Transition period

It seems I'm not the only one waiting for rainy season to end. Becky exultantly hailed the appearance of a dragonfly today.

Copious and exuberant thunderstorms and plenteous dragonflies are the signs of the transition between rainy season and dry. We've been hearing a lot of thunder in the past few days, though we haven't experienced the "rain blowing into every window" thunderstorms I've been warned of just yet.

Comments

Living stones in the holy land

I met Jesus in Israel-Palestine a few years ago. I found him not in the rocky, desert ground he trod, nor in the ancient stones of the towns and cities he visited; not in the subterranean grotto in the Church of the Nativity, nor in the mammoth Church of the Holy Sepulchre, encompassing the traditional site of his death and resurrection. No, I met him in the lives of Palestinians who incarnate his spirit, in humble, passionate people who are convinced that love is the only way. I met Jesus in people who spoke like this: “We need to be soaked in the love of Christ. Love is not a hug and a kiss. Love is to seek the life of the other that the cost of one’s own.” --Labib Madanat, coordinator of the Palestinian and Israeli Bible Societies “Love is not an opportunity to overlook justice. Love is an opportunity to pursue justice…. [But] we want to resist any form of evil with the heart and mind of Jesus Christ.… There is no love without justice. And there is no true justice without lov...

Community, continued

I had some more thoughts on community last night but it was getting kind of long, so I saved them for today! (In other news, for those of you less interested in my ramblings -- I got some of my shots today and now my arm is irritatingly sore from, hmmm, I think it's the Typhoid.) There's lots of talk these days about the importance of family. Conservative Christians in particular get really caught up in family -- family values, family friendly, family time -- are buzzwords you hear bandied about. Yes, family is important, and God does delight in family, but not for family's sake, but as a model of community. Unconditional love and acceptance. Time. Support, both emotional and material. Accountability. These are qualities we associate with "good" families. They are the qualities which make good community. I believe this is what God calls us to be; this is why He put us in families, and why we are taught to place value on families -- because they are a metaphor for...

The responsibility of those who go

I just had a meeting with my support group/sending team from my church tonight and again I'm blown away. I can't believe how intentional and involved they are. I'm only going away for 10 months; it doesn't seem like such a huge deal to me but they are so excited for me, so encouraging, so eager to be of help, and so full of wisdom. A significant portion of my church are former missionaries, a number of them to places in Africa, so there's a good deal of experience backing up their words, and I'm sure their input will be invaluable when I return and am all messed up and unable to cope with Canadian life. Actually, everyone I've told about my plans seems to be really excited for me. When I think about it like that, I realize I have a responsibility to those people. One thing I've always struggled with in regards to shorter term cross-cultural missions is that by the time you've worked through all the cultural, practical, linguistic, and logistic issues...

kar0ling

Read more posts by subject (label)

Search This Blog