When Jesus’ words are difficult, sharp, and real

 

“Love is unselfishly choosing for another’s highest good.” 

C.S. Lewis

 

Continuing from last week with our guest blogger, my precious daughter Karen:

 

I remember helping my parents pack their treasures away that summer and moving out of the house I’d grown up in.

 

I was attached to that house, to those books, and dishes, the creaks in the hallway floor, the smell of the spices in the cupboards, the view from the kitchen table of the walk outside the front door, the basketball hoop above the garage door, and the cracks in the driveway we used for the free-throw line.

 

Moving out was hard for my mom especially, although I think she tried not to show me.

 

I read the gospel of Matthew that summer and many of Jesus’ words were difficult, sharp, and real, and I was challenged to ask myself if I really believed them—did I take Jesus at his word? Both the difficult words and the comforting words?

 

My parents were taking him at his word. They were throwing everything they had into his care, against common sense, outside their comfort zones.

 

My self-centered sadness was tempered by deep admiration, and a desire to trust God and live accordingly, like they were doing. I was learning, slowly, that with my eyes on God, I could view change as adventure instead of loss.

 

That summer I accepted my first teaching job and my dad helped me find a little house to buy, both of which were equally thrilling and terrifying. The excitement of those upcoming transitions, of my entrance into the adult world, with all my optimism and 21-year-old confidence, helped some, but also made their departure more difficult. I entered these new roles without the comfort of knowing that I could fall back on my parents’ guidance and help.

 

God’s greatest gift to me had always been

the love and support of my parents.

They had been the sigh and deep breath of knowing

I had backup—they’d been there for me no matter what.

I’d always known I’d make it because,

well, because Mom and Dad were there.

My Great-grandpa Mac had assured my Grandma Kay,

“You can always come home,"

and that’s the kind of parents I had.

 

But with them in Africa, I couldn’t just make a phone call or stop by for an infusion of confidence and encouragement. I was learning that God Himself would be my support and that He was enough.

 

The night before my parents left, I remember crying. And I remember my mom crying—the only time I specifically remember her crying. Her grief was tangible. It was as if I could actually feel her heart breaking.

 

We of course had talked about our sadness, about her worries of leaving me, about the difficulties, about trusting God, but that night it was as if I couldn’t reach her. Words and hugs weren’t enough. She was isolated in her sadness, and I suppose I was too, and both of us were trying to think of the other.

 

I remember opening my Bible later and, not to overstate it, but it was like an epiphany. Words I’d read before suddenly were clear and true and alive:

 

“And everyone who has left houses

or brothers or sisters

or father or mother or children

or fields for my sake

will receive a hundred times as much

and will inherit eternal life.”

(Matthew 19:29)

 

That’s what my parents were doing. They were following Jesus. It was suddenly so beautifully clear to me that that’s what it is all about, and if we are doing that, nothing can go wrong.

 

It might not go the way we expect,

and it might hurt,

it might even break our hearts,

but we would be all right

because God was with us and we were trusting Him.

 

I remember thinking I needed to trust God for the promise in that verse, both for me and for my parents: that we would receive a hundredfold.

 

I prayed that for my mom that night. I asked God to give her a hundredfold for all her sadness, for all she was leaving behind. I remember writing the verse down to give to her. I wanted her to know that I understood, that I trusted God, that I believed Him and His promises—for myself and for her.

 

By now, friends, you understand why Karen is so dear to me and why my heart broke to leave her.

 

Come back next for Karen’s third and final post.

 

I had always known that no matter what, I could always go home. But where was home if my parents were in Africa?

 

Today I’m delighted to introduce you to Karen. If you’ve read Grandma’s Letters from Africa, you know her as my precious daughter. (See the photo below of Karen, her husband Brian, and their three terrific young men.)

 

Brian had not entered Karen’s life when my husband and I left for Africa. She was all alone. Moving half a world away from her was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. I’ve told you about that in recent posts.

 

Because some of you have young adult kids

and you’re wrestling with whether to move

in a direction God’s pointing you,

I asked Karen to jot down her recollections

of the months surrounding her parents’ departure

for the mission field.

 

Our hope and prayer is that

God will use her story to help you discern

His unique plans for you and your family.

  

Welcome, Karen!

 

“I don’t remember when, exactly, my parents told me they were moving to Africa. It was during my senior year of college and I remember the very beige apartment I was living in and the hill across the street that I used to run.

 

“It was in those places that I tried to come to grips with their move and what felt to me like my loss of them. I was probably a bit melodramatic, 21 years old, finishing college, and figuring Africa might as well have been the moon.

 

“I was terribly sad but in tune with God enough to know that much of my sadness was selfish and self-absorbed, which only complicated my emotions.

 

“Regardless, as I look back now, I agree with my mom in her book, Grandma’s Letters from Africa, when she talks about grieving and mourning.

 

“You might have to know my parents to really understand why it was such a big deal, although reading my mom’s book gives you a good glimpse into the woman she genuinely is, the woman I’d always had as my mom, my fall-back. My parents had been my rocks. They had been my inspirations. They had been my examples and my guides. They showed me Jesus.

