The Messy Middle

where grace and truth reside

Faith, Personality

HALT-B: I don’t do all that well with tired

I learned about HALT-B in some class. You can easily tick it off on your fingers:

  • Hungry
  • Angry
  • Lonely
  • Tired
  • or Bored

HALT-B

HALT-B stands for things that can lead us to make poor choices. Poor choices can lead to sin and distance and shame and regret. While none of us are at our best when we are hungry-angry-lonely-tired-or-bored, some will be easier to roll with than others.

The granddaddy of them all

When I’m lonely, yeah I’m lonely but I’m not as likely to do something that I will later regret and potentially have to confess. When I’m hungry I can get a bit testy; but the granddaddy of them all is when I’ve had a long day and all I want to do is go to bed. I am not at my most lovely late at night. To say I’m not a night person would be, um, a colossal understatement.

For me, it’s when I’m tired that I’m most likely to say something that I know — usually immediately– I shouldn’t have said. And sadly it happened yet again last week while I was on a business trip. It had been a long day (note to self, pay attention!) and I had returned from a hot-pot banquet with about an hour before bed. A friend at the banquet later emailed me that I looked tired near the end, but she didn’t think anyone but her had noticed. That was the least of my concerns during the meal! As the guest I kept getting served lots of organ meat. My primary concern around the communal hot-pot wasn’t whether they thought I was tired, but whether or not the hosts were noticing how much pig’s stomach I was trying to hide in my dipping sauce!

So, yes, I was tired.

When I got back to the hotel another co-worker called because she had had a rough day and needed to process it a bit. I like this co-worker and am glad to walk through the up’s and down’s of growth and change. She was sick, not at her best, and at those times can get a bit extreme. Her health will NEVER recover. She’s a burden to everyone she’s ever met. Darth Vader had more friends than she does.

When she gets like this I can usually use mild sarcasm to reflect back to her the absurdity of her statements. Note the use of the word ‘mild.’ Tiredness can take mild and—if I’m not careful, bypass moderate and land on caustic—sarcasm before Princess Leia’s hair comes into it! That evening I was cruising towards caustic when she rightly said, “Wow, you’re a bit sarcastic tonight.”

She was more than a bit generous and gentle! Thankfully, the Helper confirmed with a knife to my heart her admonition and I was able to dial it back to mild. But I know I don’t do well with tired. Late at night I’m good in a crisis, not in a deep conversation and if I’m not on guard what starts off as merely a foolish choice of words can end in blatant, distance causing sin. Now, confession can be made and distance closed. However, how much lighter and freer to be able to go to bed or face the next morning without regret.

How about you? Which are your greatest stumbling blocks?

Book, Summer Reading Challenge

Summer 2017 Reading Challenge

I’ve shared that two summers ago my predominant emotion was resentment.

Resentment, no surprise, is a terrible bedfellow. Last summer I set out to make some changes and because I associate “Summer” and “Reading” so strongly, I wanted a way to help “I’m busy” not be a reason to me me (and you) from the joys of summer reading.

I love my local library, but I fail at their summer reading program. You need to have a user name, password, and then daily (or weekly) log your reading. Turns out it is a few too many steps for me. When I googled “summer reading challenges” most results were suggestions for libraries to host a reading program. Exit Plan B.

Last spring as I was gardening I decided, why not hold the reading challenge I was looking for?! Thus was born the hit Summer 2016 Reading Challenge!

Like a kid pouring over the toy catalog in days gone by, I’ve chatted with family members, dreamed about books, and looked for ways to expand the reading challenge. Today, I  am excited today to reveal this summer’s reading challenge!

It will start now, June 1, and run through August 17, 2017. To enter, read seven books from the twenty categories. Along the way I’ll have encouraging posts (for example, you may not know any teenagers to get a recommendation from, so I’ll interview a few and get recommendations for you).

What’s different? Five categories have been added! And instead of five winners, ten of you can win.

What’s in it for you? All who leave a comment on August 17th telling us the names of the books they read will be entered to win one of ten $10 Amazon gift cards.

Sound like fun?!

