Starting small...
Do you know that verse in the Bible somewhere that says: 'Do not despise the day of small beginnings'? For me, that day is today. Welcome to my first blog attempt. Please keep your arms and legs inside the vehicle at all times, because this could get messy. After all, I'm the one in the driver's seat!
Small beginnings...yesterday I was hanging out at church, watching the snow fall while Jason was talking to Pastor Scott. I decided to read a bit in my Bible--some in I Timothy to think about what might be preached about on Sunday, and then I found myself thinking about the time I spent with YWAM in Middle of Nowhere, AB, (must have been the snow & solitude) and I wandered into Colossians. All my DTSmates will know why. I've recently been wrestling with some options and decisions that I/we have to make regarding employment, etc., and I stumbled upon the most interesting verse. Colossians 3:3 reads 'For you died when Christ died, and your real life is hidden with Christ in God.' Now it all makes sense!
Shall I rewind a minute?
My life, in a nutshell, ever since high school (as well as a bit during, actually) was spent doing missions, or home in-between missions. I love being a missionary; whether I'm telling people about Jesus on street corners or preaching in a church or teaching women about health care in a remote village or working as a midwife in a hospital in a city of 8 million or holding an orphan or making myself ridiculous by singing the sapo song. People ask what's the hardest part about being a missionary: being away from family or not speaking the language or living without electricity or getting sick from the dodgy water? Coming home to 'normal' life, actually. Trying to remember why a 9-5 job is more important than building houses for people who don't have a roof over their head. The attempt to reconcile my lifestyle complete with car and loving husband and apartment and easy living with the way most of the other inhabitants of the earth subsist on rice and no medical care and having no god to call upon who gives a rip whether they live or die. Realizing how bloody hard it is doing everything on my own when I used to rely on God for my next meal or bus ride or the ability to live with the same six roommates ten months into the trip when everyone's fuse is short and greivence list is long.
So here I am, sixteen months of navigating my own life later, and I want to go back! I talked to my DTS cabinmate a few nights ago, and we were both fondly thinking of our time spent in AB and longing for a chance to return, yet mindful of the fact that it was extremely challenging while we lived it and it seems easier than our current life stage of university and employment. I'm at this 'crisis of belief' as our small group's book would say, where I have to choose between doing what I love in financial uncertainty and faith in God, or doing what provides a steady income and not working where all my desires and passions are.
I sat there, staring at the thin page as the words boldly screamed at me: you died, YOUR REAL LIFE IS HIDDEN! Hidden in Christ, yes. Like when God hid Jesus in Mary's womb. Safely hidden in Him. Yet hidden even to me (most of the time, it seems). Why didn't God make it obvious? Why to I have to work so hard to find myself in this new role as wife and lay person and immigrant and primary care giver to a child under the age of two? I know that life is never easy, but does finding my life have to be uphill both ways all the time?
Regardless, it's encouraging to know I'm not the only one struggling to find my life, and maybe even that I'm supposed to be struggling to find it. Sometimes that's all the encouragement that I need from the Scriptures: that I'm not an idiot because no one has it figured out. Thanks, Paul, for writing to Colosse.
Small beginnings...yesterday I was hanging out at church, watching the snow fall while Jason was talking to Pastor Scott. I decided to read a bit in my Bible--some in I Timothy to think about what might be preached about on Sunday, and then I found myself thinking about the time I spent with YWAM in Middle of Nowhere, AB, (must have been the snow & solitude) and I wandered into Colossians. All my DTSmates will know why. I've recently been wrestling with some options and decisions that I/we have to make regarding employment, etc., and I stumbled upon the most interesting verse. Colossians 3:3 reads 'For you died when Christ died, and your real life is hidden with Christ in God.' Now it all makes sense!
Shall I rewind a minute?
My life, in a nutshell, ever since high school (as well as a bit during, actually) was spent doing missions, or home in-between missions. I love being a missionary; whether I'm telling people about Jesus on street corners or preaching in a church or teaching women about health care in a remote village or working as a midwife in a hospital in a city of 8 million or holding an orphan or making myself ridiculous by singing the sapo song. People ask what's the hardest part about being a missionary: being away from family or not speaking the language or living without electricity or getting sick from the dodgy water? Coming home to 'normal' life, actually. Trying to remember why a 9-5 job is more important than building houses for people who don't have a roof over their head. The attempt to reconcile my lifestyle complete with car and loving husband and apartment and easy living with the way most of the other inhabitants of the earth subsist on rice and no medical care and having no god to call upon who gives a rip whether they live or die. Realizing how bloody hard it is doing everything on my own when I used to rely on God for my next meal or bus ride or the ability to live with the same six roommates ten months into the trip when everyone's fuse is short and greivence list is long.
So here I am, sixteen months of navigating my own life later, and I want to go back! I talked to my DTS cabinmate a few nights ago, and we were both fondly thinking of our time spent in AB and longing for a chance to return, yet mindful of the fact that it was extremely challenging while we lived it and it seems easier than our current life stage of university and employment. I'm at this 'crisis of belief' as our small group's book would say, where I have to choose between doing what I love in financial uncertainty and faith in God, or doing what provides a steady income and not working where all my desires and passions are.
I sat there, staring at the thin page as the words boldly screamed at me: you died, YOUR REAL LIFE IS HIDDEN! Hidden in Christ, yes. Like when God hid Jesus in Mary's womb. Safely hidden in Him. Yet hidden even to me (most of the time, it seems). Why didn't God make it obvious? Why to I have to work so hard to find myself in this new role as wife and lay person and immigrant and primary care giver to a child under the age of two? I know that life is never easy, but does finding my life have to be uphill both ways all the time?
Regardless, it's encouraging to know I'm not the only one struggling to find my life, and maybe even that I'm supposed to be struggling to find it. Sometimes that's all the encouragement that I need from the Scriptures: that I'm not an idiot because no one has it figured out. Thanks, Paul, for writing to Colosse.
posted by Judy Baskerville at
10:22 PM
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