The Place In-between

  
The in-between place.  I’ve found myself here.  I know God is working in my heart and refining the old, broken, misguided ways because I feel the inner struggle of the old and new.  Maybe you can relate, sweet friend?

It began last year when I traveled to Haiti, my first international mission trip and certainly my only first-hand experience with a country stricken by the devastation of poverty…real poverty.  It was the first time I encountered a world without a free and public school system.  It was the first time I saw a land without a weekly trash pick-up.  As trivial as that must sound, this was mind-blowing!  My first trip to Haiti was the first time that the children I had seen in pictures became real in my own world, as they reached for my hand to feel the texture of “Blanc” {their word for “white”} skin.  It was the beginning of real friendships outside of my own bubble.  I was completely unraveled by the entire experience.  It lit a fire in my heart that couldn’t be extinguished.

One of my close friends said it best, “I think God is in the process of wrecking you.”  I was a wreck, alright.

My children began to hear these phrases, “You should be thankful for this dinner!  There are starving children crying because their bellies hurt and they would praise God for this dinner.”  It began to change all of us.  Thankfully, my husband left for his first international mission trip only a month later as he served alongside a team from our church and full-time missionaries in Peru to spread the Gospel of Jesus.  It was a relief to share this heart change with Him.  He totally grasped the whole thing too.

My {very young} sons began declaring the ways they wanted to help people who were hungry.  Their childlike faith didn’t hesitate to grab hold of the notion to “sell everything and give to the poor.”  I would shrug my shoulders at that innocence and brush it off a bit more easily except….I’ve heard that idea before.  Jesus spoke just that.  I strive to obey Jesus.  If we’re honest, that all sounds a bit radical to us.  Are we really supposed to do that stuff?  

I’m pretty certain that God meant for us to take him seriously.  Therefore, I’m working all of this out in my heart.  It hasn’t been that simple, though.  I was easily derailed when my first son began Kindergarten last fall and my focus changed from seeking the Kingdom of God to seeking perfectionism in motherhood again.  My dreams of sponsoring a child, blogging, beginning a ministry in my neighborhood, and everything else I was wrestling with???  It was all quieted by the hunt for a new backpack, a command center for letters from school, and the search for Pinterest-worthy lunches.  Bless.  The struggle is real…and I’m probably not alone in my silliness.  

There is this place where I hold the American Dream in my heart.  I know that I could really rock out that lifestyle and there wouldn’t be anything wrong with that…if it didn’t distract me from Jesus and His commands to think of others.  You see, my childhood dreams were built mostly of caring for myself, my own family, my own little church, and my own little classroom.  There is plenty of room for ministering in all of that, but we can’t all live that way.  Who would reach the nations for Jesus?

If I focus only on my own little bubble, who will care about the margininalized?  Who among us will fight for the orphans and care for the widows outside of our little circles?  Who will care about sex-trafficking, lonely pregnant girls, and those who do not have food to eat if we all focus inward?  There is plenty to do in my own little world…but as Jen Hatmaker said in Seven, “Are we blessing the blessed?”  Who does the dirty work?  Maybe it won’t be me, but I am going to seek His will and carry His word instead of defaulting to, “Someone else will.  I don’t feel called.”

Many people say it with their eyes and some with their words: a mother should care for her own.  I wonder, “…and should I care only for them?  Should I show them that they matter most and create the illusion of entitlement and self-importance with an always inward focus?”  With all of my heart, I believe that a mother can pour deeply into the lives of her children while teaching them to serve outward by her example.  This can happen simultaneously.  I’m learning that it is possible.

Do we think of missions and social justice as something only men or college kids can be a part of?  When the kids fly the nest, there will be grandkids, parent to care for, retirement to pursue, on and on and on.  If we wait for a certain season of life, we may wait our lives away.  God can work with any season.  We don’t have to fit him into a box of time.  The Creator of the Universe is more than capable of sorting through the seasons of my temporary life on Earth.    How does that look for a middle class mom balancing soccer practice, dinner, homework, and sock sorting?  

I don’t have a formula for any of this.  The wrestling in my heart is just that.  My heart is full of stuff that God is working out.  I’d say that I am looking for a balance but I’m not so sure that God called us to balance love for others with love for self.  My mission field doesn’t only have to be those directly around me. 

 That is my first mission field…the no-brainer.  I whole-heartedly mother, lead Bible (and Christian book) studies,  invest in my marriage, teach adult Sunday School in my church, host a weekly playgroup for moms, and assist my husband in his role of music ministry.  All of that is an important part of who God has called me to be.  Very little of it took much soul-searching.  It’s all very clear and evident that my roles should look something like that.  All of it stretches me, some of it takes self-sacrifice (specifically motherhood, amen?), and it all feels very meaningful and fulfilling.  Yet it all revolves around my life.  Don’t get me wrong.  It all points to Jesus, but if I’m honest…it all benefits the parts of my life that are comfortable and natural.  In the depths of my heart, I know the Kingdom of God calls me to think outside the bubble of self.

At some point last year, I realized I was living in a neighborhood full of people whom I wasn’t investing in, right outside my own doors.  I was closing my door and disappearing into my own world.  At some point, I woke up.  God placed me in my neighborhood, but again my focus had been inward.  My mind was wrapped around the life inside my own house.  My time was a slave to my own tasks.  What if I began living missionally? God was using that first experience in Haiti to change my heart right in my own backyard.  This change is a process, but I officially know the names of all of the neighbors.  I’ve worked alongside one of them to plant flowers, I’ve worked with another to organize a neighborhood garage sale, and the produce from my garden has served as an icebreaker to more meaningful discussions.  That’s right.  As I give yellow squash and cucumbers away, God is building authentic friendships with the neighbors that He placed around me.

There are other changes happening in our household and in our hearts.  I’ll tell you more about those one day.  For today, I write this for you and not for me.  Maybe you are in that in-between space too, sweet friend?  Perhaps your eyes are opening to everything happening around you and the call to take up our cross and follow Him.  If you can relate, know that you aren’t alone and most importantly, friend?  Hear me when I say that this is a good thing.

In the middle ground of caring for orphans and throwing our own children elaborate birthday parties, God is working out the details in our hearts.  There is this unraveling of Biblical knowledge, real life experience, and love for others that happens when we seek the heart of God.  He can break the chains of self-centeredness and lukewarm Christianity.  We can become people who listen to His voice and obey His commands–disciples of His truth, wherever and however He leads.

If it is happening in your heart, rest assured that it is happening in my heart, as well.  The uneasiness can be used for His glory.  Embrace the tension.  The good stuff is coming. Change. Can you feel it?  I’m so glad we are in this together.

From my changing heart to yours,                         

       ~Courtney