Learning to lean into the opportunities for humility
In childhood Sunday School classes, we sang “Humble Thyself in the Sight of the Lord” in a perfect two-part round that sent chills down my spine, but I don’t ever remember any teacher ever teaching on humility. The Fruit of the Spirit, yes. Being loving, courageous, evangelistic – check, check, check.
Humility was a sort of mystery to me. You could achieve it by being Not Proud, but that was just as nebulous and abstract. So I just don’t brag about myself? Doesn’t sound too hard. I vaguely remember absorbing the concept that If you are humble, you won’t know that you are. Not exactly a measurable life goal.
So I find it fascinating that there seems to be a growing awareness in our culture – and not just among Christians – that humility is a valuable virtue. I recently read Tempered Resilience, which emphasized the necessity of humility in leadership. Then I read The Ideal Team Player, which emphasized (you guessed it!) humility in being the (you guessed it!) ideal team player. And super-popular speaker Brene Brown talks about it all the time.
It seems that I’m not the only one waking up to the significance of humility.
This book is a gift to adoptive parents. Certainly, launching children into the adult world isn’t easy on any parent, but adoption brings unique challenges to this stage of life. Leveling Up is written by two adoptive moms (whose children gave their blessing to the book) and is full of practical advice and personal stories. Strengthening your relationship with your kids is the top priority, and because of that, this book is full of hope. It was a wonderful encouragement to me.
This delightful book for kids is entertaining and thought-provoking for adults too! It’s an animal story, but these animals are quite philosophical, and Eggers is brilliantly talented in giving them a voice. Few books have made me literally laugh out loud…but this one did. I read it myself and am now reading it to Johnny, who is thirteen. Great for all ages – note it does have an interesting spiritual component that could provoke some good discussions with older kids.
I read this one with my work team, since our job is to bring new missionaries into ReachGlobal. Lencioni identified three virtues–humble, hungry, and smart–that every great team member must possess. His insight is super valuable, but I especially enjoyed that he wrote this book as a novel, making it a quick and engaging read.
Whoa–this was fascinating. Wilson documents key events in 1776 that transformed our world forever. This is one of those books that actually changed the way I think, because it caused me to consider world events, moral standards, and worldviews through the lens of how the world metamorphosed in such a short period of time, less than 300 years ago.
This novel has it all – brilliant writing, engaging characters, unique plot, satisfying ending. Though it takes place during a dark time in Russian history, Towles’s ability to write in a light-hearted, captivating way means that the story doesn’t feel despairing. It’s redemptive, fun, educational, and clean (although a bit of innuendo).
Movies:
Lars and the Real Girl This is one of those movies that has a weird premise, but stick with it and find yourself surprisingly moved. At its heart, it’s about a community loving a broken young man into wholeness. Kids will be bored by it, teenagers will think it’s too weird, but young adults (or actual adults) who give it a chance may love it – as I did.
The Evangelical Orphan Movement Grows Up by Jedd Medefind Christianity Today may give you a paywall for this one, so I hope you can read it. Those of you who have read my blog for many years know that I started out naively supporting this movement until I saw the dark side for myself. I loved this summary of how the orphan movement started and where it is today, because it reflects my journey as well.
Parenting the Stranger in My House by Wendy Kiyomi I read this one a couple of years ago and recently came upon it again. It’s one of the best, most beautiful, most helpful things on adoption that I’ve encountered. If you have adopted children or love someone who has, please read this.
“Considering adoption through the lens of hospitality anticipates a real encounter with suffering and offers a means of accounting for it. The primary movement of adoption is not away from brokenness but toward it; adoptive parents give it room at the very heart of their homes. Practitioners of biblical hospitality expect to suffer because they continually lay their lives down “in little pieces and small acts of sacrificial love and service,” writes Pohl. This costly calling is compassion, literally “co-suffering,” in which parents begin to bear not only their children’s old pain but also the pain that results from a new configuration of vulnerable, fallen individuals.”
The Prosperity Gospel We Sometimes All Believe In by Tim Challies “There is a version of the prosperity gospel that we can all believe in and it goes something like this: “God, I gave my life to you, and in exchange I expect you to make my life easy. I may not need riches or opulence, perfect health or abundant wealth, but I would like ease. And if you take that ease from me, I may just assume that your feelings for me have altered or your love for me has waned. I may even regret following you. Please, just keep my life easy.”
I love gardening, and a friend asked me what kinds of things she should plant at her new house.
“It depends on how much time you want to devote to a garden,” I told her. “I love my flowers, but they are a lot of work. If you don’t enjoy the process, it won’t happen.”
And I listened to myself say these words and contemplated how that’s true about a lot of things.
