“If you have come to help me, then you’re wasting your time.
But if you have come because your liberty is bound up with mine, then walk with me.”
– Lillia Watson
I’ve been home from Uganda for almost 5 days now, and I have to be honest and say that I feel like some part of me is dying. I feel frustrated with myself…with the privilege that I have taken for granted… the excess I’ve allowed to feel normal to my existence…necessary even. I feel a little bit like I’m drowning in a pool that is full of my own depraved doing.
I’m frustrated with my kids…with the selfishness and entitlement that I know we have inadvertently cultivated. I’m frustrated with our society who stops maybe for a couple of hours a month (and that’s often even the generous ones) to do something for someone else. I’m frustrated that I’ve allowed it all to become normal and accepted in my life.
I’m frustrated that I’m as much a part of the problem as anyone else.
And if I’m being honest…I feel angry too. Angry because of hurts I’ve experienced. Angry at myself…my selfishness… my way of living so often. I feel so ugly when I take a tour around the inside of the heart that I’ve allowed to often rule my living. I wish the generosity of my heart that overflowed in Uganda found its way to the outside of my body as easily here… sadly, it doesn’t.
Part of me feels like it’d be easier to pick up and move across the globe… where my own selfishness is more readily met with an inability to satiate it with superficiality.
But here’s the thing… I don’t have the permission of the Lord to move to Africa, or Bangladesh, or whatever other 3rd world country he allows me to visit. I know that my calling is here…to figure out what it looks like to curiously follow Jesus into the things of His Kingdom and to invite whoever wants to read, to live, and to follow along with me. To figure out how to do it here…in the midst of excess and a cycle of much that threatens to suck us in and suck us dry. To take the wild lessons God teaches me in those places and make them real and daily here.
Another celebrity killed herself this week. The glamour of the outside can eat one alive on the inside. I don’t want to fall victim to the false satisfaction of this world instead of the true and full satisfaction of really knowing my Savior.
I don’t know what it looks like to work this all out here…on privileged American soil. I honestly don’t. And please don’t accuse me of being on some sort of post-mission trip high right now either. This frustration is the outpouring of a thing that has been brewing in me for awhile now. I don’t know how to do it…. to undo the patterns of this world that I’ve conformed to, that I’ve disappointingly taught my children to conform to. But I know that this undoing is the very thing that God is calling me into working out.
I confess that I have to stop being angry. I grab hard onto the Jesus-grace that has been poured out for my life and over it…and I need to extend it first to the people in my house…to continuously renew my mind on the things of my good and generous Father.
In realizing so much of this undoing that lies before me…of the freedom that I have yet to grasp… honestly…I am just un-done.
Walk with me? Journey to explore and open up the true liberty that is found not just on foreign soil, but in the heart of God for us? I don’t know what it looks like, but I’m going to figure it out.
Whoever is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he who rules his spirit than he who takes a city.
-Prov 16:32
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. – Rom 12:2
I will journey with you, friend. I feel the Lord talking to me about stepping outside of my comfortable American privilege as well. Seems like all of the books I’m reading, the posts I stumble across, the Word I dig into…it all points back to living Jesus right here, where I am, and being more intentional to not conform to this world’s way of living and loving. Thank you for letting us join you in Uganda and thank you for opening up so vulnerably back in your everyday life…because that’s where we’ve been all along- in every day life, and we could use a picture through your eyes- eyes that have been opened to something big. Thanks for sharing your mess with us–we need to see it, because we are a mess too! Xoxo
“Part of me feels like it’d be easier to pick up and move across the globe… where my own selfishness is more readily met with an inability to satiate it with superficiality.”