Here is the challenge and I’ll link to a document where you can print it out and keep track of your reading:

  1. A book related to professional development (can be loosely interpreted).
  1. A book that helps you understand part of history better.
  1. A book placed in a country you’re not familiar with OR about a country you’re not familiar with.
  1. A Young Adult (YA) book. Here are 37 YA Books You Need To Add To Your Reading List.
  1. A book recommended by a friend.
  1. A graphic novel.
  1. A book you’ve been meaning to read.
  1. A book published more than 100 years ago.
  1. A book recommended by a teenager. Several years ago my teenage teammate Gabe handed me Ender’s Game and said, “Amy, read this.” I never would have chosen it, but I love Gabe so I read it and LOVED it.
  1. A biography.
  1. A play.
  1. A memoir.
  1. A book by someone you might not spiritually agree with.
  1. A book that won an award.
  1. A book you read years ago and have meant to reread.
  1. A book that has been translated into English. 
  1. A book related to a skill (like cooking, writing, photography, or web-design).
  1. A book by an author you know. 
  1. A mystery. 
  1. A book that is more than 700 pages (counts for two books!)

Download the challenge and print it off to track your progress. I’ll be posting on Instagram the books I read. Post pictures of yourself reading or the books you read and use #Summer2017Reading Challenge. I can’t wait to get ideas from you!

~~~

In short: Seven books from June 1 to August 17.

Are you in? Pick a couple of categories and share a recommendation or a book you plan to read for that category.

Feel free to share this reading challenge with fellow readers. Anyone over ten is welcome. Why should the kids have all the fun!

China, Cross cultural, Faith, God, Learning lessons

Deeper and wider than my small arms

One of the highlights of last week was your response to Book Cousins. Thank you for jumping in with sharing where you have seen God at work. The winner was notified, but to entice you to buy The Bells Are Not Silent, today go bell hunting with Joann and me. This was first published in September 2012.

Remember the song Deep and Wide? I belted it out as a kid, complete with hand gestures and humming words as we sang it faster and faster. “Deep and hmmm, Deep and hmmm!” Through song and laughter the breadth and depth of God’s love drilled into us as we sang in Sunday School.

I shared last weekend that Joann and I were going to Harbin to research church bells. She’s the actual researcher and I am the side kick. She became interested last spring in Chinese church bells we have traveled to Qingdao, Tianjin, and Harbin. We’ve also visited the bell museum and various churches in Beijing.

These trips have shown me that my view of the Bride of Christ has stayed about as far as I can open my arms to show how “deep and wide” the church is. Um, that is to say, pathetically small.

Part of it is just the reality that we can’t know what we haven’t been exposed to. Part of it is that history has kept different part of Christianity separated. Part of it is just that I forget how truly amazing God is.

Through these trips, God takes my arms and pulls them apart, experience by experience widening my view of vastness of the church.

In the stretching, there are moments of comical “what should we do” and a bit of mild awkwardness. When a Catholic brother and sister asked us in their sanctuary if we could pray together we said, “of course!” and started to do the Protestant huddle only to realize we were going to stand in line facing the cross. In the Orthodox Church we forgot to bring head coverings and I had to keep reminding myself to back out of the church and not turn my back on the cross.

But the most holy-ground- surreal-ness of “is this really happening” comes in meeting people and seeing how beautiful the bride can be.

At the Russian Orthodox Church scheduled to meet a contact at 10 a.m. and had been told that church didn’t like Protestants or Americans, so try to speak Chinese.  We met utterly delightful Russians and as they realized we truly were interested in them, the bell, and their history, they repeatedly thanked US for caring about their history and trying to preserve it. My friend wrote more about the experience and about the bell. You should read what she wrote!

When our motley crew of Chinese, Russians, and Americans was finally allowed up into the bell tower, we were all in awe as we looked at an 1800s Moscow bell in an Orthodox church in a Chinese city being researched by an American.

We entered with those labels, but we exited one radiant bride. Humbled by the thought that God uses the likes of us.

Deep and wide. Deep and wide.  May our understanding of how truly deep and wide expand far beyond our fingertips.

I loved the responses to last week’s question: Where have you seen God at work? So, this week. What songs were popular when you were a kid? I’ll share a few I remember in the comments.

Book, Looming Transitions

Book Cousins {Giveaway: Enter and will a free book!}

You may wonder what a book cousin is. Come near and I will tell you a story.

