Friday Reminder

Friday mornings at 8:30, the same face has peered through my gate for almost three years. She pushes a two-wheeled wooden cart down our cobblestone street with usually two or three children in tow. For the last 10 months, there has been an addition of an infant car seat wedged in the back right hand corner of the cart with a tiny baby girl sleeping.  By the time she has reached our neighborhood, she has pushed that cart with her dainty frame for almost a mile.  She told me a couple of years ago, she lives down by the river in a community that is an "invasion" of squatters. By "invasion," I mean land that has been taken by a group of people instead of purchased. Most riverfront property in this city is an "invasion".  She comes our direction on Friday because it is trash day in our neighborhood.

Trash is not a public service in Honduras.  Most trash is disposed of by burning.  Our trash is taken care of by a "private service." By "private service," I mean that the residents of our neighborhood pay a small fee for some men who have purchased an old, beat-up, run-down, U-haul type truck that has most likely been sent down from the United States as salvaged to come by and pick up the trash. Sometimes, they come by twice a week like they should, sometimes once a week, sometimes not at all for weeks on end.  Their absence is typical if they aren't being paid sufficiently or are on strike. And the sad trash truck has no place to lay it's head each night so it's a gamble if it gets to rest in our neighborhood. 

      The beauty parked in front of our house. 

Smells fresh in the morning when I wash dishes.

Here in Honduras, you can bet if there is no public trash service, there is definitely no public recycling program.  This leads me back to that sweet tired face I see every Friday morning.  She comes to our neighborhood to dig through everyone's trash for plastic.  She can turn the plastic in for money which acts as her income. Three years ago, she asked me if I had any plastic bottles or containers that I could spare.  From that time, I started separating our plastic out into a different bag for her so she doesn't have to dig through our trash.  It's a job I would not like to have.  In Honduras, you don't flush your toilet paper...it goes in the trash.  And all other trash is a breeding ground for maggots and pestilence.  

She sometimes through a gappy smile asks me very specific requests. Do I have women's clothing? Do I have a crib mattress? Do I have baby clothes and disposable diapers so she can deliver another babe in the hospital? She always asks so politely, seemingly without expectation or visible disappointment if I don't have said request. She is quite delighted and overly zealous in thanking me and the Lord when I can meet her requests.  She is different than most to me. While it is clear to a commoner that she is among the most physically impoverished in our city, she has a twinkle in her eye, a grin, and a grateful attitude every week that makes me confident she is rich in Christ.  I am thankful for her gentle reminder every Friday that the Lord fills us with a richness that is better than any earthly possession.

I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus. -Philippians 4:12,19

What Are You Doing?

Once upon a time, a traveler came across three stone-cutters and asked them what they were doing.

The first replied saying that he was the most miserable person on Earth and that he has the hardest job in the world. "Every day I have to move around huge stones make a living, which is barely enough to eat." The traveler gave him a coin and continued walking.

The second one did not complain and was focused on his work. When the traveler asked him what he was doing, the stone-cutter replied, "I'm earning a living by doing the best job of stone-cutting in the entire county. Although the work is hard, I'm satisfied with what I do and I earn enough to feed my family." The traveler praised him, gave him a coin and went on.

When the traveler met the third stone-cutter, he noticed that the stone-cutter had sweat and dust on him but he looked happy and was singing a cheerful song. The traveler was astonished and asked, "What are you doing?" The stone-cutter looked up and with a visionary gleam in his eye and said, "Can't you see? I'm building a cathedral."

This parable of the stone-cutters is one that has been used in our last two Central American Pastors' Conferences to give perspective on building the Kingdom of God. I'm including it here today, mostly as a reminder to myself. 

Missionaries are expected to report to hundreds even thousands of people on their work (which absolutely should be expected). For many missionaries (myself included), this creates a feeling that they need to prove themselves worthy.

There is great temptation to tell you:

How hard I am working.

How good I am at my work.

How much I have accomplished.

...I...I...I.

It becomes very ME focused.

If we have true perspective on the cathedral and our work, we know that God is building His cathedral (His Kingdom). We are under-qualified for the task but privileged to be hired. How much more glory does God receive by building something so amazing using such ordinary workers?

-Adam Cain

Note: The ability to save blogs as drafts is a beautiful thing in a chaotic season of life.  I was just peeking back through some of these lonely drafts and thought my cute husband's wise words were the kind that are pertinent every day for all "professions."  Let God be the one who gets the glory in all circumstances! 

The Week My Life Changed Forever

As I sit here, sweat dripping down my temple, wondering if the (scheduled) impending day-long power outage is really going to happen tomorrow, I cannot help but smile.  You see, this is the week my life changed forever.  It's kind of humorous because I was more of a passive participant.  Five years ago, I sat at home in Phoenix with a swollen belly and an active two year old.  My husband, however, was in La Ceiba, Honduras, for the first time as a member of our church's short term missions team. His intent was to catch up with our missionary friends, Mike and Ashley Troxell, whom would soon be living and serving there.  Adam wanted to catch a vision of how we could support, serve, and pray for them better.  I teased him relentlessly about going just to see them but quietly prayed the Lord would work on my husband.  That Adam would return and tell me that the Lord had called us to overseas missions. Long story short, that's what happened.  Before Adam even left US soil, he knew the Lord was calling us to something different than our comfortable, complacent life in Arizona.

Adam and Ashley making bracelets with some boys during VBS

This new life is anything but what I expected.  It's easy to romanticize or glamorize something you long for only to be surprised by reality.  I recently read the story of how the Israelites crossed the Jordan River into the Promised Land and immediately set up stones of remembrance.  Joshua told them to look upon the stones and tell their children the stories of God's faithfulness.  There are so many things in the last five years that I always want to remember.  So many happenings where I can only give God the glory for his faithfulness.  

