Month 2

Hello!

Quite a bit has happened in the last month. A brief overview to get you up to date (:

-One of our sweet boys went home to his mother!

-He came back less than a week later... Very frustrating.

-The Haven team (my home church) came which was so so so wonderful, and God was very close during that week. Praise Him!

An afternoon in Malealea

-I was invited to sing at a black tie event with a couple friends from church. It started 2 hours late, but was fun nonetheless.

-I attended my first wedding here in Lesotho! It was a bit nontraditional from what I understand (and goodness knows I didn't understand much) and it started 4 hours late, but we received some wonderful hospitality, got to watch some old American western's while we waited, and had the joy of celebrating with my housemother and her son.

My mama's big pig.

 -A sweet sweet little girl was reunited with her dad. That was hard and continues to be hard.

-We received a sibling set of twins and a baby who are all SO precious, as well as 2 other infants.

-We celebrated Easter with communion, bouncy houses, and a candy hunt! Funner than fun.

There is a lot that could be said about ALL those things, but I will let the brief update and the pictures suffice.

God is good all the time, regardless of my ability to see it. There are days when it seems undeniable, and others where it seems impossible. I have been on a hunt to learn what God says about Himself in the Word, and one thing I have learned is that my perception of His character does not change who He actually is. Feelings are fickle, He is unchanging. I am also learning that my definition of good is different than God's. We tend to think that good is the absence of bad. But what I'm seeing is that good is the nearness of God, the truth of His character, even if the bad remains.

An example from the prophets. Habakkuk is complaining to God about the injustices being done to Israel, and he asked God how long He will sit idly in the face of evil. God's response?
"Oh it will be worse than this. If I told you what is to come, you wouldn't even believe me."
Not what anyone wants to hear in the midst of suffering.
So Habakkuk says, "Aren't you God? Your holiness shouldn't allow this corruption towards your holy people. Where is your justice and how can you tolerate this? I'm waiting for you to do something."
After this, God is very clear... "I will act. It may seem to take a long time, but keep waiting because I will do it. I'm calling you to live by faith, not sight, not circumstance. Justice will be served to both you and your enemies as it is due." From there he describes all the things that will happen, He describes His might.
Finally Habakkuk understands the power of God and is put in his place. With trembling, he asks that God would be merciful in his wrath, for he remembers all the things God has done to nations in the past and knows God's judgement is to be feared. And then we see that his attitude has changed. Instead of entitlement and a self-centered worldview, Habakkuk resolves that he will still rejoice, not because of the "good" of his circumstances, for that certainly was not the case, but because of the character of God and the fact that God would see him through it, helping him to walk the difficult path.

"Though the fig tree does not bud
     and there are no grapes on the vines,
though the olive crop fails
     and the fields produce no food,
though there are no sheep in the pen
     and no cattle in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the Lord, 
     I will be joyful in God my Savior.
The Sovereign Lord is my strength;
     he makes my feet like the feet of a deer,
     he enables me to tread on the heights."

This goes against so much of what we think life ought to be. We think we shouldn't suffer, we think the hard times will pass. And often times they do, but it's possible that things will get worse. It's possible you will live 75 years of struggle. But friends, there is SO much good beyond that!! Like Paul says in Romans 8, these present sufferings are nothing worth comparing to the glory and the good that is to come. Our earthly lives are so short. If you think about it, the amount of your suffering is an ever decreasing percentage in light of eternity. We are incredibly near sighted when it comes to the junk in our lives. We have a hard time getting past the problems we have right now and forget that it is such a small portion of our existence. We have forever to live in perfect goodness.

So until then, are we able to say that even though life isn't as we would choose to have it, yet I will rejoice? Can we shift our understanding of good from "the absence of bad" to "the unchanging character of God"?

In this world we will have trouble, but there is a place being prepared for us where everything will be made new, where we will no longer hunger or thirst, where every tear will be wiped from our eyes, where we will have perfect fellowship with Him who, above all, is good, forever and ever, Amen!

Let this be our hope.