Gayhearts In Peru

Let It Be

2011-11-30T10:44:00.001-08:00

Sunday. M and J were here for many hours tonight. They told us of things I’d wished I’d never heard. Blood-curdling tales from their adolescent years when Peru’s then-premiere terrorist group dominated and destroyed isolated native communities. In J’s village, bodies of live women and children were piled into covered holes in the dirt for hours-- babies and toddlers drugged with tree and leaf extracts to silence them— to save them. Quityoncari! Quityoncari! Red. Blood red. Ema first taught me this word in Yarina Isla, pointing to the blood of a dead animal. Now I think of the blood of slain Ashéninka and I shudder.

Wednesday. Nathanael, Michael and his Ashéninka language helper, whom I affectionately call the Professor, spent the hottest part of the afternoon with their machetes hacking away at waist-high weeds. Michael’s hands were bloody and blistered and he, Nathanael and the Professor were all dripping with watery mud when they came in for lunch. The girls and I had baked lemon-garlic chicken with plantain and poured it over white rice with a green herb sauce. The professor ate all of it with such enthusiasm and thorough attention to every bit of the chicken bone, Julia and Abigail and I were just delighted.

Friday. The neighborhood goat is now followed by her brown little ones just like her. They were feeding on the newly cleared land beside our front porch this morning while Profesora and I were studying some translated hymns.

Crystal with her language helper outside our house.

We sat on the front porch, and rocked and sang in Ashéninka, and I learned more grammar patterns. Inintaperoeyacaeni. He loves us. Anintaperoeyerini. We love Him.

And commands.Pomampaacotyaari Pava. Sing to God!
And praises. Noquimoshirevenaquimi. You make me happy.

Somehow foreign words spill out more easily in song, so we did a lot of singing today while we watched the goats.

Saturday. The carpenter came by. Out of the blue, Michael had called him to build a workbench area in the shed, but he seemed hesitant over the phone. Upon seeing him, we knew why. H’s face was shadowy with eyes sunken back toward his forehead. Emaciated, he sat down to talk.
The woman he’s been living with sat in the moto-taxi for quite some time while the men talked on the porch. H fears for his life. He thinks he’s dying and is cursed for rejecting God. He’s afraid. And angry. He’d come to ask us to buy his land. Or did we know anybody who would buy his land so He could go to the capital city for medical help?

I went out to the moto-taxi and asked the woman to come and sit in the shade. She declined. So I brought her water then left her alone. I walked in the house and watched her from the window. Minutes later, she was handing me a plate of smoked meat and yucca through the window bars. I gave the food to the children and went to the moto-taxi and asked her to tell me a little bit about what was happening to H.

She cautiously began… and her story unfolded, which was his story, too. She said she once followed God but did not anymore. She was sad, but did not know how not to be. I asked her if I could pray for H with her. She agreed. Together, we asked God to reveal Himself to her as she accompanied H through a great valley.

When we finished, I saw H, his chin in his chest, praying with Michael.
…The Lord is the strength of my life… (Psalm 27:1).

Sunday. Instead of a church service, there was a funeral today. The casket was cut from smooth wood and painted nearly black. On top of it were three plastic soda bottles cut off at the middle to make flower vases stuffed with colorful wildflowers beside taper candles sitting in their wax melted on splintered planks. It was hot. Our bodies were all stuck together on uneven benches. We sang choruses and children played with a puppy and picked each other’s heads.

Someone passed out plastic cups filled with cold, red cola. We looked at the casket. Then they asked Michael to come up and say something. He stood beside the black box. His voice broke. In the casket was the body of a nine-year old girl, Abigail’s friend from Sunday school. She’d been tree-climbing. And fell.
He spoke few words from Psalm 84 through the tears caught in his throat.

My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God…

Blessed is the man whose strength is in You…
As they pass through the valley of weeping, they make it a spring;
They go from strength to strength…
O Lord… blessed is the man who trusts in You!

Jose's 5th birthday with a yummy Leo cake!

Saturday. While everyone was playing volleyball in the field beside the corner church, I hopped across the way to visit Leo. Michael suggested I order one of her chocolate cakes to surprise Jose for his birthday. She told me of her dream to own a cake-shop. For now, she bakes out of her house which is mainly brick and mortar without windows or doors on a muddy lot. Her baking tools are neatly covered in fabric, and shelves are stacked with pans and spoons and chocolate bars from Lima. She washes her dishes outside. It is thoroughly enchanting. She sent me with a chocolate baking bar and made me promise to return with whatever I made. I’m thinking about fudge for Thanksgiving.

Friday. It was after 4 when Nellie started singing, signaling the start of another study. While she sang, someone banged a rock on the gate. It was Anali with three other indigenous women beside her. I assumed they were all together, though I’d never seen the three before, so I invited them in.
I went to get some bananas for the crying toddlers and when I returned, the room was full but all the women were silent. That wasn’t normal. So I asked Anali, Do you not know each other?, referring to the three women with her. She nodded. No.

Apparently the women were just walking by, and they weren’t sure why they were now sitting in our front room. So I told them I would be telling a story if they’d like to stay for a bit. They agreed.

I told the woman-at-the-well story—how a rejected woman drawing water heard how she might never thirst again. We talked about our hungry hearts that seek satisfaction in a myriad of mildly-satisfying, short-lived pleasures. And of …Christ who is our life… (Colossians 3:4). I shared examples of things I’ve groped at, vainly hoping to feel fully happy only to find that Christ is all and in all (Colossians 3:11), and He who is the resurrection and the life (John 11:25), is also The fountain of living waters (Jeremiah 17:13). Our Maker, who finally and ultimately satisfies us completely, does so because we are His.

When a rejected woman at the well heard about living water: “Whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life” (John 4:14), and that its source was found in the One who spoke I… am He (John 4:26), she believed. And was satisfied. And could not keep silent.

When our time finished, the story was more alive to me than before, and I wanted to tell it again and again because each time I do, I believe it more.

Sunday. M and J and his cousin decided it was time we visit the caves. Our families hiked in flip flops through layers of everything green and red and grey. Mainly mud and trees. Nathanael spotted an enormous carcass of some creature … Huge femur bones and a jagged skull, something akin to a creature we read about in Job: See now, his strength in his hips… he moves his tail like a cedar; The sinews of his thighs are tightly knit. His bones are like beams of bronze. Indeed the river may rage but he is not disturbed…(Job 40).

We sank to our calves into pottery-making red clay, then bare footed through fields of wildflowers and underbrush. For lunch, there were noodles with spinach and basil sauce in a lemon grove. And mosquitoes. In a cold, clear spring, the children painted their bodies with red mud.

Found the cave. Into the earth it wound. (I know only because I looked at pictures). Michael and M, his cousin and a boy from an indigenous community disappeared into the darkness armed with flashlights, pocket knives, and a green string by which to find their way back out.

In one of the spacious areas of the cave with a pool. Are there any creatures in the water?

Some areas included sliding down chutes of mud.

Too many for a spider, too few for a centipede

J and I talked while the children hung from vines in the trees and the dog chased insects and whatever else he was barking at. The men re-emerged after some time, covered in mud, elated. They saw animal tracks and a spider-look-alike with a dozen legs…on each side. The kids begged to be lowered into the entrance. We heard screams of gleeful terror. Bats. But night was falling, so we followed the carcass-laden trail to where the truck was parked beside a stream. Following the stream led to a river, and we jumped in, commencing headstand contests and mud-scrubbing from clothes and bodies.

Smiles, screams, and laughter marked an underground adventure!

At home, I stood under the hot water apparatus until my skin burned. Through the window and barbed wire, the black sky and gauzily clouded moon yielded just enough light to see flat, waxy leaves reaching into the sky. Complete and total beauty. And my soul was lost in it entirely.

Lord, your constant love reaches to the heavens;
Your faithfulness extends to the skies.
Your righteousness is towering like the mountains;
Your justice is like the depths of the sea.
People and animals are under your care.
How precious, O God, is your constant love!
We find protection under the shadow of your wings.
We feast on the abundant food you provide;
You let us drink from the river of your goodness.
You are the source of all life, and because of your light we see the light
(Ps 36:5-9).

Tuesday. I’m going through a lot of pen and ink learning about the sovereignty of God. How one nation rises and another falls. How some people are rich and some are poor. How some know severe suffering and others do not seem to. How one thing is right for one person and certainly not for another. But so much of what I observe is only a seemingly sort of observation, a dimly-lit, sorely-lacking view of what is true.

This only seeing what seems-to-be has made me really uncomfortable. It’s much more fun to be confident and certain of most anything and being a know-it-all has always come quite effortlessly to me. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I am fully known (1 Corinthians 13:12). Yet this is what is real right now—dimness. Seeing dimly reminds me not to lean too heavily on my own understanding, but to work through these matters of following Jesus humbly: God resists the proud, but shows favor to the humble (1 Pet 5:5) and with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12b). What joyous liberty then is this matter of seeing dimly! I get to hurl myself humbly, headlong, and free into the One who loves me in a way I now only dimly see! O, but when I see Him face to face, I will know! I will know His love and I will know and understand the promise He made to the woman at the well.

O let it be!

Catching Up…

2011-10-01T19:22:00.001-07:00

Mid-Late May. Grandma and Grandpa Gayheart visit. Few days with internet. June. M travels to first community along the river. Internet down. Still down. General meeting of missionary families in the desert. July. Dear friends follow us back to A-town. Ginger the monkey has disappeared into the jungle behind our house. Sorrowing. Sadness. August. M travels with our team leaders to Yarina Isla for a pastoral training event. We are separated for nearly three weeks. Highly unusual. Begin language study again. In a new dialect. Meet our fearless team leaders in Lima where we share dental work and goodbyes. At the airport we watch as they disappear into the crowd, anticipating their new life and work in Southeast Asia. We had one year together…

Next day. We return to the airport for a direct flight from Lima to LAX. Vacation. Twenty day blur of sweetness and joy in California. Touring SoCal in a lovingly-lent 15 passenger van, we visit churches, eat Cinnabon and Chipotle, laugh hard and cry harder with our sorely-missed families and dear friends. Meet our two nephews and niece for the first time. End of September. Full, happy hearts. We return to Lima where M works a few days at office headquarters with a mega-city strategist from Argentina in managing research data with Geographical Information systems (GIS). New homeschooling year : Kindergarten, 2^nd, 4^th and 5^th grade.

