a couple of days. May we have good rest and not break any bones.

Things That Go Bump in the Night

Every day is an adventure here, just some more than most. Last night was a really weird one -- we have an interfone (where someone rings the bell at the gate, and you can pick up a phone in your house and talk to them and let them in or not), and the telephone part isn't working. Someone decided that they desperately needed us to let them in the gate, and so they pressed and held onto the button. More than once. It got really frustrating after awhile knowing that I couldn't do anything about that, but it finally stopped.
About 20 minutes later (because it was definitely one thing after another), our doorbell started ringing. After a few times my roommate asked me to go downstairs with her to see who was at the door. We looked outside, and there was no one there. Creepy.... We called Ray (one of the missionaries that we work with) and he came to look at our doorbell, which by this point was ringing about once every 3 minutes. He took the box off the bricks outside, and lo and behold! There were animals that had gotten in there (a lizard and a spider). You would have thought they were poisonous. We are now doorbell-free and sleeping well.

So I am the type of person who likes lists. I like to make them and I like to check them off. I have to confess that I have been trying to do that in relationships (not to mention everyday life, some of which requires an agenda -- writing things down and actually getting them done). My errant thinking consisted in thoughts that there was a "right" way to be in a relationship or that there was a cookie-cutter mold that I and this other person were supposed to fit into. That includes both friends and family.
I am learning that I can't put relationships in a box, just as I can't put people in a box. Limits are good, and confinement is bad. Confining someone else to our own opinions and thoughts of them is like putting a goldfish in a small bowl. Our knowledge of them (and theirs of us) only grows as much as we will let it. And if there is no room to grow, whatever we have boxed in will eventually die.
Relationships are so much more than a list -- they are the stuff our lives are made of. They may last until death, or they may be given to us for a shorter time. What I am learning is that I should enjoy them for the gifts that they are.

Back home

I am back in Brasil now, and I am settled in. I have only been here for 3 days, though, so I am still having the "what am I thinking" moments. Last year I was ready to leave home. This year I was ready to come back to Brasil, even though I have left so many things at home behind. It was easier somehow, knowing where I would be living and who I would be working with, and how to get around the airport if anything happened and I couldn't find anyone who spoke English.
Feels like home!

Resting

I am discovering that resting is tough. I feel like I always have my eye on what's next, whether I know what's next or not. Psalm 46:10 says "Be still and know that I am God." Paul said "I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances" (Phil. 4:11). I am perfectly content, but I want to know what's next! There comes the tough part of resting. But why in the world would God tell me what's next if it's not time to know? I mean, I already have enough to worry about for today -- why worry about things that I don't know about? Why worry about things that the Lord hasn't showed me yet? Yeah, it does sound pretty ridiculous.
I am discovering also that most of the things that I worry about are things that others don't even notice. And there I've gone and done all that worrying for nothing.

Struggling for what?

I thought at one time that my struggles make me less of a disciple and Christian, for they don't (read: aren't supposed to) struggle. Then I remember that Christ struggled. I think of His agony in the garden. I think of His decision to be born of a teenager named Mary in a stable in Bethlehem. The disciples struggled. The giants of the faith struggled. Much more is said about the state of my soul if I don't struggle. The defining characteristic of their lives was that they always returned to the Word of God and His promises. They had in mind that He has a plan, and that it is best, no matter how senseless it seemed to them at the time. They acted based on what they knew was a reality from eternity. They acted based both on what they had seen and the things that they had read in His word. And so I should follow their example.

I am beginning to realize that the less uptight I am about myself, the less uptight most other people seem to be. I don't like feeling like I have to "behave," and I don't like being on the defensive about my own behavior. And so I choose to be me. It's the easiest way to do things.

Life made "right"?

"Concentrate on your relationship with God right and everything else will fall into place."
This phrase has never bothered me before, but today it struck me as problematic. Most of the time that I've heard it (and said it) it's been used in reference to a romantic relationship. I am beginning to realize that our relationship with God cannot be a means to an end; it must be the end itself. I want more than anything for the Lord's will to be done, and it will be done regardless of my relationship with Him. He gives me a chance to be a part of it, and why wouldn't I want to join in? That is what concentrating on our relationship with God is -- getting to know Him and enjoy Him for His own sake, and because He is worthy of praise and enjoyment, not for the material comforts and advantages that He can give us.
Give God His due, and He will give you Himself.