 

“My dad and I would go on walks together and talk about Jesus and life, and he showed me that they are inseparable, that life is ministry. He lived a life that trusted God idealistically, steadfastly, and creatively, and he gave me that same view as my paradigm.

 

“My mom had made our house a home and left no doubt in me or my brother of her love for us and for God. My mom was my example of integrity, hard work, selflessness, and the courage to tangibly trust God completely and utterly.

 

“As I look back now on my youth and specifically those days before my parents left for Africa, I understand that it was the unconditional love my parents showed me, showed each other, and showed God, that had defined my life.

 

I had always known that no matter what,

I could always go home.

 

But where was home if my parents were in Africa?”

 

Come back next week for Part 2 from Karen. You don’t want to miss it!

 

When facing the terrifying unknown: “The only thing you know is that God knows what He is doing”

 

What will happen during 2021?

 

“Today dear friends,

we stand upon the verge of the unknown.

Who can tell what we shall find?

What new experiences,

what challenges shall come;

what new needs shall arise?

(L.B. Cowman, Streams in the Desert)

 

You don’t know what 2021 holds for you. I don’t know what the year holds for me, either. We face the unknown.

 

“The unknown.” What do those words do to you?

 

“The unknown” creates strong emotions for me when those two words inflict themselves on my life, my future, my family.

When I come face-to-face with “the unknown,” my stomach knots. My knees wobble.

 

I don’t know what I’ll find but I know I’ll face challenges, and I want to know:

• Just how challenging will the challenges be?
• Just how serious will the needs be?
• Will I come out okay on the other side?

 

Over and under and around it all, I wonder if I will handle them well.

 

What about you?

 

What if, in 2021, you learn that “the unknown” turns out to be God asking you to do something that seems too hard?

 

What if “the unknown,” once known, is something that breaks your heart?

Or something that means the end of life-long dreams?

Or what if you suddenly have a crucial need?

What if the challenges of 2021 threaten to overwhelm you?

 

What if God asks you to give your “utmost” for Him?

 

At such moments, we stand at a turning point. We are at a defining moment.

 

We can say yes to God, take hold of His hand, and step into that potentially painful, frightful “unknown.”

 

Or we can tell God no, turn away, and try to slog through life on our own terms.

 

The choice is ours.

 

“Before we choose to follow God’s will,

a crisis must develop in our lives. . . .

He brings us to the place where He asks us

to be our utmost for Him and we begin to debate.

 

He then providentially produces a crisis

where we have to decide—for or against.

 

That moment becomes a great crossroads in our lives.”

Oswald Chambers

 

As you know, Abraham has been a special hero to me for years now. Let me explain why:

 

God made a staggering request of him: “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.” (Sounds like what missionaries do, doesn’t it?)

 

God didn’t tell Abraham where he was supposed to go—only that he was to go (Genesis 12:1). He was asking Abraham to give his utmost for Him.

 

So there he stood, at a critical turning point in his life.

 

Who knows how long

Abraham debated with himself

and with God

as he stood at his crossroads?

He must have agonized.

 

But, bless his heart, at his defining moment, Abraham agreed to go where God sent him even though he did not know where he was going.

 

The book of Hebrews summed up Abraham’s pivotal moment this way:

 

“Abraham, by faith, obeyed and went out,

even though he did not know where he was going”

(Hebrews 11:8).

 

He set out, simply trusting God. Talk about a blind leap of faith!

 

Perhaps today you stand at a crossroads and you’re debating whether to say “yes” or “no” to God. If not today, maybe a week from now, or ten months from now.

 

During 2021,

when you face as-yet-unknown challenges and needs,

when your stomach knots and your knees wobble,

when you don’t know where God is leading you,

may the following words encourage you: 

 

“The only thing you know

is that God knows what He is doing.

Continually examine your attitude toward God

to see if you are willing to ‘go out’

in every area of your life,

trusting in God entirely. . . .

You don’t know what God is going to do next.

Each morning . . . is a new opportunity

to ‘go out’ building your confidence in God.”

(Oswald Chambers)

 

An opportunity?

Yes, an opportunity!

An opportunity to trust God,

an opportunity to grow in faith.

 

For the Lord your God

takes hold of your hand and says to you:

“Don’t be afraid. I will help you.”

(Isaiah 41:13)

When God asks your children to make a heart-wrenching sacrifice

 July 11, 1993, at seven minutes after five in the morning, Dave and I backed out of the driveway in Port Angeles. My mother stood beside our car with her arm around Karen, only twenty-one years of age and newly graduated from college, and together they waved goodbye. Tears streaked down their faces.

 

I choked on my own sobs. How could I survive four years without seeing them?

I then entered into another type of grief. Before, I only imagined walking away from the altars. (Don’t miss I could say “yes” to  God, or I could say “no”). (See also Still wrestling down that elephant in the room and Assuming our love for God is enough and our grip on family and dreams is loose enough.) 