The following account details the trip back to our home in A-town.

Day One

The Andes. Mining towns. Ghost towns. Lakes and clear streams over jagged rocks and barren hills Tiny settlements of Quechua women distinctly layered in aprons and skirts with hats over two black braids along their backs. Unseen babies in brilliant, multi-colored fabric tied to those bent backs. Thick clusters that look like blossoming weeds tied in that same fabric to other backs in transit to the market. Densely-layered, red-cheeked grandmothers hang cold, wet laundry on the lines that hug the paved highway.

Clouds darken. Gentle snow falls. Then hail. Sleet slices at the windshield. Angry rain beats the mountain. Someone is sick to their stomach. Then another. Our temples sear with sharp pain. The Altitude. It creeps into our heads and stomachs. 14,000 feet. The truck loses power. Insufficient oxygen to engine. We are without water. Pinned between two strong mountains jutting out of the highway, we are in drivers’ blind spots coming at us from both directions. We pray. The car starts. We crawl just far enough to pull over roadside. We wait. We pray. The car starts again. The rain stops. We stagger along like a wounded beast. Stop again. The pattern continues over and over until…

Dropping altitude breathes life into tidy square gardens lined with rows of rose buds and yellow daisies. There are gardens of indigo irises and chamomile and what looks like green onion. Homes of adobe painted every green and blue: turquoise and mint green and celadon and aqua,and every hue in between. Semi-deliberate built homes clustered in groups climbing the red and green mountains whose dilapidated tile roofs are strangely appealing. But even the beauty fails to hold our attention.

Too tired to continue. Too weak to drive. Time to stop. Sickness does not relent. We pull alongside a curb. Michael is desperately ill with brain-retching head pain. Abigail and I locate a trusty hotel: a safe place to park the truck, and a private bathroom where everyone can finish being sick. Nevermind that one of the walls is shared with the casino courtyard.

Everyone falls asleep while there is still light. It is cold and we are layered under blankets of llama and alpaca. Michael awakens. His condition worsens. I descend the narrow staircase to find a pharmacy. Abigail and I buy four pills that promise to help. Abigail becomes sick. She slumps under the alpaca and is instantly asleep. Nathanael awakens. He hasn’t eaten and moans with hunger. Chloe joins him. And Julia. I take those who moan down the narrow staircase. We cross the street to the sign that translates Good Flavored Chicken. The ceiling is very low. Pictures of war heroes hang crookedly on yellowing, paint-peeled walls. A tiny sturdy woman brings heaping plates of golden rotisserie chicken piled high on hot french-fries and a small salad plate. We eat in contented silence looking into the faces of war heroes. Return to room above casino and drift into a fitful night tossing and turning amidst the ringing of slot machines.

O, give thanks to the Lord, for He is good! For His mercy endures forever… (1 Chronicles 16:34)

Day Two

Still reeling a bit from Day One. We do not move as fast as we planned. Each person takes their turn in a hot shower, but puts on clothes from the day before. We brush our teeth and wash our faces and debrief on the state of the family. The consensus is that we’re moving too slow to make it to A-town today. If we try, we’ll more than likely be stuck in raw jungle when the blackness of night falls.

For now, the truck effortlessly paces alongside strong rivers who feed emerald tree-studded mountains that seem to touch the sky. I will proclaim the name of the Lord. O, praise the greatness of our God. I am drowsy with sleep. My eyes want nothing more than to close. But to close them means to miss the mountains of majesty and their tunnels hewn through massive rock. He is the Rock, His works are perfect…And the sun is so bright and warm with the cold mountain behind us…and all His ways are just. A faithful God who does no wrong, upright and just is He (Deuteronomy 32:3-4). When I wake, we are pulling along the curb of the industrial-looking building that will have internet and soft beds. There will be no thick, blanket layers. Only sheets. We are in the jungle. We are almost home.

The Lord lives! Praise be to my Rock! Exalted be God, the Rock, my Savior! (2 Samuel 22:2-3)

Day Three

Wake early. Seek the Lord and His strength; Seek His face evermore! Remember His marvelous works which He has done, His wonders…Children still sleeping deeply. Cold Shower. No hot water. None is necessary. Already the room is warm as the sun crawls up from the east. We are out of water bottles again and everyone will wake with thirst. Gather scattered belongings into bag. Load two bags at the bread shop: one with cold water bottles—the other with hot fried egg sandwiches.

Hillsides of coffee. Large, rectangular, black plastic tarps spread with coffee beans drying in the sunshine. Homes are prosperous in this part: cement and painted wood with two stories. Some even have glass in the windows. Roadside community store. Shelves stacked high with yellow sandwich-bag portions of laundry soap and washing bars and hammocks and machetes. Soda-- pink concoctions and red ones and Inca Kola and Coca Cola. Shrink wrapped in groups of six. Stacked high. Layer after layer. Row after row.

Forest. Trees are taller. There are more of them—tangled in bossy vines nearly swallowing them up with the will to dominate. Ferns clamor for their own attention groping the roadside in dense clusters. A waterfall spills over the top of commanding boulders and mossy peaks, sputtering over our truck and trickling as a clear stream into the river we are chasing. Stop. We splash sweet coldness into our faces.

Give to the Lord the glory due His name… O, worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness! (1 Chronicles 16:29)

Butterflies. Purple and lime and scarlet and poppy. Such colors! Everywhere. Feeding and fluttering where the waterfall yields to the stream. Chloe is spinning in dizzy delight. Rest.

Wide river. Yellow tractors are still. Long trucks and watering tanks are parked midstream. Men at rest. Their mud-caked, bare feet hang out open windows. Time to cross. M evaluates deep waters. Assesses the rocks. Notes where the trucks feed, then forges the mental path we will follow. Man against river. He is confident this time, dominating and subduing rushing water and rock and earth beneath the vehicle with fierceness and ease. Save us, O God of our salvation… to give thanks to Your Holy name, to triumph in Your praise.” (1 Chronicles 16:35). Men whoop and holler from the windows cheering him on. They exchange knowing glances and hearty greetings.

Native communities. Women in violet tunics wearing their hand-woven baskets across their foreheads and down their backs, with magnificent loads of yucca root. The weight is nearly blinding, but the women are strong. Men and guns accompany them. Mostly naked children scamper about laughing and crying as their mothers yank them from the road we’re traveling.

Few hours remain before we are spit onto the backside of isolated A-town. A bed of a million crushed rocks are deposited, spread, then tractor-packed along the red mud. Slowly over the rock. Slowly. Road widens. Stop. Pull over. And behold the spectacular beauty before us. Let the heavens rejoice. Let the earth be glad; The first time we stopped here was to watch the sun rise on our first trip to capital city from A-town. Let them say among the nations, “The Lord reigns!” Even in late afternoon, the expansive, green sea of jungle makes us feel little. Even afraid. We hold our breath. Let the field be jubilant and everything in them! Then the trees of the forest will sing, they will sing for joy before the Lord for He comes to judge the earth. (1 Chronicles 16: 31-33)

Open fields of bony, white cattle hemmed in behind crude, ivory bark fencing. Round water tower. A woman wearing a teal, satin prom dress and tall heels walks clumsily along the pasture. A-town.

A chorus of praise and relief.

Pull alongside the curb in front of our house. House-sitting Peruvian family is accompanied by others on the front porch. Our landlord is carrying wood through the front door. His tools are spread about. It all seems a little peculiar.

Break in. Again. More wooden slats kicked through the hallway while the family was sleeping. Not a sound was heard. Landlord is reinforcing other walls with strong support. Nothing is taken. We left it bare.

I will bless the Lord at all times; His praise shall continually be in my mouth. (Psalm 34:1)

Next Day

Michael went to find the guy who could help us with internet. Nowhere to be found. Went to internet café. Painfully slow. Nearly imperceptible. Stop. No internet. The one man in town who works internet was sure he’d have some kinks worked out and the possibility of connecting to a world beyond A-town would be considerable upon our return from the States... but for today, we are at the mercy of a cantankerous satellite system operating out of Spain.

The rain beats upon the aluminum pieces forming the roof. So severe the beating, M and I are awakened to enjoy the lightning and thunder. He goes out to the front patio to rock on metal framed, plastic woven rockers. He reads a book in the darkness and downpour. I lay silently—my eyes still closed-- how quickly I have forgotten the sound of rain on aluminum! The sheer pounding and power of it is deafening. And calming.

Praise the Lord… praise Him in His mighty heavens. Praise Him for His acts of power; Praise Him for His surpassing greatness. (Psalm 150:1-2)

I have found one tool mighty in the slaughter of discouragement and homesickness.

Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18)

It has proven to be particularly practical. Thank you,God that you are with us on this mountain where we are stalled. Thank you that all power is yours and this vehicle is in your hands.

It is praise. Thanking God. Enjoying God. Delighting in Him. Adoring Him. Celebrating who He is and what He does and how He does it and why. Praise extinguishes fear. It liberates me as I celebrate Him. Thank you, Creator, for the people you’ve created on this mountain. For their red cheeks and brightly bundled babies. They are beautiful and you are a good Creator. May all the peoples praise you! (Psalm 67:3)

Praise fills the dark, fearing corners of my weak, doubting heart with shouts of triumph. To Him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before His glorious presence without fault and with great joy… to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority through Jesus Christ, before all ages now and forevermore! (Jude 24-25)

While sitting at the computer to pull these last months together, I noticed what seemed to be another giant rat under the roof. It was dark. I could not see well. I stopped typing. That’s not a rat.There’s a monkey in our window.

There was a chorus of cries Ginger!

Everyone raced outside screaming. Shouting. The neighbors came out. Abigail opened a can of peaches, and moments later she was in Michael’s hands with her peach half.

Three months ago, Julia cried Dear God, please bring Ginger back. I’ve already lost Osito. Please bring Ginger back if you think it is a good idea.

