"Day-du"

Hello, All!

First off, have I ever said “thank you”? No? Well then, "thank you"! (Or as my little sister says, "day-du! oh, day-du!"). Thank you for taking time out of your busy life to read this. Hmmm, speaking of thanks, as it is nearing that wonderful, fallish season of family, friends, and FOOD =), let me just say, “Happy Thanksgiving”! We have so much to praise the Lord for! The past couple weeks have been ones of reminiscing for me lately. I was thinking back to last year and where I was…where were you a year ago?

Well, about this time last November, I had just finished finding a recipe for baking a perfect pumpkin pie (lo and behold the one on the Safeway can). Work was about to get crazier as all department stores pull out the décor and turn up the Christmas music for Black Friday and guard themselves against the massive, mad, mayhem of consumerism. The aspens had turned over and the weather was pleasantly cooler in comparison to a smokin’ summer. I was with my family at my parents’ house, probably talking with my grandma, laughing with my aunt, and chasing my sister for stealing my dessert. That was what I remember of last season…

This year, things are a little different: I’m not employed! Hooray! Haha, it’s actually a relief. (Those of you who have been or are in the corporate world will understand the lack of pressure.) Besides living on a tight budget until the spring, I am having to come to terms with a hot November…because this is southern India. There is no “Fall Season”, no Thanksgiving, and hence no snow or pumpkin pie. And for me, there is no family, no friends (excluding you, Rach), and no comfort foods (well, I consider rice MY comfort food, but to the rest of the world it’s just a staple). 

It is strange to be in a country where there the predominant religions are Hinduism and Islam. Very sporadically there is a Catholic influence out of a hand-me-down mentality. So many devote themselves to pray to figures of what they call “life”, or “hope”, or “prosperity”…but there is only emptiness met with a greater void. If they only knew what “life” really was, what “hope” looked like, or what “prosperity” means to the everlasting. But they know not what these blessings are. And worse yet, they know not even the One who is able to bless. So, there is no thanks to be given.

And after an insufferable existence, disappointment, and poverty with tinges of hunger and leprosy, why would they even know how to comprehend a blessing? The injustice of female infanticide continues to grow because on a practical level, girls are expensive: another mouth to feed, a significant dowry payment to have her married, society’s cultural demands, etc.  Beggars are beggars because it is the only life they know of and it was the only life their parents knew. And now there are parts of the world that have been lowered into a class of being a “fourth world” country. 

Living expenses in the state of Tamil Nadu have over the weekend, doubled. Everything from cabbage to bus fares to petrol has all been doubled. It is expensive to live and for those who already struggle to exist, the cost is now even higher. Please pray that this center in Coimbatore as well as the other Impact centers would continue to live in the faith of the love of a risen Lord, One who blesses, One who cares. May the children who were once rag-pickers and beggars, the preachers and students who were once Godless, (and the two American girls who were once orphans) be epicenters for love and thanksgiving like the Tenth Leper (Luke 17).

“Happy Thanksgiving” to you all! I am so thankful for YOU.

-S

::lonely, narrow road::

“When it comes to suffering, it is part of our Christian culture to want to know God’s purpose beforehand. In the history of the Christian church, the tendency has been to avoid being identified with the sufferings of Jesus Christ. People have sought to carry out God’s orders through a shortcut of their own. God’s way is always the way of suffering—the way of the “long road home.”  -O. Chambers

I recently made the personal statement that I want to be the kind of friend that Jesus is. I soon had the quick afterthought of what His friendship with me looks like. “Being with Him” means BEING with Him. Being WITH Him. Being with HIM. Jesus struggled. He suffered. And He was lonely. But most importantly, He trusted His Father with the consequences of His obedience, even to the point of being misunderstood, resented, and eventually crucified. 

Peter writes, “Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal among you, which comes upon you for your testing, as though some strange thing were happening to you; but to the degree that you share the sufferings of Christ, keep on rejoicing; so that also at the revelation of His glory, you may rejoice with exultation” (1 Peter 4:12-13 with italics added). 

The Greek word Peter uses here in this passage is “pathema”, pain or hardship undergone, affliction. It is a derivative of the word “pathos”, meaning passion. In essence, Peter is saying, “share the passions of Christ”. Peter did not say to merely share the same interests, but share the same heart, the same brokenness, the same desperation and need for the Father, the same self-sacrifice.

To be with Christ, to identify our very selves with Him is to share His passions; it is to be a part of Himself, to share in His likeness, and His glory by His grace. 

Knowing His purpose is secondary to knowing His passions…when I identify with His heart, I am broken for the same things, I am desperate for the Father, knowing I am nothing without Him. I am willing to struggle. To suffer. To be lonely. To trust the Father with the consequences of my obedience. Even to the point of being misunderstood, resented, and unto death. 

To be a stranger to suffering is to not know Him. To take a short cut for the sake of avoiding pain is to never know His comfort. To find another way is to disregard “the Way”. And when He has gone before me, why should I not follow? And He Himself IS the Way! And still better yet, I am not alone, for the Father has, at the request of Christ, sent me His “Helper” to be with me always…