Behold

A while ago I wrote a blogpost about what it's like to be a missionary in a place where violence, corruption, and extreme poverty converge.  I tried to describe the constant heaviness that missionaries feel in dealing with all of that on a daily basis while trying to decide who to help, how to help, how long to help, how much to help...I'm going to copy part of the last paragraph here as context to the rest of this post. 

"It used to be that when I pondered the bigness of God I thought about creation…how He holds the whole universe in His hand and keeps it running. That's a pretty big Person, but I can almost wrap my head around that.  What I can't fathom these days is Someone SO big that He can hold all the hurts and all the trauma of everyone in the whole world.  Lately I see one pitiful street dog and am completely undone.  It's a rough place to be in since they're everywhere around here.  I saw one the other day while I was driving--the same day I met baby Kevin--and I got mad. The combination of emaciated, dying child and emaciated, dying dog on the same day just pushed me over the edge. I yelled at God in the car, “How am I supposed to carry all of this?  It’s too heavy!”  And He said, “I never asked you to.”   I have been thinking about that for a couple weeks now.  It rings in my head.  “I don’t have to carry this.  He’s not asking me to.”  But I’m not sure how to put it down. 

That post was hard for me to write so afterwards I went for a drive to clear my head.  Would you believe that I saw a dog get hit in front of me TWICE before I even made it out of the city?  Needless to say, the drive was not cathartic.  I was already feeling pretty fragile, and seeing the dog get killed was the straw that broke the camel's back.  I was angry...angry at the way animals are treated in this country...at the stupid driver in front of me who saw the dog and didn't even bother to slow down...at the whole world in general because we're just awful and do such rotten things to each other...at God because...wait, what?  

When I realized that I was angry at God, I decided to talk to Him about it.  "God, I think I'm mad at You.   I know You're perfectly just, and I have no right to be.  I don't want to be...but I am.  This world is just so AWFUL!  How long are You going to let this go on before You come back?  How can You stand it? Mom always says "this too shall pass,"  but I think she was wrong on this one.  This isn't passing; in fact, it's getting worse! The murders, kidnappings, rapes...the corruption, the poverty, the injustice...it just keeps coming and coming and coming.   It's endless, and it's in my face every single day.   It is definitely NOT 'passing.'"  It took me a while to finish my rant. I'm surprised that God did not interrupt me with lightning or fireballs from heaven.  I did eventually run out of steam and just sat there brooding quietly. 

The Bible says that one of the Holy Spirit's jobs is to bring the truth of Scripture to mind when we need to hear it.  That afternoon I really needed to hear it.   This is the scripture He brought to my mind: "The world IS passing away.  Behold, I am making all things new."  I knew the first sentence was I John 2:17 and the second part was from Revelation somewhere, but I was unsure exactly which chapter so I looked it up.  It's Revelation 21.  Here it is in context:  "And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain:  for the former things are passed away.  And He who was seated on the throne said, "Behold, I am making all things new."   It was an eye-opening moment for me.  

Behold... LOOK UP...pay attention!  It is used 1298 times in the Bible.  I'm not sure how many of those times it is used in the imperative form--as a command--but I did read all the verses in the New Testament where Jesus himself used the word as a command.  These are some of the things we are told to behold.  They are comforting to me.  Maybe they will be to you too.  Behold:

We are not alone. 

"Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us." 

We are being cared for.  

"Behold the fowls of the air:  for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them.  Are you not much better than they?"

Our enemy is fierce, but our Commander in Chief has our back.  

"And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat:  but I have prayed for you, that your faith fail not."  

This is not the end.  

"Behold, I am making all things new."

He's coming for us.  

"Behold, I come quickly." 

