Christmas in Puntarenas

Black, silty sand. Bodysurfing the warm Pacific by moonlight. Plates full of rice and beans and fresh mahi mahi. A grass fire Miguel fought in sandals with both water from the pool and the ocean. Marshmallows roasted on crude driftwood found along the shore. Late game nights with ice-less tea. Drying sheets along a concrete wall while large, iguana-like lizards scamper over the fresh laundry. Sunburned, freckled children—content to sleep and wake in the same swimsuit. Bus rides from one station to another crowded with sweating travelers. Christmas in Puntarenas.

Finals are finished, grades are in and our intensive Bible-Storying conference is over. Now that 12 piles of laundry are folded and stacked, we grab full backpacks and wind through the streets of downtown San Jose to a crowded bus station, with our blue tickets. The autobus sways alongside seas of coffee beans and wild fruit. When the bus stops, we follow Michael through the backstreets of a small, barb-wired community, to our home for the next week: an ancient, white house settled in a palm grove along the waterfront. Christmas in Puntarenas.

Here, I learn how to peel and de-vein fresh shrimp. My legs swell up like stuffed sausages, and the skin blisters and cracks after falling asleep under the tropical sun. Michael braves furious waves under a midnight sky, until some large sea creature brushes up against his legs. Chloe falls into the pool necessitating a rescue effort which renders Michael with a bruised collarbone and sore, beaten knees, while part of my leg: purple, yellow, and red covers a lump which makes sleeping painful.

There’s a fire to the left of our lot, whose flames leap across the wire fencing until Michael and the boy who lives there, armed with 3-gallon drinking water bottles, begin to drench the property. When the fire truck arrives, shovels full of the black sand are used to extinguish flames. Nearly empty beer bottles under the hot sun fueled the afternoon venture. The pool has a fine layer of ash, and our rooms smell smoky. No one is burned. Christmas in Puntarenas.

Meanwhile, the ladies in the kitchen teach me which vegetables they finely chop to boil into black beans, and how orange achiote paste makes especially delicious arroz con pollo. They stuff boiled, yellow potatoes with ham and cheese, and layer the platter with green beans from the market.

After Christmas Eve dinner, we gather with 3 other families and our Costa Rican hosts, for worship. We eat cake. We sing and listen and laugh. Much of it is in Spanish. Four months ago, I would've been completely lost. But tonight, we understand many things. We can even pray in Spanish together. Tonight is a time to rejoice: It's quite extraordinary, really, to learn to hear and speak another language. This is something God is accomplishing on our behalf, and we are celebrating this Christmas in Puntarenas.

To check out photos from our adventure, check out the link below:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=46585&id=1334529821&l=9e6bdb354f

Learning Love

Gauze-like clouds sit atop the green mountains, surrounded by a sea of sky. Slight wind is soft and warm, while I'm sitting against the wall on the speckled-like-a-bird-egg floor in the mint room. This little "closet" is tucked away in the library whose door you can shut. There is a big window which overlooks the street beyond the white lace curtains, blown by the warm wind.

Enough reviewing reflexive verbs. I am sitting on the speckled-like-a-bird-egg floor enjoying the wind, when I could be sitting in the wind. I stuff what remains of my hastily-scribbled paper piles into the backpack and race down the stairs and out the door, to find a flimsy, plastic green chair.

I sit down. I close my eyes. The sun is warm on my face. I pull out my favorite white notebook, the one I just stuffed with loose papers, and flip to the tab that contains daily musings, for I want to capture the moment in the white book. But to do so, will mean I forfeit the moment, for I will have to write, and I want nothing but to sit beside this cluster of lavender flowers and absorb everything I'm surrounded by. The white book remains open in my lap. Untouched.

Today is Thanksgiving. I'm only half-conscious of this fact because the sun absorbs most every thought... until the bell rings. It is time for Fonetica with Dona Gabi. We will mimic her like adoring little parrots repeating each phrase after her and being repeatedly corrected until our accents aren't so thick.

There are four of us in our little cluster which herds from room to room for each different class.

Ruth the valiant, who just scuba dived and nearly drowned last weekend: Adventurous mother of four, venturing to Venezuela next summer. Ruth invents things: Like ingenious ways to carry an over-sized umbrella, by turning it into what looks like a weapon, slung across her back. Ruth is from Texas. She bakes these sensational little cinnamon-sugar cookies for her neighbors and anyone else who might enjoy them. She's an athlete: the one whose always at the ping pong table during breaks, competing with ease. The one who can hop on a bus and find her way to wherever she wants to go with little care for the fact that she never really knows where she's going.

Then there's Rebecca, the overcomer, who was orphaned in Colombia as a small child, and later adopted into a family in Minnesota. An artist and musician with wide brown eyes and a conquering spirit, Rebecca has Lupus. Last month, Rebecca contracted an infection in her hand which crept into her bloodstream, nearly claiming her life until she was hospitalized. When we went to visit her, she looked fragile and weak-- her eyes heavy with concern--how would the hospital bill be paid?-- but her Bible was beside her bed, and she, though alone, was not without hope. She was still laughing. Rebecca had three different hand surgeries, and is now back in class. She does not quit. Rebecca the overcomer.

Susan is the Detailed one. Mother of two, beautiful teenaged daughters, whose family is on their way to Peru. Verb conjugations pour out of Susan like water from a pitcher. One afternoon, when Dona Alejandra handed back our tests, my heart was bursting with pride when I held in my hands that which I assumed to be the best grade in the class, only to have Dona Alejandra apologize and hand the test to Susan. It was hers. And it was her piercing blue eyes which met me outside of class one afternoon with a bag stacked with delicious food for my family. She noted my exhaustion and that I had been sniffling. She knew Miguel felt poorly, too. So there she was smiling with dinner in her hand while she whispered, "Look in the bag, there's a little something just for you." That's Susan, anticipating needs, and rising to meet them with whole-hearted attention to detail. During our last grammar test, it was Susan who was walking around to each desk placing a few candy corns. She knew we could all use a little taste of home.

These are my co-learners and my teachers. I listen to them with awe: How did Susan manage to get that out so quickly? My, Ruth reads in Spanish with the voice of a radio announcer. And Rebecca pieces everything together verbally without a hint of accent...

We watch each other and laugh. We listen to one another's mistakes and giggle. It's like being a child again in so many ways only this time it's different. We're grown-ups. Time is wasted when I want to be better than my amigas. This time we know that if we have not love, we are nothing.

Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels,
but have not love,
I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal.

And though I have the gift of prophecy, and
understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and
though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains,
but have not love,
I am nothing.

And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and
though I give my body to be burned,
but have not love,
it profits me nothing.

(1 Corinthians 13:1-3)

Without Fall

Painting Coconuts, Hanging Spiders

Julia is painting coconuts. Pumpkins weren't an option. However, one smart mom brought a pumpkin cookie cutter from the states in her suitcase, and we all enjoyed the fruit of her foresight: delighted third graders spread homemade, orange frosting on those pumpkin-cut sugar cookies. Crowned with dried cranberries and chocolate chips... It was like stepping into fall for an afternoon, in that lively little classroom, complete with a couch, floral curtains, and layers of Miss V's creativity.



Life Without Fall

Alas! There is no Fall. Living a bit closer to the equator means living without the change of seasons. Gladly though, missing one thing always means embracing another. Shortly after classes were underway, Christmas lights began to sparkle in store fronts, and now the department-type stores have their window displays in full glory: trees dripping with tinsel and adornments of turquoise and gold and red and lime green. It's truly sensational. Without harvest festivities or Thanksgiving to enjoy, it is only reasonable to begin preparing for Christmas.

So as if Fall was only for a sweet afternoon with Miss V, and with our first 8 weeks at the Language Institute behind us, we've started a new quarter with reviews for Miguel and I, report cards for the little ones, and a frosted pumpkin cookie to share. We've managed to slip into the weekend almost smelling roasted pumpkin seeds...

It is true that though seasons are not as I've known them, and this October I'm not walking into my Mom's kitchen smelling her pumpkin, cream cheese roll being lifted from the oven... there is a steady flow of God's goodness in unfamiliar places with unfamiliar sights and smells. I'm growing comfortable with unfamiliarity and finding in it a cause for rejoicing.

Lettuce Leaves, Uninvited Guests and Grammar

Lettuce Leaves
I am waiting for Miguel to return with the lettuce. The sky is dark and the rain does not relent, and somewhere between our casa and the Jumbo supermercado, he and Nathanael are braving the storm to bring home lettuce and eggs and laundry detergent.

When he does return, the lettuce is a warm, wilted mass. Being that they have braved the downpour on foot, I decide not to question the wilt-factor. Instead, I let the offering soak in the sink. The water is clean and cold, and I am hand-leafing through the layers.

Next, Julia Noel and Abby Gracie and I are shaking cold water from green leaves in the laundry room and laying them over the top of the clothesline. Hours later, when the lettuce is dry and crisp and ready for a grilled chicken tomato salad, the wilting is forgotten.