Once upon a time Amy and Joann worked for the same organization in China. As colleagues, they trained and then supported foreign English teachers scattered around China. But more than that, they were friends, good friends.

One of them was destined to write a book and her name was Joann. One of them was destined to go through a mid-life crisis and thought that writing a book would be a brilliant career move because she was lacking in skills that the work force in America valued and she had grown accustomed to eating and heat in the winter and needed money and when she was crazed she was like a mama bear storming through life. And her name was Amy.

But we are getting ahead of the story.

Joann and Amy had a favorite neighborhood restaurant they nicknamed The Green Umbrella (GU for short). On the day they discovered it all of the outdoor tables had green umbrellas. Though the restaurant almost never had green umbrellas outside again, the name stuck.

Joann unleashed a monster when she helped Amy set up a blog; in fact one of Amy’s earliest posts involves a conversation over green beans at GU and the unleashed monster and maybe a bit of Joann’s sighing at what she might have done to the world.

The would often meet at the GU after a long work day or one of them returned from a work trip. Another evening Amy learned about hashtags as they munched on fried peanuts waiting for their Kung Pao Chicken. GU became a bit character in the story of their becoming authors.

One spring Amy set out to write 500 words a day on her book. And she did. From mid-January until the end of April she wrote six days a week on what would become the backbone of Looming Transitions.

That same year Joann traveled as a translator to Sichuan and when she returned, recounted discovering a church bell from—of all places—Coffeyville Kansas. Joann had called Amy while on the trip and told her about the bell, and the Kansas connection, and the indestructibleness of the church. But it was at GU while eating the deliciousness that poorly translates as family-style-tofu, that the full story came out.

Weeks, then months passed. Over time, plates of green beans, peanuts, and spicy meat were consumed as Joann and Amy moaned and celebrated, each believing in the other’s book more than her own.

Joann caught the “Bell Bug” as she called it. Having discovered one bell in Sichuan, she knew more must exist. And she was right. Always up for an adventure, Amy joined Joann as they hunted for bells in Shanghai, Qingdao, Harbin, Tianjin, and around Beijing.

And then one day the GU was demolished in the name of progress.

Unrelated to the destruction of a favorite restaurant, Joann boarded a plane and moved back to the U.S. Several months later, Amy followed suit.

And time passed. And editors were hired. And cover designers were found. And slowly, slowly all those consumed peanuts and cups of tea brought forth life.

January 12, 2016 Amy announced the birth of Looming Transitions. Joann celebrated and was quick to text or email whenever she heard of someone reading her friend’s book. And then it was Joann’s turn. The editing done, the cover ready, the layout completed.

Come close children, as I lower my voice with a dramatic pause—this is where our tale takes a turn befitting a movie. What day do you think The Bells Are Not Silent: Stories of Church Bells in China was shared with the world? January 12, 2017!

I know, I know. Had I not seen it with my own eyes, I might find the timing a bit far fetched myself.

But this is the true story of how The Bells and Looming Transitions came to be book cousins.

The end.

///

I love The Bells Are Not Silent not only because I got to have a front row seat to the research and writing (and am mentioned in the book—keeping it real people), but because it highlights how God is at work all the time. We are the ones who forget to look or notice.

Here is the description from the back cover of Joann’s book:

When Joann discovered a 126-year-old bell hanging in a church in southwest China she knew that there was a story to tell. Who had decided to ship it? How had it been transported? How had it survived the political turmoil of the 1950s and 1960s? She also knew that if there was one bell, there must be others. Over the course of eight months she travelled around China looking for old church bells, finding ones from France, Germany, Russia, and the United States. This book is a collection of stories about those bells. But more importantly, they are stories of God’s faithfulness to his church in China.

To those who have eyes to see, let them tune in to what is around them. Amen? Amen.

Leave a comment sharing place you have seen God recently. Don’t overthink :)! Just share and you’ll be entered to win a copy of The Bells Are Not Silent: Stories of Church Bells in China.

Community, Faith, Relationships

14 Ministry Lessons From Holy Week

Happy Monday! I wrote the following for A Life Overseas. Which point do you sense God has for you today?

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He is Risen!

