Some of What He Taught Me
I got three emails from Russia this morning, and they made my day! Everyone's doing fine. Basic news: Apparently Malish, Din and Inna's cat, is all grown up and misses me. :) Rusik and Vitalik started first grade, are learning to read and write, and are having a hard time with it. Slavik sent pictures of them all dressed up going to school, and they are the CUTEST things I've ever seen!! Karina is, as always, doing great in school. The chickens have started laying eggs. And the fixing-up in the church post-fire is going well, not too much work.
I realized I still haven't really blogged about what God has done in me as a result of my time there this summer. I guess I keep waiting until I figure things out, until have something coherent to say, but that time isn't coming. So in this post, I will just type some random snippets of my heart as I reflect on those two months. It's never going to completely make sense to me, I don't think, and it's never going to be linear and logical. Some of the lessons I learned, things I realized, people I met, are interconnected, and some aren't. If I really pay attention, I can see that's how life is normally at home too, it just never strikes me as odd. You know? You just go through your days and you follow the path in front of you, and sometimes you radically change, sometimes change takes a while. And your experiences sometimes all point you in the same growth direction, but sometimes they work against each other and it takes years to figure out if you've moved to the left, right, forward, or backward. There are some ways in which you never fully understand where you are or where you've been or where you're going, because you're always in process.
So this is part of my process. Russia is part of my process. It's not a single-themed experience like building a house with Habitat for Humanity or something. It contained a bunch of those experiences, it was life, it was a 2-month span of my life, in which I was given the opportunity to get way way WAY outside of my sphere of normalcy.
From last winter when the internship process started, it was a faith thing. By faith here I mean trusting with my eyes closed. I didn't know what I was going to do exactly, I didn't know how I was going to raise over $3,000, I didn't know who I was going to stay with, how I was going to learn Russian, or what I was going to eat. The list goes on. Of course, you all understand what I'm talking about. This is the time in life that comes around every so often, usually tied to the times when you get too comfortable and God decides to change that.
I was afraid a lot before I left. I wish I would have been more unafraid. I learned through that time that fear is not of the Lord. Anna taught me that. Fear usually does not mean you're acting outside of God's will. It usually means you're being called to something very far outside of what you're used to doing and your flesh is reacting against it.
But I wasn't super afraid when I was actually going, and when I got there. Actually, I'm really surprised I wasn't freaked out when I was in those airports alone. Adrenaline or the Holy Spirit or both, I guess.
I saw a lot of my own sin this summer. For me there's something about being in an environment where you aren't propped up by comforts and other English-speakers and coffee shops and things and nice roads and WI-FI that really makes all my sin rise up. I was daily convicted of selfishness. Even while spending time with "the least of these," I was selfish. I wanted to stop going to the orphanage because they didn't listen to me and I didn't see the point. I wanted to go home instead of talking to that really old lady with the swollen legs because she made me uncomfortable. I was selfish.
And I also read Oswald Chambers every day before bed, and if you think you're a good person, I recommend reading him. There was a point towards the end of my stay when I had to stop reading it, because I was starting to see my sin so clearly that I was forgetting Jesus loves me. I hope one day I'll be able to see both equally, but for some reason, it seems to work like a seesaw in me right now. One has to eclipse the other just a little. I'd rather let Jesus do the eclipsing.
Another thing I realized in Karachaevsk is that I am very hypocritical, and have been my whole life, and a lot of people around me are too. It doesn't come up very often in our culture because of how insulated we are. We never have to get down to it. But you know those songs we sing? "Break my heart for what breaks yours, everything I am for your Kingdom's cause...show me how to love like you have loved me." "When scorned are we, we joy to be the more like thee..." I think I really mean those things (or at least, mean that I want those things), but I don't think I really live those things, or pursue them, or understand them.
In a very, very microscopic way, I learned some of what those things mean. Jesus is in the process of breaking my heart for what breaks his, starting with some people I care a lot about -- people who I have little in common with, people I haven't known very long at all, some I have barely spoken with. I think He's showing me how to love people like He loves people. He loves us so much He holds our tears in bottles. He loves us so much that He couldn't stand to be apart from us, so He gave His life. God wants my Russian family to thrive just like I do. I think when people have a strong calling or passion for something, it's God giving them part of His passion for that thing. Without that gift, we would all just be walking through life without thought outside of ourselves.
The "when scorned are we..." one I learned from Dinislam. I've never met anyone who has suffered for the Gospel like he has. His family literally disowned him, beat him, when he became a believer. But he has the most JOY ever. JOY! Joy for the Good News. Joy for the Good News that changed his life.