Uninvited Guests
Each time we open our pantry, a small cupboard above the stove, I'm noticing a seige of tiny cockroaches racing from the light. Large ones have been easy to spot and easy to say goodbye to. However, their offspring are great in number. Though not as quick as their parents, they seem to prefer communal living. Opening the cupboard always provides great amusement to everyone 8 and under. And so, for now, every bit of food is ordered into neat stacks in the darkness of a cold, sealed refrigerator.

Grammar
And so the weeks have slipped by, one after the other, until today, when they seemed to stand still.

I am sitting in our warm, quiet classroom. Our desks, forming a half circle, show only the tops of my classmate's heads. Our grammar exams are before us. I look around the room and pray for each dear friend to think clearly... then I look at my own paper.

I look, yet it's as if there is nothing familiar there. I blink. Thinking, perhaps, if I turn the fan on, things will improve, I get up for a moment. I sit back down again. I can feel my clothes starting to stick to me. Then my forehead is wet. I am seized with a deep, maddening sense of exhaustion.

I look at the articles and the demonstrative adjectives. I glance through the perifrases, searching for somewhere to begin, but this time, I don't know where to begin. So I start writing my sentences using particular verbs in their particular places, until I re-read the instructions, only to learn I'm not following them, and while I am waiting for Eddie to tap me on the shoulder and say it's my turn for the oral part of the exam, I realize I am paralyzed.

I make it through and express my sincerest apologies for my lack of presence of mind, to the most excellent Dona Alejandra. She is gracious. I walk across the way to Language and slump into my seat. Not long thereafter, I am looking at the white board, then my professor. His face is kind.

"I can not speak. I wrote wrong answers. I studied so hard. I'm studying with my children for their Spanish tests and their other tests, too, and I'm so exhausted," and with that, I lifted my notebook in front of my face and wept.

I don't recall weeping in a class before. I suppose I could've excused myself. But I didn't. I just sat there and cried.

It's a strange thing to be empty. No ideas. No words. No recollection. I studied. I was prepared. I was even relaxed. And then, I was exhausted.

In my weakness, God's Spirit is mighty. He has brought me low. He has humbled me, that I might exalt Him. Jesus' death, burial and resurrection has secured my every victory. But victories do not always appear as I might expect them to.

Today, my most fervent efforts have been reduced to crumbs. I humbly offer those crumbs to Him with my whole heart.

Odds and Ends

The Newspaper

Most mornings I'm waking up before the man on the motocicleta throws La Nacion between the bars. So he remembers where to deliver, Manolo has a clever system of spray painting an N on the sidewalk in front of each La Nacion house. He also paints a white arrow on the ashpalt. This way, in early morning darkness, the newspaper's sure to land beyond the right bars.


Trash

When it's time to throw trash away, there are no trashcans, though a very robust system, nonetheless. We place our crude piles of various multi-colored bags in a heap on the sidewalk, grass, or even in the street. Anyone who'd like to sift through the trash is welcome to. Men ride on the back of those familiar trucks, and haul away whatever is left curbside. I'm always delighted by the lack of restrictions. I can place anything out there! There's a possibility it will appeal to someone, but if it doesn't, it will be gone when the truck comes.


Rain

Last week, I was walking up the hill with Nathanael and Chloe after school. The clouds grew heavy and dark. Then there was gentle rain, and we were glad to have an umbrella. As we reached the top of the slight hill to turn right onto our la calle, we looked beside us, hearing steady, thumping. Chloe and Nathanael stared in sheer bewilderment. On our left hand side, a violent downpour erupted out of those groaning clouds. Nearly 100 meters across the street, the rain was furiously climbing the hill, and before we could brace ourselves, it was our turn to experience her fury, which mostly collapsed our umbrellas.

I stood at the gate desperate to get the right key in the right place and thrust the porton open for some relief, but my key would not open the gate. I laid the useless umbrella down. Hardly able to see the keyhole through the rain and the wind, I continued to struggle, until mastering the right manipulation and within seconds, we were under the second story of our home, laughingly watching the water pour.

This week, however, it didn't rain. The sky was blue and the wind was warm, and our classrooms whose window slats were open, were full of warm light... This alternative was amusing, for throughout the day and into the nights, electricity would come and go. Our street guard, German, (Air-maun) lamented over our desperate need for rain since we receive power through a hydro-electric system...


Without Water

Last weekend, there was a time without water. Turning the faucet on yielded only a spitting noise. So I had been especially grateful for our big brother family, whose foresight left us with a stash of water gallons (saved for such a time as this) in our utility room.

I used one gallon to disinfect vegetables from the market, and the rest was off limits until a real necessity came up. After a bit, the water was back on again, and what came trickling, then busting out of the faucet resembled rust. Intrigued, we filled our glasses.

"Look at this! It's water," Julia was enamored.
"No, it's clearly mud," Abby Gracie insisted.
"It's awesome," said Nathanael-- resolving the dilemma.


The Library

Miguel and I start each school with LIBRE (freedom)! Our first hour at school is a study period. He enjoys sitting on the terraza working through conjugations with the boys. I go to the library and sit beside an open window, whose gauzy, white sheers blow with the wind. The smell of old books and journals, anthropological findings and yellowed missionary biographies is perfect. I lay out my pages of construction paper conjugations and definitions, and begin sifting through the lists with hushed, forced pronunciations, saying them over and over again...


Carrot Cake

Carrots in La Feria (Saturday morning market) are stunning. Brilliant in color and giant in size, we've become accustomed to finely shredding them into messy heap, then throwing them into our carrot sheet cake batter. Each child helps, one at a time, with food prep. There is much of it. Their favorite is always with carrot shredding, making orange batter. Generally, we have everything for the cake part, and nothing for the frosting part. So we eat our cake without frosting.


Saturday Morning
September 12

Abigail, Nathanael and I land on a marvelous, tiny Pulperia. Located on a neighborhood corner and painted mustard yellow, we stop in this little haven after our trip to La Feria. I love it at once.

From the ceiling to the floor, every shelf is loaded with stacks of different now-familiar groceries and housekeeping supplies. They even have a bar of cheddar cheese. One end cap has plastic bags stuffed with spices, and another aisle is fully stocked with little flour packages and pasta bags and beans and rice.

In my meager Spanish, I asked what to do with the things I want to buy. The gracious owner insists I load things on the narrow counter space before her. We do. Finding each supply on our list, my helpers put their discoveries excitedly on the counter, like little scavengers on a hunt. When finished, we loaded them into our bags from home, and are off to follow the smell of roasting chicken on the fire.

Eventually, we find a store front whose giant open oven has massive tree branches for the fire, spinning golden rotisserie chickens, dripping with juice. We fit one into our bag...

Now the bags are weighted with produce, supplies and chicken, and there is still much walking before we are home. I take a deep breath and prepare for the final laps, all before the afternoon rain pours. When it does, we are listening to her beat the tin roof, safely home.

Like a Pup

Friday afternoon
August 28

We're on foot, crossing through the rotunda-- a considerable sea of traffic whose rip tide we're waiting to ride across the highway to safety on the other side. There, a long line at the police station will greet us. It's just Miguel and me, and we're getting fingerprinted again. This time, we're applying for student visas.

In line, I see people I look just like, whose language I do not speak. There are Germans, French and other North American missionaries. We take turns observing one another when we think the other doesn't notice. Our differences provide intrigue, yet so do our similarities, so the waiting is full of amusement.

Miguel has already done the math, so I'm the scribe while he presents our height in meters and our weight in kilos. Next is the address line-- only there are no street names, so it's appropriate to describe our address by:
-noting a landmark (ours is the hardware store)
-whether we're to the north or south and how many meters
-including the side of the street, color of house and whether or not it's single story
...So that takes a bit of time, as I'm translating my weak English directions into weaker Spanish ones.

At this point, I've resigned myself to reality. I am like a helpless, fond puppy following my benevolent Master here and there. In my previous California life, I felt reasonably confident. Run to the store to pick up a few things for dinner? Simple. I would jump in a dependable car, which I may or may not lock as it waited patiently for me in a smoothly paved parking lot. Groceries in tow, I would push a button, whereby the car would automatically unlock, graciously awaiting my groceries.

Now: Hmmm... there are a few things I need for dinner. Where are comfortable shoes? Will I be back before dark, when the safety factor is sketchy. Who will I take to help carry the items? Which route will be smartest for street crossing? Do I really need these things or can I make something creative with what's on hand... while my mind is weighing the factors, I hear myself calling out, "Don Miguel, are you up for a trip...?" whereby he is out the door, personal bags in tow, now considering all these things on my behalf, my benevolent master. He knows my thoughts.

A grateful heart renders her benevolent master to be her most precious gift. An ungrateful one finds something to be dissatisfied with. I confess to days of choosing the latter.