Here's a few of our ebeneezers to satisfy your piqued curiosity:

-The Lord put us on a plane to Atlanta with a 4 week old baby and a two year old when we should have missed the plane and a training that wasn't available for another 4 months. Read about it here.

-The Lord raised one hundred percent of our support in 7 short months.  He proved to us over and over again that He had hand picked our supporters regardless of who we thought would be part of our support team.  He also taught us that it was not our presentation, our plan for ministry, or anything we did or said that raised the support.  It was Him.

-He guided us through a year of transition in our first foreign country as a family.  He guided us through a new language.  He taught us to love another culture, people, and nation.  He taught us that He is the King of Kings over all creation; the same in every language. Read about it here.

-The Lord has put a hedge around us and protected us for all these years.  It started with a burglary the day we landed in Honduras.  He taught us not to live in fear but be vigilant.  Here's our welcome to Honduras.

-He taught us that lots of His blessings come through challenges, suffering, and sacrifices.  We know Christ better through things that are hard, knowing He has experienced our temptations and pain.  My summation of 2014 is still true today.

I look back on the last five years with gratitude of how our family has changed and learned more of who Christ is and how to love others.  I look forward to what Christ has in store for the next five years.

Jacob sporting "La H" 5 years ago!

When God Yells Your Name

Do you ever have a week or a month where you keep getting delivered the same message? Maybe you read an excerpt from your devotional and then go to church to find the pastor giving a message on the same passage. And then, you read the next story in the cue of your children's' Bible to find it's the same Scripture. AND THEN, your Bible study studies the same thing. I always like when this happens because know I am hard headed and prone to wander. I always feel like the Lord is calling me first with a quiet whisper onto a full out beckoning, arms waving, "Michelle, Michelle, Michelle, MICHELLE, MI-CHELLE!!" And then like my own children, I go, "Oh, were you calling me?  I didn't hear you until you were yelling?" It leads me to stop and search out what the Lord has for me to learn because He has (finally) caught my attention.

I was attempting to make it an entire year without a blog post, but I crumble a month from the finish line because I saw the theme in what the Lord has been screaming to me this last year! What a year we have had. We left a year ago, today, for our 6 month Home Missionary Assignment in the United States.  (It went by way too fast and while we enjoyed the company of so many friends and family, we still didn't get a chance to see everybody!) As I reflect back on our time in the States and our time since our return to Honduras, I can't but see a consistent yet sometimes painful theme to what the Lord has been calling me to hear: the unity of the body of believers.

The UNITY of the body of Christ in the global church

As we departed Honduras a year ago, Adam and I spoke much of what the Lord taught us through His local body in La Ceiba.  Not surprisingly, a much more charismatic culture worships our same God much differently than the Western Christian in the United States. During our pre-field training, we completed a task by which we determined if theological statements were Biblical or a product of our culture.  As we've sifted through much of this in mentoring pastors and worshiping abroad, the Lord continues to press the importance of the unity of the body of believers into my heart and mind. Hondurans and Americans may be different in language, culture, how they worship and more, but as brothers and sisters in Christ we have more to be unified by than divided by. John Piper says, "We are more closely bound to our brothers and sisters in Christ in other cultures than we are to our closest unbelieving compatriot in the fatherland."  Take that in.  As a Christian, you have more in common with a Christian on the other side of the world that you've never met than you do your closest unbelieving friend in America. Your family in Christ spreads far and wide, to the ends of the earth.   

So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. -Galatians 3:26-28

The UNITY of the body of Christ in the church in America

Being overseas for three years, we missed much of the happenings in our own church, in our supporting churches, and in the lives of our dear brothers and sisters in Christ in churches we had never stepped foot in. As we returned to the United States, we struggled as we saw how sin had divided more than one of our beloved congregations and created multiple strained relationships between believers. As we traveled the US during our six month stint, we heard story after story of the pain and division. This was weighty and disheartening for us as we were supposed to be recovering from service on the mission field. We shed many tears and longed for reconciliation for more than one church that we love, for many more than one or two friends that we love. It was like watching divorces happen before our very eyes. The desire to be right won out over the desire to be of one heart and one mind...that of Christ. I can easily look at denominational differences with the same eyes. We let our theology, doctrinal statements, church music, and more become something that separates us. We let those things become more important than sharing the one thing we can agree on...that Christ died for our sins and that He reigns in our hearts.

For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. -1 Corinthians 12:12

The UNITY of Christ between brothers and sisters

This for me is where the rubber meets the road. How do I live with other Christians on a daily basis? How do I love those Christians I work with, Christians from other missions organizations, Christians that I meet? Do I let no corrupting talk come out of my mouth? Do I edify in order to give grace? Do I overlook offenses? Do I easily forgive? Do I do good towards other Christians regardless of how I feel? Or do I get lumped into the string of sins in Romans 1? No difference is noted between gossip, slander, arrogance, and envy, malice, or murder. Sin is sin is sin. If I am divisive in any form, I do not have the heart of Christ. His heart is UNITY! The Lord has instilled in me this last year a strong desire to be unified with other believers by being like-minded by the same love, being one in Spirit and intent on one purpose. It doesn't matter your role, profession, or calling. What would loving look like being like minded, with one purpose, if we knew that's how we should be unified with every individual who loves Christ? Unbelievers would note a difference. People would be drawn to the light of Christ! We could turn the world upside down!

So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. -Ephesians 4:11-13