OK, so just a quick disclaimer: I've been reading quite a bit of Rob Bell and Donald Miller's works lately, which has many side effects, one of which is extensive thinking. The following blog is most likely the result of this dangerous pasttime.
As I look around this city, it is impossible to forget the earthquake that ravaged it one year ago. There is still rubble everywhere and thousands of tents litter the city. When I hear people recount to me the tragedy that struck on January 12th 2010, I can see the sadness in their eyes. Not a single person in this country was left unaffected by this disaster. In 45 seconds, an entire nation was turned upside down. It is impossible for me to look around at the mass graves, to hold an orphaned child in my arms and to walk through the tent cities and not ask my God the question: Where are you in all this? And where are you now?
One common explanation for the earthquake is that God was shaking the foundations of this country. People frequently tell the story of how a slave, 200 years ago, drank blood and committed the country of Haiti to the devil for 2 centuries in exchange for their freedom from the French. The curse on this land is evident: the once fertile soil is now dry and barren, poverty and famine are everywhere. Many believe that after the curse ended in 2004, God wanted to start over in Haiti, tear it all down and rebuild it. Every important government building- all built on the foundation of Voodoo rituals- has now been reduced to a pile of rubble.
Now this theory sounds nice until you drive past a mass grave where 80,000 people lie dead, or until you hear a four-year-old state matter-of-factly: my mom and dad are dead now. The God I serve is a God whose heart breaks for orphans and who despises death and destruction. The God I serve is a God who gives “life in abundance” and longs to bring joy and love to His children. How then could the same God sing the death warrant of hundreds of thousands of people and leave the rest to suffer through loneliness, disease and starvation?
No. I cannot accept that God divised this disaster, orchestrated the whole thing for some higher purpose. And while I acknowledge that God’s ways are higher than our ways, I don’t want to use it as a cop-out, and simply accept that this is beyond my understanding. I believe that the opposite of faith is not doubt- in fact, doubt is crucial to the growth of faith. In Eph 1:17, Paul prays that “The God of our Lord Jesus, the Father of glory may give to you a spirit of wisdom and understanding in the knowledge of Him" and in James 1:5 he says that if anyone lacks wisdom he should ask God for it because He gives it generously and without reproach. So I am not afraid to continue questioning. But rather than theorizing and wondering about the mysteries of God as though He were some far-off, mythological entity, I exercise my privilege of an intimate relationship with God through Jesus and ask Him directly.
And Jesus responds by bringing to mind the story of Lazarus in John 11. Now, in this story, when Jesus first found out that Lazarus was ill, He was probably aware that he would die if He didn’t leave immediately to go help him. He knew Lazarus was going to die but He didn’t prevent it. He knew Lazarus was going to die, but when He got there and found His dear friend actually dead, He was heartbroken. He wept. He grieved. He joined Mary and Martha in mourning. His pain was every bit as acute as theirs because Lazarus was His friend too, “the one He loved” (v.3) But He didn’t stop there. He took the situation to His Father and asked Him to redeem it. And it was in the midst of this disaster that Jesus performed on the greatest miracles of His ministry.
Jesus did not cause Lazarus to become sick and die- some disease or accident that is simply the result of living in a fallen world did that. In the same way, I do not believe that God caused the earthquake in Haiti. Our whole planet got messed up during the Fall. Earthquakes happen. (I suppose it is also a definite possibility that the evil one could have had some part to play in it as well- after all, Jesus did call him the Prince of the Earth.)
Jesus knew Lazarus would die. He definitely could have prevented it, being God, but He didn’t “for the glory of God that the Son of God might be glorified through it” (v.4). Jesus also knew the Earthquake would hit Haiti on January 12th, 2010, turning an entire nation upside down. He could have prevented it but He didn’t. He did not cause this disaster but He allowed it to happen. Slight difference in wording, huge difference in implications.
In the case of Lazarus’ death, Jesus’ heart broke. On the day of the earthquake, His heart broke again. He wept. He grieved. He joined with the nation of Haiti in mourning. He said to Himself in both situations, “This is not how I created this world to be”.
