Timely

In class today, Pastor Tom taught about the kingdom of God. That wheat grows alongside tares. That there will be trials. That we groan as our outer selves are wasting away, but our inner selves are being renewed day by day. That it's important to have a theology of suffering so that we think rightly about our trials in the heat of the moment.

Since October, I have been pondering what it means to suffer well. I have a few ideas wiggling around in my head, but I'm far from understanding it as well as I would like.

• I want to continue seeing God as sovereign and good.
• I want to be able to let people in even when I don't think they will understand.
• I want to be ok with not being ok.
• I want to keep in mind that my suffering now is equipping me to love and sympathize with others.
• I want to be sorrowful, yet always rejoicing.
• I don't want to be consumed by the pain.
• I don't want to be so self-focused that I ignore the pain of those around me.
• I don't want people to feel ill-at-ease around me - that saying the wrong thing at the wrong time will set me off.
• I need to remember that it's a fight. Being passive is not an option. Clinging to Jesus is vital.

This evening, I'm encouraged as I listen to "Heaven is the Face" by Steven Curtis Chapman. He wrote this song about his daughter, Maria, after she was killed in a car accident. Two years ago, this accident hit me really hard... I think I relates easily because thought of anything like this happening to my China girl is horrific. This song never fails to bring me to tears. I cry because I feel the pain, but not simply because it's a heartbreaking story. I hear simultaneously acknowledged pain and hope. I hear this daddy's voice trusting Jesus to carry him and reassemble the pieces of his broken heart. I hear a heart clutching and cherishing the gospel.

Luther: Smart Cookie

"This life therefore is not righteousness, but growth in righteousness; not health, but healing; not being, but becoming; not rest, but exercise. We are not yet what we shall be, but we are growing toward it; the process is not yet finished, but it is going on; this is not the end, but it is the road. All does not yet gleam in glory, but all is being purified."

--Martin Luther

Therapy

I find myself in yet another post-Lausanne funk. I understand it a little bit better this time, and for that I'm incredibly thankful. It hasn't taken me by complete surprise, I have a category in my mind to help me deal with it, and I have hope because Jesus brought me out once before and he will do it again.

This time it isn't quite as dramatic... yet. I'm still hot-and-cold; one minute I'm happy as a clam, and the next I'm angry, irritable, and impatient. I can't predict when my mood is going to radically swing from one extreme to the other. I want to cry a lot. Sometimes I just want to scream (and that is so not the Whitney Waldemar I know). And yet, other times, I'm completely emotionless; my mind is blank. It is this bizarre puzzle piece that scares me most; not being able to think or feel emotion is downright frightening.

My therapy for all this junk comes in three forms:

2 Corinthians.

• 1:3-5 "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too."
• 4:8-10 "We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies."
• 4:16-17 "So we do not lose heart. Though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day. For this light and momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison."
• 6:8b-10 "We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold, we live; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything."

My mama. Seriously, I could not ask for a better woman in my life, guiding me, talking with me, and pointing me to Jesus. Talking it out with her always gives me clarity.

Brooke Fraser's album Albertine. This was the music I listened to on repeat in Africa. I fell asleep each night listening to it. I cried listening to it. I got ready in the morning listening to it. When I came home and was trying to figure out who I was and, in all honesty, what the heck happened in Cape Town, I listened to it. I did homework and prepared for exams listening to it. I cried listening to it. And now, I do my homework listening to it. I cry listening to it. The combination of angst and truth is powerful. Here are some of the words with which I have been identifying and in which I find hope:

"If I find in myself desires nothing in this world can satisfy,
I can only conclude that I was not made for here
If the flesh that I fight is at best only light and momentary,
then of course I'll feel nude when to where I'm destined I'm compared"

--C.S. Lewis Song

"There's distance in the air and I cannot make it leave
I wave my arms round about me and blow with all my might
I cannot sense you close, though I know you're always here
But the comfort of you near is what i long for

When I can't feel you, I have learned to reach out just the same
When I can't hear you, I know you still hear everyword I pray
And I want you more than I want to live another day
And as I wait for you maybe I'm made more faithful"

--Faithful

"If to distant lands I scatter
If I sail to farthest seas
Would you find and firm and gather 'til I only dwell in Thee?
If I flee from greenest pastures
Would you leave to look for me?
Forfeit glory to come after
'Til I only dwell in Thee

If my heart has one ambition
If my soul one goal to seek
This my solitary vision 'til I only dwell in Thee
That I only dwell in Thee
'Til I only dwell in Thee"

--Hymn

"Love, where is your fire? I've been sitting here smoking away
Making signals with sticks and odd ends and bits, still there's no sign of a flame
Impostors have been passing, offering a good-feeling glow
But I'm holding out for what you are about - an inferno that burns to the bone
Some urge me to be temperate, lukewarm will never do"

--Love, Where is your Fire

I'm fighting to struggle well. I want to live in a way that is sorrowful, yet always rejoicing. I'm praying for more grace.

Philosophy

I get really excited when I'm reading a book and come across names like Hobbes, Locke, and Hume. Who knew that reading Calvin and Hobbes or watching LOST was laying a foundation for my understanding of philosophy?! Can you say win-win?

Sidenote: I can't wait to rewatch all of LOST after I finish at BCS. It'll make SO much more sense!

I have no excuse...

...for not posting in 11 months.

I only have time for a brief update... homework [always] calls!

Life has been a whirlwind since school started in August, including:

• Craziness of homework
• Wonder of getting to know my new classmates
• Beauty and hardships of Lausanne [the repercussions of which I still deal with daily]
• Heart-wrenching stories of shipwrecked faiths
• Tasting the joy of community, confession, and loving Jesus

I've been fighting hard to live in a way that is sorrowful yet always rejoicing.

My mind is scattered. My heart is broken. My joy is in the Gospel.

I feel really weak lately. In small group today, Dale shared a timely encouragement about boasting in our weaknesses, because against the ugly backdrop of our weakness, Christ in the gospel looks unbelievable beautiful. My tendency, however, is to stay there, reveling in my weakness. I want to whine. But that is not a full picture of the gospel. Jesus looks beautiful because his wonder is contrasted by my finitude. And because he doesn't leave me there. He is making me more like himself. I'm in awe of this fact. Only Jesus could be wonderful enough to love a person like me. Glorious.

Well, that was a small taste of the thoughts wiggling around in my head.

Two other utterly unrelated notes:

1) listening to Gratitude by Nichole Nordeman makes me want to be in Africa SO badly.

2) the sun was shining brilliantly today. The hope of spring was inescapable.

Alas, Roman and Greek wars demand my attention. So, let me leave you with this gem:

"I have blotted out your transgressions like a cloud and your sins like a mist; return to me, for I have redeemed you." Isaiah 44:23

More gospel.

More grace.

May it be real in my life.