all together now

A few evenings ago Matt was teaching from Acts when he mentioned several experiences in Haiti that utterly lacked privacy or personal space, but were totally transformed and beautiful through vulnerability and community. 

Our things, our time, our gifts, our talents, he said, aren't ours, but His. We're only stewarding them for Him and His glory. Even our space and our privacy are not our own, but His to use.

As he spoke I was transported immediately to the sweltering night in July when Ben was born, truly one of the sweetest, most painful experiences of my life. 

I labored through the sticky night after putting the girls to sleep across the hall, and when morning light woke them, they found the baby they'd been praying for in bed with mom and dad. I emerged later that day to stretch, sunshine, and introduce our curious village of Saccanville to its newest Haitian creation. As I meandered to the front gate, I found Yves, tall and chiseled by sun and labor and age and life, and just as gentle as he was hardened. 

As soon as he saw Ben's fuzzy head, he broke into his signature grin, and I announced "Brother Yves! The baby has been born!" 

I know, he smiled. Just after 1 am.

A bit baffled, I continued giving the information culturally expected. It was a hard labor, but not long. A boy, as expected. All is well!

I know, he smiled again down at Ben.

Robbed, I started to walk towards the cafeteria to see the ladies.

Well, tell the village! I called back.

I already did! he beamed. At sunrise!

I turned right back around and confronted the mystery.

Turns out, while I was laboring and while the littles slept...screens in the huge open windows of our block home...Yves was walking the campus. Night watchman... bringing Psalm 130:6 to a whole new level since moving to Haiti ten years before. 

He lit the way at 11:30 pm for Matt when he ran next door to find the midwife. He watched the lights come on inside our home at midnight. He circled our house silently in watch care and in prayer, and asked the others to do the same, and sent one to alert the wives to be praying.  

He heard Ben's cries at 1, and watched our house grow dark by 2. 

Yves had circled and watched and prayed, all night...a sacred violation of privacy vs. an announcement of Facebook three days later. 

I have often shared with Ben that a village prayed over his birth, and how men and women joyfully participated in his coming, supernaturally giving me the peace and power needed to deliver a 9+ pound baby in the middle of such political unrest that the road to the hospital was cut by burning tires in three places. 

I'll never forget it. 

And I'll always stand for our circles, our times of agony, our private spaces being for one another to guard and hold and circle in prayer...not stand at a distance. 

What I wrote in 2018...

While I labored through the most agonizing night of my life, no question, God was there in the middle, watching over me.  Yves was walking around Emmaus, encircling me in his prayers, many of you have written or called or texted to tell me that throughout the nights, you have awoken again and again and deliberately turned your midnight prayers to us. 

In the middle of a stifling, mud-hut village with only three beside me, many, many were, and even moreso, the Great God of the highest heavens, Watchman of our Nights and Bringer of the Morning, He was H-E-R-E and waiting and watching and in the middle, and brought peace.

What can preach better than Yves, that we might wait upon the Lord and lift each other unceasingly upward, waiting upon the Light intensely? 

What can preach better than Ben, that in a country and a time so broken and dark, in a night so full of pain and despair, God brings the most intricate beauty and provision and peace, that He comes and comes and comes among us in unexpected ways and in painful nights, transforming them?

What can preach better than our lives, God in the middle? 

history

A few weeks ago, my dad's wife sold their home and moved into something better suited quite quickly, and my sister drove from PA to OH to grab any last of dad's things we hoped not to lose in the transition. Little by little Lisa's been going through boxes, and she texted me yesterday telling me that she had a box of binders of every single blog I ever wrote, printed every time I posted. 

In case the internet lost them one day, Dad had them. 

I wrote the blog very first for him. We had moved to Quebec for language and cultural training, then straight to Haiti, and phone was hard, emails were being copied and pasted to him, my sister, my aunt and few supporters and friends, and I finally began a small "MattStaceyHaiti" blog so the daily updates could be found in one place. 

There wasn't a time in Haiti when I finally hit "publish" that I didn't picture dad, glasses down his nose, reading it and answering his questions. I didn't know he first hit "print" and then read it and saved it and shared it. 

What I started for him quickly became apparent was actually for me. I am confident that many of our experiences in Haiti that could have been considered traumatic and perhaps a part of me still, were processed and released instead within days or weeks because of writing. 

How can I explain this to dad? I often wondered, and as I did, I found the Lord, I found hope, I found prayers, I found words. 