That's all that I have time for this post, but I'll try to continue this before long. I am so very grateful for those of you who have walked through this journey with me. I hope you can see something new about Jesus through these things too.
ps-here is what I was talking about when I said cutest thing ever---Slavik and Tanya with Rusik, all spiffy for first grade!!
I realized I still haven't really blogged about what God has done in me as a result of my time there this summer. I guess I keep waiting until I figure things out, until have something coherent to say, but that time isn't coming. So in this post, I will just type some random snippets of my heart as I reflect on those two months. It's never going to completely make sense to me, I don't think, and it's never going to be linear and logical. Some of the lessons I learned, things I realized, people I met, are interconnected, and some aren't. If I really pay attention, I can see that's how life is normally at home too, it just never strikes me as odd. You know? You just go through your days and you follow the path in front of you, and sometimes you radically change, sometimes change takes a while. And your experiences sometimes all point you in the same growth direction, but sometimes they work against each other and it takes years to figure out if you've moved to the left, right, forward, or backward. There are some ways in which you never fully understand where you are or where you've been or where you're going, because you're always in process.
So this is part of my process. Russia is part of my process. It's not a single-themed experience like building a house with Habitat for Humanity or something. It contained a bunch of those experiences, it was life, it was a 2-month span of my life, in which I was given the opportunity to get way way WAY outside of my sphere of normalcy.
From last winter when the internship process started, it was a faith thing. By faith here I mean trusting with my eyes closed. I didn't know what I was going to do exactly, I didn't know how I was going to raise over $3,000, I didn't know who I was going to stay with, how I was going to learn Russian, or what I was going to eat. The list goes on. Of course, you all understand what I'm talking about. This is the time in life that comes around every so often, usually tied to the times when you get too comfortable and God decides to change that.
I was afraid a lot before I left. I wish I would have been more unafraid. I learned through that time that fear is not of the Lord. Anna taught me that. Fear usually does not mean you're acting outside of God's will. It usually means you're being called to something very far outside of what you're used to doing and your flesh is reacting against it.
But I wasn't super afraid when I was actually going, and when I got there. Actually, I'm really surprised I wasn't freaked out when I was in those airports alone. Adrenaline or the Holy Spirit or both, I guess.
I saw a lot of my own sin this summer. For me there's something about being in an environment where you aren't propped up by comforts and other English-speakers and coffee shops and things and nice roads and WI-FI that really makes all my sin rise up. I was daily convicted of selfishness. Even while spending time with "the least of these," I was selfish. I wanted to stop going to the orphanage because they didn't listen to me and I didn't see the point. I wanted to go home instead of talking to that really old lady with the swollen legs because she made me uncomfortable. I was selfish.
And I also read Oswald Chambers every day before bed, and if you think you're a good person, I recommend reading him. There was a point towards the end of my stay when I had to stop reading it, because I was starting to see my sin so clearly that I was forgetting Jesus loves me. I hope one day I'll be able to see both equally, but for some reason, it seems to work like a seesaw in me right now. One has to eclipse the other just a little. I'd rather let Jesus do the eclipsing.
Another thing I realized in Karachaevsk is that I am very hypocritical, and have been my whole life, and a lot of people around me are too. It doesn't come up very often in our culture because of how insulated we are. We never have to get down to it. But you know those songs we sing? "Break my heart for what breaks yours, everything I am for your Kingdom's cause...show me how to love like you have loved me." "When scorned are we, we joy to be the more like thee..." I think I really mean those things (or at least, mean that I want those things), but I don't think I really live those things, or pursue them, or understand them.
In a very, very microscopic way, I learned some of what those things mean. Jesus is in the process of breaking my heart for what breaks his, starting with some people I care a lot about -- people who I have little in common with, people I haven't known very long at all, some I have barely spoken with. I think He's showing me how to love people like He loves people. He loves us so much He holds our tears in bottles. He loves us so much that He couldn't stand to be apart from us, so He gave His life. God wants my Russian family to thrive just like I do. I think when people have a strong calling or passion for something, it's God giving them part of His passion for that thing. Without that gift, we would all just be walking through life without thought outside of ourselves.
The "when scorned are we..." one I learned from Dinislam. I've never met anyone who has suffered for the Gospel like he has. His family literally disowned him, beat him, when he became a believer. But he has the most JOY ever. JOY! Joy for the Good News. Joy for the Good News that changed his life.
That's all that I have time for this post, but I'll try to continue this before long. I am so very grateful for those of you who have walked through this journey with me. I hope you can see something new about Jesus through these things too.
ps-here is what I was talking about when I said cutest thing ever---Slavik and Tanya with Rusik, all spiffy for first grade!!
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