Dreaming About Home...

   I'm a wreck right now. No, if you were sitting next to me (which Jake actually is) you wouldn't know it. But inside I am breaking.

   You may think that I want to go home. No. It's not that. Not all of it anyway.

   We had this amazing team here recently. One of the best. I've never felt so close to a really short-term team before.

   They were a high school youth group from a large church in Colorado Springs. Maybe the reason I loved them so much was because I'm just craving people my age around me. And don't yell at me for racism, because that's not what it is, but AMERICAN people my age.

   Yes, that sounds horrible, but Swazis are different than Americans. Obvious, right? Yes, everyone knows that us spoiled Americans have a completely different mindset than people living in third-world countries. Of course!

   We all 'know' that people are dying, are sick, are hungry, thirsty, but until you get here, and STAY here, you really have no idea how different it really is.

   So, to sum up, it is very hard to become friends with Swazi young people. No, not that they aren't friendly or anything. I guess I should say it this way. It is much different to be friends with Swazi young people.

   Most Swazis are very immature for their age. So, a 20 year old that works at our house is best buddies with Jake, who turns eleven in a week. Yes. So, you say, just be friends with 20 year olds! They're the same level of maturity, so it doesn't matter! Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way. I couldn't really explain it in words. Lots of cultural stuff.

   So anyway, the team. Woodmen Valley is the name of their church.

   Woodmen had an awesome mix of personalities and spiritual strengths. I loved, loved, loved seeing all of them love on kids at their carepoint, trying to learn SiSwati, meeting gogos. The usual.

   I can't exactly explain why I loved Woodmen so much. Like I said, it probably had something to do with the fact that they were American kids close to my age. I don't know.

   They left last Sunday morning. I didn't cry, but I wanted to. I hugged them each goodbye and waved goodbye as they drove off in their bus. Goodbye Woodmen.

   It's so, so, SO hard. The team aspect of ministry here. So awesome, but so hard. You meet all of these new people, share amazing experiences with them, pray with them, talk to them and just share life with them in this unexpected setting, and then they leave. Just like that. Gone. And you'll probably never see them. Ever again. In this life anyway.

   And the thing of it is, they get to go home in a week or two. Get on with their lives. Yes, this experience has changed them, (or we'd like to hope so anyway) but they're home. I don't think they forget about me, or our family, or Africa, but the memory is tucked away in a little hidden compartment in their minds. But for me, I think about each and  every team that left an impact on me daily. Seriously, I do. Different things will trigger the thoughts. Something I see on Facebook, a place or person we saw while they were here, or even a meal we had with them.

   I dreamt that we went home last night. It was so strange, and I can't get it out of my head. I had my first day of high school. I saw people I love. It was bizarre. I woke up and didn't know where I was. For a moment I was disappointed. I thought that I had really seen my grandparents for the first time in 4 months. I thought I had really started high school and met new friends. The disappointment was fleeting, though. After a moment I realized I really was happy here, and I really do love it here. Because in the dream I really missed being here. Even in the midst of all the happiness, I really did want to be here.

   I think that dream was God's way of telling me that He needed me here right now. And making me really appreciate this amazing experience I'm having. How many 13 year olds really get to do this? Not many, I can tell you that.

   Today I read a Facebook note someone on the Woodmen team wrote about post-Africa feelings and emotions. She said this:

   "I don’t feel like Africa wrecked my life. I feel like it slowly crept into my heart, wrapped it’s roots around me, and is firmly embedded in who I am."

   I'm happy for her. I'm happy that Africa didn't completely rock her world. But for me, it did. Africa did wreck my life. And don't read that in a negative context, but Africa turned my entire life upside down. I will never, ever, ever be the same. And I will never have a TRUE place to call home.

   I feel sorry for myself sometimes. Often, actually. I'm trying not to. But sometimes I do. I lament the fact that I will never be home again. Not really. Because even if we go home after this time, and I tuck away the memory of the two years I spent in Africa as a teen, and go on with life, that memory will always be there.

   But it's ok. It really is. At the beginning of this blog I was tied up inside and scared and lonely. But now I think I'm at peace. For now. I needed to write this blog, to pour out what's written on my heart right now. Please know I'm really exposing myself with this. Some of it may seem extreme or offensive. I'm sorry if it does. It's what I'm feeling. Take it or leave it.

  So anyway, thanks for taking the time to read about my brokenness...