I often told people that by the time they read about it, I had, in many ways, worked it through and surrendered it. 

The other main question was always, What is the Lord trying to teach me? and how often writing has helped me find Him, again and again. 

It was my mom, when I came home from that first missions trip on fire for the Lord and cold over the idea of college, training, and preparation, who probably tearfully surrendered all my previous music performance dreams and convinced me I SHOULD get some further education first. As in, gave me no choice :) When bewildered over what to study if music was fading, she said, "I always thought you were good at writing?" Frustrated over the delay to be off to the mission field, I poured through the list of majors at Asbury, and checked "Journalism" because I figured if I had to get a degree, I could probably journal, and that was it.

And ever since, Dad was collecting and reading and praying, and even when I felt so far away I wasn't sure ANYONE was listening, or cared...I wrote for Dad, and in search of the Father. I know there were writings hard to read, and I know some seasons were incredibly busy and broken for him. But he always drew close, and never did we speak on the phone that I repeated anything I had written...he already knew. It's why he was calling or coming. 

In a box in an empty basement are binders and binders of my silly blogs. 

And when you lose your parents, you never stop missing having ridiculous fans like that.  

the painful places

 My sophomore year at Asbury my mama was diagnosed with a rare, aggressive form of leukemia. Every weekend I drove from Asbury University to the Cleveland Clinic and back again until I finally withdrew to fight her last months alongside. 

Came back the next semester and fell in love with Matt Ayars at the cereal bar. (He was so cute. And understood grieving with me vs. uncomfortable avoidance.)

So crippled and heavy by grief and brokenness, I withdrew again and spent 6 months in Port-au-Prince where the Lord absolutely met me with true healing and hope and a call for my life, not finished. 

Back to Asbury, eyes on the missionfield, poured into by many, on purpose….then One Mission Society….then married that good man…then graduated in Journalism and Foreign Missions and on to Haiti. 

And for 20 years I have avoided going back to Asbury—sweet and sacred though she carried me five years—because my mama moved me in and never came back. Because my dad’s eyes, in all the Asbury years, were dark and hollow and lost. Because I have always regretted I wasn’t there for my siblings that season. Because I was utterly broken down and painfully rebuilt those years. It was the hardest time in my life, and easiest to bless it, move on and put behind.

This week, with four teens, my dear friend and that same man from the cereal bar….it was time. Past time. Somehow in a blink my own babies are trying to decide where to do their launching and stretching and calling, and no way we weren’t visiting Asbury University.

We had lunch with the sincere and humble president and with the gracious and brilliant provost (who sent me a precious gift when my dad died, having never even met me). We worshiped in the senior section, all the memories of hymns and convictions and the opening of eyes just rushing in. 

We toured the buildings, old and new and remembered dozens of little stories I’d long forgotten. We toured the equine center and saw a baby calf born. We providentially reconnected with BOTH our RD’s and even in those rich conversations did He pour healing! We tucked all the kids into the OMS student center, dripping with photos and stories of mission fields waiting for beautiful feet to bring Good News. 

We stayed at the seminary where my parents always stayed, ate at the restaurant where Matt worked all four years, walked in the Shaker Village sunshine my mom loved so much, poked our heads in the classrooms that grew us, found our pictures in the basement of Hughes, and—the moment that flooded me most—toured the women’s dorms with giggling girls. 

For all the life-changing education and chapel services and cereal bar experiences, that dorm, that 2nd Glide hallway, that was where God walked with me. Became my daily bread. Became my constant companion. That was where I tested Him and found Him faithful. Room 215, four years, that was where He ceased being just my parents’ Lord and became mine. Standing in that hall yesterday, literally stepping over girls sitting on the floor talking and praying together, that was ME a minute ago. Who we REALLY are with Jesus is who we are HOME.  

God brought so much grace, growth, mercy, friendship and love to my life through Asbury University, and when I finally forced myself to face the painful place…it wasn’t. 

All I can see now is His gracious, steady and loving hand in my life. What peace trusting the slow work of God brings me for these beautiful teenagers, in His hands.

Betsy, breath and bones

Ah, my dear friend was finally freed from all her suffering today, once and for all and for always. But my heavens doesn't it ache. 

Praying for Betsy has become the Ayars family way. Every family devotion in the morning, every bedtime prayer. Every prayer list, every single day. Always. For almost 3 years. 