After the Police Station

We're street-crossing again, fingerprints bagged, I question:
"Why are you the one who is so competent, and I am like a helpless puppy? I can't think fast enough, or listen carefully enough and when I cross the street, my heart is beating so loud, I can hear it in my head, and it makes my head hurt. And why do you know exactly what to buy and all the best prices at the most reasonable places, taking the most prudent route...before I've even finished a list? Why are all these things unclear to me and so clear to you? I think slowly. I talk slowly. I move slowly. You do these things with such ease."

"Crystal, Tengo que vivir la vida," He squeezes my hand, guiding me through a narrow place in the street. I am anxious because of my purse. I never carry a purse anymore, but one is necessary today. He puts his hand on my shoulder, "Your neck is tense. Stop worrying about the purse." How does he know I'm thinking about the purse?

"I don't get tense. Remember, I'm the carefree one. I'm the one between the two of us who likes adventure," I insist.

"Tengo que vivir la vida," He repeats, " You have to live your life." I know what he's trying to say. "Que sera sera. Whatever will be, will be."

He knows I am the nervous chihuahua: shaking, tediously looking about me back and forth back and forth... scanning, scannning, scanning... he is alert, as well, but somehow, when we get home, he's jovially playing with the children, and I'm nearly passed out on the bed, exhausted, head aching, falling asleep before he realizes I'm gone.


Darkness

So now, I'm thinking about the possibility of something really great. It will take deliberate effort until I'm well-trained, and this could take some time. I've decided that I want to be a good listener. I want to be a good listener and a happy follower.

If I'm going to acknowledge the reality: cross-cultural living is taking some time for me to adjust to; therefore, I'm somewhat like a timid pup, then it follows that what I am defines how I act. This being the case, I've decided to be the pup that listens carefully. Instead of anxiously looking about, I'd like to listen, then believe. What command does my benevolent master speak?

"Do you think I'm not protecting you every step of the way? Do I not have what is best for you in mind?" He says, as we're safe on the sidewalk again. Anxiousness is failing to trust my master. When he assures me of his nurturing protection, I will listen. I will seek to understand. Then understanding, I will believe, thus changing my responses without ever really trying. He speaks. I'm listening, for I am cared for by one who seeks my very best in all things.

I don't have to try to be happy. Cheer flows spontaneously from the heart that listens to, understands, then believes her master. Happy following takes little effort for the devoted pup who delights in her master's every command. She knows these commands flow from the heart that bursts with love for her.

I remember learning in college that the word worship is derived from a word that means to adore, like a little pup at the feet of her master, bounding gleefully back and forth, as pleasing and delightful as a little companion could possibly be. It's helpful to me to understand that
happily following Miguel is like chasing after my Daddy in Heaven-- my ultimate, benevolent Master, whose every command flows from a heart bursting with love for me. Instead of complaining and asking why, I have the opportunity to shamelessly trust the One whose nurturing protection includes legions of angels surrounding me, when I call for help. I jump at his heels, begging for another opportunity to obey a command and receive a reward. I am eager to please: listening, understanding, believing... then happily following.

This is worship.

Being a helpless, fond pup isn't so bad after all.

Goodbye Summer

Saturday
Late Night
August 22

Laundry hangs on the clothesline. Some is in the dryer-- we have a dryer! The house is still. The dogs do not howl. Even the motorcycles do not take our beaten path tonight. It's quiet. This is unusual.

Generally, on La Ferreteria, shortly after my head hits the pillow, I'm asleep. I sleep through huge parties at the corner house and the horn section playing Salsa. The dogs do not often wake me. More often than not, however, it is 5 year old Nathanael's hot breath that begins to burn my eyes, as he mutters different woes requiring comfort. He never fails to lure one of us out of precious sleep. Boyish strength bottled in a being so full of so many things. I anticipate seeing him in a few short hours.

Tuesday
August 25

At Parque Okayama, Chloe is swinging brazenly, trying to make her toes touch the trees overhead. Nathanael effortlessly glides across monkey bars, sleek and agile. We watch with admiration-- "He didn't get that from me," Miguel notes. "Nor from me..." I agree. Abigail is toiling with the possibility of a flip on some swinging rings, but finally acknowledges aloud to herself,"I'm not made to do this flip deal. Forget about it." She storms off looking for a friend to make. Julia settles next to me on a swing, thinking aloud, "I'm not sure what I was made to do. I'm still looking for my place in this world," She watches us watch Nathanael. She laughs at Chloe's self-impressed glee, she marvels at Abigail's uncanny ability to engage strangers. All the while, she is wondering what it is that makes her shine. Miguel starts listing things. I throw in a few shiny somethings, too. We sit together, and I hold her.

The clouds grow dark and heavy. Our stomachs are empty. Rain jackets on, we follow Miguel across the street to Ortero's pizza, complete with the big movie screens and order the usual: one extra grande half Americana (honoring our homeland), half suprema,(celebrating all that is to come)
...and a two liter Coca Cola. It doesn't quite taste like we remember Coke tasting, yet the logo alone makes us happy.

Ortero's is dimly lit with sturdy wooden tables and stools. Movie posters cover every inch of wall space, ceiling included. Some of the advertisements are in Spanish. Some are in English, but the whole place is like stepping into another world for a tiny window of time. Julia Noel is smiling.

Dinner is over. We follow a pathway between two long buildings, whose walls are covered in fabulous graffiti. The colors are brilliant and Nathanael is impressed, stating: "These people are really good in art." We all agree. POPS is the next stop. The closest thing here to Ben and Jerry's Brownie Batter ice cream is sitting on my cone-in-hand, and we're weaving through traffic, dodging a long line of commuters, just offloading the bus back over a narrow bridge, and through the neighborhood. We are silent, anticipating what tomorrow will be like...

Tonight is goodbye to summer. Goodbye with Ortero's and POPS (popes)-- with the cool night air and a lingering walk through San Francisco de Dos Rios. Good-bye summer. Tomorrow each of us becomes a full-time student, and orientation commences a whole year in Language School. Not all goodbyes are sad.

Goodbye summer.

Living Water

We live between two rivers in San Francisco de Dos Rios. These muddied water trails host plastic grocery bags carried along by a faithful current of milk boxes, soda cans, and yogurt bottles all tempted to clump along the river bed. Somehow it is still beautiful. Giant bamboo shoots jut out from hillsides like a vigilant guardian.

I am walking along a mossy bridge which carries me over the river. It is hot. My thirst is great. I long for water, but there is only the river. I can not drink. I must find a trusted source. Other options ultimately lead to harm. So it is with my thirsting heart.

Jesus is living water, poured out freely, scandalously, without end...I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him who thirsts (Revelation 21:6b).

And let him who thirsts come. Whoever desires, let him take the water of life freely (Rev 22:17).

He shows no restraint in giving, and demands the same of the thirsty one: Delight in abundance! It can not run short. It is not temporary. It's pleasure can not wane. Drink. Let your soul delight itself! Everyone who thirsts, come to the waters... Let your soul delight itself in abundance (Isaiah 55:1,2b). It is trusted.

Living water never stops being sweet. It is always pure. For it mercifully flows:...a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb (Rev 22:1).

His lavish giving does not stop at the river. I am not required to make a pilgrimage to a drinking spot every time I thirst. He causes this living water to burst from inside of me, for rivers of living water gush out of me, as I believe. If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water (John 7:37).

Oh! To drink deeply of that which God Almighty made to flow out of me: The river of His Spirit. It dwells in me when I believe the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus was accomplished on my behalf. This finished work, this river, quenches my thirst one choice at a time.

Barefooting

Sunday Night
August 2
Sitting on a starchy, bright orange-sheeted bed following uninterrupted silence with homemade salsa and chips. Tomorrow is Monday, commencing week 2 of Barefooting, a style of total immersion into a host culture, whereby we sit with the flawlessly forbearing Dona Olga in morning hours listening, then practicing. She assigns us a task-- a communication hurdle to overcome and we are off into the city-- hurdling: What is this in Spanish? What does it cost? I am a student in Costa Rica... con mucho gusto... . We take buses and taxis, and ambitiously make our way through a maze of nameless streets 350 meters from this Parque De Bosque-- or beside that red Pan Por Kilo corner stop... This is Barefooting. We drink coffee and tea, feel the sunshine on our backs, or listen to pelting rain against the lemon and tangerine trees while Dona Olga opens Pura Vida, the Tico world to us, armed with slow, articulate Spanish, amusing charades and a host of adventures mapped out in her notebook. Barefooting.

Four family units from Virginia's Learning Center now circle up, straining to decode words spoken faster than they are deciphered. Our heads are aching. Miguel is our translator. His 5 previous years of Spanish trudge a mucky path through knee deep mud of unfamiliarity. We step where his feet once did, following at an inconvenient distance.

Oh, give thanks to the God of Heaven... who remembered us in our lowly state, for His mercy endures forever. Psalm 136:23

Speaking messily mangled, mismatched words can be painful. I fail to insert verbs in their rightful location. Mis-conjugating them in one sentence, then fumbling for a preposition in the next. Often, I'm flipping furiously through my pocket notebook, straining to pair unknown words with ones I recognize.