 

Beautiful Things

 Recently one of my good friends, Brie, recommended a song. Brie was one of the girls on the Real Life team that came to Swazi last year. (a lot of you guys have probably listened to me babble about how awesome they are)  I was skype-chatting with her today when she told me about this song by The Michael Gungor Band called Beautiful Things and how it reminded her of life here in Swaziland...

All this pain...

   Swaziland is a battlefield. Kids and Gogos are dying left and right from the horrible HIV/AIDS epidemic here. It is a place where death is almost tangible, it is thick in the air, causing everyone to trudge through it on a day-to-day basis...

... I wonder if I'll ever find my way?...

  Everyone here is daily faced with questions like: "Will I survive today?" or "Am I going to wake up tomorrow?" All of the death surrounding this place causes people to question their ability to make there way through life normally...

...I wonder if my life could really change? At all...



   People here also question if they can make a change. They think that if so-and-so lost his parents very young, couldn't afford to make it through high school, contracted HIV and died at 20, they will never be able to be anything. They doubt their ability to make a difference in their community...

...All this Earth, Could all that is lost ever be found? Could a garden come up from this ground? At all?...

    There is so much of Swaziland...A nation almost destroyed by HIV/AIDS. It's overwhelming sometimes, the immensity of it all. All of the death and pain. A once fertile, beautiful nation that took just one person infected with HIV to undo, will take years to tie back up...



...You make beautiful things! You make beautiful things out of the dust!...

   The hope that this nation has is that Even amidst the pain, the death, the overwhelming size and depth of the issues here, God can make beautiful things out of this dust. He can take our sin and shame, our shortcomings, everything, and make them into something beautiful that furthers his great Kingdom...

  ...You make beautiful things! You make beautiful things out of us!...

   As well as our sin and shortcomings, God can make beautiful things out of our very selves. He uses us in amazing ways to bring him more glory. Yes! Even us, shameful sinners hiding behind our fear.God can take us and mould us into what HE wants for his Kingdom...

...All around, Hope is springing up from this old ground.

Out of chaos life is being found, in you...

   It is amazing when we begin to see what God is doing in our lives! If we would just look around we would see that he is making all things work together for our good!...

...You make me new. You are making me new...

   Jesus died so that we may have life. So that we could become new creations. Born again through the Spirit. We are made new by God's great love for us through Jesus' sacrifice.

                                                  

   What I see in this song is a message of hope for Swaziland. It is so true to life here! This song reminds us that even though so much pain and death exist here in Swaziland, our Lord has the ability to make all things new. The ability to clean up our horrible missions and make us into something beautiful.

   I praise God for what he is doing to make things beautiful here in Swaziland. I pray that he will continue to make it evident to us and the people here that despite our sin and shame, we can be made beautiful through him...



'You make beautiful things, you make beautiful things out of us'



United For The War

   Recently, we had visitors from the States here. We had a fantastic time and a multitude of new experiences, stories that will be told forever.
   
   It felt like they were here for much longer than the week and a half they joined us in ministry here, and we were very recharged and energized by their visit, but, now that they're gone, each member of our family, in their own way, is coping with the hole they left here.

   It is quiet, and we try to put on a happy face for eachother and others, but everyone of us is sad.

   It's a hard life here. It is. I don't think any of us prepared ourselves for how difficult it would be. I don't think any of us could have really known, either. It's so rewarding, yet so hard. There is so much need here. And there isn't always a happy ending to the sad, sad stories we see everyday.

   We'd like to think so wouldn't we? That there's always a happy ending? But there isn't. Not always.

   No, there are few true "happy endings" to the millions of life stories in this world. Some are good, yes, but many are horrific and grief-filled. There is however in this world, hope. Individually, not many lives end as well as we would like, but, in the end, each story will weave together into a beautiful tapestry of hope. And that hope is Christ Jesus. As long as we welcome him into our heart, we have hope.
   
Just last night, we were discussing how God allows satan to win some battles on this earth. But Heaven wins the war. Always.

    Yes, each of us is fighting individually the battles satan tries so hard to win. Right now, in our family, the battle is against feeling unfit for the work here, becoming bitter, feeling we shouldn't be here right now, when it's obvious we have to be.

   We're fighting individually the battles set before us, but as a family, and on a larger scale, the body of Christ, we are united for the war. We are soldiers in God's army, recruiting others as we go along in this life, fighting against the fiery arrows of the devil.

   And, no matter how hard it is here, or anywhere, we can be assured, no matter what, that Heaven wins.