I've joked with her along the way that praying for her has gone from our lips and our dinner prayers down to our breath and our bones...praying for Betsy, a part of who we are. In and out prayers. Praying without ceasing. I'm so thankful for the way praying for Betsy has grown and shaped our family.

I'm most thankful for how Betsy has grown and shaped me. Many a time have I asked her what to do with these teenagers! She hosted my struggling-to-celebrate baby shower for Emma and poured in grace. More than once she has shown up unannounced with a crate of berries and mangoes for the Haitian kids and plopped down for an hour of laughter and tears. We'd go to breakfast and stay 'till lunch, she showed up several times at events she had NO interest in simply because we needed a person to show up for us, I sat in a gas station parking lot for an hour in the rain as she vulnerably poured out an intimate and very real encounter with the Lord, she brought me a bowl she was certain the Lord told her to bring me (which I will cherish always). 

She brought me blueberry bushes when Dad died, something beautiful and provisional to carry on, dinner when Nora was in the hospital, again when Emma was, always with fancy desserts...and we never had a conversation that wasn't meaningful. She made it meaningful. The point was meaningful. She never chatted to fill the space, but used her life to meet yours and pour in Jesus. 

Betsy was never afraid to face the pain, to share her pain, or to step into mine. She saw the places I was hurting, and brought light in. She never seemed to worry about saying the right thing...just pointing to Jesus in it, and sharing what He was sharing with her. Betsy wasn't worried about showing up the wrong way, just sitting with you. She also wasn't worried about sharing HER pain the right or comfortable way. Just allowing you the sacred space of carrying it with her. Never apologizing for pain or tears. 

The last time she came, her face was glowing. Visually. It's like the closer she came to Jesus and to leaving her failing body, the more she looked like she'd been with Him. I told her and tears sprang to her eyes. She knew.

He rejoices over her unabashed wholeheartedness in painful places few dared to go.

That's a rare dear friend. And sitting with her, carrying her burdens, praying in my bones, often without words, asking the Lord for and believing for the things she was asking and believing for...was such a sacred privilege. Betsy was really good at running to the sound of pain and pointing out Jesus was already there. 

ALL the healing Betsy was believing for is finally HERS, every ounce. The Lord never failed her and never will. 

Pray with me for her husband, parents, children and friends...in just a moment we'll be with her.

I'll carry her on, in my bones and I hope, in unabashed love. 

listen

It sure was easier back home in Haiti writing about what I was learning!  I was spanning cultures, languages, circles, experiences...making them easier to share.

Here, it all overlaps, and I just can't share as freely what I'm learning, what the challenges and gifts are, how I'm growing and how it's going. Writing's always been how I process, and I've just not been able to do it as openly these state-side seasons. 

But Greg Benson's words are always in my mind during hard seasons, with that annoying but gentle smile  on his face after giving me a few moments to vent or bawl:  So, what's He teaching you? 

He's teaching me to listen to Him. 

He is closer than we think...right down IN the nitty gritty. There is One who knows, One who really sees, One who understands and identifies, and it's His breath in our lungs.  In the times we can't explain, in the times we can't defend, in the times we can't fight, in the times we don't even have the words to pray...He is w-i-t-h us. Mighty God. Tender Father. Precious Friend.

And I'm realizing that He's always speaking. It's been such a heavy season that I've found myself talking to Him continually, asking Him question upon question...asking for help, for clarity, for eyes to see. And He has spoken. Again and again. My thoughts have been going down one road, and suddenly a vision of something entirely different fills my heart. With it comes a gentle flood of peace.  Not a million details. Not an answer to all the questions, but here, hold THIS.  

One by one, I have watched the peace He's given me materialize. Many times the last weeks I have told Matt, "I know this doesn't make sense, and I know it doesn't look like it, but I promise He was clear. He is doing such and such, and we've got to trust Him."

And He IS. He's speaking, still small voice, peace that passes understanding, and we SO often miss it because we are worrying / planning / depressed / distracted / self-medicating / panicking.  

And He has given us His Word to feed, sustain and help us...and we're not taking advantage of it. We can't cite it when we don't know it. We can't cling to it when we're not in it. We can't use it if we're not carrying it, and we can't be satisfied by it if we're not eating it. 

I've been awful missing Haiti this week. We were there a year ago now, and all the pictures popping up bring back far more than that visit. I miss the eternal breeze and sunshine and green, for sure, but I miss more the simple (of the village, of the classroom, of life) and the beauty (of the community and the people). 

