Grace is Eleven

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On January 17, 2017

In Other

Since Grace is my oldest, I always break new parenting ground with her.  So she is my first to start transforming from my child into her own person before my eyes.

I took her errand shopping this weekend, and I was reminding her how much of a trial it was to take her shopping when she was little….how she would constantly push the mini-cart into my heels every five seconds.  I told her that story to contrast how much I genuinely enjoy her company now; how much fun it is to go shopping with her.

Grace is still a girl, of course, and will be for a while, but I am getting more and more glimpses of who she will become.  And it’s pure pleasure, because anyone who has met Grace knows that she is delightful–friendly, happy, always encouraging, always including.  She wants to be a teacher or a social worker when she grows up.  It is such a privilege to be her mom, and to watch her becoming my friend.  She already teaches me so much about what it means to love others well, because I will wholeheartedly admit that she is better at it than me.

Grace wanted a “whole-class” party this year, which meant I insisted it be held at HOPAC after school, since my living room and my nerves cannot handle 24 fifth graders in party mode.

So Dad planned a “nerf gun” party, which was enthusiastically adored by all who attended.  Kids regularly tell us, “That was the most fun birthday party I’ve ever been to!” after one of Gil’s parties. This one might have been the most epic of them all.

Ten Years Ago Today, This Blog Was Born

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On January 13, 2017

In Other

Today, January 13, 2017, is exactly 10 years from when I started this blog.  Here are the two posts I wrote on January 13, 2007.

I know.  You are impressed.  I started with a bang.  If you look at the time stamps, it actually took me ten minutes to write those two posts.  

I have been blogging now for a quarter of my life.  I had just turned 30 when I started, Grace had been home for a little over two months, and we had lived in Tanzania for only three years.  A lot has changed in ten years.  

I think I had an audience of maybe….200 people?…for the first several years.  I was okay with that, as I saw this blog as primary a place to communicate with our supporters and friends.  But as the years went on, I remembered how much I loved to write.  I was an avid journal writer in my younger years, and those kind of thoughts starting flowing out onto this screen.  

The post that changed it all was this one from four years ago:

The rest is here.  It was a response to the Sandy Hook school shooting.  It was the first time I wrote something that I really wanted people to read, so it was the first post I ever shared to Facebook.  My former college professor, Dr. Adams, shared it with Tim Challies, one of the biggest Christian bloggers out there, who shared the link on his blog.  Suddenly I was getting thousands of hits from around the world.  And suddenly, I had an audience.

I’ve now grown to about 30,000 hits a month.  That is still very small potatoes in the blogging world, but hey–I have an audience, and that is significant to me.  Other writing opportunities have come my way, especially this year, when I started writing monthly for A Life Overseas.  And perhaps most exciting was when a magazine bought this article to print in their magazine last October.  I got published for the first time!


Earlier this year I did a lot of thinking of whether I wanted (or God wanted) to take my writing to the next level–whatever that might be.  Like, for example, buying my own web domain and taking advertisers, that kind of thing.  Or submitting articles for other publications.  In the end, I decided, Nah.  For now, that’s not what I want.  If my audience grows, then great.  If it doesn’t, that’s fine.  I like being able to write without pressure; I like being able to post pictures of mundane things and my kids’ activities and not feel like I have to keep my numbers up.  Because honestly?  This is the main reason I blog:

Every year I take my posts and turn them into a book.  It’s like having a combination of a scrapbook and journal, and I hope that one day my kids will read them and know their mom’s heart.  So really, if no one else reads what I write, it’s worth it to me if it will one day be important to my kids.  

That’s not to say that I don’t appreciate you–my readers.  I am incredibly grateful for you.  I love when you share my posts, or interact with them.  My favorite is when you email me to say that something resonated with you.  You spur me on to keep going and become a better writer.  

Blogging is one of the ways that the internet has changed the world for so many people.  Now anyone can be a photographer, or sell their handmade products to the entire country, or be a writer and find an audience.  It’s a tremendous opportunity.  


To commemorate the occasion, here are some of my favorite or significant posts from over the last ten years:

Little Grace:  That time my two-year-old got stuck in the house by herself, or that time when she sang Amazing Grace in front of the whole school or she was just really, really cute.  

Bringing home Josiah:  The Sadand The Hopeand The Joy.  How this boy made me smitten and how his visa caused us much grief.  

On infertility.

My first post on the topic of poverty (which became many, manymore).

That time when everything flooded.  

