Brokenness --- finding a new way in and old wave

Part 1 – it happens... things get broken

She shared words that were hard in coming. Words that told a story she wished had never been written. I said in the softest flow of air, “You can't stop what's happened, but you can choose a different ending than the one you're in now.”

No vase would choose to be shattered. No heart asks to be broken. And when things break, the world would say it has been ruined. It is useless, it is finished.

But the world is wrong......... again.

Because the One who is above all things looks at that same brokenness in a wiser way, with a keener eye. He says He can bring beauty from a pile of ashes --- He can bring streams of water in the desert --- He can take what seems ruined ------------- and make it------ new.

It's the way of brokenness.

Few will invite it to come. Most refuse its approach. Usually we have no choice.

So rather than allow it to complete it's work in us, we fight it --- deny it ---- medicate it ----- run from it.

When we've known the hammer blows of personal brokenness, and lived to see the smoothing out of something rough in us, then we begin to understand it.s importance. But until we've known its effectual work, we struggle to sit still in its unsettling presence.

It's one of the huge differences between living in a first world place and a third world place. The contrast is stark. In a third world environment, there are few ways to escape the “thing” that is working to break you. You have no option, you can't simply go to another place and begin doing a different thing. Need and hunger hold you still. But in a first world place, there are options, choices, ways to get away from the thing that is pressing down. You can pick up and move, get another job, leave the spouse that's hurting you, get in your car and drive to a new life.

But what if you're a child and the brokenness is coming to your parent, who is not covering you, and their brokenness rolls into your little world. You can't escape it. (In a third world country like Kenya --- this is exactly how many street children come about. They do run --- to the street. And a different, mean, worldly kind of broken begins to breathe.)

Or what if the breaking is coming in the form of a disease. Even in a first world place, there's no way to hide from it's impact.

It's just that brokenness is a universal thing --- it comes in every corner --- and to everyone.

Yet when it comes to us, when it's painfully personal and standing on our doorstep, we can feel so alone. Alone is not good. We were not created for aloneness.

She knew that something was gravely wrong. Tears came as her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth.

Our toes dug into the sand, we watched families playing in the waves, the sun began to set. She'd endured life, and worked to overcome much pain, but her past was haunting her present and fear was crashing in again.

Grave – it's the right word for it.

She could smell the pungent stench of death, her eyes could only see the struggle around her. And her strength, all of it, was being consumed (and wasted) on trying to maintain, survive, endure, and find a way to defeat the problems before her. And they weren't just her problems anymore. They were the problems being lived out in the lives of her children now ---- their hurts carried a faint echo of her own even though they knew nothing of her story. She had held it silent for all her 60 decades.

It looked exactly as though the other person in this painful “Life-Play”, was the cause of the stench. It was their sin, their fault, their wrongdoings that caused the problems. (And to a very large degree, this was oh-so-true!)

If they would just change....

or perhaps if they had just disappeared...

“could they just go away please?”...

“Then this suffocating dust could settle and the sun might shine again and life could get back on course... perhaps happiness could then come.”

But as surely as that solution seems so right ------ it would only be a temporal reprieve. For that would be the outward way of “relief” --- not the inward way of “healing”.

When the struggle inside us collides with the hammering-tool outside us (the situation, the person, the sickness, the “problem”), our eyes become fixed on IT, the problem. We put our focus on IT. We laser in on it. And all our mind can think on is “if this thing was changed, I could find peace”.

IT is the problem. Right?

But what of the Holy Words that say, “In this world you will have trouble. But do not be afraid. For I have overcome the world”.

Doesn't that mean that in this old world, there are going to be so many “its”? Struggles will abound. Problems are “normal”. Oh but I cringe even typing those words.

It's a hard reality --- not a sparkly, feel good truth --- it's raw.

Troubles come ----- then they go ---- then others come -----

The woe-is-me-soul would want to throw in the towel and give up on life. But not the Jesus-in-me-soul.

Have you ever walked on the ocean's shore, sand under you, sun above you, and waves steadily pounding beside you? There's a rhythm to the steadiness of it all; on most days it comforts us in some inner way.

Then the sun gets too hot and we long for the coolness of the water. We inch our way in, toes first.

As she spoke, the waves beside us seemed to speak as well, “keep going, we're not shocked by anything you might say”. They invited her every word, they were not afraid. Waves know what to do with the dirt of life.

The cool waters feel good to our feet, so we keep moving forward. As we make progress into the waters, we come to that place where the waves crest. Where they peak and then fold, tumbling down in a ribbon of white rush. That's the line where, if the wave has any size, we might get knocked down. When we walk to the line of the rolling waves, we either choose to let it knock us over OR we choose to lean into it.

The former means the wave is unbroken and it will carry us where it wants to. That's usually a whirl of confusion in foaming, sandy waters.

But the latter means the wave line is broken and we find ourselves still standing on the other side of the impact.

Either way ---- something gets broken--- either the wave line is breeched or we are.

If you've ever found yourself coming against a big wave in the ocean, you know this, you have to brace yourself, even crouch down, bend your knees and lean forward to be able to endure the impact.

For me ---- those big waves require that I ---- bend my knees.

I've never once conquered a wave with straight, board-like legs.

Try it sometime if you never have --- you can't do it.

It's the bending of my knees that gives me balance.

It's the bending of our knees that gives us balance.

Part 2 --- Facing the waves wisely

In this sharing, the waves represent the “in this world you will have trouble” part of that verse.

Unbent knees, stiffness, will not serve us well when facing those waves.

Bent knees, a lowering of ourselves, better allows us to withstand the impact, and find ourselves in a new place. We're not bending our knees to give in to the trouble --- no, we're bending our knees to balance ourselves against its impact.

Have you ever noticed how calm the water is just beyond the wave line? (calm at least until the next wave comes)

Too often we might think of the wave line as the place where we should become strong, rigid, firm. We think if we get tough, we can beat the wave. But it's not our strength that will get us on the other side of the impact.

More Holy Words speak directly to this thought of rigid strength winning. “Not by power, not by might, but by my Spirit say the Lord.” (Zechariah 4:6)

The way of the world says, get stronger, meaner, tougher --- fight fire with fire --- if they hurt you, you hurt them more.

But that world-way doesn't fit with the Abba-way. Jesus showed us clearly. His greatest show of strength came on that cross; He stayed there during the breaking. Then His greatest show of power came at the mouth of that tomb.

Our willingness to face the “wave” wisely (because “in this world you will have trouble”),

to “bend our knees” (“do not be afraid”), and choose to focus on the calmer waters beyond (“for I have overcome the world”), (John 16:33)

------ this will carry us through.

It's not the removal of the wave that is needed.

The waves are there ---- they will always be there ---- they will not be removed --- until Heaven.

If it's not this person, it will be another person. If it's not this challenge, it will be another like it. If it's not this unkind situation, it will be another. The waves are always there.......

(and if we can r-e-a-l-l-y understand this at a soul-deep-level, we'll find a storehouse of grace and mercy for those around us who are being tossed about in waves of brokenness)

It's not the removal of the waves that will finally bring us happiness or peace or calm.

