Category: Eternity Page 2 of 3

This American High

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On March 7, 2022

In Eternity, Fear, Living Like a Missionary in America

When I was a girl, my most prized possession was my sticker collection. Around age 10, Mom took me to a craft boutique, and I clearly remember the moment I laid my eyes on the most perfect sticker book ever: A photo album with a pink hand-sewn cover, hearts embroidered on top. 

My Gram snuck stickers into birthday cards. I peeled every sticker off A+ quizzes. “Trading stickers” was my favorite friend activity, and I relished carefully placing each sticker in that perfect album, gazing upon their colorful, sublime wonder over and over again.

I lay in bed, worrying about fires and thieves and tidal waves, and knew confidently what item I would save first: that sticker book.

A couple of weeks ago, my parents dug out my boxes of childhood treasures from the depths of their garage and brought them to my house. Lo and behold, there was my sticker book.

I look disdainfully at the object of my childhood adoration and see it for what it really is: a book of sticky paper, now browning around the edges. Thirty-five years offer a great deal of perspective.

Last week journalist Mindy Belz tweeted, “Pentecostal leader in Moldova writes of daughter and her family vacating their apartment and moving in with him so Ukrainian refugees can live in her place.”

Would I be willing to do that?

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Homesick

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On December 7, 2021

In Eternity, Leaving Tanzania, Re-Entry to America

I volunteer weekly at an after-school program for disadvantaged kids, and I went to the banquet that celebrated this ministry’s 20 year anniversary. 

We watched a video montage of how the ministry has expanded over the years. We listened to young people, now grown up, whose lives were changed because of the investment in them. 

It was a lovely evening. But when I got to my car afterwards, I wept. I enjoy being a part of this ministry, but the banquet reminded me that I am a newcomer; I know nothing of the history of two decades. And all I could think about was how I had left behind 20 years of history in Tanzania.

I did not anticipate the lostness that comes with starting life over again.

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Drinking From the Jug of Suffering: The Steadfast Faith of Sheshi Kaniki

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On November 2, 2021

In Eternity, Life in Tanzania

Sheshi Kaniki loved to dance. Anyone visiting God’s Tribe Church in Tanzania witnessed this pastor engaging in delighted exultation, full-body worship. Always in the front row, next to his wife Trudie, Sheshi danced in praise — that same joy then radiating through his preaching.

After a brain cancer diagnosis in May 2020, Sheshi soon lost the strength to dance. Despite this devastation, his story of personal sacrifice and submission to God’s sovereignty in suffering has challenged the church in Tanzania — and beyond. 

Sheshi was born in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, but his father’s job as a professor provided him an international life. He was one of those kids who gave his parents a run for their money, pushing boundaries, the life of any party. 

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Reflections on Losing My Mother-in-Law

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On September 22, 2021

In Eternity

On the evening my mother-in-law died, I drove to pick up Josiah from soccer practice, thinking about how there is no good way to tell a grandson that his grandmother is gone. 

The moon rose, a perfect crescent hung low in the clear sky. Under the expanse of the night, the boundary between earth and heaven felt blurry. She was Here, and then she was There, a moment later.

Eternity is not so far away as we think it is. It is right there, one breath away, as simple as pulling back a curtain.

The shock of losing a parent is kind of like the shock of aging. (Hey now, how can I possibly be turning 45? Only old people are 45.) You know it’s coming, but still, it takes you aback when it actually happens. Not everyone loses a child in their lifetime, but everyone will lose their parents. It’s “normal,” but that doesn’t make it any less astonishing.

A parent is a fixed mark in life. Lose one, and the earth shifts under you. Life gets divided into two segments: Before Mom, and After Mom. 

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Pulling Weeds While People Are Dying: How Do I Respond to the World’s Suffering?

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On August 19, 2021

In Eternity, Poverty

I pull out the weeds in my lawn and think about how absurd it is that I am pulling weeds while under the same sky, a young man tries to escape his country by hanging onto the wing of a plane.

I put Cheerios into my shopping cart, and jingling monotonously over the loudspeakers is Dance until the morning light/Forget about the worries on your mind/We can leave them all behind. Half a world away, a mother tries to thrust her baby to strangers and safety on the other side of barbed wire.

My daughter and her friend chatter in the backseat about a missed pass in volleyball and how Honors English is so much work. The same moment in time, a 15-year-old daughter of a pastor is pulled from her bed and forced into a marriage of terror, her father watching broken and helpless.

I read about the mountainous landfill in Ghana, filled with cast-off American clothing. Even the poor of Africa are overwhelmed by the influx of our discarded shirts and dresses. I contemplate the statement: “We’re buying 60 percent more clothes now than we did 15 years ago. But we’re keeping them for half as long.” Meanwhile, a few countries over, a doctor dashes around her city, foraging for any bit of cash she can coax from empty ATM machines. 

My house now has two refrigerators in it. Two. Because heaven forbid I go to the grocery store (which is five minutes away) more than once a week. But I justified this because practically everyone in America has more than one fridge and I bought the cheaper one and I buy used clothes and I pull my own weeds instead of paying someone. There’s a whine in my voice and a defensiveness on my face because I don’t want to admit how spoiled I am, despite what meager sacrifices I am making.

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