Monday Morning with Dona Olga
August 3

"What is she asking me?" We take turns whispering, pleadingly looking Miguel's way. During week one, I find this to be a great asset. Being married to the star student has its advantages; However, this is day one of week 2, and I become irritated. Miguel appears antsy-- overly eager to assist. Dona Olga patiently waits. Miguel corrects me in his gentle, low voice. I am deeply agitated. I return his correction with a hushed one of my own.

Class is over. I march home stoically, and collapse onto the orange sheets.

Tuesday Night
August 4
Dominoes. Abigail is exposed for illegal plays. Miguel hoists Nathanael up the stairs for bedtime routines, and I'm peeking through the oven window, watching banana cake slowly lift from the sides of the pan. After UNO and tiny block forts, children are dragging into bed, delirious from contented chaos. Soon, they are piled one on top of the other, insistent that they must all sleep together tonight... the soft, steady rhythm of tummies rising and falling means Miguel and I have one plate, two forks, and gooey deliciousness drenched in brown sugar frosting. It's a date.

I am no longer agitated. Accepting correction as a gift, rather than a battle wound seems the more prudent path.

Wednesday
August 5

"It's time. Go talk to her now," Miguel urges. We are at La Parque de Infantil under a grey sky, enjoying teeter-totters. Chloe is squealing over a "white, puffy doggie" nipping at a young mother's heels. A little girl beside her is bike-riding in circles. "Talk to her," He repeats, steadily watching my hesitancy...

Now Chloe is holding the white, puffy doggie. Abigail is practicing Spanish with 5 year old Carolena, Nathanael is riding Carolena's bike in circles, and I'm talking in Spanish with Tanya! I'm actually having a conversation; not practicing vocabulary or irregular conjugations, but talking! I say what I can, and she graciously coaxes me along, just as my Miguel.

Barefooting.
Talking with people. I make little sense, but I do not quit.
Barefooting.
Delighting in another person and their world.
Barefooting.

This is how I will learn Spanish, I resolve. It will not necessarily be my study habits or my devotion to notecards that seal the deal. It will be Barefooting.

I never liked wearing shoes anyway.

No Such Thing as a Free Lunch?

Disclaimer: I want to let everyone know up front that this is not a post from Crystal so if you are looking for "beautiful words" and "I feel like I was there", no need to read further. I do edit Crystal's post though so I feel I can take some grammatical credit for her posts (I found dog spelled bog in the last post). I felt compelled to write my first blog entry because of an experience I had tonight; here goes nothing...

We've been in Costa Rica for only four days and have already been asked for money twice. Each time a middle-aged man has stopped by our gate and told a sad story of a mother or wife in the hospital that has cancer or a heart problem. They seem very sincere and just don't have enough money to pay medical bills or get a taxi to go to the hospital.

The problem is, I am generally a skeptical person. I hear a voice in my head that says "they're lying and just want to bum money off a seemingly rich gringo" or "this story sounds similar to the last one, did they collaborate?". The first guy even had his story printed out on little sheets of paper so he could let me read it (good practice for reading in Spanish). Maybe both of them really needed financial help and would use the money for medical purposes, but we have decided to offer food to people who come asking for assistance.

Even handing out food is a big step for me because I have the nagging feeling I am being lied to, but that isn't my responsibility to find out, so each time I've gone back in the house and Crystal and I have prepared a small bag of food with some apples, oranges, bread, etc. I must admit that while filling the bag earlier today I thought "I need to lock myself in the house so I stop getting asked every other day!". I also wondered if we were going to get to eat any of the oranges that Crystal bought. Not the best attitude...I know.

Another one of my vices is being frugal; my siblings would say I'm cheap. This just compounds the problem of giving freely to those in need, but also has led to extra trips to the grocery store as I have been trying to keep our grocery bill low but inevitably we need/want more stuff. One of those extra trips occurred tonight and I had to make the 10 minute walk to "Jumbo" (pronounced something like "hum-bow") as it was getting dark outside. This was my first venture out of the house at dusk and Crystal was just praying I didn't get mugged.

Don't worry, I wasn't mugged although it would make for a great blog entry too! I got to the store and did my good ole frugal shopping for the things on Crystal's list then uncharacteristically splurged on a few extras (lunch meat, juice packets, even gum!). After a long battle of figuring out the best prices, I made my way to the checkout counter and the line straight in front had someone almost finished so I started to go there, but I noticed one lane with no one in it; my lucky day! I unload my stuff and after she finishes ringing up the goods some sign on her screen lights up and she starts saying something to me with a big smile. I'm not sure what is going on at this point, but the checker in the next stand comes over and pats me on the back and comes to watch as a bell goes off and they tell me I am the winner and all my groceries were free! I did my best to communicate what I could in Spanish and managed to blurt out "debo comprar mas" (I should buy more) and "gane" (I won!) along with a few other things about not being able to speak much Spanish and I am new here in Costa Rica.

I kept thinking this must be one of those episodes of Candid Camera where someone is going to say they were supposed to win and yell at me, but it was real...I really won! As I walked home, the generosity of God overwhelmed me as I realized that I had given up so little in handing out a couple bags of food and had been so richly blessed with four wonderful kids and a beautiful wife who is becoming famous in the blogosphere. God can even give me free groceries as He desires! I shouldn't sweat the little bags of food; just make sure I have a smile on my face and a cheerful heart as I share the love of Jesus.

Costa Rican Cookies

Morning: I wake up to the screeching of a monkey I assume;
(Uncle B assures us it's a gecko, not a monkey, and that geckos sing like birds). The sun is bright and glaring from water on the tin roof across the street. I tip toe down stairs while the house is quiet, for it is 5 am, and I want to be part of this hushed morning stillness. I open the curtains, warm sun on my face(already!), sitting in the provided couch from which Chloe pulled someone's bungee cord, toy screwdriver and yarn yesterday. My mind begins to suppose that I could cover this couch... wait, I am not organizing or scheming or upholstering right now. I open my Bible to Proverbs because Miguel has been in Proverbs much lately. I'm looking for a new passage to memorize while we transition into a diffferent life.

6:15am: Time to start the morning routine. Miguel's making his famous peanut butter, banana oatmeal. His troops are readying for morning worship over breakfast. Abigail and Nathanael are on a team-- UCLA Yellow Canaries; Julia and Chloe are on a team-- God's Beautiful Feet . The reader on each team is now going through Proverbs, praying with and for each other, and preparing to lead the rest of us in an acapella sing-along. They choose one verse that leaps out at them, explaining why. Chloe is often twisting under the table, standing on someone's lap kissing their face and whispering unrelated tales of reptiles or dogs, while Julia is trying to gain composure and control for the God's Beautiful Feet team(first born deal, Miguel insists)...

9:15am: Three families are walking down the neighborhood greeting each neighorhood guard while walking the necessary 10 blocks to Primera Iglesia Bautista. Straight down the street for a few blocks. Left turn. Right turn at the narrow bridge over a muddy, littered river tangled in jungle. The path beside a busy street is wide enough for one adult and a small child. Chloe and Nathanael see chickens along the river bed. The walk is long, but there is no complaining today.

Block 10. We follow a smiling woman to the children's classes. They are all in Spanish, and our three families of children file in effortlessly. Next is our turn to file into the little class for ages 18-35, where casually visiting friends stop to greet us. They are studying Marcos 7 and I pick up bits and pieces, requiring devoted labor. Next is another service when our children join us for part of the next two-ish hours.

1:00pm: We stop in at Giovanni's pizza, elated to see printed on the door: We Speak English. We watch the masters lift and spin dough into the air, littering the white floured surface with chile dulce and a host of other fresh vegetables. Full and happy, we are now crossing the street--a valiant effort: Two families readied for Frogger, and alas-- there's a clearing! CHARGE! We are laughing, hands held tightly, hoisting our children to safety at the supermercado, where nearly everything seems to be about double what it was in the states.

3:00pm: There are just enough groceries. We manage carrying them home in cheerful, red Jumbo bags without hassle. I am anticipating kneading chocolate chip cookie dough between my fingers for a taste of home. My red bags contain everything I will need, and I'm planning my list of who they will all go to: the guard at end of the block, the man who comes digging through our trash, drinking the last bits of peach nectar from the box...

4:00pm: I am pulling the cookies out of the oven after wrapping extra dough to refrigerate. The townhouse is silent. Everyone is exhausted and piled onto the bed in Julia and Abigail's "apartment" (They are proud to man the secret bathroom under the staircase) where heavy drapes block out all traces of light. I sit at the table to enjoy the first cookie and am sorely disappointed. It tastes nothing like home. Every bit of it is dry, even powdery-- save those chocolate chips we splurged on. For now, home cannot be tasted.