He is Risen Indeed! After Christ’s crucifixion and the agony of Saturday this refrain never gets old.

Lent culminated yesterday—technically Saturday night at midnight for some churches, or early morning as the sunrises for others, or at any hour your tradition follows. Holy Week is rich not only for our faith, but for the ways Jesus taught his disciples about a life in ministry.

Earlier when they asked him to teach them how to pray, he did not hesitate. He taught them. If the disciples had asked Jesus to teach them how to live a life centered on service and ministry, He would have pointed to Holy Week.

  1. Jesus will be recognized for who he is.
  1. Later, some who recognized him as Messiah will reject him.
  1. Jesus is a God affronted by injustice as he fashions a whip and goes after the moneylenders.
  1. Ministry requires patience, but a time may come that you need to curse the fig tree, so to speak, and move on. Fig trees take about five years to bear fruit. While Jesus was not using the fig tree as a time measurement, he does say fruit is one way to measure a project, team, or season.
  1. Learning from Jesus is important. Much of Tuesday is dedicated to Jesus’ final public teaching. What does he emphasize in his last lessons? In part, God’s heart for his children and how love will be a hallmark of His children.
  1. Silence. Nothing is recorded for Wednesday. In a week where we know more than any other week in Jesus’ life and ministry, Wednesday stands like a gapping hole. Ministry also can abruptly have silences from leaders, supporters, and teammates, even God Himself.
  1. There will be times to go broad. Take Tuesday. Jesus poured into the many as he taught.
  1. There will be times to go deep. Thursday evening finds Jesus with the twelve. Even though he knew his time with them was coming to an end, He invested in them until the very end.
  1. Betrayal is a part of ministry. Recounting Judas and Peter, neither or overly villanized, instead their actions are reported. We also see that not all betrayal is the same. Judas did not reconcile with Jesus this side of death, Peter did.
  1. Accusation is also a part of ministry. Jesus was falsely accused and paid dearly for it. If Jesus Himself was falsely accused, should we be surprised when we are?
  1. Jesus will serve you. Ministry is not only about us ministering to others. We too will have our feet washed by Jesus.
  1. Jesus will feed you. Take eat. Then He took the cup. Do this in remembrance of me. Ministry is a life of pouring out and feeding others. But do not confuse feeding others with feeding yourselves. Jesus will feed you; you do not have to feed yourself. He will be creating in feeding you, but it is not on to be fed.
  1. Death is a part of ministry. This side of heaven, death is woven into ministry. People die, relationships die, hope may die, even ministries may die.
  1. But death is not the final word, resurrection is. Somewhere, somehow, life will sprout.

Jesus never held back any punches on the realities of ministry, did He? He understood the blessings and cost. And because He loves us, He never tires of investing in us as ministers of the Good News.

Which of these 14 lessons stood out to you today? What is Jesus saying to you about that lesson?

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Have you wondered what Spiritual Direction is like but don’t know where to start? Part of the Velvet Ashes Retreat involves working with a Spiritual Director. The retreat is geared towards women serving cross-culturally, but because it is scripture based, you can benefit wherever you are in the world. Have you signed up? Did you know there is a generous scholarship fund because God wants to be with you? For only $15 you will receive personal spiritual direction, testimonies from those who serve cross-culturally, a retreat guide, and more. Remember #12 from above? Register today.

Cross cultural, Messier than normal, Relationships

Still grateful: Nearly died, but didn’t

“You will die a horribly painful death in China.”

I’m not from a faith tradition that is known for “words from the Lord.” So when I heard this deep in my soul as I unpacked from my first trip to China twenty five years ago, I (a) didn’t know what it meant and (b) didn’t know what to do with it. I assumed it was for many years down the road, might be related to my faith, and would be concerning to share with people, so I didn’t.

 

Camaraderie came in an unexpected place: a John Irving novel. When I read A Prayer for Owen Meany I found a kindred spirit in Owen who knew odd details about his death. Owen, I get you! This message didn’t consume my thoughts or leave me in fear; but I did wonder at times what a “horribly painful death” might be like and if I’d embarrass myself, others, or the Lord in the process. I hoped that I wouldn’t.

I rarely get sick so it was not the norm when one day I started feeling like I had the stomach flu after lunch. My colleague, Erin, and I assumed it was just a normal illness, nothing to be concerned about. I threw up a few times.  Who doesn’t? To cut a long story short, less than 24 hours later I was throwing up convulsively, had red spots on my skin, and my head felt like it was in a vice grip and my brain being squeezed.