Problems were complicated...but it made the trusting of the Lord more simple, especially when everyone was always reminding you He could be trusted. I miss the un-rush. I miss the prayers that always included song. I miss the singing and worship that always including dancing and clapping. I miss a lot of very precious people, inventing our own fun and richness, meals that fed so much, time that seemed so much more, jokes and conversations and prayers in two languages. Dependency on the Lord. 

Writing every other night or so when the littles were in bed.

http://mshaiti.blogspot.com/2017/09/expectant.html

He's the End

I haven't meant to be so absent, but have had two separate colds, a quick family getaway, a college tour, an Ecuador presentation, a Roman soldier day, Ash Wednesday and a lot of normal life in there! Whew. 

My big prayer for stepping away for the weekend was rest for Pastor Dad, and GOOD time with Lily and Sofie...between school, work, cheer and friends, it is SO hard to come by. He met me with walks on the beach with Lily, nights in the hot tub with Sofie, a Sunday off for Matt, and precious time with all the kids...SO needed and thankful.

Without fail, stepping away from daily life and running to where the land ends and the sea begins always puts everything in priority. At the end of the earth, we sit and think and see and remember that HE is the end. That He holds it. That HE is the one telling the waves where to stop. That His is on the throne. 

What I was NOT ready for was all the emotions that came with starting our college tour season. Like, I am NOT old enough, NOT ready, and yet here went my girl-number-one, looking like all the college students, asking questions, walking off...and I realized she's just about there! I groaned to Peggy that I can't be doing college tours AND a three year old, and she responded, "You're young. You'll be find." bahaha. I'm trying.

Another reality that hit me unexpected was just how much my life was shaped by losing mom my freshman year of college. Even as Lily chattered about decorating her dorm room or eating in the cafeteria, so many memories rushed back...and I felt this unexpected sense of my time with her being finished...finished, finished. College for me meant the end of life with my mom. Decorating the dorm room was with her the first time, and alone and just reeling the next several. College life was phone calls and care packages, and weekends taking everyone home for mom to cook...for a second...and then reeling after.  The end of of how and who our family had been. Huge holes of grief speckle that whole sweet four years and being back on a campus and watching mini-me walk the campus just brought back some of that ache, and the realization that subconsciously I keep thinking "off to college" means this is the END. 

and it's not. Not because He has promised me her college years. Or even that He has promised me tomorrow. Because He hasn't. 

But just that He's the end. 

My grief-experience pattern is NOT the reality. He's the reality.

He's the beginning and middle and end, and in HIM our days are. Lily is His, and wherever she goes and whatever she does and however much time I have and whether I can image a future for my kids college-on that I am IN or NOT...He's got it. His hands. I trust Him. His glory. Our good.

It was a sweet day and a healing day and I did cry most of the way home. I'm not ready. 

I don't know that William Carey will be the school...but I LOVE that all these last 14 years of reading every missionary biography out there to my children caught Lily's mission heart for a place founded on William Carey's abandoned life.

 My dear dad's been gone three years this week, and it feels like it's been more like forever. It seems like a lifetime ago since I heard his voice or saw his face. I suppose a lot has happened and changed in the past three years. One of the hardest things this week that I remember also experiencing after losing mom was the realization that very few of the people in our current lives ever met or knew dad. To most of the people in our daily lives, Dad never existed.  Our church is our work and life and ministry and 80% of our community, and Dad never met it, never knew it, was never known. That makes him feel extra far, I suppose. It keeps the Malcolm stories and memories among us so few. 

It fades him.

I hate that. 

And it's not true...he is far more real and as he should be NOW than he ever was among us. Even if Emma doesn't know who we're talking about. Even if I only have a very small handful of people in my life who knew Dad, and an even smaller few who ever knew Mom. It's His reality versus how it feels...and His reality is always the one I'm trying to orient to.  

So I ask the kids what they remember and we eat graham crackers, honey and milk, and I miss having someone to call when we get there safely, someone to bring peace and wisdom to uncertain situations, and someone who called and cared about all the little things with each kid. I miss the man who came when we needed him, who checked on me and then asked to talk to Matt for a while, who always came looking for a to-do list, and the man who always joked after a long conversation that we had "fixed all the world's problems"...and it always felt like we did.

My dad was an imperfect, really good man and dad and grandpa. 