6:00pm: Upon sampling my taste of home, Miguel resolves that we focus on Costa Rica's precious offerings: the sweet vegetables and fruit at the Saturday morning market.

Darkness: The children are in the gated, front courtyard creating parchment script with Skylar and Sydney (quadmates from training now studying language with us). They are rubbing notebook paper rapidly against the tile, "to give it delicate age", Skylar insists, announcing they have found scrolls from 2000BC. The sounds of the night unfold: car alarms, barking dogs, motorcycles... and the children are talking about Sunday School leisurely:
"I didn't understand a thing," confesses Abigail.
"Neither did I," Julia Noel agrees. They happily recall Oreos, the David and Goliath computer video, and games they joined by copying what their classmates did. They anticipate next week, and I am in awe.

His divine power has granted to us EVERYTHING pertaining to life...
2 Peter 1:3a

Costa Rica

July 24


Morning: Make sure you tie your knots loosely in all trash bags-- that way when people go through your trash, they will not tear the whole thing apart, says our Big brother family, the one that placed a Costa Rican chicken pot pie in our freezer, and familiar foods in the refrigerator when we arrived in the middle of the night--the family that has carted us along beside them through marketing and banking and such things that make up life. Loose ties in trash bags.

No purses--they are too easily snatched.

Always lock all gate layers behind you as you go in and as you go out.

When turning knobs, be gentle.

Eager to fill a bucket with water for mopping, I tug on a stubborn valve only to rip the aluminum (?) pipe in two followed by furious, bursting water from the exposed line. I grab a 13 gallon trash bin, full in seconds, and watch cold water spurn the laundry courtyard, the kitchen, the bathroom...

"Miguel! Miguel, I'm having an issue..." I call.
"What kind of issue?"
"The kind you'd be interested to see."

He reaches the bottom stair, stepping into water that does not relent. He disappears, searching for the water main. No success. Next, he's fumbling with locks, trying to unlock the gates to call for help. Success. Maybe our next door neighbor, Big brother, will know where to turn the water off. Lord, we do not know what to do. Help.

Our landlord is driving down the street and sees flustered gringos, his new renters, out front. He pulls over. Within minutes, he shuts off the valve hidden underneath a plastic tube in the sidewalk, and the pipe stops rushing. He walks inside to survey the scene, which is only slightly problematic, due to tile flooring. Gingerly detailing his future return to repair the valve, He leaves moments later, our broken microwave under his arm, about as contented as one could possibly be. We are uncertain as to when he'll return, or when there will be water again.

Noon: Miguel is walking to get some fish, chicken and pork chops for a neighborly lunch with new missionary families, while I muse through bags, looking for toothpaste, which seems to have hidden itself since the Travelodge in LA. Lunch is delicious, families are adjusting and the peach nectar is a fast favorite.

Darkness: The duffle bags, rescued from the morning flood, are drying out in the laundry courtyard. The floor is dry. My eyes are bleary red. I sprawl out across our cold-sheeted bed and scratch three words into my notebook: believing, thankful dependency.

Believing, thankful dependency.

Atalaya, Smiling

I am in a Cessna grazing maybe 6,500 feet above the Amazon basin. An hour has passed. We've left Pucallpa for Atalaya. Our plane is steadily skimming over closely clumped broccoli through which muddy rivers snake. My mind sees Nate Saint's canary yellow plane and Palm beach where he landed (Through Gates of Splendor, Elisabeth Elliott). Everything beneath me feels deeply familiar: brown rivers which meet, then go their own ways separated by silky sandbars... Along the bank, civilizations come into view, and Marty is detailing places He and Michael were following on a giant wall-sized map stretched across his dining room table last night. My eyes start to burn with hot tears.

Michael sits beside our missionary pilot, dialoguing between headsets about aeronautical charts, which he previously created in his past-career. He is brimming with all the fervor one will ever see from one such as Miguel, because he is using the tools he once created from a desktop. He is exhilarated.

We are nearing the landing strip, a crude asphalt patch welcoming us. From my view, Atalaya seems to be similar to what my mind has always imagined a small island to resemble. Stepping out of the plane to my right a hilled-pasture with grazing white, bony cattle grows into a bright blue sky. There are groups of close-knit trees interspersed among grassy green patches. Nestled atop the hill, sits the mayor's house. Atalaya has around 10,000 who make her home, none of whose faces are white. Where cement streets and even curbs have not yet been laid, the ground is silty brown laden with smooth river rock. In some ways, Atalaya is even more progressive than Pucallpa.

Pucallpa's markets and port are hard-packed with a colorful mosaic of trash wrappers, smashed banana peels and bottle caps. Broken glass, rotting jungle fruit and limp green lechuga line stalls beside stately bags of dirt-crusted sweet potatoes and plump tangerines. Giant holes in both the streets and the sidewalks require vigilance. One must always be scanning where his feet will step next, while holding tightly to whatever is in his hands. My eyes continually rove across curious onlookers and eager pickpockets while dodging drops in uneven ground and poles which reach unexpectedly out of the earth in the most unsuspecting places. Pucallpa's sky is deep azure and her earth is covered in green: almond and blossoming mango trees. There is continual tension between this raw,lush beauty and chaotic, soot-covered walls which host San Juan Cerveza advertisements and spray-painted political ideals. The streets are perpetually crowded with loud, weaving moto-taxis blasting purplish clouds of motor fuel. The port boasts a consuming bonfire, the size of a small building, sitting in the river rock with elderly, shirtless men missing both teeth and shoes. They generously carry heavy loads with broad smiles. Grandmothers in multi-colored halter tops smile, their arms dripping with beaded necklaces and bracelets for sale...

Atalaya is different--smaller. There are moto-taxis, but they travel along freshly laid cement streets. The market stalls sit tidily upon curbs. I marvel at neatly stacked piles of clothing and cheerful red and white striped hammocks hanging along store fronts. The people are timid and curious. Some are shouting greetings from their brick and mortar piles, as they momentarily stop their labor to observe outsiders, for Atalaya does not regularly host visitors. Accessible only by boat or plane, she sits alone, a neat and tidy grid in Asheninka territory.

When Nicanor, a Spanish-speaking brother in Christ arrives alongside the way to lump us into his moto-taxi, we figure one of us may sit backwards and the other three will have enough space to sit comfortably, while searching the community. Where will we live after language school? What will be home base from which we will set out into the jungle to be with the Asheninka? We are looking for a home to rent; searching, searching... a dark, narrow corridor squeezed between a tall, mostly finished brick wall and hotel-like structure is available--each family member having a separate room and bathing quarters but no kitchen area, no gathering place. One could be built outside, we reason. Then there is a tall, hot warehouse with a roll down garage front: Peeling-painted, cement walls without windows--no light. Another home is resting on a shaken cement foundation; tin roof lifted above cement walls...we peek in the window to see darkness, and a hastily clad clothesline strung between the two walls. Someone is living there while the owner searches for a new resident. Their empty yogurt bottles litter the grass and dirt...

"A house must be built on a strong foundation," Dena decidedly announces.
"I'd rather start from ground zero," agrees Marty.
"You will need a peaceful haven to come to when you are weary from your work in the communities," Dena insists. She asks to see land for sale. Nicanor pulls alongside a curb and stops the moto-taxi beside a brick divide walling off mature, ripening fruit and cocoa bean trees. We walk in through the backside of the property. It is shaded and glorious under the hot sun. We stumble upon two massive graves as we wander through the thick, muddiness, glad to be wearing rubber boots. I have the notebook and pen, and Marty insists that I write "WOW!" next to the number I copy beside the lot's specifications. Both Dena and Marty start musing how our children will love the trees and the fruit and the space...but it will need some structure. We will need to build. In the jungle, this is just a matter of weeks...enough musing for now. We are all hungry. I pocket the information and we taxi to Shao-Ling: Peruvian food Chinese style. Our waitress is a young girl my Julia's age, and I am hungry to talk to her, but I cannot. My Spanish is so poor. I resolve that my time in language training will be spent prudently. During lunch, Marty, Dena and Nicanor are speaking Spanish. My mind wanders as I begin processing what I have seen and sip cold, yellow Inka Cola.

Lunch is over. Soon, We are making our way back to the airport, where an anxious, Atalayan mother, newborn held close, is waiting to board our chartered flight. She must get to the hospital in Pucallpa where her seven year old daughter is ill. The pilot assigns her and I to the back of the plane. First she boards. Then it is my turn. The pilot tightens my seat belt, and shuts the door. I look away from the woman and pray, "Show me what to do. I cannot yet speak her language. Help me." I look into my lap and my camera is there. I have been holding it this whole time. My camera! I can show her my own children! Excitedly, I push the play button, and fumble through scenery pictures scrolling back, back, back...there! "Mis ninas y nino" I smile, "Ocho, seis, cinco, y tres!" I can talk! She studies my face, then the picture. She is not impressed. I keep scrolling, nervously searching for a family picture. "Mi familia," I am smiling. She studies the picture, then studies Michael. She studies the picture again, and our eyes meet...