It's our willingness to face them, and allow our bended knees to break the impact that will bring us to new places in life.

What happens to the wave?

If you've ever bent your knees, lowered yourself, closed your eyes, held your breath, and leaned forward into a wave, you find that you can endure it. The whirl of its waters will pass by. Then the wave continues on to where it was going. But it has not carried you with it. It might even lift your feet off the ocean floor briefly, but if we keep our positioning, it can not carry us with it.

Therefore ----- our stance does not change the wave. We can not change the waves. We can not complain about them enough, argue with them enough, fight back against them enough, or in any way alter them. We have no control over the wave.

What we can do ---- what we do have a control over --- is how we choose to face it. It is our only chance at altering the outcome.

It can either throw us backwards onto the shore and crash its waters all over us OR we can choose to bend our knees, lower our center, and lean into it.

The waves of life ------

they might intimidate us with their size, they might hit hard when they come, but oh --- with bent knees and a “lowering of self”, they will not push us backwards into old places.

So this means that I can't face the waves without bending my knees and lowering my center of gravity.

Those two things must be in place ---- two things that will allow a breakthrough --- but two things that will also allow a “breaking” in me.

It's a very different kind of “breaking”. Not the brokenness that comes from the hand of another; it's rather a brokenness that comes IN the hands of the FATHER.

Bending my knees is that visual reference to praying. Bending myself, no stiffness of leg or heart or mind or emotion. (This is a hard thing to do if we're stuck in the “i must defeat it” mode.) Bending my everything to HIM, not it or them. It means I must grab hold of His robes, look for His way, choose His hand on my heart. No more shaking my fist at the wave. Instead choosing His way in the wave. Trusting that He really is good and He truly can carry me through the impact(s) of this life and in so doing, He will be washing me with each wave, He will be washing something from me that needed to go. Something I hadn't even realized was stuck to me. And when I will allow the truth to really come through --- i'll realize the stench that i'd faced so often, thinking it was on the other, was actually also on me.

Only Abba can wash that stench away with His blood. But because of His sacrifice on the Cross, He can also use the waves of life to help us, as we bend our knee to Him.

For just a few lines, i'll share of one wave that repeatedly crashed into my world and left me covered in scratchy sand. For all my life i've been eager for friendship. Even as a little girl, having friends around me, good friends, meant all was right with my world. Somehow I was wired to enjoy friendship. But throughout my life there have been sad stories of friendships gone wrong. Not all my friendships, thank God --- for there are many who have journeyed closely with me for all my days. What a gift. But still there have been several key friends who I treasured so much, who i walked closely beside, but then suddenly they stepped away, and disappeared, sometimes even hurting me in the process. Never once did any of those “friends” come to tell me what i'd done to cause their rejection. Even if I went to her and asked “why?”, there would be no reason given. Just an abandonment of the friendship ---- and i'd be leveled by the wave. Some people, of different temperaments than mine, don't care so much when a friend moves on. But it's been a wave that has pounded me at least 3 hard times in my life. The last time this hard wave came, I lifted myself up to Jesus and said, “Please help me, I need help here, this hurts too, too much.” I bent my knees to Him, lowered my center (myself and how I felt), and asked Him to wash me, wash off of me what needed to go to be healed from the inside out.

And He showed me something IN ME that He wanted to “clean up” (change).

The wave can wash us. It might not touch the one who has hurt us, but it can wash us in good ways.

What was it in me that needed to go?

What needed to be washed away?

He was jealous for my focus. He did not want me to be so focused on that friend, what they thought, how they cared or didn't care, if they responded or walked away. He did not want their actions towards me to matter nearly as much as I was allowing it to matter. He wanted me to lean in to HIM, and not lament over them. Period. It was that simple. And in the bending of my knees in the wave, Jesus said, “Pray for them, give them to me, i'll deal with them, YOU FOCUS ON ME, I will never leave you.”

John 21:22 came alive for me, “If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is that to you? As for you, you follow me.” Paraphrased and personal for me it became, “If I want them to... (step away from you), what's that to you donna? As for you --- my instruction is clear to you, you----follow----me.”

Yes, this is a small thing in life right? For some it is. For others it can be debilitating. For me it was bigger than it should have been. I'm letting you see the bottom side of my scrapings as i dare share it here. But, the point is ---- waves come in different sizes and with different strengths. Small or big --- if a wave (a trouble in this world) has the strength to knock us down, then it needs to be handled carefully, faced wisely, and dealt with completely. It needs to be approached and measured and honestly laid before the One who will use it for good in our lives, if we'll hold His hand at the wave-line. Bent knees. A lowering of “me”, my center of gravity (what holds me in the right place). Little or big, if something wounds, then when the wave comes again, as it always will, we can learn to let it wash something off us that needs to go!

Next time you find yourself near those strong ocean waves, do yourself a favor and let yourself experience a visual of this. Don't laugh at me here, resist the urge to roll your eyes (cause you're gonna want to...).

Find a spot on the beach all to yourself. This is not a spectator “sport”.

Carry a bottle of ketchup with you, the cheaper the better.

Stand at the shoreline and pour that ketchup all over your arms and legs. You'll feel goofy for sure, but only for a second or two. Then walk your sauce-covered-self out into the water up to the wave-line. Bend your knees and lower your center of gravity, brace yourself for the waves, don't let them break you --- instead you break their line. Stay there for wave, after wave, after wave. With each wave you'll find you get more accustomed to the stance you need to have, how low you need to go, how much you need to bend your knees. You'll get tired, yes. But you'll get wiser in the ebb and flo of those waves. Let 10, 12, 15 waves come and go, then turn and walk back to the shore. Look at your arms and legs. Is there any red ketchup left? There won't be. What was on you will have been washed from you as you focused on bending your knees and lowering yourself.

Is it a silly visual or a solid picture of truth? (maybe both) :)

Now, be honest with yourself and with the One who already knows the answer to every question. What's the cheap ketchup mess in your life? What is stuck to you that needs to go? (Because if it gets to stay it will bring a world-brokenness inside you.) How many times have you felt its stickiness in your life? Be honest with God about it ---- right now ---- and ask Him to help you as you bend your knees (pray over it again and again), and then lower yourself before HIM (so He can increase Himself in you). Ask Him to show you the new way you need to allow a cleansing brokenness (from HIM) to wash the sticky mess away. It won't happen in a day --- or even a week --- for me it almost always takes a steadiness in many waves to finally walk back to the shoreline and feel “clean of it”. But begin today dear one. Begin today.

Part 3 – Wash me Lord, use those waves to wash me – Broken for GOOD.

Lowering yourself, lowering your “center” of gravity so the wave doesn't catch you off balance and throw you backwards is the picture of John 3:30 “I must decrease and He must increase.” Oh how we struggle in the living out of those 7 little words. For we think we must increase, we must get stronger, we must press our point or win the fight or prove them wrong or take our revenge in order to beat “the wave”. But this, dear one, is the lie of the evil one.

We can not beat the waves with stiff, strong, unbent legs.

We can not stop them from coming, we can not alter them.