It was.

I had bacterial meningitis and was dying a horribly painful death in China.

Twenty years ago on April 2nd I should have died. I choke up even now typing this. My parents were awakened in the middle of the night by Erin’s dad telling them he’d just gotten a call from Erin and based on her description, he thought I had meningitis, the prognosis wasn’t good, and he just thought they should know. They called my sisters and woke them with a similar message. Each sister reached out to friends and family and thus started the word spreading.

I did not die; I did have to relearn everything except—no comments—talking. Ah, even at the brink, I had things to say! I re-learned to walk, dress myself, write, and wash dishes; things that we take for granted, for a season, I didn’t.

On this twenth anniversary I want to say, again, thank you.

To my family for not coming. One of the hardest parenting decisions you have ever made was to stay away so that I could get the help I needed. Many questioned that call, but you held firm. And you paid the largest phone bill of your lives! Your frequent calls to Erin, and later to me, were worth every penny.  Elizabeth and Laura, even half way around the world, I felt your sisterly love and connection.

To my students who cared for me around the clock. Especially to the girls who, in teams of three, sat by my bed during the night, combed my hair every morning, and washed my face.

To friends and family around the world and in China who found tangible ways in a pre-internet world to reach out.

To the school officials where I taught for caring for me as if I was your own, because I was.

To Debra and Kerry who let me convalesce with you for a month in Hong Kong. Your home, ice cream, CBS nightly news, and two cats were the best way to return to the land of the living.

To Erin. The list is too long. But one image that captures so much of what you had to bear is this — when I had come out of the coma and was hungry, we didn’t have many food options and you made me something with oranges and yogurt. After eating I abruptly sat up and projectile vomited all over your clean sweater. You, the picture of grace, picked little bits of orange off your sweater and said it “was no big deal.” And it wasn’t, because you’re that kind of friend.

I don’t know why I didn’t die. It might have been the amount of people praying around the globe for me. I know many are prayed for and they still die. All I know is that “word” was lifted from my soul in Hong Kong and like most of us, have no idea when or how or where I will die.

While I would have been okay to die (I actually begged Erin to kill me), I’m grateful that I didn’t.  Today, I am reminded of the preciousness of life and how quickly it can change. Erin, my family said it to you then and still mean it today, we owe you so much more than can be put into words. Thank you for getting me to the doctor when I would have just stayed home and died in my bed.

To that 29 year-old-woman who had accepted a leadership position before she became ill and had no idea she would stay in China for many more years. She had not tasted the heights and depths of ministry pain, nor met many of the wonderful people she now calls family, I say this: Life is hard, God is faithful, and girl, you will have the time of your life. Enjoy.

I updated a post I wrote five years ago.

Looming Transitions

When You Are Getting Married . . . is God fair? (Part 2)


Yesterday I shared a letter Janice wrote to me in which she is getting married and her roommate isn’t. In brief she shared:

  • “My roommate really desires to be married. She is mid-30s, and has been in Laos for over seven years. So she is older than me, she’s been overseas longer than me, and she has probably been praying for a husband longer than me.”
  • “I know that God does not always do things in ways that seem obviously fair to us, but in this situation I feel the unfairness very deeply myself, and I can only imagine how it might feel from her perspective.”
  • “How are you supposed to feel, when you know that what is a blessing in your life is the subject of such deep pain and disappointment to someone you love?”
  • “It is painful for me to leave her. I know that our friendship can’t be exactly the same after I leave Laos, but I don’t want to lose it entirely.”

I wanted the posts spaced out for two reasons:

1. We live in a click-bait, hurry up world. Let’s go deep and then move on. The internet is wonderful—just consider how many different places this very post is being read right now while YOU are reading it?! Kind of mind-boggling, isn’t it? But in general it is geared towards noise and new information. This forms us unconsciously to have a false sense of urgency and move on to the next topic, post, crisis. It confuses our soul as to what is a urgent and what is important.

I believe this is an important conversation to have.

2. I did not want to jump in too quickly with my thoughts, instead I wanted to create space for God to speak.