This time we are both smiling.

Stay Close

Crossing the street in Lima is an art. Pedestrians do not have the right of way. Is there a breath in the steady stream of cars--Yes? Then move. Now.

Yesterday, I stood on the side of the road. Michael saw the breath and proceeded forward. He was on the other side of a busy impasse before I knew it, and I was still standing in the same spot... waiting.

Fresh Start. New curb. I decide to be a bit more ambitious. I see the break. I speed across the street with stellar, clumsy force. Michael meets me on the other side, amused:

"This is an art," He coaches, "You don't miss an opportunity by waiting too long for a perfect moment. But you don't panic like you're being chased. You watch carefully. You study patterns. You seize your moment. You move at a resolute steady pace."
"Ok, ok, " I breathe deep, only half-listening, because I'm glad to be done for now.

All too soon, we try again. He's watching. I see his eyes scanning the lanes. We stand on the edge of what feels like a cliff. It's a curb. Whether cliff of curb, I imagine one hasty step and my story ends the same.

He's firmly gripping my hand.
"Go," He starts moving.
"What?" I stall.
"Come. Now." He's guiding me off the curb, around the front bumper of a momentarily stalled taxi. I see that there is nothing but oxygen between me and the host of oncoming skillfully-maneuvering, battered taxis. Michael has this way of signaling his intentions by how he squeezes my hand and in which direction he does so. This time, I'm signaling intentions of my own. I run for my life, and am safely on the new curb with time to spare. I am bewildered that he's still steadily moving forward with just enough time and space. How can this be? How can he know the rhythm and know this street-crossing art already? After all, I am the artist-- and isn't this an art?

"I was nearly hit!" I resolve.
"You were nowhere near being hit."
"Your point?"
"Crystal, Look. I never change my pace. I know exactly what to do to lead us both. Stay close to me."
"That makes you pretty near amazing. But I would say I'm pretty near fast."
"You don't need to be. You just need to stay close."

Crossing the street in Lima makes one, certain demand: Stay close. Stay close to he who leads. I question and I banter. I love to rant and rave. But to wander is to be willing to risk total separation.

Tonight I'm anticipating the brevity of jumping into an isolated, unknown-to-me jungle community where ours may be the only white faces. It feels like a cliff. But it's only a curb. The Mastermind behind all things created: both cliffs and curbs, the jungle and her mysteries, makes an art of it all. I know not the rhythms nor intricacies, but I know the Creator. He makes one, certain demand. Stay close. To wander is to be willing to risk total separation. Stay close.

Stay close.

Lima 2

9:30am Sleeping still.(This is wonderful!) Someone's knocking. Michael jumps out of bed to meet a beautiful, young couple (Olson's) also staying in the guest house.

10:00am Four of us pile into the backseat of a Toyota, while our zany Master's couple (Tate's) drives us to a market. We weave in and out of traffic, until a maze of stalls appears before us: hair decorum, variegated yarn, leather shoes, raw sausages, hanging tripe and giant bags of golden, purple, and yellow potatoes. We are not carrying purses, and are instructed to refrain from looking prosperous.

12:00pm Return to guest house. Haven't eaten since octopus lunch yesterday, and decide to go explore Ovalo Gutierrez. There's a grocery store there, Wongs. This place has a grand piano sitting between the seafood counter, cinnamon rolls, and a carved wooden staircase. We follow the winding staircase. Later, Michael tells me to pick some ice cream on the way out. I try something new and what I think is caramel happens to be plump, gooey, golden raisins.

1:00pm Tomorrow the McAnally's arrive (Our team leaders!). We clear out of our guest room and move next door to a little bedroom hosting a bunkbed, microwave and refrigerator. The bathroom is now next door. It is hard for me to remember: No toothbrushing with faucet water. All water must be filtered. And no flushing toilet paper down. I am grateful for all of the posted signs.

2:30pm There's a giant pre-Incan layered adobe structure dated between 400-700AD near the guest house. Tour begins. We hike along taupe,dusty trail beside coca bushes, aji plants and yuca, passing llamas and alpacas. Our destination reasonably resembles a layered, square-ish pyramid. We are taken to the top of this massive heap where ceremonies were commenced rendering human sacrifices: 12-25 year old women and children were offered to appease gods and goddesses. They hypothesize the structure's withstanding fierce earthquakes rests upon careful space between adobe bricks and those bodies given to the gods.

6:00pm Walk with the Olson's to the Tate's apartment, located behind a giant fortress-like wall, for a feast: Homemade spaghetti and crusty, buttered bread; Salad with all the chopped, disinfected vegetables from the market earlier; Soft, fleshy Peruvian fruit (somewhat like a banana and a pineapple combined), and Burney Tate's hearty, banana pecan cookies. We enjoy our tea and fast friends.

11:30pm Michael is on the top bunk beside the open-windowed breeze. We listen to car alarms going off in the neighboring streets. Maybe tomorrow we will wake before a knock on the door...

Lima

Celebrating our ten year anniversary in a little preview trip to Peru, before her jungles become home next summer. My journal, stuffed with papers, observations and notes, documents bits and pieces of our time so far.

July 6
11:30pm Dad drops us at the curb @ LAX, backpacks in tow. We wave goodbye...

July 7
12:00am Winding lines of international travelers carrying masking-taped microwave boxes and surfboards are tangled together. Which line do we stand in?

12:20am Watching attendants going through our suitcase, sifting through the things we're bringing for our team leader: Twizzlers, dryer sheets... and the solar laptop charger (the attendants love this!). The suitcase gets zipped and thrown onto the assembly line of others. We're relieved.

2:00am LA's city lights are now behind us and the vast Pacific, lit by the moon, before us. I am deliciously frightened.

4:30am Mine is the window seat. Michael and I watch the sun peek through the horizon while drinking strawberry-banana nectar.
The rest is a blur. Dramamine for motion sickness again owns me. My eyelids are heavy. Next I am drooling, chin against my chest...

3:00pm Lima. I follow Michael. He's a travel pro, and everything is new to me. We wait in line for a stamp. We wait for our checked backpacks. We exchange our money. I am quiet the entire time. He is not used to this and keeps asking if I'm okay... I am.

3:30pm Maneuvering through the city in a taxi. Honking horns. People walk among the cars, selling Chiclets gum, postcards and the like. I smell diesel fuel and settle in to the rhythm of stop and go while Luis weaves in and out of invisible lanes, steadily communicating without a word to each taxi or bus he passes.

Early evening-ish: We arrive at the Baptist guest home, behind tall pointed bars. Common area is shared on the bottom floor, and there are a number of missionary families each enjoying a separate apartment.

Dark: I am asleep again until the famous Pham family is knocking on our door(amazing missionary family of nearly seven). We are wonderfully whisked into their Lima lives for the night. Perfect.

July 8
10:00am Victor is knocking on our door. Time for our tour and we're still sleeping.

11:30am Victor leads us to The Catacombs under Santa Domingo, while He is jovial with the pigeons flocking at his feet, "The rats of the air," He bemoans. Our guide follows the mortared tunnels underground explaining the remnants of 30,000 people buried in our midst. The skulls and bones are stacked beside us. The rich. The poor. The femurs, pelvis' and ribs look the same. Many skulls are similar too. We are somber.

Noon: Seafood along the coast. I do not ask what it is, but I recognize one thing: octopus. Inca cola drinks like bubble gum and I love it at once.

2:00pm Orphanage. Rock walls. Barred windows. Victor is attacked by delighted little squealers: hanging from him, touching his face, squeezing his legs. Michael reaches down and scoops children into his arms; He is glowing. I see a little boy in blue; He is crying. He looks to be Nathanael's age. I lift him to me and he does not leave the rest of the time. He touches my eye lashes. To look into his eyes is paralyzing-- I know we leave and he stays. This can not be. I imagine him with bows and arrows and Nathanael...


3:00pm My heart is full. Michael's heart is full. Victor takes us to his home, and I see a little box of kittens, and meet his strong boys. Victor is a Peruvian brother in Christ, loving the urban poor, listening with his heart to their lives and their pain. His love for Jesus and His people is most compelling. Our chauffeur becomes our mentor, our dear friend and we are greatly helped.

July 9
12:00am Michael is sleeping with his Bible opened across his chest. Have I ever been so rich?

Orange, Blue and Belief

Driving last night just after sunset, I was silenced by pale peach clouds against sapphire sky. When have I seen those two colors together above me--orange and blue? And when do I ever remember reading this: Therefore, do not cast away your confidence, which has great reward. For you have need of endurance… “Now the just shall live by faith; But if anyone draws back, My soul has no pleasure in him.” But we are not of those who draw back to perdition, but of those who believe to the saving of the soul (Hebrews 10:35-36, 38-39).

I am struck right now by the power of what the Gospel actually is: Somehow my resolute confidence in the accomplished work of Jesus completely satisfies God’s wrath against me. Had I not believed, had I shrunk back in fear, or my aloof pompousness, it would be to my own eternal destruction. That’s perdition. It is my belief alone that secures my being thoroughly delightful to God Himself; Creator GOD.