The Way You Do The Things You Do

I have had quite a few people question a decision I recently made, and I would like to offer an explanation. I think it will help all of us be a bit more understanding of one another.  What comes to mind when you hear the word culture?  If you're like most, you think of differences in language, dress, food, and maybe holidays or festivals.  While those are certainly obvious differences, culture encompasses SO much more than that.  Culture also includes things like:

• gender roles
• the concepts of personal space, time, cleanliness, or modesty
• what is considered funny
• attitude towards authority, school, or foreigners
• gestures and body language
• ideals of beauty 
• manners and appropriate social behavior
• childbearing and child rearing practices
• assumptions/what goes without saying

...and a whole HOST of other things that would probably never flicker across your brainwaves unless you were plunked inside another culture and found yourself floundering to try to understand what is normal to everyone else. 

It is very easy for us to make judgments about other people without taking into consideration this thing called culture.   Those of us who live and work in a culture outside our own often feel judged by both cultures instead of feeling included by both. Living in Guatemala has changed the way I see the world.  What used to be normal behavior to me--American behavior--is not normal to me anymore.  That's not to say that all Guatemalan behavior is normal to me, because that isn't the case either. I've been here almost 9 years now, and there are still a lot of things I don't know or understand about Guatemalan culture.  So I'm somewhat stuck in the middle of the two different ways of thinking.  Out of that middle ground is where I made the decision to take Olivia to her new home the other day.  

Remember Olivia?  She is the 33 year old widow who was in Loving InDeed and recently left her 6 children with their paternal grandparents in order to marry a 20 year old "man" and move over 3 hours away with him.  Many of you questioned my judgment (some of you pretty forcefully) when I drove the new couple to their home, believing that to be a show of support on my part.  Before I mention how culture played a part in that decision, let me just say that Olivia knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that I was in total disagreement with her choice to leave her kids and remarry.  We had had many very frank discussions about it prior to the event.  So then why did I do it?  For one, I felt like it was important that someone on her side knew where she was in the case of emergency (one involving her or one involving her kids).  Google maps does not work in the mountains of Huehuetenango.  People who live off dirt roads in the mountains don't even have addresses.  If I hadn't taken them home, I would have had absolutely no idea how to ever find her again if the need arose.  But that's not the only reason.  There are cultural things that make Olivia's decision to leave her children a little more understandable and a little less horrible.  I am NOT saying her decision was the right one; I am only saying that I can understand how she made it.  

• In indigenous culture, it is not uncommon for a young widow to remarry and leave her kids to be raised by their grandparents.  Most men do not want to be burdened with caring for another man's children; most young women see marriage as the only way to protect themselves and get by in life.  Remember that this is a very macho culture.  Women are nothing more than property and have little to no rights in indigenous areas, regardless of what the "law" actually says.  If a woman is going to have any hope at all of having a roof over her head and food on the table, she either needs to be married or live at home with dad.  Dad was not an option for Olivia; she was orphaned at a very young age and has no memory at all of either of her parents.  So from her point of view, she needed to remarry.  (Also, from her point of view, I am her mother; she has told me so many, many times.  There is no circumstance in which I would be willing to turn my back on Jessie.  By the same token, there is no circumstance in which I will turn my back on Olivia.) 
• In indigenous culture, it is not uncommon for parents to be either extremely abusive or extremely permissive with their children. Every single one of the widows in the LI program leans towards permissiveness when it comes to their children. Olivia asked her children to move with her; they said no, so Olivia would never attempt to force them.  It just goes against the grain.  
• In indigenous culture, the men have all the power.  Since Olivia's father and husband are both dead, the next man in line to be her authority is her father in law.  He would not allow the kids to move with their mother even if they wanted to, so even though it is Olivia's legal right to take them, it would not even cross her mind to fight him on it.  

I am positive that there are a lot of other cultural factors at play here that I do not understand, but these three things alone, coupled with the fact that I love Olivia no matter what she does means that I was willing to put my own feelings about her decision aside and take her to her new home.  

This whole situation has made me realize that I need to be quicker to extend grace to people instead of being so quick to judge.  The fact is that none of us really knows how another person thinks, why they do what they do, how they were raised, or what difficulties they have faced that have shaped them into the person that they are.  Yes, there is biblical right and biblical wrong.  Some things are black or white.  But the older I get, the more I realize that a lot of life falls into the gray, and that I will rarely go wrong by extending grace.