Tag: Lessons and Musings Page 3 of 21

I Am Not Cut Out For This

On July 29, 2017

I’ve had that thought hundreds of times over these past sixteen years of missions: I am not cut out for this.

I am probably the least adventurous person on earth. I need a plan. I need a schedule. I need things to go according to plan and to schedule.

I hate transitions. I hate change. I think I would be happy if everything in my life could stay exactly the same, always and forever.

Yet here I am in a life that is full of adventure, whether it’s as simple as a chicken on the loose in my house or as scary as a snake in my daughter’s bed. I’m living in a culture that does not value plans or schedules (but thinks people are a lot more important…I guess there’s a point there). And even when I try to live by a plan anyway, then I lose electricity or the store is out of sugar or the rain has closed the roads.

And now here I am, facing another international move, yet again. We leave America on Wednesday to return to Tanzania. The anxiety keeps me up at night and wakes me early in the morning. I despise saying goodbye to the people we love; it rips my heart out every time. But I know that even once I get back and get settled, that I will continue to thrust myself into these transitions over and over again. I have put down roots in Tanzania, but I am a guest. It will never be permanent.

I think to myself, Why on earth did I choose this life? I am not cut out for this.

So why do I keep doing it?

You could call it a calling, but that makes it sound so noble and sacrificial and godly and stuff. When in reality, I want to do this. I want this life. It’s complicated, isn’t it? Because if I say I want it, then that makes it seem like there are no sacrifices and I never get sad or have regrets. But if I say that I am just being obedient to a calling, then that makes me seem like a martyr.

Choosing this life is both of those explanations. Yes, I hate spontaneity and change and transition–but I’ve lived long enough to see the joy that makes it worth it. Yes, I’m not too thrilled about living a life in two worlds and all the packing and the sense of rootlessness. But there’s that joy again. The joy of learning from other cultures. The joy in living a life of purpose. The joy of living a life with less. The joy that comes from anxiety that is cast upon Him.

And really, we’re not cut out for a lot of things, are we? We get into marriage, or motherhood, or the menial job, or the stressful job, and we think, I’m not cut out for this. But we keep doing it anyway, because there’s always joy. Joy in doing hard things. Joy in getting through a day we never thought we would live through. Joy in knowing that no matter how bad it gets, this life is not all there is.

But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

When Emotions are Untamed Horses

By Amy Medina

On June 3, 2017

In Other

There was a time in my life when believing the truths of the Bible caused an earthquake in my life. Did God really exist? Was the Bible true? Did Jesus really rise from the dead? My search for truth in these questions dominated my life for several years. And at the end of a rather obsessed season of study, I was convinced: I could trust the Bible.

People often equate faith with blind faith–mindlessly chucking all rational thought into the wind for the sake of belief. But when I talk about faith in God, and the Bible, and the resurrection, I don’t know if I could even call it faith by that definition–because it’s 100% rational for me. And as a result, I rarely have intellectual doubts in Christianity anymore.

No, where faith comes in for me is in the area of emotion.

I must admit that I don’t have a lot of patience for emotion. I prefer rational, clear thinking based on facts. But my emotions don’t often cooperate, bucking around like untamed horses, refusing to be domesticated.

Sometimes I think that the entire Christian life consists of believing God over believing my emotions.

Anxiety tells me, You must control your life or everything will fall apart and the world will end. But God tells me, I am in control. Nothing can separate you from me, and that is the One Important Thing.

Resentment tells me, You deserve to be treated better. You deserve more appreciation. You have a right to demand it. God tells me, This life is not about you. You can forgive because I forgave you. Wash their feet.

Despair tells me, The world is dark. Things fall apart. There’s no point in fighting. God tells me, I am the Light of the World, and there is always hope.

So who will I believe? My emotions, or God? Believing God–right there–that is faith.

The problem is–everyone knows–that emotions are powerful. So powerful that they cloud the way we see the world. When anxiety or resentment or despair or lust or anger or grief or happiness have taken over our souls–then that is reality for us. The emotion, quite literally, defines our universe.