Ginger lived in the wild for three months. Last night she came home. Snuggled between Julia and Abigail contentedly, the three of them slept as if she never left.

O, give thanks to the Lord, for He is good! For His mercy endures forever… (1 Chronicles 16:34)

And we begin again…

2011-06-04T18:48:00.001-07:00

April 29, 2011

It was dark when we stood on the edge of the river -- flip flops stuck in mud. We had visited the same port repeatedly, expecting the metal mass to have pulled from shore and into the black water. One night after another the pattern repeated itself. Waiting. Tonight while we waited, however; the boat was sunken under the weight of moto-taxis, an entire city’s monthly beer supply, bricks and upside-down aluminum boats stacked one on top of the other. People lined every inch of space that cargo didn’t fill. Our packed Land Cruiser sat on the left hand side of the boat, and the bookcase and mattresses and table to the right of it were smashed together between layers of towels and plastic shrink-wrap under the captain’s quarters.

All week we stuffed fat tarp bags full of shoes and plastic hangers and school books and some molasses to make gingersnaps when we reached home base. I was relieved to be standing in the mud, seeing it all float away. The possibility of that boat sinking seemed very real. My mind started rehearsing the possibilities of what we would do if it did sink. Julia has the notebook in her backpack. It has a list of each bag and what’s in it… And then the men pulled away the wooden slats connecting the muddy shore to the black river. There was yelling and people were waving, and it was gone.

Michael drove the truck along those rough- hewn, wooden slats onto that boat without being able to see what was beneath him—where the boat ended and the river began- and he’s right here beside me right now. I kept thinking how strangely fragile life is, and how if I would’ve been driving that truck onto the boat, we would not be sharing this enchanted last evening in Pucallpa together…

Julia and Abigail could not stop chattering about all the possibilities: Did Ginger have enough bananas and apples and lucuma to last her the 4-day river trip? Would she be afraid? Would she recognize us when she arrived in A-town? Did she feel abandoned? Ginger Valentine, sweet little monkey of mine, we sang hand in hand, walking away from the port into town.

Eight months ago our plane had landed in the low jungle airport to begin the first part of our training process. Tomorrow we would be taking a much smaller nine-person plane to the next stop in training. We would be moving to isolated A-town to live in Ashéninka territory and work along different rivers learning another dialect of the language we’d been studying.

April 30, 2011

I called my parents from the airport this morning, anticipating very little internet availability in the upcoming days. It was good to hear their voices until there was no change left in my pocket and no more voice on the other line.

Now may the God of peace who brought up our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead, that Great Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you complete in every good work to do His will, working in you what is well-pleasing in His sight through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen. (Hebrews 13:20-21)

I am comforted.

May 2, 2011

We woke early. Our hotel beds were covered in math computation, American history, vocabulary studies and journal s and spelling and reading, and after many hours of hunkering down, we tore pieces from a fresh bread loaf and headed to the house to paint white over crude brickwork. It was oil based. That was a bit more work than we all expected.

Anticipating the possibility of the boat arriving tomorrow with hopes that little Ginger fared well.

Therefore, let us continually offer… our praise to God, that is…giving thanks to His name (Hebrews 13:15).

Thankful to be here.

May 5, 2011

There is one ATM in A-town. We do not have a local bank account. Today, when the ATM announced it would be out-of-service for the next 4 days, we were a bit nervous, with the equivalent of 30-something American dollars in pocket.

It was a first for M. He called his parents and asked them to wire an emergency survival stash—something we could live on until the ATM was no longer out-of-service. They smilingly agreed and the money was wired and we were jumping up and down and resolved to plan ahead for other such surprises.

May 8, 2011

Nathanael woke up at 3:45 to use the bathroom. He had his flashlight with him, and was calling to us from over the wall. Our rooms are divided by a thin, painted, wooden panel that stops short of the tongue and groove ceiling, allowing for 3 feet of blue screening—like something that would be in our windows back home. It encourages air flow and discourages privacy, making for a camp-style bungalow deal.

From the top bunk, Nathanael was pressing his head and flashlight against the screen, calling to us. My eyes were blurry and I think I was still mostly asleep, but I saw his face and told myself I would tell him to stop looking through the screen sometime when I was awake.

For whatever reason, he began to detail everything he was doing: I’m taking my flashlight and going to the bathroom. That music is still playing. It’s really loud. These people here sure like music. They like it really loud, right? Don’t they? Our fan was whirring. This is what I think he said, and then either I was asleep again, or he stopped talking.

Next thing I heard was something like I’m done. I’m getting into my bed again, and it’s really funny that the kitchen door was open. It was all open.

I was now awake. I heard his every word in its chipper triumph that he and his flashlight found the bathroom stall and had returned. (It’s a stall, just like in a public restroom, and the shower is a stall just the same—plastered in turquoise-painted cement -- and they are separated by a tiny white sink between the two of them. It’s perfectly odd and delightful.)

Are you talking about the kitchen door beside the washing machine or the kitchen door that leads outside? I asked, eyes wide open.

The kitchen is at the back of the house. We walk down a hallway which ends facing a row of modern conveniences: a toilet, a shower, a washing machine and a dryer, which leads to the kitchen. We walk through that door to enter the kitchen, and through another one, at the end of the galley-style passage, to go outside. Standing at the back kitchen door to the left is a tall wall of rock and dirt, an embankment that the kitchen nestles into, from which tall trees and a neighbor’s palm-thatched roof can be seen. To the right, is the parked truck beside a pile of rocks and dirt and unruly thatches of jute grass.

The kitchen door, He insisted, not answering my question, The kitchen door was open.

Which one?

I got out of bed. I think M was listening, but was not necessarily engaged in the transaction until I called his name. When I came to the end of the hallway facing the turquoise wall of modern conveniences, there was a draft. Cold air blew through both open doors.

For both of our doors being open, I can’t believe we haven’t been…Michael! Michael. Come here.

Just above our washer and dryer, I noticed three nearly 2 foot wooden slats had been pulled away from the house. I was looking onto the embankment the house is built against.

Someone had been in the house. With ease, the culprit had gently kicked in the wall slats, crawled onto the washer and dryer ... M’s phone was gone. And milk and cereal and chocolate. But apparently, Nathanael and his flashlight had cut the venture short, and the gathered computers and an un-plugged microwave were left behind.

Thus began Mother’s Day.

May 9, 2011

There is a fat rat with a very long tail that lives in our kitchen. I wonder if his family joins him. Nano stepped on glass and failed to mention he has a grossly infected swollen toe. The roof is leaking and the kitchen floor has puddles from the storm. M backed into the fence that was just built, and there were a few other oddities that made me long for my own pint of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream today. But alas, our landlord is here adding another layer of wood to the back of the house, along with more barbed wire, and we have some bright purple violet extract that will heal Nano’s toe in no time and I am remembering the passage we were just reading this before the home invasion.

One… clothed with a garment down to the feet and girded about the chest with a golden band. His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and His feet were like fine brass, as if refined in a furnace, and His voice as the sound of many waters; out of His mouth went a sharp two-edged sword, and His countenance was like the sun shining in its strength. And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. But He laid His right hand on me, saying to me, “Do not be afraid, I am the first and the last. I am He who lives, and was dead, and behold I am alive forevermore.” (Revelation 1:13-18a).

When I felt that draft send a shiver down my spine, knowing someone had been in the house, I was strangely, almost instantly made bold by this staggeringly brilliant description of the One who reigns in glory and is above all created things. The One in whom there is no darkness. The One who says, Do not be afraid. I was not afraid. I am the first and the last. The beginning and the End. I am He who lives, and was dead, and behold I am alive forevermore.

An event I had dreaded and anticipated had come to pass and I was standing in the light of He whose countenance is like the sun shining in its strength, and I was not afraid. Chilled. Shaken. But not afraid.

Do not let me be ashamed of my hope (Psalm 119:116).

May 12, 2011

Still no internet. They’ve been coming to the house and working on it.

Today we made gingersnaps and the girls and I grated fresh ginger into the buttery batter while the boys in our family moaned that the smell was awful. The boys don’t do gingersnaps.

The house is coming along in regards to security upgrades. Nano’s toe is healing. The backed-into fence has been repaired and the house has been full of visitors coming in from their native communities. Some are selling pots. Others, finely stitched cloth and purses and others are coming to ask who we are and why we are here and what are we doing.

Today I had only hard rolls to offer because I hadn’t walked to the market yet. They were eagerly accepted by an elderly couple from another indigenous community. We sat on the front porch and visited. They had spent time in Pucallpa, so there was much to talk about and my heart was happy.

The girls and I made chicken in a cilantro sauce drenching peas and carrots and garlic, and they peeled, boiled and mashed the potatoes. We agreed we would serve this when our next visitors came for dinner. The carrot-chip cake came out resembling carrot-chip cake, but sorely lacked the cream cheese frosting we would make in Costa Rica. There is no cream cheese or sour cream in A-town. I suppose that means we could learn to make it. But that will be sometime after we find a language tutor to begin studying the language again…

M is busy working through details with the closet-builder and the internet connection. He runs into one obstacle after another. Each yes seems to mean no and each today must really mean tomorrow. Meanwhile, our rooms have their piles and stacks and suitcases from which we’re trying to make order. Yet the sweetness of having a home here, close to the people to whom we want to tell Jesus’ story, makes the unwieldy transition purposeful. And so we begin again.

Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, to God who alone is wise, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen (1 Tim 1:17).

Most of March

2011-03-25T15:25:00.001-07:00

Saturday

What normally takes nearly 8 hours by truck and boat, took 12 ½. It was a long travel day. We started out before morning light. Not long after hitting the dirt road we follow for 3 1/2 hours, a tall truck which had lost hundreds of papayas in the mud the night before, blocked motorcycles and trucks from both directions.

Later there was the brook that flooded, nearly carrying away brave trucks that had forged on through. One truck got stuck and Michael used the winch to pull him out. We waited for the water level to lower in the sunshine before crossing. Water seeped in through the sides, but just enough to remind us of where we’d just been… and we were off again.

