in the face of fear, unpack.

"Aren't you afraid?" is without a doubt the most common question we receive when we visit churches and conferences in North America.

"Aren't you afraid for your children?"

For twelve years I have been able to say honestly, "We aren't!  Haiti is a beautiful place full of beautiful people and we trust in the Lord and He gives us His peace and we are not afraid."

Then a few days ago I sat in a Zoey's Kitchen with a cold can of seltzer water and a beautiful bowl of veggies and chicken and tears were pouring down my face, unexpectedly sharing with Elisa a dark night I hadn't shared with anyone, not even Matt.

I didn't want to tell you because I didn't want YOU to be afraid. I didn't want to tell you because I looked down when I should have looked up.

But I was afraid, once.

We talked a lot in February and March about how difficult things in Haiti had become (she is almost there again, family, pray with us). 

Haiti is in a season we've (Matt and I) never experienced before, threats and fear being welded by a few, keeping the masses frozen and terrified.  Keeping the roads blocked, keeping schools shut down, keeping men and women from going to work, keeping children from going outside, keeping businesses from opening.

For weeks on end, an entire country began her mornings with texts on our phones, if you send your children to school today, write their names on the soles of their feet, so you'll be able to identify their bodies.

For weeks on end, messages filtered through media and radio and mouth to mouth, if you send your husband to work today, be sure to kiss him goodbye one last time.  

Rumors of murders, rumors of chaos. Road blocks and rocks flying and shattered glass and burning tires blocking the way and heightening the fear.  No fuel, shutting down everything, persisting, contributing to the fear. Belony hit by a bottle on his way home from work.  Jodenel being unable to get home at all. Maurice sliced by a flying bottle, walking around smoldering piles of rubber with the girls to go to church.

Every day, wondering, asking, calling around...could the girls go to school today? Could our students come? Would the road be open? Would the schools be open?  Every morning, calling around, asking around, is there fuel? Where is it? How much?

Every day, hearing more, seeing more, wondering more...what if there is no fuel for weeks on end? What if we can't get food? What if food can't get to us? What if things get desperate? What if we can't get out for weeks on end? What if the airlines keep not flying? What about all the dark embassy reports?  Where was the UN? What about all of our precious friends and family? What about when the cell phone network runs out of fuel? The internet providers?

But it wasn't pondering these things or hearing these things or talking with trusted, beloved Haitain friends that really got to me.  We stayed home, as did our Haitian friends, as did most of Haiti, and clung to the Lord and provided 'normal' for our kids and shared all we had and trusted and prayed and caught up.

But it was when everyone started leaving that I got shook.  When family after family, couple after couple, mission after mission started evacuating, I started to feel sick.  Each day, it was stories of another family, of teams, visitors, business people, missionaries, friends and acquaintances buying tickets for today, leaving now. Even being life-flighted, emergency evacuated, more stories.  Not of strangers, anymore, but friends.

Let me say: everyone in Haiti is in a different situations in different areas of Haiti doing different ministries with different relationships and different resources and everyone had to pray and be wise and be faithful to the Lord for themselves. Neither staying nor going was right for everyone, and HOW everyone stayed or went was far more important than if.

But Matt and I had been praying without ceasing, asking and listening and evaluating and researching, thinking and searching His Word. We were seeking good advice from trusted ones. We were clinging to Him, and experiencing His peace, trusting Him and fully receiving His calm. We were led, again and again, to be calm and courageous and to encourage our Haitian brothers and sisters not only with our presence, but with our words and hospitality, our teaching and preaching and relationships. He confirmed it, many times, that we were right where we needed to be for such a time as this. He established it in our hearts, individually and collectively.  He even confirmed it through vibrant Sunday morning worship service in which the pastor held my hand and said to me exactly what I'd felt so led in: "I know this is a scary time, but you being here today, walking here, worshipping with us, among us in trial, it is a great encouragement to us."

I was clinging to my small mustard seed of faith as the dark cloud around us pressed in, persisted, pushed.  It was one hour at a time season, trusting Him. He was sustaining me, I was asking Him to, and He was.