The story of Gil and Amy (how we ended up in Tanzania is mixed in there too)

Meeting Lily and waiting for Lily and waitingsome more and finally bringing her home and that hard transition.

Struggling with electricity problems (I wrote a LOTof posts about this!), struggling with the lack of permanency in my life, struggling with the death of my friend’s baby, struggling with fearand safety. 

Our transition away from HOPAC and Gil’s legacythere.  

Moving back to the States for a year, and reflections from a week in culture shock.  

The miracle of Apartment #14.

Cultural Schizophrenia.

Re-thinking short-term missions.

Why I believe something as astonishing as the Resurrection.

What I love about America and what I don’t miss.  

After This, American Bridal Showers Will Always Be Boring.

Tanzanian worldview:  Evil Spirits and Electricity Problems, Witchdoctors and Football, Murdering Albinos, The Witchdoctor’s Goats.

Finally, finally, bringing Johnny home.  

The Great Battle of 2016 for Dar es Salaam (and the Soul of Amy Medina)

God Doesn’t Owe Me the American Dream

If I had to choose my all-time favorites, I think they would be When I Am Not Sane and Anarchy is Loosed Upon the World.

Thank you for reading and for being a part of my story!

Slavery and the Inequality We Continue to Ignore

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On January 8, 2017

In Race and Diversity

It was eerie, really.  I was reading about William Wilberforce’s fight to end the British slave trade, and I just couldn’t help but think that the language sounded exactly like today’s fight to end abortion.

Wilberforce was a politician who fought hard for almost 20 years in the British parliament to end the slave trade.  His primary argument was in proving the humanity of slaves.  And he based that argument on biblical principles.

This ticked off a lot of people.  “One of [abolition’s] most dedicated opponents, Lord Melbourne, was outraged that Wilberforce dared inflict his Christian values about slavery and human equality on British society.  ‘Things have come to a pretty pass,’ he famously thundered, ‘when one should permit one’s religion to invade public life.'”

Hmmm.  Sounds familiar.

Wilberforce was certain that proving the equality of every kind of human life would ensure the abolition of slaves.  In one impassioned speech he proclaimed, “I have already gained for the wretched Africans the recognition of their claim to the rank of human beings, and I doubt not but the Parliament of Great Britain will no longer withhold from them the rights of human nature!”  But the fight was still years away from being won.

Even non-religious doctors and scientists will readily admit that an unborn child is a human life.  It’s just not a person with equal rights.  However, this assertion is not based on any kind of science, because no one can agree on when a fetus becomes a person other than when that fetus suddenly becomes wanted.

Think about it:  The egg is not a human life.  The sperm is not a human life.  But when the two form an embryo, suddenly:  Human Life.  In fact, that Human Life can be formed in a test tube, frozen for a couple of years, and then placed in the womb of a non-biologically related woman, and yet what will happen to that embryo?  In nine months it turns into a child.  So if that embryo is not a Human Life, then what is?  

Sometimes people accuse Christians of caring only about eliminating abortion, but not caring about the people those babies grow up to be.  Of fixating on abortion and ignoring poverty, slavery, abuse, racism, and other forms of inequality.  It’s a valid accusation, no doubt.  Christians need to get their act together about other social injustice issues.

However–and this is a big however–I want to make the point that caring about social justice issues, but justifying abortion–well, that’s an enormous contradiction.  Because if social justice is all about caring for the voiceless and the powerless….then how is it possible to ignore those human beings who are the most voiceless and powerless?

Either all people have value, or they don’t.

Either all people are equal, or they’re not.

It shouldn’t matter what they have to contribute to society, or how poor they are, or how disabled they are, how dependent they are, or how much of an inconvenience they are.

You can’t pick and choose.

In Wilberforce’s day, there was no general agreement about the equality of human beings. In fact, Wilberforce himself had a enormous part in helping western society come to that conclusion.  We owe a lot to him.  If it’s a no-brainer that slavery is wrong, that has a lot to do with Wilberforce.  Yet much of our society is unwilling to consider how the exact same arguments apply to abortion.

Last week, WORLD magazine reported, “The Select Investigative Panel on Infant Lives released its final report today, calling for an overhaul to the abortion and fetal procurement industries, including defunding Planned Parenthood and a federal 20-week abortion ban.”