He is the One who initiated and pursued me: You did not choose Me, but I chose you (John 15:16). When my will staggered after its own pleasures and revelries, He said, “I will put My Law in their minds, and write it on their hearts” (Jeremiah 31:33b). When He wrote His Law on my heart, it was satisfied by His own provision, the blood of Jesus-- blood that demanded my freedom, then declared it! He reassured Me His entire Law could be summed up in Love. Love the Lord your God, with all your HEART…SOUL…STRENGTH (Deuteronomy 6:4). And that love would spill over onto others by this important thing: Whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law…(Matthew 7:12). He supposes the degree to which my hope is in Him will be made obvious by how I treat other people: A good tree does not bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits you will know them (Matthew 7:18-20).

My hope in the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus, the Son of God, is THE ONLY absorption of God’s consuming wrath against unbelief. Faith in Jesus is my salvation. I am saved through His mercy when I believe what He says. Everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure (1 John 3:3). My right standing with God is secured to the degree that my faith remains grounded in Him.

This takes a lot of work to believe. Trusting Jesus instead of depending on my own intuition, seeming facts, or what is tangible to me is hard work! Everything else is so much more immediate and demanding sometimes-- most times.

When I was driving home, alone in the car with the orange and blue sky, I was mad at myself. I had again failed Jesus in a hidden area of my mind only He and I knew about. I was frustrated, and cried out loud to Him, “Why do I perpetually insist on doing things my way, when my way fails to provide lasting satisfaction EVERY time?! What game plan do I need to resurrect? What now?” I groaned relentlessly, droning on and on…
Minutes later, I looked up. I saw it; the sky in furious splendor. I was silenced. Trust in the Lord and do good… feed on His faithfulness. Delight yourself also in the LORD, and He shall give you the desires of your heart (Psalms 37:3-4). In that moment, this one thing was real to me: BELIEVE JESUS MORE! To overcome trials, temptation, raging self-absorption… is to BELIEVE JESUS MORE. How can I do that?

I ran inside, closed my eyes to the piles of laundry and opened my Bible in a quiet place. Spending time with Him helps me to believe Him more. Trying harder makes me resentful. Oh! But to BELIEVE JESUS MORE (What does He say? I’ll do it!) is to have every desire of my heart satiated. My belief in what God says not only guarantees my future with Him, it frees up my present with Him, to be bubbling over with continual joy.

I am dry, pouty and dull when I am not believing God. Sometimes, I don’t know what to believe, because my mind is too full of my own blaring newscast. I’m having to stop what I am doing or thinking in that moment to feed on His faithfulness. Sometimes this means closing my eyes and crying out to Him, “I don’t know what to believe right now. Help me!” Other times, it means giving my children a task, setting my plans aside, and opening my Bible in my lap, when I’d much rather be meeting my needs my way.

Feeding on His faithfulness is hard work initially. I rarely want to do that on my own. But once the grazing begins, my only task is to believe what I’m feeding on, then do it. God himself even provided a helper for me to actually obey: the Holy Spirit. Before his death, burial and resurrection, Jesus said: It is to your advantage that I go away…the Helper…I will send Him to you (John 16:7). He therefore enables my obedience, through the Holy Spirit, to the degree that I believe. Obedience is rooted in belief. The minute I stop believing God is the minute I fall...


Therefore, do not cast away your confidence, which has great reward (Hebrews 10:35).

White Noise

I love white noise. For now, white noise is the perpetual hum of the ceiling fan droning out Michael reading Dr. Seuss to Chloe, who repeats every sentence after him. We have arrived back in California at the Mission House for our final weeks before language school in Costa Rica, and Mission House living means life includes a bunk bed. Oh, oh, a bunk bed! Julia squealed when her eyes fell on its bright reds and blues: I’ve always dreamed of a bunk bed!This famous sleeping spot currently houses Michael, Nathanael, (hanging from the bars, doing flip and spins) Julia hovering over the book to listen carefully, and Abigail making necessary corrections to Chloe’s repetitions. Michael steadily plods through the book while interruptions ensue, as if all he hears is white noise…

These last weeks were somehow swallowed up in the thrill of closing out responsibilities, goals, reviews and an exit paper at the International Learning Center. However, it is the play time that my mind is settled on for now: shrewd scheming in the dim-lit quad as the Mafia game unfolds when the day is done. Aunt W and Aunt P have everyone fooled, and are winning--again. I taste Uncle D’s famous, marshmallowy popcorn balls (listening to Abigail moan upon nearly cracking a molar on a corn kernel). I hear Uncle Brian and Aunt Felicia playfully jousting in their wonderful deep-south Mississippi drawls, while Uncle Andrew wields out the Uno with whichever children are begging him to play. Uncle J rides Sydney on his back playing the Shetland pony role, (quickly becoming famous as Skylar and Nathanael skid across the carpet to yank his T-shirt and hoist themselves onto a free ride!) Aunt Christine is back from the quilting quad with a patchwork of autumn colors perfectly stitched together, and she pulls out the summer Oreos, the ones with the blue cream in the middle. Inevitably, Chloe has managed at this point to gather chapstick from Aunt Amber’s pocket in one hand, while she’s talking on the cell phone she pried from Aunt D, making her way out the door, and into the grass field where she will cunningly collaborate with Levi, allowing him to talk on the phone next. Aunt K comes strolling over with her diet-something soda, which nearly spills onto her new shirt when Nathanael runs to her, tightly squeezing her legs, my friend! Then Julia bursts in the quad with a new journal and cold Chick-Fil-A french fries as an offering, while she stumbles over the details of a date off-campus with Aunt Amy…

I love white noise. The white noise at the Learning Center was people noise. The white noise at church this morning was people noise. People who love Jesus have an other-world bond—-their hearts are united and set on another place. The sweetness of our togetherness is deepened by the fact that it is temporal. We’re not just cloistered in the narrow comfort of one another. We’re partners in combat. We’re in a huddle: rejoicing with those who rejoice, weeping with those who weep. But the huddle is not the means to the end. We remember the end: That your way be known on earth, your salvation among all nations. Let the peoples praise you, O God; Let all the peoples praise you…Psalm 67:2,5b.

We actually live for the end; the real deal. When the white noise is the prayers of God’s people singing a new song to Jesus, the perfect Lamb of God: You are worthy… for you were slain and have redeemed us to God by your blood out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation…Revelation 5:9,10.

S.I.R.

Chloe Joy is asleep beside me, moaning every now and again. She had the yellow fever and rabies shots this afternoon. Her fever is high, which is normal, and our quad family is helping us rotate between fever reducers through the night…

To keep all of our arms moving after all of our shots, we played a weak game of frisbee golf in the sunshiny-ness. By the fifth round, I laid in the grass at the top of a hill, enjoying the frisbee pillow. The strategist woke me from my reverie, "This is frisbee golf! Keep moving!" (That's the difference between me and him. He's squinting through the pine trees, positioning himself to go in for the victory...and I'm listening to the blue-winged, whirring insect dancing through the tall grass. He would never say an insect dances, or even that it whirs-- and especially not in the middle of a considerable competition.)

Once his frisbee-victory had been established, we followed the Strategist down a tractor-hewn trail. It took relentless convincing to maintain followers as we traipsed through the same pasture where my strategist and I had watched leaping deer on Tuesday. But eventually the trail ended, as they always do, and we were fixed on an enchanting, muddy river complete with a sturdy rope swing and miniature cabin. What deliciousness!

I’d desperately needed this diversion. The intensity of the training process has been staggering at times. Daily, I feel exposed and raw. Any hidden indulgence that I've unknowingly nursed lies open before me, screaming to be coddled. Each feeble attempt I've made to tell myself what is acceptable and what is not, is met with this obstinate battle-cry from my gut: "But I want to do things my way!"

Last night, burying my head in my hands I cried aloud, "I am weak! I thought I was strong, but I am desperately weak. I need help to do what I believe. I need help to live what I believe! My belief is bigger than I am, and I'm drowning in my smallness!"

It hit me. I cannot attack my thought life like I do the game of Frisbee golf: handing over the victory to another in contented oblivion, while I pursue personal peace and pleasure. The problem for me starts at the beginning of the day…

Mornings are hard for me. I like to sleep in. I enjoy late, lingering nights. I’ve often minimized this, but doing so has been too costly. I am realizing that my personal victories will be established in simple decisions. Personal losses will be obtained in these same, simple decisions. Simple decision: I must get to bed early enough to actually wake up and seek God. With eyes wide open to the mercies of God, I beg you, my brothers, as an act of intelligent worship, to give him your bodies, as a living sacrifice, consecrated to Him and acceptable by Him. Don’t let the world squeeze you into its own mold, but let God remold your minds from within, so that you may prove in practice that the plan of God for you is good…(Romans 12:1-2, Phillips).