Then one evening I took my eyes off his face to check out the stormy waves under me, and fear filled me.

Some main players in our lives evacuated unexpectedly that morning. Heavy and hard stories and news reached our ears continually throughout the day. There seemed to be NO end in sight. We hadn't left the campus for several weeks except to walk to church and to friends' homes in the village. We'd had to cancel classes for several days, the girls hadn't been to school in weeks. The constant unknowns were wearing on me.

And as I headed to bed that night after Matt was already asleep, I panicked.  I looked at my beautiful, fragile, sleeping children, one after another, touching their hands and faces. I thought about how things were getting so bad that it might already be too late to evacuate, that there might not be flights for a good while. I let my mind wander into all that COULD happen, maybe, shudder. 

Suddenly, I was suffocating.

I was afraid.

I put my cell phone in my teeth, and by it's flashlight I pulled out our rugged, worn suitcases from the guest bedroom and starting flipping through the girls' drawers rapidly, pulling out t-shirts and shorts, grabbing our pouch of passports, digging through desk drawers for cash. Sick to my stomach and with shaking hands, fear started me packing.

I was right in the middle of Sofie's drawer, two bags down, rapidly rolling her soft purple pajama shorts into a fold when His still small voice echoed powerfully right into the heart of my fear.

Not. Like. This.

The phrase pounded in my ears and my frantic packing froze.

Not like this.  There might be a time and there might be a day, but you're not packing, you're not leaving, because of fear.

Rarely instantaneous, His peace-that-passes-understanding flooded in and cast fear out, and I immediately, immediately, put her shorts back in her drawer.

Quickly, steadily, I unpacked all the bags, put every last thing in their place and the passports back in the drawer, and went to bed, His gift of SLEEP.

And the next morning, instead of getting on a plane, we got on a wooden boat and went to the beach.

In a strange way--in the middle of the storm, unafraid--that day was my leap of faith and act of trust.   In the midst of the world's danger, He gifted me, just hours after such fear, with His beauty and with peace and with laughter.

Why am I telling you all this now?

Because listen.

I don't know all the fears you're facing, just like you didn't know all the fears I was. And I can't tell you that I stood faithful when instead of taking my fears to Him I took to packing my bags.

But I CAN tell you that if we seek His voice in the middle of dark nights, when we falter, He will speak to us, and His voice, His peace is ALL we need.   

I can tell you that when we give in to fear, even for a moment, even for "good reasons", even when everyone thinks we should, that it eats us alive.

I can tell you that when we don't take every thought captive, when we play around with all the "what-ifs", when we allow ourselves AFTER His peace and direction to think our own thoughts...it will lead to fear, that which the Bible tells us hundreds of times not to allow, for His glory and for our own good.

There is His way for you today : His way for you in dealing with your marriage, His way for you in handling children gone astray, His way for you in confronting your fears, His way for you in reconciliation, His way for you in your singleness, in your finances, His way for you in your parenting, His way for you in handling our pasts and our presents and our futures, there is His way for us in the face of fear.

And it's the only way.

If you're trying to handle it on your own, if you're looking at your feet instead of looking full in His face, if you're trying to do your best on your own strength, if you're acting out of fear and what-ifs,  trying to control the situation in your own way, trying to hold your flashlight in your teeth in the dark with shaky hands...

Not. Like. This, family.

Cling to that mustard seed of faith. Help our unbelief. He can redeem your marriage, He's at work for your children. He can be trusted, He's got your family, He's got those families, too.  God knows your situation and He affirms that He is there, and love. He knows what He is doing, God was in your past, your present, your future, and His perfect love casts out our fear.

Beloved ones, unpack.

The private faithfulness in our midnights MATTERS.

May we be free from the fear that suffocates our hope and overshadows our peace, and be free from the fear that causes us to run away, instead of drawing boldly to His throne of grace, that we might receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need (Hebrews 4:16).

Great things can He do through the lives of those who, most of all, simply trust Him.

You're such gracious family. Thank you for allowing me to share.