But if we will decrease (let go of what needs to be washed away from us) ---- as we choose to increase Him, choose Him at the center, raise Him up in the lowering of “me”, then we find there is a bedrock strength that can stand in the wave. It is He who then causes the wave to wash us, as it passes by, and we find ourselves in a strange new place of still waters.

Watchman Nee writes so beautifully of this lowering of our center --- but his words call it a choosing of brokenness, an allowance of God's dealings. His book “The Release of the Spirit” has filled my plate of late, and opened my eyes to much.

Brokenness.

Brokenness is something to be avoided if it's only being used to destroy; where the waves of life keep throwing us down on old shores laced with boulders and sharp edges. This is the brokenness that comes when the world wins and ashes remain.

But --- the brokenness Jesus guides us towards, is something to be embraced. It's a revelation of being able to see what in us needs to go, what needs to grow, and what needs to change. It's a realization of our inability and His ability which compels us to bend our knees. We see the need to lower our center of gravity; allowing ourselves, our will, our attitude, our my-way-mentality to be broken and washed away. And after the work of this kind of brokenness is complete, we find ourselves standing in a new place. A place we thought we could only arrive at if “they” or “it” changed.

Instead we find, ----- the thing that needed to change, was something in us.

Now ---- perhaps “they” or “it” are a serious issue, a real problem, a troublesome thing to endure. No doubt there are those grievous people and painful situations that cause much angst in our lives.

Certainly change is needed in them as well.

But just as we have not power over the wave ------ we know, we have not power to change them.

Keeping our focus set on them, will rob us two-fold. We'll never see the good possibilities of bending our knees and increasing Christ-in-me and we'll never know what life could have been like after the wave-line was broken and the stuff stuck to us washed away.

The answer is not found in running from the waves. The answer is found in overcoming them by facing them wisely.

Brokenness.

Life is a constant remodeling taking us from what was to new places of what can be. But in order to get there, we must be willing to let the One who made us, carry us through the waves. And He can only do that when we bend our knees and lower ourselves in His hands.

He will deal with those who wrong us.

He knows --- He sees --- He will deal with them. And a fearsome dealing it might be. (Makes me cringe to think of it, it compels me to pray for them.)

But never forget, He's also watching to see how we respond to the wave-lines in life. Do we lean into Him, bend our knees and lower ourselves as He increases in us? Or do we rigidly fight the impacts of life and struggle in the surf after being knocked down again?

“For the eyes of the LORD run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward Him.”2 Chronicles 16:9 KJV

... in my kindergarten way of thinking this verse through, this I know to be solid-rock truth....

I can not even begin to have a “heart perfect toward Him” if I have not become practiced in bending my knees, lowering myself, and facing the waves of life. Letting the waves flow over me in such a way that what needed to be removed inside me is washed away and my eyes are found set like flint on Him.

Oh Lord, help her (the many “hers” --- and the many “hims” too).

Oh Lord, help me.

Oh Lord, help us all.

Wash us again and again -------

Hold us steady in the waves Daddy-GOD.

We trust Your dealings with us on the path of brokenness. You can take our rough selves and find the diamond inside.

The world's dealings with us brings a brokenness that takes our rough stone-selves and pummels us into sand --- where little if anything remains.

Two kinds of brokenness.

One destroys --- the other “makes things new”.

We choose you and your way Father.

Don't let us miss seeing what you see, when you look at us.

Count it all Joy...

Joy is a choice.

Long ago someone boldly said to me they believed LOVE was a choice, and i cringed a bit.

His wife had confessed her unfaithfulness in their marriage; even admitting she had been with other men while carrying their unborn child inside her. What a challenging thing for a husband to face.

But his response ---- “love is a choice – and i will not let her choice alter mine --- i choose to love.”

It was such a profound moment. It shifted something important inside of me.

It is true. Completely and unavoidably true. Love is a choice. We choose to love or we choose not to love. It's not their fault if we don't love them, and it's not to their credit if we do. It's all on us, our choice.

The same is true with joy.

Too often we get caught up in the whirl of circumstances and stress, letting them dictate to us how we should feel. And some days can take our breath away --- in not-good-ways.

But, we always hold the key to how we will choose to respond. No one else holds our key.

And i believe God in Heaven smiles with delight and nods His great head when we choose to lift our eyes above the world-mess-stress; choosing to remember we are dearly loved by Him and HE IS THE ONE WHO IS ABOVE ALL THINGS.

He can take what was intended for harm and use it for good.

He holds the earth on its axis and the stars in the universe.

He saves the world through a baby.

He saves our souls through the shed blood of His Son.

Joy immeasurable is ours because He lives, we're saved, we have a home, the King is our Daddy.

Joy is a choice.

We can get distracted and deceived to the point that we even forget it's an option on the buffet He prepares daily for our consumption.

That's the game plan of the enemy --- to keep us from even remembering ---- JOY is an option we can choose anywhere, anytime.

One way to keep our hearts and minds better able to remember what's on the buffet is Philippians 4:8 -- “Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable --- if anything is excellent or praiseworthy --- think on such things...”

Then the Word says --- “and the God of peace will be with you...”

Peace and Joy hold hands --- they are tight with one another.

So for JOY to be chosen, we must manage where we allow our thoughts to dwell, we must grab hold of what's good and go with it. There is always a good to grab hold of (we might have to look for it, but there is always a good option)--- joy is a choice.

For me --- i'm actively choosing to set the stage for joy--- for the goodness of the Lord to be seen center stage,

when i :

• Redirect my thoughts from what has grabbed my attention, and choose to guide my thoughts to where they need to be.
• Notice the flower, the cloud, feel the wind, hear the bird-song.
• Light the candle before i pick up His Word in the dark hours of morning.
• Become captivated by the giggles of a child – thanking God for good people caring for her.
• Hear my husband's snores as if their reminders that again tonight... he chose me to rest beside.
• Reframe the actions of the rude driver --- instead choosing to consider they might be rushing to the hospital and need my prayers or they might be rushing to a toilet because they have diarrhea.
• Lingering long enough to see the kindness between two aged-people holding hands as they walk, smiling as they've chosen to wait for each other.
• Pushing through doubt, and choosing to memorize the verse that helps us. Letting our mind go to that verse wherever we are, because we're choosing those words instead of...
• Saying no to the couch/tv/phone/computer and yes to conversation that lets the people around us know --- we see them, we chose them.

The list is infinite. All the ways we can choose specs of JOY instead of robotic responses to life that might very well leave us feeling drained and tired.

Joy has the essence of living intentionally ---- not reacting wearily.

When we take the wrong turn and allow our joy to be connected to another person or place or circumstance, we make it really easy for the enemy of our Lord to pull the rug out from under our feet. Because no person, place, or situation can bear that load. They're not built for that purpose, it's not their responsibility.

When Jesus said, “It is finished” on the cross He was breathing out the option of JOY onto any who would be willing to see it, and grab hold. But first we must see HIM. Joy comes from Him.

Ben Carson's mother once told him, given his good mind and good God, that if he (Ben) was not wildly successful it would be all his fault. (paraphrased a bit but that was the charge she gave him)

i have learned and applied this same way of thinking to the “choice for joy”.

