(this picture is censored to make it PG 🙂
Category: Other Page 135 of 181
The events which transpired on this day almost 2000 years ago are the reason why I am willing to get on a plane on Wednesday and fly across the world to live in Africa.
I believe that Jesus Christ was a real, historical person whose real, historical events are recorded in the New Testament. He was not simply a spiritual leader, or a good man, or a wise sage. He claimed to be the Son of God, and I believe He was.
I believe that Jesus was killed by the Jews and the Romans, was buried, and came to life again three days later, on what we celebrate now as Easter Sunday.
Yep. I believe it is all historical fact. Many will think that puts me into the looney bin category. I understand that. And please don’t think that I haven’t wrestled and thought and researched and read just about everything I could get my hands on for this subject. This was not a blind decision or something I just “felt” was right. It came as a result of much mental turmoil. But I am truly convinced.
And that’s important. Because if Christ was not resurrected from the dead, I am wasting my life. If it was all just a fairy tale made up by delusional men, or only a “spiritual metaphor,” then there is absolutely no point to us tearing our children away from their grandparents, to leaving the comforts of home, to looking away from lucrative job opportunities, and giving our lives to people in Africa.
If Christ was not resurrected from the dead, I am an absolute fool. Please, don’t patronize me by thinking that I am just a “good person” who is going to do “good things.” If Jesus Christ never existed, or if He wasn’t who He said He was, or if He never died and rose again, I give you complete permission to call me a fool.
The apostle Paul himself wrote, If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.
Indeed.
But if it is true, then that changes everything. Right?
I stake my life on it.
He is risen; He is risen indeed!
And that is why I am getting on that plane.
Three seconds was all it took.
He found the pebble on my parents’ family room floor. He remembered that pebbles belong outside (or so we are guessing). And he hurled it at the sliding glass door.
And there you have it. Good thing you are cute, little boy!
Oh, and just for your interest, recent stats:
Height: 50th percentile
Weight: 0 percentile
Yep, that’s my boy.
tear (târ)
v. tore (tôr, tr), torn (tôrn, trn), tear·ing
1. To pull apart or into pieces by force; rend.
2. To separate forcefully; wrench
3. To divide or disrupt
That ache has started.
It’s familiar to me now, so it doesn’t catch me off guard. And I’ve gone through it enough times to know that it’s temporary; that once we get back to Tanzania and life resumes to normal, that I will feel okay again.
We leave two weeks from tomorrow. It’s that season of “lasts” right now. Last visits, last shopping trips, last Taco Bell runs, last times to the park. A season of limbo–that feeling of not belonging anywhere. It’s like standing on the precipice between two worlds. It’s stressful and anxious and I usually don’t sleep very well.
Worse: it’s the season of good-byes.
It feels like ripping a band-aid off of soft skin. Gil said to me last night, “I feel like we come here long enough to realize what we’re missing, and then we leave again.”
There’s just no way around it–it’s hard.
And though the good bye is not forever, now that we have children, it sort of feels that way. Because a year or two can go by in our lives, and not much changes. But a year or two goes by in the life of my children, and everything changes.
It’s loss, really. Not permanent loss, of course–not as tragic as that. But loss of memories. Family vacations and birthdays and Christmases that won’t be spent together. Knowing that even with internet and phone calls and cards, an ocean and two continents separate us. And when we come back, those years can’t be bought back. Loss.
Of course, I know all those things about why we’re going and God’s sovereignty and how He brings beauty from ashes. And I believe it. I do not grieve without hope.
But the sadness is there. It will remain a lump in my stomach for the next few weeks. It will get better again, I know that. But that doesn’t really lessen the pain right now.
How I long for that Day to come. That last Day, when there will no longer be any good byes.