With eyes wide open to the mercies of God, and as a reasonable service to God, the mornings are an opportunity to present my body a living sacrifice To Him. To do so is to make a simple decision to fight for joy. Certainly, I may resign myself to cozy covers and a dull, sleepy daze, but my patterns lead to mediocrity, dissatisfaction and general, mild misery. The mild, mediocre misery is to me a slow, steady form of torture.

Today, a thought occurred to me: Perhaps I ought to challenge Michael to another game of Frisbee golf. This time, I will not lay down in sunshiny-ness during the heat of the battle. My temptation to relax, when I’m actually on the frontlines is met with this: Therefore, I cheerfully made up my mind to be proud of my weaknesses, because they mean a deeper experience of the power of Christ. I can even enjoy weaknesses… for my very weakness makes me strong in Him (2 Corinthians 12:9a-10b, Phillips).

Look out, Michael Day. You have met your match, my strategist-in-residence.

Prayer Card

We just ordered our prayer cards from overnightprints.com. Hopefully they will arrive by the end of the week. Please keep us in your prayers!

Cross-Cultural Worship

Central Asian worship at the International Learning Center looked something like this tonight: As we piled into the building, the lobby was lined with various shoes--men's, women's and children's. Barefoot men made their way to the front of the room. Women, clad in mostly floor length skirts, long sleeves and head coverings sat in the back with the children. My girls wore pillow cases covering their hair and shoulders. I loved sitting at the piano beholding a sea of sent-out ones: strong, jovial men, sons hanging on their backs and mothers bouncing little ones on their knees. Grandmothers sat with gauzy scarves draped over their heads and shoulders and 20-something singles with all of our children in their laps, too... Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity! Psalm 133:1

Much of the music was in minor keys, and it was so powerful with steady percussion, driving guitar and the ethereal flute. My fingers followed the melody on ivory keys, and though I could not understand the words, I was experiencing the presence of our Most High God who did, and was delighted. I could feel His delight. There was an awesome Dari sermon, and a time of silent prayer for God to make Himself known to the people of Central Asia. Our children joined us in praying that the glory of the Lord would fill the hearts of these people...

"For from the rising of the sun, even to its going down... My name shall be great among the nations," says the Lord of Hosts. Malachi 1:11

Perfect Moment

Faint traces of bleach fill our quad. We've been required to do routine wipe-downs due to a wave of Rotavirus sweeping through the Campus. Everywhere we turn, there have been posted signs coercing our hands to hot water, sudsy soap and friction to kill lingering germs. The worst is over for now.

And alas! It is Saturday! Michael took the troops adventuring down a road they had not yet explored. They ate Salisbury steak and mashed potatoes, followed by a trip to the playground, where they were squealing in the rain, trying to swing up into the clouds. Swinging was especially fun when the rain poured in torrents we don't see in California. Soon, coming down so hard, it felt like hail, making it nearly impossible to see ahead. Racing toward shelter at the quad, I thought the wind was threatening to drag Chloe and I away and we began laughing as hard as the rain was falling. Warm rain beating the asphalt paving, feeding wet grass...making us laugh... It was perfect. And then everything stopped. The rain, the wind, the laughter. The perfect moment was gone.

While Julia was gathering everyone's wet clothes in a heap, Abigail came into my room and began sobbing, "My heart was so full of so much love for you while we were running in the rain, it was so sweet!" She sobbed, "I loved being at the playground in the rain with you." She sobbed. She too thought it was a perfect moment.

Lies and a Confession

This has been Spiritual Warfare week. Dr. Rankin, after fasting three days before spending time with us, has presented pages of scriptures that have penetrated to the core of me. This afternoon we had our house church debriefing on these issues. Intense. Some 10 hours so far on enemy strategies and I'm ashamed of my oblivion in one area in particular...

In the jungle, many people believe lies like: white men will kill my children and sell their organs, or my newborn has a cone-shaped head, is therefore demon infested, and must be buried alive. Lies possess minds and drive actions.

The truth is that, although of course, we lead normal human lives, the battle we are fighting is on the spiritual level. (2 Corinthians 10, Phillips)

Tactics stateside are a bit different, though equally debilitating. There are hours I wrestle in the invisible chains: lies I choose to believe. Lies that drive me inward. Lies. I am constantly tempted to believe some lame lie about myself; relishing again in me-ness.

Here I am a God-follower-- seeking to adore Him with my whole heart, because He first delighted in me!-- yet I am somehow also seeking to be my own Master, my own ruler. Who do I think I am? What a foul stench of entitlement I may carry around on any given day!

But thanks be to God who overwhelmingly gives us the victory though Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8, Phillips)

Our battle is to bring down every deceptive fantasy and every imposing defense that men erect against the true knowledge of God. We even fight to capture every thought until it acknowledges the authority of Christ.
(2 Corinthians 10, Phillips)

His authority secures my freedom! His authority is my freedom! May the King of Kings, the Most High Lord of Hosts be exalted among the nations, among all the peoples. Thank you, Jesus, for securing an overwhelming victory for all who call upon You!

Living On "The Farm"

April 23, 2009

As the sun was sinking low in the sky this evening, after I could not manage another bite of the wonderful once-a-week dessert: a buttery bowl of chocolate and cherry bread pudding, I went for a walk. Our quad is settled on a rich, rolling landscape, tucked between clusters of tall trees and bright hills dotted with happy, brown cows. To meet the required physical fitness requirements during our training will be a sheer pleasure, as I can not remember the last time I loved walking so much as tonight.

The little ones are happily tangled in their sheets-- even Michael is sound asleep. His brain has not stopped administrating, strategizing, delegating, assimilating...since our plane landed...until tonight.

We live in a quad: five family units maintaining their own mini-kitchen, bath and sleeping areas while sharing a great room. There must be close to forty quads. And the cafeteria! Flags from every nation hang from the ceiling. There is a faithful wall of Fruit Loops and Apple Jacks and a dozen other cereal towers, a salad bar (that always has a nice heap of the hard-boiled eggs that Chloe devours), and tonight they served peppered pork chops. Every meal is a feast and I pile the dishes onto a conveyor belt which makes them disappear.

Earlier, we finished a required scavenger hunt-of-sorts. Tripping along the asphalt pathways, we found a clinic where they administer vaccinations (rabies, yellow fever, malaria...)That same path led us through the mail room,the Children's Research/Education buildings and International Center where halls are covered in photography: nameless faces of peoples from many nations.

In Your presence is fullness of joy;
At Your right hand are pleasures forevermore. Psalm 16:11

Family Photos

Packing

Our Immanuel Baptist Mission House is an interesting smattering of piles tonight:
Degree deodorants and Fusion razors in one clump-- Michael's neglected seminary books begging him to start that 10 page paper in another. Receipt piles, discarded-CDs-from-college-days piles, and the ominous packing list upon which my feet are currently propped...

In the kitchen, I hear Michael fumbling through a crumpled manilla envelope I packed full of things for him to go through. Condensing, condensing, condensing... The goal? Stuff six duffel bags. That's it. All of life must fit into these six duffel bags. 10 sweet years of life. Six people.

Gratefully, one of us is the strategist. One of us is going to subdue the stuff victoriously. The other one will be cheering from the sidelines with her feet propped up on the packing list...Each of us has a job to do, and for a moment in time, mine has been spent in the storying of it all.

Legacy

A calling is a peculiar thing. I suppose Michael's and mine can be most likened to God's pursuit of us. His relentless tugging has become both tangible and very specific.

Michael had a Grandfather who had been a missionary in Peru (the jungle), and I grew up listening to missionary biographies from a cassette player beside my bed at night. During our childhoods, we each pondered life in a cross-cultural context. We thought about living among a people different from us-- learning from them, loving them. However, we rarely entertained these thoughts at the same time.

That changed during a missions celebration at Immanuel Baptist Church in March, 2008, nine years into our marriage. During this week, we chose to fast and pray. Michael went on a long walk listening to Romans 10 on his ipod:
Now how can they call on one in whom they have never believed? How can they believe in one of whom they have never heard? And how can they hear unless someone proclaims him? And who will go to tell them unless he is sent? As the scripture puts it: How beautiful are the feet of them that bring glad tidings of good things!

He was overwhelmed by the possibility that his feet could be those that brought good news. In his mind,the word legacy did somersaults. He told me the next morning he could not stop thinking about a particular word and was curious to see if I could guess what it was. "Is it legacy?" I quipped. In that very moment, the Holy Spirit put legacy in my mind, "The Lord wants us to go to Peru and finish the work your Grandfather started." This was something we had never even discussed or considered.

Michael, being calculated and cautious, is rarely given to impressions. He is very discerning and logical and hardly sentimental. To be apart of this moment with him--this legacy moment-- was thoroughly unexpected...

Next week we leave for Orientation in Virginia. Language School in Costa Rica follows. Not until later next year will we actually arrive in Peru. Will you join us in this legacy?