I’ve dropped some melted wax from a burning candle to the top of a tuna can. The candle sits in that wax providing my only light, but even its soft glow cannot lure me to write. Another time.

Sunday

Hermano Hyoni pulled a giant fish in from his net, and everyone was running in circles telling everyone else who already knew. He was this morning’s hero providing breakfast for many. For lunch, I let black beans simmer over the fire, bathed in cilantro and chopped carrots and we had garlic rice and aji (thin slivers of salted purple onion and diced hot peppers drenched in the juice of many lemons). We fried up some eggs and called it a feast.

Balsa logs roped and woven together with strips from the palms formed the raft Abigail, Julia and I sat on while washing clothes. Two other young girls sat along the river with us, so I told them part of Joseph’s story from Genesis until the clothes were washed and wrung-out. And then the four of them were off, jumping from the shallow cliff into the muddy river until their teeth were chattering and they could bear the cold, risen current no longer.

The sky is so black, and the stars so white, Julia was delighted to have stuffed her telescope into her tarp bag for such a night. I’m sneaking outside to watch her watch the sky.

Monday

Refuse to lean on my own understanding.

You are the one who will profit if you have wisdom, and if you reject it, you are the one who will suffer (Proverbs 9:12).

Today I am declaring dominion over my fluctuating feelings. They seek to drag me across the thorny valleys of unbelief, like a panicking stampede of furious cattle. I refuse to be controlled by ideas whose only power is the power I yield them. I will not therefore yield or linger on my own understanding, nor my own perspectives. Any who love knowledge want to be told when they are wrong. It is stupid to hate being corrected (Proverbs 12:1).

I will receive correction joyfully, even when I want to believe I’m the one who is right. Can I see the whole picture? Can I see all sides in any situation? I cannot.

People who are proud will soon be disgraced. It is wiser to be modest (Proverbs 11:2).

Tuesday

Ema and I went through story after story following the saga of Joseph’s life. I told them in Spanish. She repeated my sentences and paragraphs in Asheninka. I recorded her telling the stories in Asheninka, and as they unfolded, she lamented the fact that her Asheninka Bible stories in written form had been lent out and she was without them, so she stopped telling them.

Everything froze in my mind. She supposes that one cannot tell a story unless they have a paper to tell it from, and here I am confirming this very idea as I read more stories to her and she tells them back to me. She assumes that our story of Joseph is hinged on this piece of gold-leafed paper I’m reading from.

I stop.

Ema, I lamented, These stories are in your heart! You’re telling details that I’ve not even included. You know these stories better than I do, yet you’re not telling them because you don’t have them written down? My problem is that I depend on what is written. If my Bible falls in the river or gets burned in fire, woe is me! But you! You have them in your heart, and they can never be stolen nor destroyed nor burned…That I would be like you, Ema… And I will!

She smiles. Ema says she will be telling the stories again.

Wednesday

Michael found a snake in the kids’ room this morning. After the excitement of its decapitation, it was time to begin breakfast.

Any time I make a meal, a small crowd gathers, eager to share in what will be served. This morning I was feeling mad about this. There I was-- being hauled off by those stampeding cattle of emotions. I wanted to make a meal for my family and no one else, and was thoroughly vexed. Then I decided I should probably feel really awful for being mad at the little brown eyes awaiting some rice. I should be mad at their parents for leaving their bellies to groan.

Stop. You have to whip a horse. You have to bridle a donkey, and you have to beat a fool (Proverbs 26:3). Dominate the stampede. Demand calm, resolute confidence in your Creator. Who gave me the rice I’m preparing? Who makes my hands to work? Who gives fire and sustains it? Do you realize the disaster that God or the king can cause (Proverbs 24:22)? Do I want to thrash about and grumble as own who leans on her own understanding? Am I willing to risk paying the cost of self-dependency? See what happens to those who trust in themselves, the fate of those who are satisfied with their wealth—they are doomed to die like sheep, and Death will be their shepherd (Psalm 48:13-14). Wouldn’t I rather triumph through trusting? The righteous will triumph over them as their bodies quickly decay… (Psalm 48:14b). And have I not already settled the matter of my righteousness? I have none of my own, but am declared righteous by faith. But those who depend on faith, not on deeds, and who believe in the God who declares the guilty to be innocent, it is this faith that God takes into account in order to put them right with Himself (Romans 4:5). Isn’t this therefore a settled matter? Being cheerful keeps you healthy. It is slow death to be gloomy all the time (Proverbs 17:22). The next little guest will be met with a steaming bowl of rice and a hearty smile.

Friday

We needed to prepare enough 1 ½ liter bottles of water to get us to Puerto Davis with enough time to allow for water filtering upon arrival. We drank from those and ate sweet papaya for breakfast on the boat. Our leaking boat hoisted upriver and the higher we got, the taller grew the trees, and the mountainous jungle crawled up on all sides around us. Squirrel monkeys flinging through the trees made us forget how long we’d been sitting on those wooden boards.

Sunday

Ema’s daughter, Lourdes and I shared lunch together under her house in the shade. Lourdes has come alongside me in all things: teaching me, serving me, loving me, and she knows she does none of these things. She anticipates needs I don’t even know I have and rushes to meet them. Like laying hot coals in our cold logs. I go to make a morning fire and it’s effortless, because Lourdes has walked down the hillside to bring fire. Or Lourdes has walked down the hillside to carry fresh water she’s gathered from the heavy rains. Or she’s peeled papayas to share, or guarded her finest meat for us.

It’s been a year since her husband left her and three unusually peaceful children.

I wake up at night thinking about her.

The storm. I didn’t mention it yet. Ferocious rain was beating so hard, I thought no hut would be left standing. In the middle of the night, the wind tore our mosquito nets apart. Water poured in through the openings in the wood, soaking our light blankets. Thunder shook even the ground. We rushed to find an area where the roof wasn’t leaking, and shared the one blanket that wasn’t soaked. Huddled in a circle, we sang all the songs that reminded us of God’s greatness. I was downright terrified.

We lay on the wooden slats. Everyone slept. I could not. I was cold, and could not stop listening to the girls scratching their lice-riddled heads. Nothing would stop the lice. Nothing would stop the storm.

You give perfect peace to those who… put their trust in you (Isaiah 26:3).

Monday

Nightly, we’ve gathered by the light of hanging bulbs, powered by the church’s new generator. We told stories, re-enacted those stories (complete with Lazarus rolled up in toilet paper), and sang heartily in their heart language with hand motions and human-trains formed by the children. Michael and Alejo ventured upriver to gather other families who came to share in the songs and stories. We told stories of adoring Jesus (Mary anointing Jesus feet with costly perfume), and how adoration is compelled by love—not ours-- but God’s pursuit of us: We love God because He first loved us (Jn 4:19). And about Cain and Abel: If you had done the right thing, you would be smiling; but because you have done evil, sin is crouching at your door. It wants to rule you, but you must overcome it (Gen 3:7). From this story, listeners were made participants and we generated a list of verses and passages based on the belief that prizing God’s promises is our protection and our purity. How rich are the wonderful blessings He promises His people, and how very great is His power at work in us who believe! This power working in us is the same as the mighty strength He used when He raised Christ from death… (Eph 1:18b-20a)

Wednesday

Michael was up at 3:30 this morning: loading the boat, hauling water… He’s 31 today. And we’re leaving Yarina Isla. We’re moving to another part of the Amazon’s Basin.

The first thing I thought when I woke up to the candle sitting on the tuna can was this: Michael’s life has given me a new life. He is so focused. So compelled and driven by a big picture view of life and people and the world. He solves problems. He refuses to let those raging cattle of whirling emotion stampede and dominate his mind. He teaches me how to do the same.

I suppose I will spend the day thinking about him. We’re heading home, and we’ll be together, and there will be much to talk about.

Pictures of our “March Madness”

2011-03-24T05:30:00.001-07:00

We just got back yesterday from our “March Madness” trip to the jungle. Here are a few of the pictures, but make sure to check out all of the photos here.

A Difficult Week

2011-02-25T20:57:00.001-08:00

In God’s sovereignty, I wrote about my adjustment to seeing animals die a week ago and the reminder of Christ’s shed blood for me. Since then, He has brought the theme a little closer to home.

On February 12th, one of our neighbors gave us a cute puppy that was very young. We were hesitant to accept her, but the kids loved her so much and Abigail quickly took over ownership. Julia already had Osito the monkey and Nathanael cared for Snowflake the dog. We landed on the name Glover because of her white front paws.

We were wary of caring for such a newborn pup, but the mother had abandoned them, so we gave it a go. Abigail had to get up in the middle of the night to feed her. It was a tiring job. On the night of the 17th I heard her whimpering in the middle of the night like I had other nights, but I didn’t bother to get up to make sure Abby attended to her. She was dead in the morning.

We were all very sad. Mistake #2 was letting the kids bury her in the back patio. By the 22nd, there was a foul smell in the house and it was clear that the dog was the source. Glover had to be exhumed, and placed in the trash outside. That was adding insult to injury and we were all very tired that night.

It rained cats and dogs, or maybe monkeys and dogs would be a more appropriate saying for us here. It was after 2am in the morning. What followed was something like a nightmare, and I woke Crystal up to show her Osito dying. It is a memory that is etched in my brain for life. It would be cathartic to write all of the details of what happened, but we decided not to share the how part with Julia and promised her not to tell another living soul either until we decide to first share it with her. In other words, like the now old military policy “don’t ask, don’t tell”.

I decided to wake Julia up and we took her into our room with a candle lit and prayed before I broke the news to her. Her heart was broken as ours was too. We all cried and hugged and talked for a long time. Ultimately, it was a very bonding experience. We discussed trying to bury him or putting him in the trash, but left it up to her. She very maturely agreed to let him go out in the same trash pile that Glover was in too; wrapped in a special blanket.

The last two photos we have of Osito are from Chloe’s birthday. Fittingly, they are with Julia holding her.

What a depressing post right? We are still recovering from the double whammy, and call it a rebound purchase or whatever you like, but we have two new monkeys! Glover was cute, but we only had her for days. Osito meant a lot more to us and won’t easily be forgotten. These new monkeys won’t replace him, but they do ease the kids’ pain and are a lot of fun.