~~~

If you haven’t had a chance to read through the comments on the original post at A Life Overseas, please do. They are rich and offer additional perspectives.

Here is a bit of what I’ve have been thinking and praying over in response to Janice’s letter:

1.  We need to have these conversations. The very enemy of our souls wants to isolate and through isolation whisper lies mixed with half-truths. In the whispering, we can become disoriented as to what is truth, what is half-truth, and what is lie.

In community—and let me stress safe, healthy, trustworthy community—we do not have to bear burdens alone and we can sort out what is true in our situation and what is not.

2.  Notice how the language of “fair” and “guilt” are both a part of the swirl of emotions, thoughts, and reactions. I find this fascinating how almost universal both concepts are, whether married, getting married, or desiring to be married. Both can be very strong which can be confusing because they seem to run counter to what “good Christians should” believe or experience. Because we do not talk about “fairness” or “guilt:

  • people often don’t know what to do with these feelings
  • how to start conversations about them or
  • how to process them

Allowing them to grow which can lead to greater isolation (see #1 above).

3. Too often we believe that we must pick between one emotion or the other.

Guilt is often a by-product of one emotion saying “If you feel me, obviously you don’t REALLY care [about either the joy or the sorrow].”

So, for the person getting married, if she expresses happiness in getting married, she may hear in her head, “If you are happy, then you don’t really understand how it feels to live with disappointment.” Or If a someone is not getting married and feels angry, disappointed, and sad, she may believe, “You are an ungrateful, selfish, bitter spinster.”

You don’t have to choose between joy and sorrow. You can have both. Guilt tries to manipulate you into one or the other, so that you don’t live an integrated life.

We need to grow in our capacity to experience (and give permission to experience) more than one emotion at a time.

4. I am more and more convinced we need to lead the charge in a “culture of grief.” We, as Christians, should be the best darn grievers on the planet, and yet, too often we stink at it. I dedicated an entire chapter in Looming Transitions to grief. I now see that the need to weave grief into our lives runs deeper than I ever thought.

Feelings of “fairness” and “guilt” can also be warnings for “an area to grieve.” Look for the loss. Are you loosing a friend? A location? Control? Someone who gets your jokes? The list could go on.

5. God is mysterious. I had a professor in seminary who cautioned us, as Christians, not to be too quick to cry “Mystery!” in the Christian faith. He instructed us to do the hard work of studying scripture, of asking theologians, of knowing history. But he also said, we needed to also remember that at the end of the day, studying, questioning, and knowing may not provide an answer and we will be left with mystery.

Why do some get married and some don’t? Why do some spouses die and others don’t? Why do some struggle with this addiction but not that? Why do some children have problems that other children do not have?