Remembering all that has been done for me, and all the options before me, if i do not choose to live-with-joy ------ it will be all my own fault.

There may be days of tears (there will be), but the flowers will still bloom, the stars will still shine.

At the end of the day ----- what i choose ------ is mine.

But what of those who suffer intensely, those trapped in places of horrific pain and injustice. What of the sick who agonize with gripping, shooting, breath-taking pain? Am i supposing that joy could still be a choice for them?

It's in those very arenas that knees begin to tremble and the questions will try and wipe the Holy verses out of our head. The verses that keep the belt of Truth buckled. If those verses can be overwhelmed in the midst of suffering, then, joy can float down the rushing river like a life-boat cut loose from its ship. Those are perilous, ominous waters to be adrift in.

So, let's be brave and look into those places where darkness crashes in and birds might stop singing.

I think of Daniel --- he was a real man ---- he wasn't just a long-ago-character in a story.

He was a stellar person on all sides. Even though he had been kidnapped from his childhood home, he still worked to always do the right thing and press himself to excellence. He worshiped God, served the king, and wisdom was his running-mate.

But there came the day when he found himself in a lions den ---- because he wouldn't succumb to a wrongly placed ruling. Was it possible Daniel allowed joy to stay inside him as he descended those steps into the growling pit?

Or what of the day he watched his three closest friends, those he had been kidnapped with and had served beside for years, being wrongfully thrown into a fiery furnace? Could joy have been present as Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego stepped into the flames that incinerated the guards holding the door open for them?

Joy might not always show itself on the outside of a person, but it's the presence of joy on the inside that lends great strength and endurance to our steadfast resolve. Not joy in the wrongful thing that is happening, but a joy that is above the circumstance. A joy that whispers into the marrow of bones ----- God is over this, God is with me, God is not defeated, God IS my good Shepherd, yes, though i'm walking through a dark valley, i will not be afraid, for God is with me, His rod and staff surround me... keeping my eyes fixed on Him, He will finish this in His way.

Joy comes (bubbles up to the outside of us) in the morning after the long night of steadfast trust.

Joy is not the same thing as carefree happiness.

Joy has the aroma of powerful faith.

So yes, Daniel had joy coursing through his veins as he descended into the lions den, because he knew his God was with him. And whatever the outcome, he knew God would be in charge.

The three in the furnace stepped forward bravely, and joy was present in their resolve. Because they knew God was about to be seen by all. At the very least they knew HE was with them.

Imagine the joy that rose to the surface and shined in their faces as they stepped back out of that furnace knowing everyone present had witnessed the greatness of their God. Joy was present.

Betsie is in the middle, Corrie on the left.
Nollie, was also a sister, but was released early on from the concentration camp. 

Betsie, the much loved sister of Corrie Ten Boom, carried a sparkling kind of joy inside her that even though her circumstances were all-wrong, she was all-right on the inside. She died in a concentration camp, her sister witnessed her passing, but for the rest of Corrie's life, she told the stories of joy-found in dark places --- forgiveness-given to the undeserving --- peace in the midst of war.

A dear friend of mine was held as a prisoner of war for many years. He was tortured and starved and faced many horrifying moments. Yet, he was not destroyed because he worked to keep his personal, internal (that place where no guard could reach) focus on the knowing that God was with him, He was not forgotten. His testimony is powerful. (God bless Captain Jerry Coffee and all those who have suffered wrongfully while serving our country.) Was joy with him in those dark cells? He says it was; not on the outside like a bubbling brook, but on the inside like an artesian well of promise.

Joy is available when Jesus is present. Evil can not destroy it, unless we choose to allow it to do so.

Joy is a choice.

Few of us will face days of dark prison cells and concentration camps. Those are places where heroes carry joy and hope ---- and the rest of us watch in awe, inspired. But if joy can walk into a lions den with Daniel, and joy can be the sparkle in a dying woman's eye, the smile on her lips at Ravensbruck concentration camp, then joy is an unstoppable force if we choose to let it live inside us.

Before Betsie died, she whispered to her sister Corrie, “There is no pit so deep, that He [God] is not deeper still.” Those words could only be spoken by a woman who knew what the deep pits looked like, and found “the joy of the Lord is my strength” there.

Joy is a choice. 

Count it all joy... (James 1:2)

Behind the Veil

Leaning toward Steve i said, “Goodness, it is scary.” He nodded in agreement. Then as i stepped up to the guard to be scanned, she said, “You are scared? Why are you scared?” Shocked that she had heard me, i replied, “No i'm not scared, i only spoke to my husband about something that is scary.” The female guard looked me in the eye and said, “i know, and yes it is.” She felt the same way i did, she understood.

We had been driving most of the day, headed north. Stopping to buy some groceries, we approached the entrance of a store just as a young woman stepped in front of me to get a cart before entering. She was not rude, no offense was taken. But it was her clothing that caught my attention and gave me pause. She was wearing a full hijab, with a niqab, (where a small slit allows only the eyes to show). I've grown accustomed to seeing them here and there, but usually they are in full black. Her's was different.

It's still hard to believe i live so far from my homeland. But, i do, it is real, and daily my Abba stretches me to know more of Him, His ways, His plans. I no longer allow myself the indulgence of seeing things with my own eyes only. There's just so much more to be seen, understood, and done. Looking with my eyes alone would only limit me from seeing the real reason i'm breathing. There's more, there's always more. And the more Abba wants for His kids is not purchased with coins, instead it's found in obedience to whatever He is saying in the moments of any day.

Finished with the guard's scans, assured we carried no weapons, she smiled warmly as we entered the store. The fully-robed lady walked in front of us, and i noticed how everyone stared at her. She did draw attention to herself, but even from behind i sensed she did not want to be noticed.

Some might think me silly, but another thing i have learned living in this country, is when in doubt----- it is time to pray. And honestly, i am in doubt so many times every day. Doubt of what someone is about to do, how the police are about to behave, where the crazy matatu drivers are going when they fly past us on the dirt side of the roadway, the doubt goes on and on.

I grew up where there was order, rules, and for the most part people followed those rules. If they didn't, they eventually ended up in jail. But that is not the case here. There are rules, yes, but they are viewed as suggestions not requirements, unless of course the random police officer decides to enforce them. All this to say, it is always wise to pray... always. So we spend much of our time praying. It feels completely normal to us now. The crazy swirl of piki drivers, noisy loudspeakers, guards with guns, a riot of colors, and languages from 120 different dialects all within this one wonderful country of Kenya, doubt prevails, so must prayers. For sure, i love this country and its people, but it keeps me ever on my toes, no scratch that, it keeps me on my knees.

So as we walked down the first aisle and i noticed her shrinking shoulders responding to the ever-watchful-eyes of everyone she met, i prayed.

I'm not trying to sound all holy and perfect when i say that i prayed. Please don't read it in that way. Instead, it was a prayer asking for protection, and an asking for her. I needed her to not do anything to harm anyone. But i could not ignore that she needed someone, anyone, please s-o-m-e-o-n-e pray for her.