Without further ado…introducing Ginger and Eleanor.

Ginger is Julia’s new monkey. You can find out more about her species at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peruvian_Night_Monkey.

Eleanor is Abby’s new monkey (Chloe gets to help too). You can find out more about her at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_squirrel_monkey.

I am sure there will be more pictures and/or stories to come about Ginger and Eleanor, but I better close because Ginger (the nocturnal one) keeps jumping on the computer!

Photos of our latest jungle trip

2011-02-24T21:05:00.001-08:00

If you would like to see photos of our last trip to the jungle from January 15th – February 8th 2011, please check out our Facebook photo album here: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=110795&id=1334529821&l=f40212b1e6

and for the those that want to see more of those gross photos click here:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=110803&id=1334529821&l=ed8c0b9941

Confessions of a City Slicker

2011-02-17T13:22:00.001-08:00

(WARNING – This post contains gross photos!)

I grew up in a suburb of Orlando, Florida. My family moved to a suburb of San Diego, California when I was 13. I attended the University of California at Los Angeles in one of the largest cities in the United States. After graduating, I lived in suburbs working behind a computer all day to earn a living. My entire life has consisted of the sheltered suburb and city life.

I had never seen (not counting television) an animal die or be killed; not a cow, not a dog, not a bird, not even a rat. I take that back; I saw a chicken killed in Africa on a mission trip and it grossed me out. I didn’t eat the chicken that night. I had never been hunting before. Road-kill was about the extent of seeing dead animals and I quickly turned away and avoided dwelling on it. While enjoying steak, chicken, and hamburgers just as much as the next red-meat-loving red-blooded American, thinking too much about how the meat got to the table can make me a little queasy. I don’t think anyone would classify me as an animal lover; my only pet growing up was a fish.

Well, in the first few trips into Ashéninka communities, blood and death has been a common part of life. It has taken some getting used to. The Ashéninka love to eat meat, and although fish is often all there is, hunting and trapping is a vital part of their life. My first experience seeing a dead animal in the community was a capybara, known as a ronsoco among the locals. It is the world’s largest rodent—think of Rodents Of Unusual Size from Princess Pride—and can weigh well over 100 pounds. Hyoni shot one on the island across from Yarina Isla and as he rowed back to shore, I was intrigued and silently nervous at the same time.

I posed for pictures with this rat on steroids and forced myself to watch the pouring of boiling hot water on the body as the skin contracted and the hair was scraped off revealing a bright white skin underneath. That wasn’t nearly as bad as the de-gutting and hacking of the carcass—more tamely called field dressing. The meat was surprisingly good, but my first experience of blood, guts, and death was eye opening.

A couple pigs were killed and cut up in similar fashion. I helped drag one of the freshly dead ones and the other—killed on a separate trip—had to be hammered in the head after being shot a couple times with an air gun. The sound of hammer and skull clashing was gruesome, but again the meat tasted great. There have been various birds mixed in, but that is hardly as upsetting and the meat doesn’t taste as good. On the latest trip, Hyoni’s traps have done the hunting for us and two añujes have been caught. An añuje is another rodent creature, much bigger than a rat, but not nearly as big as the capybara. The first one had its head blown off and the second had its back blown off. Both were incredibly gruesome, but the leg meat was a special treat.

The most difficult of all was the cow that was killed for the training conference. We waited for a couple hours to get the cow in its corral, but when it wasn’t entering, it was decided to shoot her instead. I heard the shotgun blast and we started looking the cow as it ran away. Blood was dripping in the mud, but the cow was “utterly” unaffected because the shot had hit the cow near the utters. I was an eyewitness to the second blast and it still didn’t go down. Ultimately, the cow had to be roped to the ground and Hyoni jabbed a Rambo-style knife into the back of the neck and began cutting the head off. Everything about this sawing of the cow in fourths was bigger, grosser, and harder to watch. The kicker was having to carry a quarter of the cow on my shoulder for a 30 minute hike back to the boat. Yes, that was a 30 minute hike through the jungle carrying somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 pound of bloody, freshly dead flesh. In the end I was exhausted, covered in sweat and blood, reeked terribly and couldn’t believe what I had just experienced. I washed the shirt I was wearing in the river, but it was still thoroughly stained. As with most of my other jungle animal death experiences, the meat tasted great!

I had never been covered in blood like that before and reflecting back on it, I am reminded of the sacrificial system of the Bible. Animal death and blood was a common sight in Old Testament times in an effort to cover the sins of the people of Israel. No matter how many animals were sacrificed or how much blood was spilled, it was never enough to keep up with the sins that were being committed. It wasn’t until Jesus came to earth and was the final perfect bloody sacrifice on a cross did we receive the opportunity to have our sins forgiven once and for all. His blood covers us and makes us clean and sinless in the Father’s eyes. I may never get used to the blood and death that is so much a part of life in the jungle, but I sure am thankful for my Savior’s blood and death for me.

Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins. (Hebrews 9:22 ESV)

Jungle Journal

2011-02-14T18:56:00.001-08:00

Wednesday

January 19, 2011

Late afternoon, just after climbing the hill from the river

Yoselin spent most of the afternoon crushing lemon halves against her head. Her hair was laden in pulp and I wondered why. Quilmer said it was for relief. Citric acid kills lice. So now I know.

Thursday

The rain did not stop all day. I did not want to leave the mosquito net because of tiny, stinging gnats, so Jujee, Abby, Nano and Chloe joined me. We read our books together, worked through math, memorized facts and listened to the rain. When I saw Alejo chopping firewood in the fury of the downpour, I assumed they must’ve run out. They needed to eat.

Minutes later, he and little Christian were dumping armfuls of slender logs on our platform. He was cutting wood for us.

I remembered how Jeremy said to chip away the top layers because the inside would not be wet, and with a little diesel fuel and trash wrappers we could count on a strong fire in little time. We did, but the in little time part did not work out as planned.

Starting fires in rain that slants sideways is nearly maddening.

Friday

The rain that wouldn’t stop, didn’t stop again through the night. When we woke this morning, the river had risen some 20 feet and the hill above the river that winds to our hut was under brown water. Everyone was saying these kind of floods happen every 5 years or so. Hyoni’s canoe is gone, but all the motors are safe.

Saturday

Abby Gracie brought me the oil for frying platano. One of us didn’t screw the lid on tight. It was not worth trying to expose the culprit. It might’ve been me. Nevertheless, Black ants were floating in that oil-- the precious oil! I figured we’d fry the ants with the plantain and no one seemed to mind.

Sunday

We made a list together, all of us huddled in the crudely painted wood church at Yarina Isla. 18 passages that pertained to God’ promises to us: I have overcome the world. Be of good cheer. I will never leave you. Michael scratched them in chalk and we all copied them into our notebooks.

The men carry hand-woven bags to these Sunday services. Women carry the children. Many people have torn-up, weather-beaten Bibles, chewed pens and dirt-covered notebooks they’ve bought downriver. We sit on wooden slabs in the dirt. Men in the front-- women and children in the back. Sickly dogs and sometimes chickens come and go. We sing heartily. There was a guitar today, but it didn’t seem to be playing the same songs we were singing. And the drum. Someone generally plays a drum. Sometimes people are barefooted, sometimes not. Yesterday Nellie, in her sixties, wore two different flip-flops. They might’ve belonged to the same foot.

We were quite satisfied to have compiled such a list of promises and nearly everyone was copiously note-taking. It made my heart happy. I made sure to take copious notes, too. I wanted to be just like them.

Tuesday

Excessive rain makes it nearly impossible to dry clothes. We wash them in the rushing mud, then hang them on a line if the sky is not threatening rain. Within minutes, however, a sudden, unsuspected downpour is feeding the earth and dancing on the trees, and I see Manuela run for her clotheslines. This happens over and over… I am in language study, sitting on one of those hard benches with Ema, and it makes little sense to stop.

Michael and Julia and Abigail race for the clothes and hang them along the fence around our platform. There is also zig-zagged rope from the our wooden ceiling constructed under the Yarina thatches, so when my talking watch says Son las tres en punto , (It’s 3 o’clock) I go to the hut to see what has become of wet laundry. Re-hung along the half-walls, zig-zagged lines are drooping under the weight. 3 days and the same clothes are still wet. Chloe is wearing Abigail’s stretchy pants again because every one of hers is wet on the line.

After class today, Julia and Abigail boasted of their newly-constructed pulley system which hoists clothes to and from the roof to dry, with seemingly little effort. They were elated. I was distracted. I find that I am often distracted.

Thursday

I can always hear Alejo and Ema singing and worshipping long before sunrise. Their voices are always first to arouse my consciousness. I wake while it is somewhat dark to read and study. After my heart and mind are full, I leave the mosquito net to start the fire. Some mornings it is easy and takes little effort. Others, when the wood is wet and my ambition sags like those weighted clotheslines, a simple fire is a massive undertaking. So much work for oatmeal.

After oatmeal, the girls and I fill three large round bowls with water and wash the dishes. Nathanael sweeps the floor and feeds animals. Left overs are thrown out to woeful dogs and Mother hens with their trailing, devoted broods. Osito, the monkey, can never wait for leftovers, and always shares a bit of whatever Julia’s eating. She feeds and cleans up after and cares for Osito, and he sleeps with her every night, unfailingly entrusting himself to her.

The first four hours of the day Michael spends in language study. During this time, the rest of us do school, too. Sometimes under the mosquito net, Sometimes sprawled out across the floor. Every book and pencil and notebook is lugged back and forth in a water-tight bin between Yarina Isla and Pucallpa.

The thought of studying along the riverbank was always so intriguing to me, but we’ve found it thoroughly impossible to accomplish anything. We must be in our family quarters with the door shut. Even then, little eyes poke through the slats, and toes squish under the door. Neighborhood children sit on our platform waiting…

Que vas a cocinar, hermana? (What are you going to make, sister?)