It may seem cheap to say it, but only God knows. And we have to live with that tension of the mysteriousness of God.

~~~

Above all, God can be trusted with all of our emotions. If you are angry, you don’t need to hide it. If you are sad, you don’t need to “put on a happy face.” If you are excited, you don’t have to pretend you are not. If you are not at the same place emotionally as someone else you don’t have to fake that you are.

But you do have to own it. You do have to offer it to God. You do need to find community to bear and process it with you.

Trusting that in the offering, God is good, sovereign, mysterious and . . . at work. 

This is what I’ve been pondering. I’d love to hear from you. What have heard? What conversations with God and others have you had?

A version of this first appeared on A Life Overseas

Looming Transitions

When You Are Getting Married . . . (and your friend isn’t)

I received an email from a young woman who had read Looming Transitions. Janice is a Canadian serving in Laos, but soon to leave as she is moving to France to marry her French fiancé. She wrote so beautifully about the tension singles can feel around marriage. I received permission to share this excerpt.

 

Dear Amy,

“In this type of lifestyle, my roommate and I spend a lot of time together. We live together, we work together, we go to the market together, we go out visiting people together, we go on walks together, we pray together, we watch movies together, we read each other’s books.

“Before I came to Laos I didn’t know her. However, we found we get along quite well. We have many overlapping interests and can talk about some personal subjects. I feel bad about not being there to help deal with challenges like money requests and electrical system issues. I also know that my leaving means that there will be periods of time where she is alone as the only expat. In the past there have been periods when I was alone in our town for weeks at a time. Despite having locals I was working with and visiting, and despite the fact that I am largely an introvert, I struggled with loneliness. I feel guilty about potentially putting her in the same situation, even though she doesn’t mind being alone here as much as I do.

“Aside from this, is the fact that I am leaving to get married, which is where I feel the worst about the situation. My roommate really desires to be married. She is mid-30s, and has been in Laos for over seven years. So she is older than me, she’s been overseas longer than me, and she has probably been praying for a husband longer than me.

“I know that God does not always do things in ways that seem obviously fair to us, but in this situation I feel the unfairness very deeply myself, and I can only imagine how it might feel from her perspective. In the past, she’s expressed her frustrations to me about how difficult it is to meet men while living here. And then I connected with this man, and now I‘m engaged. Everything about it just seems so unfair. And I know that there are many other single women like her serving overseas, because there are so many more of us than there are single men.

“To be honest, this has been sort of a difficult area in my faith. Before I came to Laos it was a struggle for me personally; knowing that if I stayed overseas a long time, I might not marry. But I felt God leading me to go, and I went anyway. And I learned of so many others in the same boat as me, including my roommate. Now I am stepping out of the boat. I am so grateful to God for bringing my fiancé and me together, and I do not take our relationship for granted. But I find that even now I still feel the pain somehow, though in a different way. And I feel guilty.

“I have found these feelings somewhat difficult to explain to people who haven’t been overseas and aren’t aware of the general situation. I have tried to talk about it with my fiancé. He is quite willing to listen, but I have found that if I get stuck on this topic with him too much, it is not beneficial. I don’t want it to sound like I feel bad that I’m marrying him, because that’s not what I mean to say. Right now some of my joy is buried beneath these other things. I keep hearing about people in Canada and France who are so happy for us. But I feel somehow removed from the happiness. How are you supposed to feel, when you know that what is a blessing in your life is the subject of such deep pain and disappointment to someone you love? 

“I’ve seen that my roommate has been having a difficult time with this over the past few weeks, since some hopes she’d had for a relationship recently fell through. In the past she has been really supportive of me when I’ve gone through difficult times, and I wish I could do or say more. It tears me up inside, to think of her feeling so hurt and disappointed. But I don’t know what to do besides listen, and tell her I’m sorry, and tell her I’m praying for her. And I do pray for her, and when I do, I feel very hopeful for her. I have tried to tell her this, but it’s not very specific, so I don’t really know if it’s helpful.

“I really want to finish well with my roommate. It is painful for me to leave her. I know that our friendship can’t be exactly the same after I leave Laos, but I don’t want to lose it entirely. Since I got engaged four months ago, I’ve tried to tell her that I care about her, that I’ll miss her, that she’s been an important person during my time in Laos, that I hope we can keep in touch, that she’ll be in my prayers, that I wish her well. I hope we can share honestly with each other about how we are feeling, because I wouldn’t want us to have regrets later about things we wish we’d said to each other. But at the same time I know that there are so many deeply personal emotions involved that it can sometimes be difficult to talk about it. During this time I am also going through some of my own transition stress, but I still want to be sensitive to what’s happening around me and be able to express myself to people who are important to me in a way that is honoring to both of us in the long term.”

“Thank you for letting me write to you, Amy. I know this is quite a long email, and I don’t expect a super long response. If you have any thoughts on anything though, I’d be interested in hearing them. Again, I really appreciate your book; it’s been a blessing to me during this season in my life.”

Blessings,

Janice

~~~

What a gift to us, eh? The way Janice expressed all that is going on. Tomorrow I’ll share my thoughts. Where have you bumped into what may look like unfairness?

A version of this appeared at A Life Overseas

Book, Guest Post

When the middle is l-o-n-g

I met my friend Britta at a writer’s conference. I did not know anyone and was lurking near the door, waiting for the organizers to open it so I could slink in and find a seat. Britta has never met a stranger and after ten seconds we had already made a connection.  She was starting a Lenten Curation website called the Meet Me in the Middle Project. Since my blog is The Messy Middle, we bonded over the word “middle.”  Since then, Britta has become a friend and I love her. (I”m also so grateful that she knows basically everything. I learned about Gumroad.com from Britta. She is the birth coach to the Looming Transitions Workbook and the audiobook.)

Everyone needs a Britta in their life.

Britta started the Meet Me in the Middle Project because our world is taken with the “before” and “after” pictures. But much of life happens in the middle . . . the messy middle. Easter is the ultimate after picture. Lent invites (forces?) us to look for God at work in the middle, knowing that the “after” is coming.

This week, I’m over at the Meet Me in the Middle Project sharing about when the middle is l-o-n-g.

If you met me, you might think I am a people person. And I am.

I just happen to be a task person who also likes people. I love the rush of accomplishing tasks. So, I try to weave into my day a few tasks that are short and concrete just so I can get a hit. Doing a load of laundry. Going to a class at the gym. Writing a blog post. I like to be able to look back at the end of the day and have a sense of accomplishment.