If i believe my Abba Father is who He says He is (and i do), then more than anyone, i know the depth of her intense need for Him. Imagine it --- she does not know the One who made her, she knows nothing of His love for her, she eeks through her days dry on the inside because she has not one drop of living water flowing through her parched soul. It hurts to see her with those eyes.

But hey, why am i getting all prayerful and deep in the middle of the market ---- i'm there to buy onions, chicken, and yogurt right??

Still, i prayed, “Father God, you see her, you know her, help her please... and as for us, no harm is allowed to come near us in the Name of Jesus. I'm covered and cared for by the One who is above all things... no weapon formed against us will prosper... Father help her...”

As i said amen, she went straight and i turned right.

It was over ---- now, ..... where do they keep the creamer i like in my tea?...

Steve went one way, i went another. We Americans, we like to be efficient with our time. Our plan, we'd be in and out in less than 5 minutes.

But two minutes later as i headed towards the yogurt cooler, guess who was standing near the cheeses? Reaching for the yogurt, she spoke to me. She said, “Could i please speak to you?”

Within 2 seconds i had 10 solid emotions rush through me.

The afraid-woman should pretend i didn't hear her, ignore her, and walk away quickly.

But is that why i'm breathing...?

The defensive-woman should level her with a hard glance and ---- walk away.

But that's not who i am...

The unsure-woman would respond with trembling hands and her doubt would be smelled by all.

Nope.

But the woman who knows who she belongs to and why she is breathing again today, knows, buying yogurt isn't what matters. People matter.

So i paused for a breath prayer (i'm not kidding about praying allllll the tiiiiiimmmmmme).

Looked at her and said, “What did you say?”

“Could i please speak to you?”

“Certainly.” Lord, fill this space.

And i prepared myself for what i suspected she might want to say to me. Had she heard my words at the entrance speaking of how “scary it was”... had she known i was speaking of her clothing and how it covered everything but her hands and eyes? Was she about to confront me?

Lord, fill this space...

I stepped a bit closer, so i could understand her timid voice.

Lord, fill this space between us...

And she said, “I am the oldest of 7 children. We live with my grandmother. My parents both died in a car accident in 2008, my grandmother has cared for us since that time. She is now very old and very sick. Caring for the family has fallen to me, and i need a job please, i will do whatever is needed. I can cook, clean, it's only that i need a job.”

Lord, help me help her...

I shared with her briefly that we already have a dear lady who cares for our home so well, so no job was available. But i pressed ahead quickly to say, “The only thing i can do for you is pray for you, that God will make a way for a good job to come.”

By now, she was looking me in the eyes, and giving me the unspoken permission to look into her eyes. Much is said when eyes meet.

She responded and said, “Please do pray for me, since your God is my God, and he will hear your prayers.”

Lord, give me your words, your know what she really needs...

Ever so carefully, as gently as is ever possible, I said, “Thank you for letting me pray for you, but you must know, my God is Jehovah. And by the way you are dressed, shall i guess that your god is allah?” She nodded. “But still, may i pray to my God for you?”

And the look in her eyes...

if only words could match the depth...she knew she needed more than just a job... she knew...

She looked around cautiously and said, “Yes, please, perhaps He will hear you and help me.”

I asked her name, she softly gave it. I called her by name and said, “For sure my God will hear a prayer concerning you, for whether you know Him or not, He knows you and He loves you. So i will pray for you by name as i go, but may i pray for you right now so you can hear what i will ask on your behalf.”

And she visibly shrank.

Her eyes darted about as if enemies lurked in bushes near by (as if we weren't in the freezer section).

She said, “You mean here, you are asking to pray here?”

“Yes, you see my God is with me wherever i am. He never leaves me, He is everywhere and He always cares.”

Again... those eyes.

When all you can see of a person is their eyes, those eyes must be carefully looked into. There is no tilt of the lips that can be assessed, no shrugging of the shoulders can be seen, and no smirking face can be detected. Only the eyes can speak when words are measured and all else is hidden.

I called her by name again and said, “I will pray with my eyes open, and even looking at you, no one will know we are praying, only you and i and the God who is a Father.”

Her eyes watered, she shifted her face-cover, then ever-so-softly said, “p-l-e-a-s-e”.

And so in the frozen food section of a public market, i carried her name to the One who loves her. No veil can stop His great love-longing for her soul. We prayed, i spoke, she remained silent, and there was kindness in her trapped brown eyes.

Who was watching her? Was anyone watching her? Why was she so afraid? Yet, she had the courage to allow me to pray for her in public.

Fear. It is the enemy. Fear drives people to do horrendous things to other people all because they are afraid. They might think they are killing for other reasons, but i've grown to understand, even the terrorists are killing because of fear. They are afraid of their gods disapproval, they are afraid of what their comrads might think of them if they do not, they are afraid of being killed themselves. Two months ago we sat and talked long with two young men who grew up muslim, but converted to Christianity during their early twenties. Now they run for their lives as even their own family members search for them, to kill them, all in reverence to their god. These young men explained to us how you are trapped in that religion, and if you try and break free from it, you will suffer. One of them had been persecuted so harshly for his Christian beliefs, that when he refused to renounce Jesus, he was pushed from a four story high window. His stomach burst on impact, spilling his stomach and intestines out onto the ground. His last words to his attackers were, “You can not kill me even if you push me, Jesus will save me, or He will take me home, but you, you are not able to end me.” They pushed. He fell. He burst open. He lived. Those who pushed him... two have died since that time, the third is losing his mind and hides in his home, to afraid to be seen. Why? Because he saw Jesus save the life of the one he pushed.

They knew.

Jehovah is the One true God.

The lady in the market, who allowed me to pray for her, she too knows there is something more. She is trapped behind the veil... she carries an aching soul inside. A soul that Jehovah l-o-v-e-s.

My life rarely has space to read what social media conveys. I miss most of the whirl; the words, the rants, the trending fads, the accusations and declarations.

Still i know that often times harsh lines are drawn by some who hate this group or criticize that group.

But as for me, my Abba reminded me as i walked out of the market that day, “Don't be afraid, don't let the outside cause you to miss the inside that I see. Just be where I guide you to be, and speak what I guide you to say, and I WILL DO THE REST.”

We are not in this world to win. We are not here to argue a point and come out on top. We are not here to dominate and rule over others. We are not here to be afraid.

If we call Abba our Father ----- we are here to love Him and love others... and maybe we will grow in our ability to live out the truth that love actually covers over a multitude of sins --- love covers all --- love drives out fear ---- LOVE WINS. 

---- when you see the veil covering the face ---- pray for the soul it is trying to hide ----

When You Walk Into a Room

When you walk into a room, what happens? How does your arrival make others “feel”?

Are they intimidated? Happy? Anxious?

When we walk into a room, sometimes, no one notices. But more often than we realize, others will have a subtle emotion surge through them when we enter.

How we live beside them, how we respond to them, how we look at them begins to author the emotion they feel. Are we a calming influence? Do they feel rejected? Can they feel safe? Do we make them feel insecure?

Jesus showed us the importance of seeing others and responding to them in right ways.