I’ve been asked several times for advice about starting a blog. “Don’t bother if you don’t love writing,” I tell them. This doesn’t mean that writing isn’t a discipline. There are plenty of times that I have to pick myself up by the scruff of the neck and force my fingers to start moving. But I want to write. I am motivated to do it. So I find the time.
We can complain that there’s never enough time, but the truth is that we find time for what is most important to us.
As a mom, do I have a control problem? Maybe. Do I have a responsibility problem? Definitely.
I’ve taken the StrengthsFinders assessment twice in the past twenty years; both times, responsibility was way up near the top. If I agree to do something, I will do it, and I will do it well, so help me God – or lose my sanity, my sleep, or my good sense in the attempt.
Raising teenagers makes me lose all of the above.
I tried so hard to do All the Good Parenting Things. I made them drink Kiefer, read countless books with them, prayed and played, showed and shared. I taught them to come when I called; I re-learned pre-algebra twice; I put limits on their screen time. I take my job so seriously. I am the Responsiblest Mom of them all.
And now I have four teenagers, with adulthood lurking around every corner, and I feel the desperate urgency looming over me that my time left with them is short. So Gil and I made an Adulting List that they must check off, and we are teaching them to drive, interview, clean, and budget. As they begin to make their own choices, I warn and cajole, nudge and prod.
Today, March 25th, is five years since I left Tanzania. Tomorrow will be five years since I’ve been back in the States.
A few weeks ago, I took our dog Mzungu out for a walk at night because it rained all day and when it is raining, he refuses to go outside to do his business unless he is on a leash on a walk. I didn’t want to bother with both the leash and an umbrella, so I figured we’d be quick and I wouldn’t get too wet.
We had an incredibly dry winter in Southern California. It had been months and months since it really rained here, so my senses soaked in the rain just like the thirsty earth. The dog did what he needed to do, but I found myself still walking.
The dark streets were empty and the windows glowed warm, and the rain dripped off my hair into my eyes and seeped through my jacket, but I kept walking.
And I walked and I remembered. I wasn’t thinking at all about Africa, and then suddenly I was. Rain, in my memories, is synonymous with Africa.
I remembered walking home from school in Liberia when the dusty red roads would turn into muddy red rivers and my flip-flops would splatter red on the backs of my legs. Thunder would roar around me and lightning would crack onto the ocean and I would twirl and dance in the warmth and power engulfing me.
I remembered my children in Tanzania, shoving on their rainboots and charging outside, returning sopping and breathless and pleading for hot chocolate (though it couldn’t possibly have been under 80 degrees).
Some months it rained so often that I told teachers to send their kids out for recess in the rain unless it was pouring, and I remembered their plastered hair and shining faces, piles of shoes outside each classroom.
I rarely bothered with an umbrella in Africa. The rain was either too light and I knew I would dry off quickly, or it was too strong and an umbrella would be useless anyway.
Sleeping to the sound of rain on a tin roof. Wet feet in sandals. Dark skies, temperamental ocean waves. Crystals dripping off hibiscus petals.
And now it’s been five years. It’s strange how for so many years I couldn’t see the end to living in Africa, and now all of a sudden, it’s been five years since I left.
So as I walked and remembered, the wetness from my eyes mingled with the wetness from the sky. I miss Africa. Yet the memories are latent now. They don’t sit on my chest and keep me from breathing. It feels like a long time ago, and that makes me sad. I don’t think of it every day anymore, and that makes me sad.
I was talking to a friend who returned from serving overseas a couple of years after I did. She was fresh in the grief of leaving the place she loved, and I assured her that it would eventually be okay – things would get better. She asked me: Did it really get better, or did you just get used to it?
I’ve thought about that question for a long while. Because those losses I felt so acutely at the beginning – the loss of community, the loss of a life that overflowed with meaning and purpose, curiosity and discovery – those things have not been replaced. I have grown content with dimmer substitutes instead. I’ve just gotten used to it.
Of course, nostalgia has a way of bringing to the surface only the sweetness while the bitter seems fuzzy. Part of the reason that African rain was so sweet was because the heat was so oppressive. Driving and sleeping and cooking and communicating are infinitely easier in America. I love that my house has no bugs in it. I love being able to walk my neighborhood at night and feel safe.
Yet even in these perks, there is a sense of loss. Being challenged daily, realizing I could do more and be more than I originally thought I was capable of, seeing tangible results of sanctification in my heart – those African inconveniences turned out to be quite convenient indeed.
Perhaps this is why, even after five years back in my passport country, I still often feel like I am floating on the outside of things. I hover here – my body planted firmly in one country, my soul forever existing in divided loyalty. Yet it’s worth it. I wouldn’t change it for anything.