When Britta approached me to write for this series with a before and after picture, I wanted to pick a meaningful example where you would marvel at my deep insights on some ordinary part of our lives. The pictures would have been so amazing you might have been jealous. Just saying.

But what came to mind wasn’t a tidy task; instead, I sensed God say, “Amy, where do you see me meeting you in the middle of long tasks? When the end is not necessarily in sight. You know, the ones where you are in danger of getting lost in the weeds? Or distracted by something that might have more of an immediate pay off.”

Read about when I almost got lost in the weeds.

Have a great weekend. Enjoy lots of basketball :)

Just for fun, Learning lessons

Guess Where Pi Showed Up This Year?

If you’re new around here, you’re in for a treat! If you’re a regular, you know what’s coming and you’re still in for a treat because that is what π does . . . treat us all!

My love of π started several years ago when I was working with English teachers new to China. Kind of a curveball, right? English teachers in China? What? I know. Throughout the three week orientation period I taught small modules on expectations based on Expectations And Burnout: Women Surviving the Great Commission. Sounds about as far away from math as you can get.

One of the areas we talked about involved our expectations about God. If you would like to hear overly optimistic, Sunday School answers about the nature of God, talk to a group of people who are just starting their adventure in service in a foreign land. Hey, I get it. When I first went to China, I was star-eyed and fairly unaware of how experiences I would have in China would maybe be confusing to what I thought I knew about God and how He operated.

The chapter on expectations of God is worth getting the book! I knew I ran the risk of either being too simplistic or sounded like a bitter “been there, done that” old-hand when it came to God. How could I lead a discussion on the amazingness of God from an angle that was unexpected.

Hit a group of English teachers with a math lesson, that’s how.

In case you’re a bit rusty on math, π comes from taking the circumference of a circle and dividing it by its diameter.  Marvel in this π:

  • Never stops.
  • Never repeats.
  • Is irrational (in the mathematical sense, not emotionally)
  • You always see something different because it never repeats. No pattern exists. Even at about best attempts to be random, as limited humans we cannot help but have patterns.
  • It is quite mysterious.

What a beautiful description of God. Every single circle literally radiates the glory and majesty of God.

That lecture—those who heard it might have called it preaching because of how animated and passionate I became—was the start of my love affair with pi.

March 14th is π Day (3.14, get it?! Love it!?). Two years ago was the Ultimate π Day since Pi is 3.141592… and the date was 3.14.15. Last year was Well Rounded π as 3.14159 rounds up to 3.1416. What was the date last year? 3.14.16.

Well rounded pi

What more could be said about Pi? Have no fear, Pi is the gift that keeps on giving.

1. Like most of life, Pi is never the same two year in a row. Two years it might have been the Ultimate Pi day, last year it is Well Rounded Pi. 

Of note this year, Niece #3 is at Outdoor Lab this week for school. Since  π day is in the midst of when the 6th graders will be gone, they are having a contest to see who can say the most digits. Want to try it with your friends? Why not.

Might I recommend this song to learn as many digits of pi as you can. It is catchy! Enjoy.

A friend sent me a picture she took at a McDonalds in Chengdu (where I used to live many moons ago):

Can you believe it? I love it.

Which leads me to my next reason I love  π.

2. Pi can be whimsical and fun. A friend asked me why I talk about math so much.  Simple answer is so much beauty and fun exist in math. Unfortunately that is not the the  message most (at least Americans) believe. Pi Day offers us a chance to challenge this message in the best way! Jokes. Songs. Cartoons. Food. Come on, you try and throw a better party.

3. Not only is Pi different each year, so am I. Pi doesn’t actually change, but I liked the sound of that sentence. What I mean is that my relationship and understanding of pi is dynamic. I also change each year. This year, for the first time, I won’t be able to eat pizza or pie. Sigh. Elizabeth kindly texted me saying, “I can’t stand the thought of you not having pie, I could make you a tart using almond flour.” You know you are in a mathy family when there is sadness over mathy fun. Here is hoping that next year I can at least eat a small piece of pizza.

::

For fun 

Happy Pi Day! How are you different this  π Day from other years? What are you doing to celebrate? Any other stores or businesses getting in on Pi this year?

Amy :)

P.S. The family is eating raspberry blackberry pie. Yum! What kinds of pie are your favorite?

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