But He didn’t stop there. He didn’t panic or freak out or go “Ah! Now what?!”. No, he rolled up His sleeves and from the ashes of disaster, He began to bring life. He looked at the fallen world, at the beautiful mess we’ve made for ourselves and He got to work. Because God is in the business of redeeming. He loves to take our mistakes and turn them into something beautiful. He did it with Lazarus. He is doing it in Haiti. And He is doing it in our lives every day.
So where is God in disaster? He’s right there with us, feeling our loss, our confusion, our pain just as intensely as we are. But even as He wipes the tears from His eyes, He is working in situation- no matter how convoluted- to make it into something even better than it was before, to bring His kingdom of Heaven here in the place of Hell and to give glory to His name forever and ever. Amen ☺
Saturday, April 23, 2011
Saturday, April 16, 2011
Emily...
She had chocolate skin and short brown hair tied in tiny, matted braids, beginning to turn orange at the roots (a sign I later learned, of malnutrition). She looked up at me with lifeless, watery eyes from the arms of her sister. Her arms hung limp at her sides and her head rested lethargically on her shoulder.
-Tiens, her sister said to me. Take her.
I lifted the baby girl from the outsretch arms of her caretaker, no more than three years old herself. At first, she seemed to object to these foreign hands- their unusal coloring and funny smell undoubtedly unnerved her- and she let out a faint whimper, tightening up her face into a half grimace. But after a moment, she layed her head resignedly on my chest, too weak to protest. I had one hand on her head, covered in blisters and sores, unskillfully hidden by her thin cornnrows, and the other on her bare bottom from which dangled two thin legs.
-How old is she ? I asked her sister in Creole.
-Un an, came the reply. One year old.
At first, I wondered if I had understood her correctly. The child in my arms could hardly have passed for six months, much less twelve, weighing barely fifteen pounds by the feel of it. I wondered when the last time was she’d had anything to eat, if she could even grasp the concept of a full stomach. I could feel the congestion in her young lungs as she painstakingly drew breath after breath. I didn’t even want to contemplate what kind of sicknesses she was probably battling, what parasites were gnawing away at her insides.
-Comment li rele?, I asked. What is her name ?
-Emily, they told me fondly.
Emily. My name. Suddenly, this rag doll resting on my bosom was no longer simply another impoverished child living in a tent in the slums of one oft he world’s poorest countries. Suddenlz, we were connected. She had a name. My name.
My mind went back to seventeen years ago, my imagination painting a scene not so different from this one: another little girl, one year old, resting her head on a young white woman’s shoulder, her name also Emily. The only difference was that this Emily had just eaten a full meal, her pudgy arms and legs making her tiring to hold, a peaceful smile resting on her round, white face. This Emily would grow up never one going to bed hungry, never knowing what it is to walk barefoot over gravel roads or to sleep on a dirt floor in a tent. She woul leanr to read and the names of planets and how to drive a car. She would travel the world and own sixteen pairs of jeans just because she could. She would never have to drink muddy water from a hole in the ground to quench a burning thirst that she would never know.
In that moment, my mind fought to comprehend how two humans, both made of twent-six chromosomes, with ten fingers and two lips and the same name, born into the same world could have such vastly different experiences of it. How is it decided which Emilzy will go to Italy for vacation and which Emily will be born in a tent? Why should one eat cheesecake simply because it tastes good while the other tries to ignore her growling stomach in an attempt to find slumber?
I couldn’t find an answer to satisfy my restless heart other than maybe (at the risk of sounding cliche) it’s a bit like the wind. I mean, have you ever thought to ask why there are some areas of the world that have high barometric pressure and others that have low? I don’t think anyone can explain the why but everyone loves the result: a cool breeze. So maybe the reason why some have so much while others have nothing is so that the one can give to the other and something good can come out of it.
I don’t know. Maybe that’s a stretch. But it gives me some measure of peace so I’ll hold onto it.
-Tiens, her sister said to me. Take her.
I lifted the baby girl from the outsretch arms of her caretaker, no more than three years old herself. At first, she seemed to object to these foreign hands- their unusal coloring and funny smell undoubtedly unnerved her- and she let out a faint whimper, tightening up her face into a half grimace. But after a moment, she layed her head resignedly on my chest, too weak to protest. I had one hand on her head, covered in blisters and sores, unskillfully hidden by her thin cornnrows, and the other on her bare bottom from which dangled two thin legs.