It doesn’t help, of course, that we live in a society that glorifies emotion. From the time we are small children, we are told to Follow our hearts and Get in touch with ourselves and Validate her feelings, which really are just other ways of saying that we should let our emotions rule us. And, of course, I’m not suggesting that we become a society of stoics who stuff and deny and shut up everything we feel–because that’s not the right path either.

But as those who have been transformed by the gospel, who are being controlled by the Holy Spirit, there’s got to be a better way. There’s got to be a way where we feel deeply, and yet at the same time, learn to take those emotions by the scruff of the neck and wrangle them into submission to God’s Truth.

And that’s why faith is so important. Because when I’m seeing the universe through an emotion, I must have faith that what that emotion is telling me is wrong. I must step back and look at myself from the outside, and analyze what I am feeling from the rock-solid words of Scripture, and then preach to myself instead of listening to myself.*

That means, sometimes, that I must loudly rebuke my despair or shame or self-pity, or, the most aggressive in my case–anxiety. It means I must hold on by my fingertips to the things I know that are true.

And it also means that in those times when I am thinking rationally, that I do the hard mental work of knowing what God’s Word says and why I know it is true. Because if I am not absolutely convinced, then there is no way I will be able to fight that fear or resentment or frustration when they take over my brain.

Faith isn’t blind–except when I am blinded by emotion. Then, faith is believing what I already know to be true.

*from John Piper

God Does Not Accept Me For Who I Am

By Amy Medina

On April 14, 2017

In What I'm Learning

Our culture is obsessed with acceptance. Have you noticed this?

Believe in yourself. Be yourself. Come as you are. Accept people for who they are. Don’t judge. I felt judged. I promise I won’t judge you. I promise I wasn’t judging you. Love yourself. Don’t ever change. Treat others the way they want to be treated.

And perhaps you’ve even heard this one: God accepts you for who you are. Unconditionally.

That is a lie. And if you believe it, it comes straight from your culture, not from your Bible.

God does not accept us for who we are. He never has. He cannot. He literally cannot go against His perfect and holy nature and accept us for who we are. In fact, the Bible says that we are enemies of God. That we are children of Satan. That we are at war with God. That He despises our sin.

That is not acceptance.

But here is the hope: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Acceptance, no. But love, yes.

The problem is that our society simply refuses to acknowledge the fact that we all are wretched sinners. It’s ridiculous, really, because we watch the news at night and we discipline the children who are clawing each other’s eyes out and we shame the bullies and we are horrified at the racism and the raping and the riots, but then we think the answer to all of this is simply to…..accept one another? Really? Yet we do everything we can to tell ourselves that we’re really not all that bad, that we just need to build our self-esteem and get rid of the toxic people in our lives and practice better self-care, and then our lives will be grand.

Oh, I get it. We’re all good people, deep down. Sometimes really deep down. At least I am, right? After all, I wouldn’t have been one of the millions of Germans who stood by and watched the ashes of six million Jews fall on my head. It wouldn’t have been me who picked up a machete and murdered one million neighbors in Rwanda.

Seems to me that the deeper you go, the less goodness you find–not more.

It’s true that as a human made in the image of God, I am infinitely valuable. But I have never been worthy of acceptance. I am arrogant and selfish. My patience level is directly connected to sleep and food and air temperature. My heart is not naturally inclined to worship God. Perhaps if God was a good-natured grandpa, partially blind and deaf, then he could find it in his heart to accept me. But who would want to worship that kind of God anyway?

Jesus Christ died on the cross because God does not accept me. It’s like the parent who loves his drug-addicted son so much that he cashes in his pension and sells his house to pay for his treatment. That’s not acceptance; because what parent willingly accepts his child’s addiction? But that is love. Amazing love. Sacrificial love. Unconditional love. Never-stopping, never-giving-up love. But not acceptance. We cannot confuse the two.

I cannot understand the cross until I understand that my sin is the reason it cost so much. I cannot understand that cost until I come face-to-face with the truth that I Am Not Acceptable. But He became Acceptable for me. I was not acceptable, and yet I am loved in a way that is far beyond what I can ever understand. And the more I understand my wretchedness, the deeper I understand His love.

I am now acceptable to God. Not because of who I am, but because of what He has done.