Oh so true! There is such joy when what is superfluous is stripped away and we have a taste of heaven. This living here, in the mundane, is maddening and empty. Praising God that you had this glimpse. Process, journal, plan, talk it out with your husband realizing this, this is all part of God’s grace to you. He led you on this journey, He will finish this good work He has begun. Jesus has not left you nor those children as orphans, He will come to you. (Jn 14:18)
I’m with you Logan. I’m not sure that the answer is depriving ourselves or our families of what God has blessed us with. We have been given much so that we can share, and teach, and love….in whatever ways we are able. I have been working on a reducing plan -not just simply to reduce what I have possession wise, but also to reduce what I expect. Life here is America is what it is – we are privileged to be able to provide for our families and enjoy life beyond just the basics of necessities. I think that we just continue to reach out exactly in the way that you do – and teach our children to do the same. Living in poverty doesn’t make you a good Christian – being thankful when you have, and when you don’t, and then using our experiences (both good and bad) to guide and help others is what we are asked to do. Even Jesus had followers that were rich by their standards, followers who continued to have so that they could share. There is no need to feel guilty for having. Just keep being who you are Logan, your broken heart will lead you to the work He calls you to do.
After a few “mission trip highs” of my own, I began to recognize that those first few weeks back home are a gift from God. The heightened awareness of and brokenness over the contrast between our “normal” lives and the lives we just left behind compels us to pray and search for ways to more fully engage God’s purposes. I pray he speaks to you as clearly during these next few weeks as he did during your time in Africa! I’ve soaked up your updates from this trip and plan to host a Sole Hope party soon – thanks so much for sharing openly!
Yes. Only when we become un-done can He put us back together in ways that magnify His name and further His kingdom. I have become un-done in some ways too. It is painful, but He is here. (((HUGS)))
Deb Weaver
I totally, TOTALLY understand and am RIGHT THERE with you!! And as much as I tried to hold on to what I learned in Ghana, it disappears in my American life. I don’t want to forget that the world doesn’t live like I live.
I’m with you. And I know your heart, this is not just a post-trip high. This is something much deeper. I want to walk with you in this.
Amen! Amen! Amen! I find myself regularly vacillating between excess and emptying, having to empty myself to allow more of God to be poured into me. Somehow the excess always finds its way back. It’s maddening sometimes, trying to live out Christ’s command for us to be in the world but not of the world. I need to go back and read David Platt’s book, Radical. He points out that “We were settling for a Christianity that revolves around catering to ourselves when the central message of Christianity is actually about abandoning ourselves”. The things of this world are becoming more and more intoxicating and if we don’t watch it we will be drunk by her seductive fragrance. I heard a story this week of a man whose brother died of a heart attack in his early 40’s. To many of his family, they thought he was a moocher because he was an attorney but he lived with his parents. After his death, his family discovered that he had given all of his earnings away to charity during his entire working life. Jesus, show us how to surrender ALL to you!
Undone is a word my husband and I use often and plan to have it tattooed on both of our arms. I’ll never forget my first time back after a 1/2 year family mission trip. I was in the cereal aisle at our local grocery store and couldn’t handle all the choices. Too many choices. There is a beauty in coming face to face with our reality and an even greater beauty in learning to live in the tension of where He’s put us and how to be faithful in that space. He carved out this place for you. He did it. He knows what’s best for you and your family, but the gift that’s been given is your heart getting a glimpse of just HOW BIG He really is. ..just how big our family really is…and may be repositioning you to see your place from just a different angle. It’s good friend. It’s really good.
This is just how I felt when I returned from my first trip from Haiti–at Christmas time. And the second. It’s not left. Angry and frustrated and even helpless.
Oh friend, I just got to read this. I am with you. I feel I have lived most of my life in a state of being undone. I’ve always known the reality of the third world and the contrast of our life here in America. When I went to Africa, I felt no culture shock, it felt more like being home. I feel more lost here in the states yet it’s like you said, God has not released me to go permanently. I’ve struggled against that for years, resisting being fully here. When I got back from Africa recently I went silent for two months on the blog. Just searching out how to live here and love here and still kindle the passion I feel for those oppressed by poverty. I don’t have all the answers. I’ve barely been able to write about Africa. It feels too close and tender still. But I’m with you, friend, in the questions and the seeking.
Yes! Yes! Yes! Please let me walk with you to try to figure this out. It’s a daily challenge to figure out how live this life. It affects every decision from passing the person with a cardboard sign to buying a bag of M&Ms for my little guy that I know isn’t Fair Trade to curtailing excess as much as possible. Such a bewildering ache that I just can’t seem to actualize on any given day. Let this be the first step of our long walk friend!
I’m with you Logan…