Ya has terminado tus clases? (Have you finished your classes already? )

They wait and wait and wait…

When we’ve finished, it’s time to start another fire and prepare lunch. We might peel and boil yucca or make soup. Nathanael and Chloe gather cilantro and peppers along the shed. Julia finishes copying a passage from one of the books she’s reading. Abigail details aloud every transaction of whichever story she’s reading…

We eat. I leave for my four hours of language study across the dirt path…

When the talking watch says Son las cuatro en punto (it’s 4 o’clock), I close my notebook and turn the recorder off. We gather our buckets, soap bars and laundry and head to the river. The children are racing and tripping and squealing… we wash clothes and bathe. Michael jumps from the bank into the cold mud. Abigail follows him with Osito on her shoulder and the puppy swimming at her side. Nathanael swims to catch up, and Chloe calls from the hillside, “Wait for me! Wait for me! Daddy, hold me! “

When the sun slips behind towering trees, Michael hauls three 5 gallon buckets of water on his shoulders, from the river or the brook. Those are poured into a big trash can and serve as our water supply for the next day. Some is poured into our water filter, while the rest is used to wash dishes and hands and cook.

As evening falls, the fire is warm and we gather around with other families to share fish caught in the net, rodents from the trap and details from the day’s events. I bring rice. We eat until our bellies are full and moan about the deliciousness of it all, lounging in the hammocks. The children entertain us with their stories and antics and we laugh until our eyelids are heavy when someone says Amayeve Ashéninka for We’re going to sleep. Everything stops… and the day has ended.

It all sounds so easy.

It is not.

These first six months living in Peru, I’ve often found it difficult to say what I’m thinking, partly because I don’t know what I’m thinking much of the time. Learning to live differently than I lived before has been more demanding than I could’ve predicted, but I’ve a sneaking suspicion I might be creeping out of this dense fog of complete shock…starting to form ideas, measure observations...

The stark nature of my person-ness, who I am and what I believe, has been violently stripped from me without my even knowing… Like a mummy wrapped in 50 pounds of cloth, it is as if someone found where that strip of cloth ended and has been pulling on it for 6 months. I’ve been

spinning

spinning,

spinning

… at so fast a speed, I thought I was standing still—hadn’t moved. And now—everything has stopped. In my mind I am standing completely still and it is really so!

The sweetness of following God into a dense, viewless fog is less-frightening than I had thought. Being loved by Him, and led by Him, talking with Him, and listening to Him makes the unseen an adventure. It makes not knowing and not understanding alright. I don’t have to know. I don’t have to understand, or be good at either of them. I’m just following.

Where there is nothing to prove, there is nothing to lose. All the world is before me, and yet does not depend on me. The world does not revolve around me after all… I think Michael will be especially glad to hear this.

Like Ema’s Smile

2010-12-23T16:50:00.001-08:00

Rain pelts Yarina palms, whipping and beating at the thatch-roof. I feel no water. Remarkable the way these dry, layered palms cinch in pairs with long strips from tall trees. They are as a fortress.

Night has fallen. We are snugly tucked under the mosquito net. It looks nothing like the ones in department stores back home: wide and long, it’s like a cube of airy netting tucked under the slab of foam that supports our sleeping bags.

Above the mosquito net, I hear bats. Children left uncovered awaken with a stream of blood trickling from their scalp. Exposed heads are open targets for such flesh-biting, darting, winged creatures. Being that their homes are tucked among the thatches overhead, this white cube of netting provides sure relief.

I have heard that snakes enter mosquito nets rather effortlessly. Better not to think about snakes before bed. I dismiss the thought, and smell the rain instead.

As if we are under a waterfall, it whips and sloshes through the mud surrounding our hut. Down the hillside it rushes. Through Aunt Dena’s tidy rows of pineapple, drenching her mint and lemongrass which stretches out of the brown earth, the water follows a predestined trail carved by machetes through hard dirt. A hungry stream groaning toward the rising river.

These same machetes hack deadly snakes, slash pineapples and hoist hands of banana from their lofty places. It cultivates the earth, clears the weeds, and carves trails through fierce, raging undergrowth which wars to dominate every path: from one community to another, from gardens to huts.

Time for laundry. After scrubbing fruit and charcoal stained clothes that have been soaking in rankish river water, with a pasty, turquoise laundry bar, we dip the clothes into the current, watching as cloudy white suds disappear into the cold, moving mud. I close my eyes, face turned up toward the sunshine. I suck in a deep, contented breath of soap and mud and wet sand. The sun, the blue of the sky, and the green of everything growing above the river is intense and alive. And it seems the blue is holding everything together.

In language study, I learn there is no name for the color blue. There isn’t a concept of blue? But what of the sky? I resolve to ask the question again when I may string together a few more vocabulary words in Ashéninka. No blue? There are words for black and green and red. One color for red is basically translated raw. The raw that describes a freshly slaughtered animal. No blue-- but raw, blood red. I note this observation in my notebook, feeling somewhat important-- like an anthropologist. I am very satisfied. I close the notebook, and hold it up to my language tutor, Ema. Red, raw red? I question in Spanish-- is raw red the color of my notebook? No, she insists raw red is purer and my red notebook is really a sort of pink. Names for shades of red, but no name for blue.

I watch Ema. I record her voice that I may wake to her words each morning, at the push of a button. It’s as if she is with me when she is not. Such a tiny, barefoot wonder. Few teeth to speak of. Coarse, unruly hair. Does she own a shirt without holes, or shorts that haven’t been crudely stitched in odd places? I have yet to see either.

I stare at her as she speaks into the funny little box I hold near her mouth. Oh my, but isn’t she beautiful! Content. Wise. Laughing easily. She possesses peaceful resolve. Neither time nor person can steal that certain, impenetrable beauty that is hers alone. And when she smiles! Is there anything so lovely as her smiling contentedness? I include this in my notebook. Ema’s smile.

I often think of her smile at unusual times. It depends little on the ease or predictability of circumstances, for she has neither. Clearly perplexing is that smile, when she launches hushedly into her sagas… her 20-something daughter having died, her own debilitating sickness and those speechless fits of fever, death hovering. Her voice is nearly hoarse as her stories unfold, as if she were looking around to see who might hear…

So cautious they are-- and skeptical-- especially of us. Our skin is a different color. Our feet are so big, and we stand a head taller than most. We are dangerous. There are stories of the white man, and every person seems to know the same one: White Man comes to slice, then peel off their faces, rendering them unrecognizable. He who cannot be recognized can never be found. The white man steals their children and peels their faces, too, then sells their organs. We are the foretold face-peelers.

But not everyone thinks this way. In the clustered spread of huts that is Yarina Isla, we are surrounded by a loving Grandfather who is from another tribe, and his son, Hermano Hyoni (Yoni) who is married to an Ashéninka woman. They have four children, three girls and a boy. They are believers.

When the children have all bathed, and cleanish clothes are all strewn about, darkness begins to settle over the river. Everyone is hungry. I make an extra large pot of soup. The whole eggs have been carefully dropped into a boiling broth, and when they are hard, it will be ready to serve: a fat pot of potatoes and peas and bit of corn in a creamy broth. The fire hisses and sputters when soup spills over the side of the blackened pot.

Behind the potato-pea-corn and cream soup is another toppling pot crowded with slivers of freshly-cut yucca. Every meal must include yucca. A dug-up root, it is still earth-encrusted when the rough, brown bark is hit with a machete, peeling away two layers of protective bark. The starchy center settles into tepid water.

Little MacDina comes toddling toward the fire. Her face is layered with runny nose, caked-on dirt and smeared plantain. Lice crawl from her head. And still, she sparkles, eyes twinkling while she babbles jibberishly. I tell her to sit down and wait for the soup. She throws her doll on the floor and screams. She hits the monkey with her doll. Then she obeys.

Hermano Hyoni is sprawled in the hammock, while his daughters, Laura and Yoselin are pushing him. Baby Caleb is crawling toward a whirring bug that has hit the floor, and is his to smash in-hand. Hermana Manuela gathers some bowls and tells the children to call Abuelito. The soup is ready.

Candles resting atop cans of tuna and evaporated milk are spread throughout the hut. We eat soup by candlelight. Sometimes we are silent. Sometimes everyone is talking at once. Sometimes Hermano Hyoni is playing a guitar, and other times Manuela is preparing the bird or the rodent or the fish he’s caught. Other times we are praying together, or studying the book of 2 Peter. We sing and laugh and listen to one another. And always, there is a certain sweetness in the mysterious clashing of our different worlds. This melding is at times uncomfortable. Awkward. Complex. For them, and for us. But without fail, it is always something beautiful. Like Ema’s smile.

To see more pictures from our latest adventure click here.

Some of September

2010-09-13T15:01:00.001-07:00

The Embankment

Rain is beating against the red earth (Pucallpa is Quechua for red earth). Dust becomes thick, hungry clay swallowing up any wheels that try to pass through unpaved streets. Maybe the dust isn’t so bad, I’m thinking as Uncle Marty’s (as the children affectionately call him) truck is sloshing across red mud and begins to sink into a ditch.

An eccentric, elderly Peruvian woman without teeth is in the front seat directing us to continue on this road so that she can get home. Her backward bandana rests on gray curls and high, strong cheekbones. Wearing richly pink pants, and a shirt of many colors, she’s insisting that we move forward, saying aloud in Spanish, “All powerful God, Help us!”

We are helped.

Bad Water

The water tank on the roof is growing algae. Maybe this has something to do with the persistent high fevers: Chloe’s reached 105. Michael’s: 104. With this water, we have cooked, bathed and washed dishes and vegetables. But now the man on the roof is draining the source of our expenditures and foul, green water shoots out through two protruding pipes from the top of the house down to the sidewalk. Sounds like rain.

Groceries

Heavily-loaded canoes and other boats, whose names I don’t yet know, are pulling into the muddy river bank unloading stock after stock of green bananas and plantains. There are sweet-rather-than-sour lemons, and all shapes and colors of hot peppers. In the market stalls, beautifully woven hammocks hang from tin roofs. In others, there are beheaded turtles, whose limbs are separate from their shells.

