courageous

Haiti always kinda brings out the boldness in me. It always makes my excuses surface...and look pathetic. Makes my Christianity feel cushy. Makes my faith seem dimmer than it should be.

I get frustrated with a few things at my church...and then my Haitian brothers and sisters pass me on the way there, walking miles to get there, carrying their chairs on their heads. They've been waiting all week to gather together, and they're gonna be there, whatever the cost. They're gonna sing like heaven's already here, dance like they're bringing glory down, clap like the rhythms of life are His.

I get shrunk by disappointments and losses in my own life...and then my Haiti people are kissing loved ones goodbye from treatable, minor illnesses because the hospitals are shut down and gang-burned. They are investing everything in one another, and then losing one another to the Bahamas, Mexico, Brazil, Turks and Caicos, the US, anywhere that perhaps could offer a job or safety or a little money to send home. People work hard to earn a little money to send their kids to school...and then threats and dangers rage, shutting down schools again and again and keeping kiddos home. 

I think it takes courage to post a truth on FB or to confront a friend...and then the students at Emmaus tell me about what they have overcome to be there, about mothers and fathers who have rejected them, entirely, about threats and curses and hardships that would have crippled and done me in. 

I think there are areas where I'm giving enough, doing enough, praying enough, stretching enough, and Haiti reminds me every time I'm there that it's not. When the One we follow gave everything, and asks everything, when following Him costs many everything...so much of my "good enough" suddenly feels so pathetic. 

What excuses do we live by? We're tired...money's tight...it's someone else's turn...no one expects us to do that...we don't feel like it...people will think it's weird...we don't want to do it alone...we have good reason not to forgive...we have our own problems without worrying about someone else's...we're afraid...we're worried. We're content. 

I've had a lot of these excuses in my life these past seasons, and since coming back from Haiti I keep envisioning myself seeing Him face to face and sharing my reasons for smallness. My reasons for dimness. My excuses for blandness. When I see the global church, persecuted and hungry and weary and I see His precious face, I bite my tongue on my excuses. I stand before Him and I have none.

What are we praying for that we're not ready for Him to do? What are we asking Him to do that we're not prepared to vessel? What am I wanting to see from the church that I'm not churching myself? What am I complaining about that I wouldn't in front of Him? What am I praying for that I'm not meanwhile preparing for Him to do? What am I giving to Him and then trying to sneak in the back door and keep worrying about? What is not evil...but junk, and why's it tolerated?

It's not far from my dishwashing vision of the praying pastor's wife...if godly and holy and obedient and radiant-unto-Him looks any different than our lives do today...what's our excuse?  Do we want it? 

I am grateful for the country that always reminds me that He is who He says He is, and that He's asking what His Word says He is asking. 

It all gets complicated and cluttered until it's mud huts and food for the day and walking dirt roads by faith and trusting Him for tomorrow. It all gets entitled and comfortable until there are churches of beheaded Christ-confessors, and men and women risking their lives to be the Gospel and homes who do not have enough, hemming in orphans and widows and refugees and homeless. It all gets cushy and easy until we take His Word at His Word and let it highlight all the allowances we've given ourselves that He never did. 

I'm thankful for a few days away to process what all that means! I'm thankful for our Haitian family, encouraging me to be deeply rooted, sincere and brave...just by being themselves.