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.