When Jesus walked into a room, things changed.

And when He left this earth He said we would do all He had done --- and more.

So ----- i've been sitting with this question ---- what happens when i walk into a room? Do joy and peace arrive with me? Or do i bring anxiety and strife? Something more than just flesh and bones enters when we walk into a room.

Something more than used air will remain after we go.

If we asked 10 people closest to us to share one word describing how our presence makes them feel, what words would they use?

Wherever we go, we fill up that space with more than can be seen.

When we walk out of a room, we leave something behind. People feel better, worse, or untouched completely. Have we warmed hearts or chilled them?

It's the pre-cursor to the legacy we will leave when we die.

It's what Heaven's been whispering to me of late.

On a Monday we prayed again over my aching chest. The cough had first come four weeks earlier. Tears had dominated my night; fear is a mean bedfellow. Ugly thoughts like, “could this be the beginnings of a heart attack?”. Since i've never had one, how can i know how it would feel? I'm not typically a worrier, but this extended sickness had begun to win and i was losing the battle in my mind. After lots of prayer, and sorting out many details, my husband bought the ticket to fly me home the next day. It's the cheapest ticket we've ever bought between Kenya and home, what a relief.

Tuesday i boarded the plane.

Twenty-three hours later i landed in Atlanta.

People surrounded me. But my eyes searched only for my daughter.

Maggie walked into the room at the international arrivals in ATL --- and everything changed.

A sparkle of “home” arrived with her. Flowers in hand, she brought peace, calm, love, and the sense of you-are-not-alone. It all walked in the room with her. My chest still ached, but my heart breathed more easily ------

The next day found me sitting in a doctor's office. Friends had made the appointment for me, we'd spoken with them just minutes after booking my flight on Monday. I needed to see a doctor, they made the arrangements for me (thank you Gene and Jackie!). Seventy-two hours later found me in his office. I sat quietly on the high examination table, Jackie and i watched the door. The doctor would soon arrive; he would bring a knowledge of what was wrong with my chest and what needed to be done.

The doorknob turned, Dr. Momin walked in, a smile and a greeting, and i knew answers would soon come.

When the doctor walked into the room --- everything changed.

Before meds were even prescribed, my thoughts shifted and i felt better, just knowing someone was present who knew what to do. No more guessing, i could rest. It was only bronchitis and pleurisy ----- the words heart attack or lung disease never came. It's a tiring battle to keep believing the best when your mind runs rampant over less appealing possibilities.

When someone who could give an educated answer walked into the room --- there was no more space for battlegrounds in my mind.

Two days later i sat in a room proportionate to a castle hall. Called the “Great Room”, it a quiet space where students can retreat from the continuous activity of university life. My youngest son had said, “Mom, while you're home, come to class with me...”. He now attends my alma-mater. It's a beautiful campus in a small gold-mining town, hence the steeple on the oldest building is covered in gold found in the mines long ago. Between classes we walked pathways familiar to us both. I shared storied of the places his father and i had sat and talked during our dating days, before a wedding ring, before children. Under the same-same oak trees, walking the same-same pathways, my son now journeys where i once did, and we felt time shrink. As class called him away, i headed to the great room, he would meet me there after lectures were done.

It's a dark room with a stained glass window on one end, flags hanging high around two perimeter walls, and couches neatly placed in groupings. I chose my spot, slid off my sandals, curled up against the cushions and studied along with the other much-younger-students in the great room. They delved into books like physics and foreign language, poli-sci and calculus. I opened familiar pages of ancient history laced with endless love. My Bible, my greatest study, my home.

I read, journaled, read more, prayed. Mentally sitting right beside the hems of His robe, and wiped tears over the flood that comes. The hour flew by. Looking up from my studies, i saw him round the corner. Peter walked into the room, and everything changed. There came that smile on his face as he found me in the dark great room, that smile of recognition, that look that silently says, “There you are, i know you, i've been looking for you ----”. Familiar kindness, peace, calm – it all came into the room with him.

Days later, i sat in my parents beautiful mountain home. It's their weekend runaway, where the deer battle with my mother over her newly planted flowers and the trees wrestle with my dad over their leafy covering of his long mountain views. It's a place of silence and peace even with these playful wrestlings of nature. Mom and Dad know, the mountain owns itself really (the Deed in their hands means nothing to the mountain), and the trees and deer and bear see their lovely home as a well manicured playground. We'd laughed the night before as we stayed up late and talked. Early morning found me perched in the quaint sitting room off their breakfast area, holding leather-bound-home in my hands again and talking with the One. Everywhere can be home with Him. Finishing up my readings, i sat quiet. The morning sun was shaking the shoulders of the mountains as a mother does the shoulders of her children, “time to wake up”. Light leaked into the little room wrapped in windows. Then mom walked into the room, and familiar flooded in, dad was right behind her, and everything changed. Familiar faces with familiar voices ---- for over five decades. Familiar, safety, kindness, and i-miss-seeing-your-face walked in with them.

My short two week visit home was a flood of much-needed-moments with those dear to me--- walking into the room. And for those two weeks, i allowed myself the gift. Mentally, i wrapped each entry as if it were a literal present.

It was an unplanned trip. A last minute decision. Go home to see a doctor (chest pains pressed the decision), but also, and perhaps even more important, go home to see your children, your family, rest in quiet places with souls that your heart is aching to see.

Perhaps it wasn't pleurisy that pressed me home after all... no, it wasn't a heart attack... instead it was a heart in need.

My dear husband gave me this gift --- go spend Mother's day early with them. The time it will take to fly there and back will be about the same amount of hours you labored to bring them into this world.

What a thought.

As i flew back to Kenya, sitting alone surrounded by people, i revisited all the moments of familiar faces walking into the room.

Words are not able to share the heart sometimes.

It's perhaps one of the great griefs of releasing a loved one to the grave. The pain of knowing they will never walk into the room again. Living so far from home, i do think on such things. And it grows me. Others-centered thoughts, not self-centered ones.

Appreciating the fact that when someone walks into a room with us ------- it is a gift that will not be allowed always. This should not provoke sadness; this should provoke appreciation. SEE the soul that enters the room. Embrace the gift that has come near. And go a step further still --- ask ourselves to be truthful about what others might feel when we walk into their rooms.

In the blink of an eye, my visit was over. Good meds had begun defeating the chest pains and coughing. I'd rested near my children in my daughter and son-in-laws home. Getting to lay my head down under a roof that's also covering the heads of those i gave birth to --- well, that's better than ten Christmas mornings for me.

Waiting on airport tarmac, anticipating those wheels leaving home-soil again ----- those moments of seeing them “walk into the room” filled in the cracked pain of leaving them again.

Landing back in Kenya, i held that same leather-bound-home in my hands. And i purposed in my heart to appreciate who would be walking into the room here. My Steve. We who have been married for many years can all too often overlook the gift that should be seen when they walk into the room. Steve and i have been married for almost 34 years. That's over 12,000 days of walking in to each others rooms. Too many let it become common --- it should not be.

“Walking into the room” ------ it was a thought, a grouping of words that i'd been studying on for near two weeks.