-How old is she ? I asked her sister in Creole.
-Un an, came the reply. One year old.
At first, I wondered if I had understood her correctly. The child in my arms could hardly have passed for six months, much less twelve, weighing barely fifteen pounds by the feel of it. I wondered when the last time was she’d had anything to eat, if she could even grasp the concept of a full stomach. I could feel the congestion in her young lungs as she painstakingly drew breath after breath. I didn’t even want to contemplate what kind of sicknesses she was probably battling, what parasites were gnawing away at her insides.
-Comment li rele?, I asked. What is her name ?
-Emily, they told me fondly.
Emily. My name. Suddenly, this rag doll resting on my bosom was no longer simply another impoverished child living in a tent in the slums of one oft he world’s poorest countries. Suddenlz, we were connected. She had a name. My name.
My mind went back to seventeen years ago, my imagination painting a scene not so different from this one: another little girl, one year old, resting her head on a young white woman’s shoulder, her name also Emily. The only difference was that this Emily had just eaten a full meal, her pudgy arms and legs making her tiring to hold, a peaceful smile resting on her round, white face. This Emily would grow up never one going to bed hungry, never knowing what it is to walk barefoot over gravel roads or to sleep on a dirt floor in a tent. She woul leanr to read and the names of planets and how to drive a car. She would travel the world and own sixteen pairs of jeans just because she could. She would never have to drink muddy water from a hole in the ground to quench a burning thirst that she would never know.
In that moment, my mind fought to comprehend how two humans, both made of twent-six chromosomes, with ten fingers and two lips and the same name, born into the same world could have such vastly different experiences of it. How is it decided which Emilzy will go to Italy for vacation and which Emily will be born in a tent? Why should one eat cheesecake simply because it tastes good while the other tries to ignore her growling stomach in an attempt to find slumber?
I couldn’t find an answer to satisfy my restless heart other than maybe (at the risk of sounding cliche) it’s a bit like the wind. I mean, have you ever thought to ask why there are some areas of the world that have high barometric pressure and others that have low? I don’t think anyone can explain the why but everyone loves the result: a cool breeze. So maybe the reason why some have so much while others have nothing is so that the one can give to the other and something good can come out of it.
I don’t know. Maybe that’s a stretch. But it gives me some measure of peace so I’ll hold onto it.
Saturday, April 2, 2011
The adventure continues in Haiti!
I’m not sure quite what I was expecting from Haiti but I definitely was not expecting to feel instantly at home here. However, everything from the smell of burning trash to the flat roofs and tile floors of the villa where we will be staying this month to cows grazing on the side of the roads makes me feel like I’m back in Morocco and puts me right at ease.
We were blessed with amazingly smooth travels to Haiti- we made our connecting flight in JFK without a problem, all our bags made it and we found our contact at the airport in Port-au-Prince easily. We loaded up into the back of a truck and began the long, dusty trip to the YWAM base- a big villa in a quiet neighborhood, about 30 minutes from the heart of the city. The YWAM base here is divided up into 2 houses: the Mayagate house where the base director and most of the staff live, and the Bellville house- our house- home to 4 American and 3 Haitian staff.
Our daily schedule is full but fun! We get up with the sun at 5:30 AM to have a quiet time followed by breakfast at 6:30. At 7:15, we have worship and at 8:15 we clean the house. From 9 to 12:30, we do ministry. So far, we’ve taken a prayer tour of the city, played with kids in the tent city down the road, and dug foundations for a house. Today we’ll be visiting an orphanage. During the afternoons, we either have more ministry or we have the afternoon off.
We don’t have city electricity most of the time, so during the day, we just don’t use it! Surprisingly, I have found it is perfectly possible to live quite comfortably without electricity. We make coffee by pouring hot water over grounds, we take showers using a bucket and cup and the Haitian sun provides all the light we need. At night, we run a generator, giving us access to internet, so I’ll be on Skype and Facebook most night for a short time, if any of you want to chat with me!
Well, I’ve been on this computer for far too long now so I’ll sign off. Please keep praying for good health and protection for our team! Dorothea is currently wrestling with “Haitian happiness” (aka Diarhea), so please keep her in your prayers.
Love you all!
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