Snake in a rusty cage. Ducklings and chicks. Quail eggs in jars. Tiny, firey monkeys whose red ribbons tie them to the cages they sit upon snarl, and make threats to passers-by. Quechua women drag carts through the meat stalls with their smooth, wooden spoons and bowls, weaving in and out of hanging pigs’ feet and giant black and white slippery fish piled in sloppy stacks. As the sun crawls higher into the sky, sweat drips from our noses and the bags of garlic and peppers, lemons, meat and mandarin oranges begin to make our shoulders ache. The moto-taxis plunge through the rocky dirt paths leaving little room for street-crossing.

One father is wearing his tiny baby, while driving his motorcycle. Another small toddler is sitting in her pink walker which is tied to the back of the motorcycle seat resting on the bench of the moto-taxi. We begin to walk, then race through open holes in the traffic pattern, inhaling gusts of diesel fuel. We are on the other side now. There are woven brooms and hanging kitchen sinks from awnings. Painted, peeling turquoise wood panels are made into towering shelves that hold laundry soap beside giant sacks of loose flour and sugar and hard corn.

Strike

Later in the afternoon, Aunt Dena serves fried fish and giant kernels of buttery corn mixed with red pepper and smoked pig meat. There is garlic rice and homemade apple pie. We are celebrating Michael and Uncle Marty’s safe arrival from Lima. Having driven the usual 16 hours in 21, given a two hour road-construction stop and mile after mile of striking cocaleros, their safe arrival calls for a feast.

A convoy of trucks protected by police in army fatigues carrying semi-automatic weapons led the way while cocaine-growers and their sympathizers launched rocks from the hillsides at the Land Cruiser Uncle Marty and Michael were driving. The road was littered with burning rubber tires. For weeks the main highway had been impassable due to coca-growers (whose product is processed into cocaine) on strike. As soon as the newspaper deemed the road clear, Michael and Marty flew the hour to Lima to pick up our vehicle, making the long trip back home with a car load of supplies from Lima…

They hear a heavy thud on top of the car. They’ve been hit. And later-- hit again on the side of the car door…

Home in Pucallpa, Dena and I have lost communication with them and it has been many hours. We are growing restless-- uncertain…

Sunday

It’s been 23 hours. Still--no electricity. A little frog is hopping across the dark house, after finding his way through the open front door. The windows are open, too. We are sprawled with pillows across tile beside the door. Usually fans provide relief-- there is no air conditioning. But even the fans sit dormant tonight without power.

Everyone in my family is sleeping. My eyes are closed. I imagine a warm wind beginning to move through darkness. I am recalling the events of the day: learning to drive that stick-shift Land Cruiser, shifting gears without the clutch only to be firmly scolded by Michael: You’re not doing what I say!

Me: I can’t even understand what you’re saying. That’s not my learning style. I do much better with trial and error.

Michael: You can’t say that about driving! This is not about learning styles. We’re trying to stay alive here, Crystal! Listen to what I say and do it.

I am laughing.

He scolds again: This is no time to be laughing. You’re in the middle of the street and everyone is staring at you. You’re blocking traffic.

He tells the people to go around me, and I try again to shift into third gear. I cannot stop smiling. He’s always great at giving directions. My ability to heed them under pressure can be somewhat lacking. Still, I cannot stop smiling. So he does too.

For in union with Christ, you have become rich in all things… 1 Corinthians 1:5

Pictures from some of September can be found here: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=75281&id=1334529821&l=1419c97b21

The First of Two Homes

2010-08-31T13:43:00.000-07:00

Pucallpa

Men without shirts are sitting under brightly colored umbrellas with typewriters conducting business: the typing-out of formal documents or solicitations for a small fee. And on another street not far from this one, there are crowded stalls of hanging light bulbs and machetes and rubber boots and long, fat tubes of chorizo. These streets have no lanes. Motorcycles weave in and out of moto-taxis. There are few cars, few trucks.

Motorcycles are often piled high: women in high heels sitting side-ways holding a small baby in one arm and plastic bags of plantains and potatoes in the other. One or two other small children sit between them and the driver as they dart effortlessly through dusty downtown stalls stopping for one thing or another until the motorcycle is lost in black and yellow and white bulging plastic bags, and sweating bodies. There are also moto-taxis.

A moto-taxi is a motorcycle whose attached 3-foot seat is supported by the two wheels underneath that attached seat. All of us get around town on that one 3-foot seat. Michael gets in first with Nathanael on his lap, then Julia, with Chloe on hers. I get in last with Abigail on my lap and Michael and I hold our bags of bars of soap and scrub brushes and such with our free hand on a little shelf attached to the back of the moto-taxi. Because it is dry season, there is much dirt and little rain. Riding into town, even our teeth become covered in a spray of red earth. It can burn the eyes and make breathing a bit labored every now and again.

The Neighborhood

By the time we arrive on our little street where the corner market stands-- painted a peeling, lovely peach color-- we climb out and pay our driver the price we came to an agreement on in the beginning. Under our feet crunch fat, brown mango leaves from the cluster of tall trees jutting out from littered earth. We follow the mango leaves to our black gate set in a pale aqua cement wall. This must be the third or fourth layer of paint this wall of cement and brick has known. Someone has taken a blue crayon and drawn a wiggly line across that whole front wall. I’m not sure if that someone shares our last name or not.

Instead of being separated by a street, our houses face each other separated by a sidewalk and some red dirt full of incrusted bottle caps and candy wrappers from the little market across the way, and a stray dog or cat.

The house in front of ours has a tall picket fence and mannequins with pink, green and blue-colored hair. If the multi-color-haired mannequins are out, our neighbor’s little shop is open for business. Her screened-in veranda is piled with plastic wrapped sandals she’s designed and labeled, clothing, purses and some jewelry. It’s quite an operation.

At the corner, across a dirt road, Maria sets up a few tables covered in cloth, chairs and a hanging light bulb or two. She lays out a spread of boiled yuca and bananas. There’s usually rice and potatoes. The meat cooks on the fire there on the street corner. There is always a crowd.

The Roof

On the rooftop, there is much wind, little dust, and the tops of palms, almond and mango trees in view. An airplane leaves the airstrip not far away. Driving, Latin rhythms absorb the usual roar of the competing moto-taxi engines.

Our water supply is also housed on the roof: a stout, blue, routinely-filled water tank. While we cannot drink from it, we do bathe in and cook with it. We use this water for our laundry. Beside the blue tank are electric-looking cables strung in zig-zags where we hang the clothes and sheets that have been hand washed, stomped on, wrung dry, and piled tall--still dripping--into a bucket and carried up to the roof to dry in the hot sun...

The first home.

Pucallpa.

Yarina Isla

The next: Yarina Isla.

In October, we will begin to travel. For up to a month at a time, we will be living in Yarina Isla, a tiny jungle community along the river, reached after a long, dusty road trip and boat ride down the river. Our home there is underway: a raised wooden floor built on stilts covered by thatched palm. There are no walls. Water must be gathered from the river and boiled. Wood must be cut. Jungle brush cleared, and yuca and pineapple planted. Yarina Isla will be our next home.

Showers in Rain

2010-05-01T12:52:00.001-07:00

Punta Leona

Centipedes are plentiful and Guanacaste trees, ancient and moss-laden. The ocean is clear and green for the first 100 meters or so and the sky is azure with few clouds, unless it is late afternoon when the skies blacken and feed the earth. There is no thunder. No lightening. But beyond the thick grove of palms and other unfamiliar trees lining gray sand, the ocean is translucent green. Then-- where the water and sky meet-- is a collision of angry navy blue with nearly-black. Set against green water, the pending storm is breathtaking. Foreboding.

Meanwhile, we are floating in warm, turquoise pools. Wanting to stay-- if only to watch the sky and the water-- it is time to go. We follow an incline through the yellow and purple-leaved pathway. This is like crossing a spring stream as the rains do not relent.

Punta Leona is masterfully spread out along the Pacific coastline. Tucked away into the rainforest are little cottages and grand pools, winding trails and alas, the white sands of Playa Blanca. Foliage climbs both trees and houses. It is a constant battle between man and machete to tame the growth. When the sky opens and the waters pour, her fury is awe inspiring. Water may beat the rocks and dirt and hungry trees late into the night, but when morning breaks, beyond the trees, the sky is again a sweet blue.

The rain proves useful for showers. We stand in the little courtyard under the afternoon sky and wash our hair in her waters, which pelt so hard, the soap rinses out completely.

Without Power

Power has gone out. The night is completely black. Apparently this is not unusual, and there's a candle and sturdy box of matches on the table. I fumble to strike a match and open the door. Everything is black. Our eyes have not adjusted, but when they do, it is still nearly impossible to see. There is nothing but darkness and the sound of busy monkeys and other unseen creatures among giant trees and their branches. It is seven. Hunger gnaws at our bellies, for it is time to follow the path to the house on stilts lit with candles where beet salad and chocolate ice cream and fresh fish are waiting to be served.

Eventually we hear the steady drone of generators, and borrow a flashlight to follow Greg along the paved trail to the house on stilts, where hurricane glasses filled with sand host lone, white candles. Fat carrots and broccoli are heaped onto silver platters among fuschia bouganvilla. Thinly-sliced cucumber covered in pink yogurt is delicious.

Later that night, we drift off to sleep in the same blackness: waiting, whispering... anticipating these final 15 weeks of language school. August will come and Lord willing, we will board a plane for the jungle, where there will indeed be more showers in the rain.

Apple Doesn't Fall Far From the Tree

2010-04-01T08:53:00.000-07:00

Thursday
I had planned to do some laundry. The machine is broken. What do I do with all the soapy water and clothes? Should I start washing by hand? Michael specifically asked me to do some writing. So, I shall write.

Wednesday
Nathanael is having a bad day. He's temperamental. Abigail is moody. Julia is pouting because she feels left out and Chloe says no to every command. I'm boiling.
"Everyone be happy! " I command (without a hint of cheer).

Later, Abigail is crying. Her eyes are red. She sits on the corner of my bed and confesses a list of everything that's wrong with her life. Each thing, strangely enough, is something that is actually wrong with someone else in her life: Julia Noel is bossy and pouty, Chloe Joy is destroying her tent, Nathanael won't stay out of her room. Everyone else needs to change: "If they would all do the right thing, I would be such a delightful person." But until then... she is justified to moan and make her family know how they have not only destroyed her tent and her mood-- they are robbing her of the ability to be a delightful person.

