The Fine Balance

I am a fan of little things.  It seems that little things, when truly appreciated, are for more reliable for bringing pleasure while the big things that we wait upon with great expectation are liable to disappoint.  And so, I am starting a list of little pleasures in life, things I really enjoy and for which I feel grateful.  If I can figure out how maybe I’ll keep it ongoing.  Anyway, I would love to hear about little, simple things that make you happy too so please leave feedback.  

-  It rained yesterday, bringing fresh scents and cool air.

-  Pide Nale, a spunky, little, old woman from Lassa Tchou.

-  My daughters’ laughter.

-  My husband’s quirky (and sometimes truly genius) sense of humor.

-  Coffee and a good book on a quiet, rainy day.

-  Good memories.

-  Candid shots (sorry Becky!)

I’ll stop there for now.  One more thing, I changed my blog title as I was convinced by my veteran blogging friends that it needed to have some significance.  Thus, the new title is The Fine Balance and refers to an incredible book I read last year by Rohinton Mistry.  So maybe I’ll write more on that another time.  (Becky, Andrea, and Tracey, did you catch that I started the last sentence with “So…”?)  

I was Skype chatting with a friend last night and our conversation led me to reflect on how much Mark and I have grown in our marriage over the last almost 12 years.  I feel so incredibly blessed that God has been so patient and faithful to work in each of us as individuals and as a couple, and I can’t imagine what married life would be like without his hand to daily “transform us into His likeness.”  There was a time when it was so hard and took so much time and emotional energy to communicate and get on the same page, now that communication has become essential to providing clarity and perspective to my own thoughts and feelings.  I love talking to Mark, I love how he listens, I love hearing his thoughts and feelings, and I love how God has given me someone who knows me so well and loves me so much that I can trust him implicitly with the inner workings of my mind and heart.  

This post could sound very boastful, but I would imagine that those of you who have known Mark and me for the last 12 years take it in a completely different way.  I think that the work God has done in us is very apparent and that there is a visible difference in how we relate to each other.  It is amazing and beautiful that God weaves people together in such a way and I am just grateful to experience that!

Having entered into my mid-thirties I feel like I am just now gaining perspective on long term investments that don’t reap immediate rewards.  Marriage and parenting are definitely like that.  There are a few short cuts you can try to take along the way, and they might seem tempting, but the results of putting the effort into doing things God’s way are beyond comparison!

I just got back from a weekend in Lome with my team girlfriends.  It was pretty much a textbook girlie trip with food, shopping, and lots of laying on the beach.  Those of you who know Lome probably don’t think of it as the ideal get away spot, but we really lucked out on the hotel, food, and beach- the weekend was really great.  

Most of all, I am impacted by how my teammates reflect Christ in their relationships with one another.  The conversations go deep and are sometimes tough.  They don’t gloss over things with each other and really get down to the root of things.  Sometimes hard questions are asked and sometimes hard answers are given, but there is always love, grace, and genuine communion throughout the process.  I don’t know that I’ve ever seen people interact with such a high level of being engaged, with such integrity, so consistently for such a duration of time through such intense situations.  It is not always easy, and some might say it’s not “pretty”, but I believe the relationships I witness here are beautiful to God.  I admire the commitment my teammates have to each other, to this work, and most of all to Christ.  I admire their ability to praise God and enjoy the immense blessings he sheds on us and also to persevere and grow from the sufferings they endure.  Wow, I find myself gushing about them and that isn’t what I thought I was going to write.  Oh well, I guess it’s just an outpouring of some things in my heart so, here it is.  

Thanks Andrea, Becky, and Tracey for a great weekend that was relaxing, fun, refreshing, and nourishing.  Thanks for sharing your lives and your spiritual walk with me and teaching me how to walk and relate to others with an intense integrity that brings me closer to Christ.  

Admittedly, neither Mark nor I are very money minded.  Our career choices certainly tell the tale, undergrad degrees in Fine Arts and Elementary Education, graduate degrees in religion and education- these are not fields where we will earn millions!  Due to our recent move to West Africa we have been trying to sell our house in Memphis.  It is a beautiful house in my opinion, a 1926 Arts and Crafts Bungalo with all the charm and more space than one could expect.  We were thrilled to find out that we had an offer on the house after only being on the market about six weeks, and that it was close to what we were hoping to get.  That seemed too good to be true in the current housing market, but alas the charms of well preserved 1926 Bungalo are strong.   Last week we found out that our “bonne chance” took a southward turn.  Unbeknownst to us, the house failed to pass inspection and has several code violations that originated with the people who restored the house and then sold it to us.  The result is that we will be paying out ?thousand dollars to correct these problems and sell the house.  The thoughts and feelings that issued forth from this news have had me thinking about the nature of man in the midst of bad tidings.  As we have talked with people there is such a tendency to place blame.  The question seems to be “how did this happen?” and “who is to blame?”  Was it the people who rehabbed and sold us the house being sneaky and trying to get things by us?  Were we to blame for not being more vigilant about the state of the house?  Was it the fault of our realtor for not seeing to it that these things were not overlooked?  Or was it, as I am inclined to believe, some combination of all of those factors? When I analyze my own thought processes I am convicted of one thing, that I want to place blame on the person I like least regardless of true logic.  I was not very fond of the people who sold us the house because they had made some remarks that betrayed racial prejudice and conveyed an attitude of WASP elitism.  I don’t want to blame our realtor because I liked him and felt like he had a lot of integrity, but when I think about it I would certainly have expected him to make sure that we covered all of our bases.  Of course I don’t want to accept blame myself, but in the end we were probably a little too trusting.   This all does not seem like like a huge deal to me (we’ll see if I feel that way when we find out what the final bill is!)  After all, we are where we want to be and it will be a blessing to be free of that financial obligation.  As long as we can make it day to day we are doing well, and God has always been faithful to meet our needs.  

  There are so many things for which to be grateful right now.  School is going well and we are teaching about water and the well project.  I love teaching on themes and being able to apply them directly to relevant, real-life experiences, and I also pray that our kids will see themselves as a part of the work here and know that we are here to really help people.  I want them to see God’s love, compassion, and mercy at work and to take it with them through life.  We are also preparing for an open house at school and so our class has been practicing for it.  I cannot divulge any details  as my students’ parents make up the primary constituency of my readership, but trust me when I say that these kids are gonna be adorable.  Certainly pictures are upcoming on that subject!Last night we had dinner with some friends from an NGO called Hope Through Health that is very active here.  We have been working with them some to provide help for some orphans in one of the villages, and we are talking with them about expanding our relationship.  Over the last couple of years I have realized that I have very strong feelings on the idea of wholistic ministry.  I don’t understand how one separates the physical, social, spiritual, emotional well being from one another.  They are interdependent.  Reflecting on my own life has led me to believe that integrating our walk with Christ into every aspect of living is the way to know him more fully and to experience his presence and grace and compassion constantly.  It is exciting to be a part of the Mission to the Kabiye at this time, when I can build on the amazing foundation God has laid by the work of our teammates and the churches here.  Hope Through Health is already changing lives, and our team has seen God change lives in the churches, it is so humbling to be a part of it all.  Life in Africa feels always so extreme; there is such extreme suffering and hardship all around me, and yet such extreme joy when God redeems those hardships and uses us in the process.  The juxtaposition of the joy and sorrow make life here very rich, and I praise God for it.