How it felt when others walked into my room... how it might have felt for them when i walked into theirs.

Then two days after my return home to Kenya, i sat with a missionary friend as we prepared to lead worship on Sunday. She had chosen several songs for us to consider. Playing her guitar, we sang. Coming to a song i'd never heard before, she sang it alone, i closed my eyes and listened. She sang the words -------

“When You walk into the room --- everything changes...”

She did not know the journey i'd been on with those very words. I opened my eyes and reached for the song-sheet, as she continued to sing.

“When You walk into the room ----everything changes. Darkness starts tremble ----at the light that You bring.

When You walk into the room----- every heart starts burning --- and nothing matters more than just to sit here at Your feet ---- and worship You.”

When Maggie walked into the airport arrivals room – everything changed for me.

When the doctor walked into the examination room --- everything changed.

When Peter walked into the great room at university --- everything changed for me.

When my parents walked into the quiet-time room --- everything changed.

...there were countless other moments of special room arrivals, each of which is dear... and perhaps i appreciate them all the more because it is not often i get to see them walk into my rooms.

But when it came in a song ---

“When YOU walk into the room, everything changes --- darkness starts to tremble at the Light that You bring...”

Heaven whispered.

HE had been giving me glimpses of it – the importance of what happens when LOVE walks into a room.

Truth --- when we walk into each other's rooms, it matters. We bring something with us when we arrive. We bring joy or angst, peace or turmoil. And we actually get to choose. We should choose well what we allow to enter a room with us. It will matter --- more than we know.

Heart-healing can come when others walk into our room – when the doctor walks in – when my children, my sister, my parents, my husband walk in. Heart-healing.

But ----

SOUL-HEALING comes when HE walks into our rooms.

So ---- when the room is filled with too much pain, too much lonely, too much ache --- and we're longing for something to come and relieve the empty space around us.

Let's close our eyes and ask HIM to walk into the room.

When He walks into the room ----- everything changes.

We must not let the wild commotion and deep pains of life on planet earth keep us from remembering -----

what we REALLY NEED --- is for HIM --- to walk into the room ---

and when we walk into the rooms of other's lives, we need to carry Him with us.

And may we never forget --- some of the most unkind among us --- have never felt HIM walk into their aching rooms. May we carry HIM all the more steadfastly into their hollow spaces.

A Story of Faith

She stared ahead as bare feet skimmed over red dirt and she wondered, what will come of me. 

Her tattered blue and white school uniform hung from shoulders burdened with weights not meant for a child to carry. Around the curve on the trail her friends would be waiting, the path to school was more wisely traveled together. The journey would be quick; the schoolmaster would be harsh if they delayed.

In her thirteen years, hard lessons had come. She'd buried her father, then 3 blinks later, her mother. It might have been 3 years, but for her mind it was all a fast moving blur. Three children were left, Faith and two younger siblings. Left in the care of her mother's family, they were not abandoned. So why could she never seem to escape the sound of shoveled dirt landing on a hollow, wooden, casket? It was the last sound she heard before sleep came each night, and the first sound she heard before the rooster called each morning. Another year with bare feet gave her not a second thought, but the passing of endless days never uttering the words “momma” or “daddy”, that revealed a lack in her innermost heart no covering could protect, no words could sooth.

But today, fear had a white-knuckle grip on her stomach. Keeping morning ugi down was proving to be a monumental task as her feet padded down the path.

In Uganda there is a law that declares if anyone is caught molesting a child, then few questions will be asked, before they are thrown in jail.

Great in theory, this appears to lend weight in the direction of protecting children. But in reality, there are always clever ways deceitful people are able to circle 'round to the back door of something and find a crack.

The backdoor crack in this law goes something like this...

There are evil-minded people who “promote” their young daughters or nieces to lustful men. Warped men who look with perverted eyes, and plan with darkened hearts how they can take innocence. The “seller” may be a family member, looking to make a schilling as they “off the record” sell their own niece or daughter. However, there's a wicked catch. When the “client” arrives and begins taking what he has paid for, the “seller” secretively takes photos using their cell phone. With proof now in the photos of the violation of this Ugandan law, the “seller” eagerly threatens to call the police and prosecute the “offender”. The perpetrator begs for mercy, the negotiations of bribery begin, and the lost innocence of a devastated child is ignored. Not only has she been sold ---- she's been sold by those who should have been her protectors. The “agents” (usually family members) begin working their deal. “If you pay us $----, then no police..., if no, then we have proof...” More money exchanges hands. The child bleeds in more ways than can be seen.

It's not a trumped up story in a book or headlines on the evening news.

But instead, it is reality for too many little girls.

As she walks to school, struggling to ignore the hot breath of fear on her unprotected neck, she concentrates on holding breakfast down. More food will be long in coming, she needs to keep the ugi down.

Her mother's sister had come to care for her after her mother's death. Auntie Anne was kind and good, the children were safe in her care. But rumors were rumbling and auntie had cautioned little Faith. The family of her deceased father were plotting. Was her father rolling over in his grave? Did he know, his own family wanted to “sell” his daughter? Before that could happen they would have to take her from Auntie Anne, and that would not be an easy thing to do. The community had been alerted, the rumors were being used as a warning, “Protect little Faith, protect all the girls. Trouble is lurking.” So daily, little Faith walked with caution traveling between home and school. No one should walk alone, girls would walk together.

Faith knew she was in danger. But threats could not put schemers behind bars, and absence from school would only cause marks to decline on test day. She had to go, fear had to be beaten.

She released the long-held air from her lungs when she saw her friends waiting under the mishola tree; never even realizing she'd been holding her breath since leaving her auntie's hut. Little Faith kicked off fear as her friends smiled. Feeling safer with them beside her, shoulders shifted under her worn shirt, eyebrows rested above tired brown eyes.

Many miles away, Auntie Eve is praying. She knows the dangers young Faith is facing, and she knows her sister Anne is doing all she can to keep her safe. Eve laments again over the painful moments of seeing her sister's life slip away, leaving three orphans behind. But what can she do to help as this trouble appears on the horizon. She's in Kenya, Anne and Faith are in Uganda; a country spans between them. She prays.

Faith walks with purpose beside the familiar bare feet of her friends. Life is hard for each of them, but they are together. Strength in numbers.They smile at one another.

Laughing together over things little girls find funny, they are almost there.

But a car swerves off the road and rough hands grab at little girls like lion claws. It happens in a flash, but their minds see it all in slow motion.

There are screams.

Tears.

Joy hides in the bushes as fear snarls.

Before she knows it, her friends disappear and the car lurches wildly down the hole-pocked road.

And what can a thirteen year old little girl do in those moments?

Three friends stand alone, there had been four. As the car disappears, flying dust swallows up their friend. Faith has been taken. Looking at one another, no words come, only screams as they run wildly to school. The headmaster rushes to them listening carefully to their horrid tale. He calls Auntie Anne, she calls the police. They all know little Faith's every breath now hangs by a thread.

