We’ve been looking forward to this in the sense that we knew that our lives would be lived on the other side of the world serving God, we knew that. I has been 11 years since God asked me to “GO”!
These days I miss home… I really miss it! I don’t know if it’s because we’ve been here for a year and everything is pretty much normal, and we are used to life. After a year of living here there are things that I am missing that I didn’t really miss before, new things. I made a meal for a group of friends the other day, which if you don’t know truly is my love language, if I work hard to make food for you it’s because I care and want to show it! This group of friends… well they didn’t not enjoy it, but after eating my Indian Butter chicken, Naan and Raita they didn’t respond the way that some of my other friends would have responded. I wasn’t extremely disappointed because I know this is a different land, different culture, different taste buds, but after, I did miss those people who LOVE to eat my food… you know who you are!
Butter Chicken and Raita
I have been quite emotional… and it’s not even “THAT” time of the month. I have missed friends and family, and church…. Home, I have missed home. I think what I forgot is that it’s OKAY to miss home. I think I forgot that when God asked me to come here he knew I would be leaving a part of my heart elsewhere. I miss my car, which is weird I haven’t really thought about that for a year, but ya I miss driving and singing at the top of my lungs, having much needed conversations with my Lord. It’s like after a year these things are becoming a reality. Even though I know that we moved our lives here, I have still felt like we are just on this trip and we will go back home sometime soon.
Undoing. I feel like God is undoing me a little bit… a lot-a-bit! This refining, redefining, this undoing, redoing process is hard. It’s sort of like a grieving process which we all know just takes time. I think I am grieving my life, my friends, my family, my church and my culture being ripped away from me. I am coming to the next level of realization that this has been left behind. Because my relationships are important to me I still stay connected and my heart will always be all over this planet in the hands of close friends and family. Today I hold tight my husband and my two daughters who I am so grateful I get to be on this journey with. At the end of the day when I ask myself if this is worth it? There is no question in my mind, because God is good and I honestly don’t want to be anywhere but where He wants us. He said “GO” and here we are. There are lonely hard moments, but as I learn to lean into him, I find that we have such sweet time together, and that daily life and small daily decisions cannot be made without him. And what I cannot forget is that this is a privilege that He has chosen us, seriously weak people to do his work. I am grateful for HIS clarity and knowing without a doubt that it is GOD who brought us here, and the SAME God who is working in the hearts of men drawing them to himself.
A question I realize has been entering people’s minds is, how am I doing in the baby department? You know it’s funny! I have been so content with where I am at and have been so grateful to just be our family this past year, to not focus on babies, or worried about loosing babies. I have not had a desire for more children right now, other pregnant people have not brought pain to my heart, I have honestly just been content with the break enjoying the lack of pain and suffering.
All that said, I also realized that having lost several babies, has effected my two daughters as well as the fact that they want more siblings. So if we have more kids, that will effect them, if we loose more babies that will effect them and if we have no more kids, that will also effect them… there is no way out here. Not too long after we moved here Ava promised that she would be praying for a brother every day, she has not failed. Ava and now Penny pray for 2 baby boys every. single. night. Penny now prays for their lives, she prays they will serve God, and be good Godly men, she prays for specific things in their lives. Last week she prayed that TJ would make them a crib and told God “How can we have 2 boy babies and no crib?”, “Daddy better make a crib”. To tell you the truth I don’t know what to do with this, and my heart is a little calloused I think. TJ and I have been challenged to continue reminding God of his promises as we look forward to whoever baby Joseph is, so that is what we have been doing. And most recently we have been challenged to just lean into God and who he is, to seek his face, not to look for what miracles he has for us, but to seek Him and his character.
Yesterday Ava started talking about lost babies as she often does. She talked about Nola and told me she remembered looking at the sonogram without a heartbeat and seeing mommy cry all the way home, she remembered looking at Nola’s body before putting her in the ground. She remembered very specific moments, and this normally doesn’t bother me, I think it’s good for her to work through the emotions and memories. However yesterday was a little different for me, she started talking about our last baby, she said “mommy, do you remember how me and Penny were looking at those videos every week on the couch about how your baby was growing? And then all of the sudden one day we just stopped watching them?” I had forgotten about that… You know how I was doing fine? How content I was feeling? In this moment my heart felt an instant stab of pain like it had just happened… As those last words flowed out of her mouth tears rolled down my face. Part of the pain is that it effects my children too, not just me or TJ, they feel the pain too! It was the first time in a long time that I felt that really strong, pit in my stomach pain of loosing so many children. It’s the pain of burying my daughter, the pain of seeing a pregnancy test, being excited and coming to find I have lost another one. The pain of believing God had a baby for me and then loosing it. Soooo… I suppose part of missing home is also from the pain of this journey with our children. I know it’s not over yet, so here I am I can’t do anything but lean into him. He knows me and my heart, he knows my daughters and their heart’s, he hears their cries, He hears mine.
Ava and her Nanny
Penny and her Nanny
Marilyn Straughan
Sep 29, 2016 @ 20:11:42