Then Julia is forlorn. She stands in front of me with a long, miserable face and announces woefully, "I did the experiment. For 20 minutes, I set aside my own plans. I decided that I was going to serve Abigail. I wrote out my plan, my hypothesis and an empty space for the results. When the timer went off, it had been a horrible 20-minute-experience, so I sat in the corner of my room and cried."
"Why? I thought you were going to spend 20 minutes serving Abigail, making life great for her."
"She didn't want my service. She didn't want my plans for her. I told her that I was serving her."
"Is that how you serve someone?"
"What do you mean? I gave her that whole 20 minutes, and she rejected me. The experiment failed."
"You were not serving her. To serve her is to fit into her world, her plans. To join in with what she's already working on and make it sweeter for her. You ask her what she needs, or even just anticipate it. Serving doesn't make demands. You don't do what you want, how you want to, and call that serving. That's bossing. That's why she's mad at you to begin with."
"But I told her I was going to serve her."
"Then you proceeded to demand how and when?"
"But if I live like this, who will serve me? I'll be doing all the work and all the 'fitting-in'."

Such a good question...

Even as I'm rebuking her, I'm uncomfortable, feeling the weight of my hypocrisy. I look at her, wincing, and admit, "Julia, I'm demanding something from you that I am not doing myself," I begin.

Abigail enters, and interrupts,"Yes, that makes you a hypocrite."

Can she read my thoughts?

"True."

Julia's eyes light up, "What are some other ways you're a hypocrite?"
"I tell you to rejoice in the Lord in your every circumstance, but when I'm bothered with you, instead of praising God, or calling out to Him, sometimes I go and pout, too."

They are clearly both very satisfied upon hearing this confession, leaning in a little closer. I continue, "Abigail wants Julia to stop being the boss and pouting when she's not, but she demands this of Julia, while pouting herself."
"Amen," says Julia.
"And your idea of service is really for your own gain, Julia," I continue. She smiles uncomfortably, knowingly.

While I long for my children to motivated to serve each other out of love, I often serve them out of duty with joylessness. When they act like I do, my own choices become painfully obvious.

I suppose Julia's question is more important than I realized: Is a life of praising God and serving others cheerfully REALLY worth it? In her words, Who will take care of me? If I'm so busy serving others, who will serve me?
We talk awhile longer, realizing that none of us is the innocent party. We are confronted later, when Michael is reading to us:

"...but whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant, and
whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave;
just as the Son of Man did not come to be served,
but to serve, and
to give His life a ransom for many."
Matthew 20: 27-28

Therein lies the Gospel, in all it's fullness, as it applies to bad moods and disagreements and everything else that finds it's way into a normal day...

Day Off

2010-02-25T11:57:00.000-08:00

Thursday
February 25

From my bedroom window on the top floor, I am staring at green tin roofing. It's encircled in rolls of razor-wire along the top of the neighbor's fence, and beneath the wire is some graffiti- the same three silver letters I've admired from this window for these last 7 months. Above the wire, the sky is white and gray. It feels like a Friday...

But it's Thursday, and there is time to rest. The grammar tests are stacked on our teacher's desks. Our notes are set aside, and my bed, which is usually covered in these notes, reference books, verb conjugations, construction-paper note cards and a Spanish-English dictionary, is empty. It will be a three-day weekend, and this time-- there is no homework. I take a deep breath, and continue to stare at the silver graffiti.

Friday afternoon
February 26

Abigail and Julia are with me. We're walking with our vegetable bags in-tow, but they're empty. The narrow curb we're following into Desamparados is laden with trash and broken glass. The cement is uneven and cracked, making it important to watch where we step. There are deep holes stuffed with bottles and wrappers and something rancid.

We cross a bridge over brown water and admire tin houses built above the river. Some are painted turquoise, some are copper. Drying t-shirts hang just barely above adobe-potted red geraniums. The geraniums are stunning against peeling turquoise paint. We stop on the bridge while Abigail drops a leaf and watches it float slowly into the brown river. Julia is interested in the fact that the leaf follows invisible zig-zags before finally touching the water, carried along by the current. We think about the people who live in the tin houses. We admire those tin houses and the flowers and the laundry, and we keep walking.

The thrift store I anticipated seeing when we turned the corner is completely gutted. Instead, there are men on extended ladders painting the ceiling of the warehouse. "This is the right street, isn't it?" I muse under my breath, tracing my steps.

There on the corner are braids of onion and garlic hanging from the yellow awnings. Stacks and stacks of bananas and plantains line the corner. Fresh melons are cut into different shapes. I know this is the right corner-- where is the right store?

Julia is tense: "You don't know where you're at, do you? Are we lost?"
"No, and no."

We trace our steps back to a church on the corner. Just across the street is another thrift store. We settle for that one. We walk in and hand our empty bags to the lady who stores them behind the check-out counter and gives us a wooden number in exchange.

The music is loud and there is a smiling woman speaking very rapidly into a microphone attached to a karaoke machine. I listen carefully, and decide she's announced that there are 15 minutes left to gather blouses from the front rack where they are 2 for 1,000 colones. This means they're about a dollar each. Julia races to the section where fancy bathrobes and old-fashioned dresses hang.

"Oh, Abigail, I actually had a dream where I was wearing this dress!"
"I'll buy it for you," boasts Abigail, who never leaves home without her coin purse. She's sifting through her heaviest yellow coins. We each disappear into different aisles, lost in the tightly packed rows of skirts and blouses and dress-up clothes.

When it's time to leave, we hand the smiling karaoke lady our wooden number, and she hands us our bags, where we stuff our treasures. Julia's most happy about a scarf she's found that is the exact bright, clear red of the geraniums at the tin house. Abigail's found a layered silver party dress. Neither one of these things are needed: red scarfs are not necessary in the tropics, nor are party dresses for the jungle, but we couldn't be any more delighted, until we smell the bread bakery, nearing our house.

Instead of going straight, we turn, and quicken our steps toward the smell of hot bread. We load a little red tray with buns for dinner and Abigail adds a loaf of cheese bread insisting that if I don't want to pay for it, she can.

We turn the corner to see our front gate, long after we've heard Nathanael's grunts and cheers. He and Miguel are playing soccer on the tile behind the gate and race to to find the gate key when they see we have yellow bags with bread.

Instead of saving the bread, we all gather around the table after Nathanael hollers, "We're having a bread party for everyone who wants some bread!" He's the first to tear a piece from the cheese loaf, and we all agree that the hot loaf tasted much better than it would've with dinner.

Saturday
February 27

Miguel has the troops down at the baseball field. Since rainy season is over, the field is no longer a lake. Neighborhood children and men throw and chase balls, preparing even the youngest to join the team.

I am home, taking advantage of the fact that we have water right now. I race through the kitchen chopping radishes and cilantro with celery, green onion and almonds for tuna wraps. I bake oatmeal bars preparing for the time we will spend tomorrow with baby Rebeca, at the cafecito. All the while, I am washing as many dishes as possible and turning over as many loads of laundry as the machine will allow, before there is no water again.

Late Afternoon
February 27

The house is dark and silent and everyone sleeps for now. Oatmeal bars are iced with a vanilla cream, waiting in the refrigerator for tomorrow. I am reading through John 15 both in Spanish and in English over and over, for nothing ever sinks in the first time.

In this moment, I am rejoicing in my freedom: God's Spirit lives in me, directing my thoughts, my words, each choice, as I call out to Him. He is lovingly directing each small detail of my small life, so that I can join Him, the Creator of all that lives and moves and has being, in His huge plan for the nations.

Christmas in Puntarenas

2009-12-31T07:59:00.001-08:00

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

2009-11-26T17:52:00.000-08:00

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

2009-10-31T20:45:00.001-07:00

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

2009-09-25T22:11:00.001-07:00

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

2009-09-12T14:58:00.000-07:00

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

2009-08-27T15:23:00.000-07:00

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

2009-08-25T19:16:00.000-07:00

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

2009-08-17T16:50:00.000-07:00

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

2009-08-02T20:07:00.000-07:00

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?

2009-07-27T18:20:00.000-07:00

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

2009-07-26T16:21:00.000-07:00

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

2009-07-25T12:38:00.000-07:00

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

2009-07-16T18:11:00.000-07:00

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

2009-07-10T15:11:00.000-07:00

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

2009-07-09T14:51:00.000-07:00

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

2009-07-08T20:49:00.000-07:00

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

2009-06-30T13:40:00.000-07:00

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

2009-06-21T17:34:00.000-07:00

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.

2009-05-22T21:13:00.000-07:00

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

2009-05-19T13:56:00.001-07:00

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

2009-05-17T18:38:00.000-07:00

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

2009-05-09T19:06:00.000-07:00

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

2009-04-28T18:00:00.000-07:00

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"

2009-04-23T16:57:00.000-07:00

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

2009-04-15T11:15:00.000-07:00

Packing

2009-04-13T23:04:00.000-07:00

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

2009-04-12T22:18:00.000-07:00

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?

Gayhearts In Peru

Let It Be

Catching Up…

And we begin again…

Most of March

Pictures of our “March Madness”

A Difficult Week

Photos of our latest jungle trip

Confessions of a City Slicker

(**WARNING – This post contains gross photos!**)

Jungle Journal

Like Ema’s Smile

Some of September

The First of Two Homes

Showers in Rain

Apple Doesn't Fall Far From the Tree

Day Off

Christmas in Puntarenas

Learning Love

Without Fall

Lettuce Leaves, Uninvited Guests and Grammar

Odds and Ends

Like a Pup

Goodbye Summer

Living Water

Barefooting

No Such Thing as a Free Lunch?

Costa Rican Cookies

Costa Rica

Atalaya, Smiling

Stay Close

Lima 2

Lima

Orange, Blue and Belief

White Noise

S.I.R.

Prayer Card

Cross-Cultural Worship

Perfect Moment

Lies and a Confession

Living On "The Farm"

Family Photos

Packing

Legacy

(WARNING – This post contains gross photos!)