Anne in Uganda calls Eve in Kenya as police begin their search and Faith hears only the sounds in her head, of dirt being shoveled onto a hollow wooden lid. It's the first sound she had heard after her mother's face was covered, it's the dark sound that comes when she can not face this pain. Life goes numb.

The aunts know, prayer is the only thing they can do. Thoughts must not be allowed to careen them over the cliff, they must control their minds. Prayers, to the One who sees and knows and can save. Prayer is the only right response when life goes so wrong.

The aunt in Kenya is our own dear Eve. It is her niece who has been taken.

We've met little Faith once, when her mother passed away and we visited the family to show respect.

But now, in these dark days, when little Faith has been kidnapped by the family of her deceased father, Eve's grief became visibly evident. Her heart pained so deeply for her niece, her eyes rarely left the floor. After sharing with us all that was happening in Uganda, our home remained silent as we each went to separate rooms to pray to the only One who could save this stolen child.

We prayed together...

We prayed alone...

For 24 hours few words were shared as we each held to prayer and clung to hope. Internet was down. No emails for prayer could be sent. Prayers don't need internet. Nothing can separate us from the One who is over all things.

It would take the hand of God to rescue this child.

Nothing else could do it.

And i thought to myself ---- how many little girls are treated in these ways, and no cover of prayer reaches into the darkness for them. Oh God, the evilness of mankind, how grievous it is.

Idi Amin trampled over the very ground this little girl was now being consumed by. The soil of that land has soaked up much blood. But Lord, this innocent child, may we see Your hand move these mountains of evil and save her from the monsters who have taken her.

Twenty four hours passed. Prayers stuck in our throats, but tears kept them flowing. Pleading for the life of a child, it can freeze blood in veins.

But that evening, Eve called with the news.

Little Faith had been saved.

The police had surrounded the huts of the deceased father's family. Auntie Anne had been forceful, more demanding than most African women. Carrying witnesses who testified of the plotting family's threats to take the child, this aunt did not stay silent! She did what good people should do, she fought for what was right. “Evil prevails when good people are silent...”

Both aunts were doing all they could; one demanding police attention, the other calling out to God.

And a child was saved.

Worth repeating.

A child was saved.

So often we can get to words like those and we cheer and celebrate and say, “What a great story! How great to know they rescued her from certain horror...”

But when you live up close to the endless flow of the stories, you realize something that maybe can't be seen as easily from a distance.

The child's life is not finished, it's not over for the child. There is still very present danger as she walks the path to school the next day, week, year, decade.

Just because the first plan was foiled by an over-zealous auntie, doesn't mean the destroying evil will fold its hands and sit down. Oh no. We must step out of the mentality that everything is solved and the bad guy is defeated all within the one hour drama, and just in time for a commercial break.

For little Faith is still alive, still breathing, still falling asleep at night hearing the thud of dirt on wood as she ends another day wishing she could have said the words, “I love you mother”.

She's still a little girl with fears, and now she needs to stand stronger than ever before, because she knows what it feels like to be gripped by cruel hands and thrown into the back of a car. Her screams were ignored. She must work that horror back out of her mind. Faith still lives. Faith has more chapters to come. She still is a little girl in Africa, a little girl ------- in Africa -----

So what happened next in her story?

When the police found Faith, her father's family had locked in her a ramshackle shack behind their huts. Plots were being formed as to who they could bribe for the highest price. Perhaps they were planning to let the trauma of the kidnapping pass, or time to let the news of the kidnapping fade, or they might have been planning to send her to another area for the “sell”. Regardless of their reasons, their hesitation gave time for her rescue before she was molested. When the police found her tied in the shack, they untied her, carried her to a nearby safe place, and raided the family compound. But... as evil as the plots were --- no arrests were made. No one was locked up for traumatizing a little girl. No one could be convicted of what they hadn't done...yet. And after all, couldn't they simply say they wanted to visit with their niece and that is why they took her??

So loud words were shared, police intimidated, Faith was rescued, but no one suffered for what they had done. Only the child bore the wounds of it all.

Immediately both aunts began praying and trying to figure out what to do to keep Faith safe.

The fact that she had been saved, could only be celebrated a short time, for the clear presence of real danger was still lurking near. One foiled kidnapping only meant the ruthless family would now hire another to kidnap her again, this time carrying her far away from local eyes.

Eve and Anne, good aunties of Faith, prayed and talked and a plan came clear.

Anne would send little 13 year old Faith on a bus, from Uganda to Kenya, to the waiting arms of Eve. Anne could not travel with her, for she had 2 other children to care for, and travel costs would be too much for them all to travel together. Eve could not go to get her, for she too had 2 small children at home. Eve has four children of her own: one is 20 and out of the home working as a seamstress, another is 17 at boarding school, then twins a boy and girl, 9 years old living with her. Eve is a single mother, having been abandoned by her husband 9 years +9 months ago. The night he left her, he brutalized her terribly intending to end her life. She did not die. Instead, 9 months later she gave birth to twins.

Seven years after that nightmarish night, God moved us to Kenya, and as we asked a dear friend here to let us know if he knew of a good woman who needed a good job, Eve walked into our lives.

Can you see the hand of God at work?

We do.

Eve with her three youngest children - this pic was taken about 1 month before the events shared in this blog took place.

Auntie Eve knows what ruthless hands feel like. She's raising 4 children alone, and now she peacefully says, “It is for me to give little Faith a safe place to grow up. I can do this mom and dad, it's why i've been given a safe home. So she can have a safe place to grow.” Now, again, can you see the beauty of God at work?

We do.

Two days later, little Faith arrives on a bus.

On that same day, two dear friends arrive to visit us from America.

That evening, one of our friends hands us an envelope with $100 and a beautiful note of love and support. Sent from a young lady back home, she simply shared her desire to send the money to be used in whatever way we felt God guiding us.

That night ---- when the dust had settled from the whirl of the day ---- we prayed.

Thanking God for the safe arrival of Faith to Eve's home and our guests to ours.

Thanking God for saving Faith and for blessing Eve with a good home to welcome her into.

Thanking God that our children were safe and sound and had not been taken from us...

Thanking God for dear ones at home who support and love us and help us in countless ways.

And then ---- asking God, “Be sure and show us Lord, where you want your $100 spent...”

No sooner had “Amen” come out of my mouth, than i knew for sure. Like a wave on the ocean's shoreline, it rolls all around you, leaving you standing in the same spot, but you know you've been touched.

The money had been sent weeks before --- from America --- and it was for little Faith's needed school fees. The money had begun it's journey to us, even before she had been kidnapped. Her Abba knew what would be needed and where. That money has now paid for little Faith's school fees for one whole year. She sleeps peacefully tucked safe inside her Auntie Eve's little two room home, with cousins to play with and a good school with new friends.

These days, little Faith is found walking with her cousins to a nearby school, wearing a new school uniform and shiny, black leather shoes AND sparkling white socks. She smiles. She's a whole country away from those who plotted dark schemes.

She's safe.

She has a future ahead of her.

And the sound of dirt hitting hollow wood is beginning to fade away.

Instead she closes her eyes at night, to the sounds of giggles and prayers and love all around her --- and morning's light brings still more of the same.