I'm trying to remember until it's all things new and better, and bottomless, and there is no end.

His third way

One morning this week, while the house was still dark and cold and the dear ones were all still sleeping, I looked at the stack of devotionals and Bibles on my desk unopened, and didn't know where to start. I asked the Lord to tell me. 

Lord, I don't know how to do this differently, but I can't keep doing it like I've been. I need you to tell me, like, real specifically, how to handle this painful, complicated situation. Not just be here with me in it.  I need you to SPEAK. I can't handle it anymore. Also can't see any way out of it. So you gotta tell me some third way...and whatever it IS, I'll DO IT.

Ever been there? 

My brain was so blurry and tired in the middle of a too-much week. But the situation I was abandoning to him has been months. Years. At my breaking point. 

I wasn't being in awe or respectful or meek, Lord forgive me. 

But I was being fully abandoned. Fully needing. And fully looking to Him. 

And in the middle of a week of friends surgeries, blueberry cobbler for 70, hosting small group, teenage drama, homeschool, church events, serving in kids ministry, some hard conversations, two days of zoom meetings with the One Mission Society board I am so incredibly honored to serve on, some hard things to carry with Matt...He met me. 

His third way. 

With power and clarity and peace. 

His third way...that way we NEVER see until He shows us...and then it is Absolutely The Solution....that third way that changes our HEARTS, not necessarily our situation..He showed me. 

First, in the designated devotion for exactly that day. Said exactly what I needed to hear as if the author, long dead, knew exactly my situation. Then, in my Bible reading exactly for that day, again, through an author long dead, as if he saw, in verses I've read before, but never like this. And then, through a routine board training I expected to simply "get through", that sliced RIGHT to the heart of the thing and spoke loud and bold and free. 

What I am experiencing, JESUS experienced FIRST.

What has been painful for me, was DEATH for Him. What I have known, He knew far sharper, far better, exactly understands. 

My first peace almost always comes from the realization that the Almighty God understands SO completely and Jesus has lived it SO fully, that I am hemmed in, understood and loved better than I could ever understand..and boldness and courage and comfort and joy meets me there.

My second peace came from His truth. His truth--the one I know but have been overlooking in this situation because I've been clinging to my experience--is truth that CHANGES the hearer. By Jesus and His grace, we ARE equipped to be His witnesses where.stinking.ever we are. WhatEVER situation we are in. WhatEVER difficulty we are facing.  We. Are. Equipped and Accompanied for it. To overcome it. Equipped to look like Him, speak like Him, respond like Him.  What we NEED we HAVE in Him. 

His Word, His Truth, makes what feels like our truth and experience fall to the ground.

That thing you can't carry...bring Him. He's got a third way, and His burden truly is light.  

leave room

 I know I share it every year when I flip my dilapidated copy of My Utmost for His Highest  to January 25th. I'm sharing it again..."Leave Room for God".

Do not look for God to come in a particular way,

but do look for Him.

The way to make room for Him 

is to expect Him to come,

but not in a certain way.

No matter how well we may know God,

the great lesson to learn is that

He may break in at any minute. 

Keep your life so constantly in touch with God

that His surprising power 

can break through at any point.

Live in a constant state of expectancy, 

and leave room for God to come in as He decides.

If it speaks to me every year, I guess I'm wondering why. And I think it's that I forget to be looking for Him.  I get to serving Him and working for Him and trying to love Him...and forget to leave ROOM for Him. forget to be seeing HIS ways...HIS places...HIS leading. 

Everything wasn't easier in Haiti, but that was. Poverty was always shocking me.  Unfixable NEED had me constantly looking for Him, needing Him. Crazy cultural experiences and confusions had me always looking for Him to break through, and I was so at a loss so often that there was room for HIm. 

I've pretty well got it worked out here, and with 43 years under my belt, 20 of them in full-time ministry. Most of the work, I can do and have done a million times. Most of the experiences, I have navigated. And it gets crowded...my mind, the calendar, the spaces...and I forget to look for Him.

Or I look for Him only in a specific way.

MAN do I want to be living a life that leaves room for God to come in as He decides, living in a constant state of expectancy.  

As much as we hate the hard seasons...they ARE the ones where we make the most room...where we go looking for Him, where we don't care how He comes, just THAT.  Just that He comes.

Lord, give us that kind of hunger, that kind of perspective...and in our families, in our churches, in our communities, may your surprising power break through.