In the early 1800’s, Wilberforce pleaded, “Sir, the nature and the circumstances of this Trade are now laid open to us.  We can no longer plead ignorance, we cannot evade it, it is not an object placed before us, we cannot pass it.  We may spurn it, we may kick it out of the way, but we cannot turnaside so as to avoid seeing it.  For it is brought now so directly before our eyes that this House must decide, and must justify to all the world, and to their own consciences…the principles of their decision.  Let not Parliament be the only body that is insensible to national justice.”  (Amazing Grace: William Wilberforce and the Heroic Campaign to End Slavery by Eric Metaxas)

Medina Life, November and December 2016

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On January 7, 2017

In Other

Pamoja Week at HOPAC (like Spirit Week).  The Tanners were staying with us this week, so that Caleb and Imani could join in the fun as well.  This was Superhero day.  We’ve got Superman (Johnny), Usain Bolt (Caleb), Batman (Josiah), Spiderman (Lily), Go Go Tomago (Grace), and  Honey Lemon (Imani). All costumes courtesy of Gil Medina!
Grace, Josiah, Imani, and Lily on Nerd Day.  We had to show them an episode of “Family Matters” so they would know what a nerd is.   
Pamoja Week House Soccer Competitions.  Josiah scored and won it for Green House!
International Day–Our little confusedpsuedo-American/Tanzanian kids.  
Lily and Imani
Josiah and his buddy Tim…who is a confused Zimbabwean/Tanzanian/South African.
Gil agreed to coach the HOPAC varsity girls’ soccer team temporarily….which turned into the whole season.  But of course, he loved it, and took his girls to an almost flawless season.  They won two out of three tournaments, and the last tournament they lost only in penalties.  
Josiah took one term of after-school Tae Kwon Do. He decided that was enough; he’ll stick with soccer.  
Our Egyptian Princess on second grade Egyptian Day.  Costume (again) courtesy of Gil Medina.
I taught an after-school baking class for fifth grade girls.  Crazy, crazy fun.  
HOPAC’s Annual Christmas production
…and Grace had her first solo!
Bibi and Babu came to visit for two weeks!
We spent a couple of days in Bagamoyo with Bibi and Babu.  
Our Annual Christmas party with our Reach Global team.

Gingerbread house decorating

Christmas morning

In his retirement, my dad learned how to make stained glass windows.  Oh my gosh.

Meet Melody, the newest member of our family.
As per tradition, we spent the week after Christmas at a lodge in the mountains with mission friends, where the temperature went down into the 60’s.  It was glorious.  

How Do I Make Goals for 2017 When I Know I Can’t Meet Them?

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On January 5, 2017

In Other


Missionaries are experts in high expectations. 

I mean, who else has a job like this?  Most of us went through a stringent interview process just to get here.  Pages of applications, hours of interviews, weeks of training, our references were asked for more references.  We are held up as examples of godliness.  We have high expectations of the kind of people we will be.

And then, once we are accepted, our pictures are placed in the foyers of churches and on family refrigerators all over the country.  We are paraded around like celebrities.  Not only are we expected to write strategic plans every year and submit them to our supervisors and our supporting churches, but then we are required to write monthly reports to hundreds of stakeholders.  If it feels like they have really high expectations for how we will perform, well, our own expectations are probably even higher.   After all, if we are going to sacrifice so much, if we are going to ask others to sacrifice so much on behalf of us, then we better see results.

Based on our yearly goals (or you could call them glorified New Year’s Resolutions), and the amount of accountability we receive, missionaries should be the world’s most productive and healthy people.  And really, the world should be saved by now.  Right?

On one hand, I’m thankful for this aspect of missionary life.  I am a goal-oriented person, and I like the accountability.  I think it’s a great thing to think long-term about how we are going to accomplish what God is calling us to do.

On the other hand, we just never reach those expectations, do we?  We move overseas, and it brings out the worst in us.  As a spouse.  As a parent.  As a friend.  As a minister to others.  And as for our ministry?  What we felt called to do?  What we felt called to be?  Well, that just never goes as we planned.  And sometimes it’s even a total disaster.

So how do we find that balance?  How do we set goals for ourselves, for our ministry, when we have experienced disappointment and failure?  When we’ve been betrayed by too many friends?  How do we temper the anxiety of not being able to reach the expectations of those who are holding us up?

After 15 years as a missionary, it’s true that my early idealism was smashed a long time ago.  You know those times of wonderful rejoicing, when all is going the way it should?  Well, it just takes one stumble, one new piece of information, and suddenly it all falls apart.  What seems like a happy ending can still turn tragic in the end. 

Does this make me cynical?  It can, sometimes.  

Rest the rest hereover at A Life Overseas.

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