The new morality in our culture bears the disguise of goodness. Don’t we want people to just feel good about themselves? Except that when we do that, we lie to ourselves. We lie to our friends. We lie to our children. Often we make our sin worse because we refuse to deal with it–or even acknowledge it. And certainly, we lose the power of the cross. And that is a tragedy indeed.

“Till sin be bitter, Christ will not be sweet.” (Thomas Watson)

Ten Years Ago Today, This Blog Was Born

By Amy Medina

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!

When We Don’t Want to Think About Aleppo, Especially at Christmas

By Amy Medina

On December 17, 2016

In Other

Last night I went to sleep thinking about Aleppo, and the absurdity of the fact that I was thinking about Aleppo while sleeping in my comfortable bed in my air conditioned room with a full stomach, and healthy children in the room next door. Yet somehow I am living on the same planet and I share the same sun as those describedhere:

“As residents began to flee, bombing continued and a steady rain began to fall. Parents holding small children by the hand picked their way over dead bodies in the streets to escape. One image showed a man with his wife ducking from shelling, holding a child in one arm and an IV bag in another, the drip still attached to the blanket-wrapped infant. Some photos showed adults holding babies wrapped in blood-soaked blankets or pushing the injured in carts as they made their way out of bombed apartment buildings. Early Wednesday morning, AFP reporter Karam al-Masri watched as a mother with a child in her arms stooped in freezing rain, desperate to scoop some spilled powdered baby formula from the mud at her feet.”

What do we do with that? The thought that a mother is frantically picking out baby formula from the mud at the same time I am picking out presents for my children just seems ridiculous.

Yet this is life, isn’t it? All eyes are on Aleppo right now–it’s about time--but what about Congo and South Sudan and North Korea and Afghanistan? Apparently if the suffering didn’t have a start date and there’s no end date in sight, we just get too tired to pay attention.

The bombs drop while we laugh at Buddy the Elf and the babies cry from hunger while we decorate sugar cookies and the father cradles his maimed son while “Joy to the World” plays in the shopping mall.

So we send in some money to make the guilt go away, but what is enough? Is it still okay to buy the American Girl doll for my daughter while the other mother picks out formula from the mud?

The fantasy of Christmas is alluring. We want to believe in magic, in goodness, in peace. We want to forget the blood-soaked blankets, the stepping over dead bodies because it’s too hard to enjoy the pumpkin-spiced latte that way. Happiness feels guilty in the face of terror.

There’s got to be some sort of inbetween. We shouldn’t have to ignore suffering in order to be happy. We shouldn’t need to be afraid to turn on the news because it might spoil the Christmas spirit.

Sometimes, though, we sugarcoat our perception of Christmas. We want the magic, the silver bells, the glittery lights, the sweet baby on the silent night. But is the story as idyllic as we imagine? Yes, angels sang when Jesus was born, but we forget that babies and toddlers were also ruthlessly massacred. Joseph and Mary were hunted refugees who ran for their lives in the middle of the night. Somehow that part doesn’t make it into our Christmas pageants. A second-grader with a sword, jabbing doll babies to death doesn’t have the same allure as rosy-cheeked shepherd-children with bath towels on their heads.

Mixing in the stories of terror and war and horror shouldn’t be incompatible with Christmas. In fact, if we really want to understand the significance of the Incarnation–God becoming flesh–then perhaps it might do us good to meditate a little bit more on that war and terror that went along with it.

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light;

those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness,

on them has light shone.

For every boot on of the tramping warrior in battle tumult

and every garment rolled in blood

will be burned as fuel for the fire.

For to us a child is born,

to us a son is given;

and the government shall be upon his shoulder,

and his name shall be called

Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God

Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end,

on the throne of David and over his kingdom,

to establish it and to uphold it

with justice and with righteousness

from this time forth and forevermore.

The same passage that speaks of the great light also mentions blood and burning and darkness. There’s a reason why Jesus was called the Prince of Peace.

So is it possible to experience the joy of Christmas and the heaviness of the world at the same time? Of course. That’s the whole point, actually. John Piper calls it brokenhearted joy. We are not those who flit about with our head in pink clouds, but we also do not descend into despair. We weep with Aleppo and South Sudan and our suffering neighbor, but we simultaneously rejoice in the Son,

Our Mighty God,

Our Prince of Peace.

Lily, 2014