 

The time had come to live out the reality of it. I felt almost dead inside but, at the same time, something in me whispered to God, I lift up this offering to You. Please find it an acceptable sacrifice. Find in it a sweet aroma. (See Philippians 4:18 and Exodus 29:18.)

 

We were heading toward Dallas for pre-field meetings. That first morning in the car, after the sun rose, I opened my favorite devotional book. To my surprise, my precious Karen had lettered several Bible verses and slipped them into the book on special dates.

 

For August 11, the date of our flight out of the States, she wrote in her graceful script, “Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and anyone who does not take up his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it” (Matthew 10:37–39). (See photo below.)

 

On the date of her birthday, she had written, “And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields for my sake will receive a hundred times as much and will inherit eternal life” (Matthew 19:29).

 

Inserted at her brother Matt’s birthday, she’d written, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world but forfeits his soul?” (Matthew 16:24–26).

 

When I read those words in Karen’s handwriting, I sensed that she had placed her parents upon the altar, lifted us up before God, had gone through her own grieving, and in the process had come to some understanding of those verses’ meanings. (from Chapter 2, Grandma’s Letters From Africa)

 

Words can’t capture the utter rawness, 

the unspeakable ravages of dying to oneself 

in order to walk away from one’s children, 

even when we do it because God is asking that of us.

 

Words can’t capture the utter rawness, 

the unspeakable ravages of what Karen 

and her brother Matt experienced 

in order to let go of their parents and, instead, 

to offer only their benedictions and love.

 

Christmas greetings from Africa

 

“Krismasi Njema” and “Heri ya mwaka mpya” 

("Merry Christmas" and "Happy New Year!" in Swahili).

 

I’ll be taking a break until January. 

Have a special Christmas season, 

and may God tenderly bless you and yours now and in the New Year.

When God asks you to give Him those you most cherish

 

July 11, 1993, at seven minutes after five in the morning, Dave and I drove out of Port Angeles. My mother stood beside our car with her arm around Karen, only twenty-one years of age, and together they waved goodbye. Tears streaked down their faces. I choked on my own sobs. How could I survive four years without seeing them? (from Chapter 2, Grandma’s Letters from Africa)

Recently I told you about my mother’s strong—even desperate—objection to Dave and me leaving our kids and our home and moving to Africa. (Click on You’ll need a Kleenex: When parents don’t want their kids to go to the mission field.)

 

During the application process for working with Wycliffe Bible Translators, my mother went through an intense time of wrestling with her own will, her daughter and son-in-law’s will, and God’s will.

 

Somehow, within the months of wrestling and begging and weeping and soul-searching, my mother recognized she had to let God have her daughter.

 

You see, when she was pregnant with me, her doctor feared she’d miscarry so for months she prayed, “Lord, if You let my baby live, I’ll dedicate her to You.”

 

And He let me live.

 

And later He would ask my mother to follow up on her promise to Him about me.

 

That time had come.

 

That was in 1993. Fast-forward to 2014 when, after my mother died, I found the following in her Bible: a photo of the driveway scene I wrote about in Chapter 2, above, and paper-clipped to it was this William Cowper poem in her own handwriting. (See photo below.)

 

O Lord, my best desire fulfill

And help me to resign

Life, health, and comfort to Thy will.

And make Thy pleasure mine.

 

Why should I shrink at Thy command

Whose love forbids my fears?

Or tremble at the gracious hand

That wipes away my tears?

 

No, rather let me freely yield

What most I prize to Thee

Who never has a good withheld

Or wilt withhold from me. (William Cowper)

 

My heart broke and bled when I grasped the message—my mother was offering me up to God so that Dave and I could serve Him, despite the severe pain she and Matt and Karen had already suffered—and would suffer even more in the coming years. “Let me freely yield what most I prize to Thee,” she had written. Discovering that in her Bible after she died was a very emotional experience for me.

 

And I was puzzled by her handwriting—it had gotten sloppy toward the end. That surprised me because her handwriting had always been so perfect. It took me a couple of years to realize why her handwriting got shaky: It was because she was crying when she wrote. No doubt tears streamed down her cheeks and her hand trembled.

 

I’ll never know the magnitude of my mother’s heartaches and the costs she paid. But God bless her for the sacrifices she made—for me throughout my life, and for Him. I choose to believe that He also brought her blessings and joys as a result of her sacrifices, her yielding to His will.

 

P.S. You really don’t want to miss You’ll need a Kleenex: When parents don’t want their kids to go to the mission field.)

 

Reaching out to grab the impossible

 

Moving to Africa and leaving my kids, Matt and Karen, hurt more than anything I’d ever experienced.

 

Everything within me cried out that my children still needed their parents. I recognized they didn’t need us the way they did when they were little, but I believed they needed our behind-the-scenes support to transition out of the world of college and into the world of professionals.

 

However, my husband, Dave, didn’t understand my thinking. He pointed out that by the time we’d leave, Matt and Karen would have graduated from college, and that Matt didn’t need us because he had already married Jill.

 

Yes, Matt and Jill had each other, their own support system, but Karen was alone, and by the time we’d leave for Africa, she’d be only weeks out of college and transitioning into her professional career. It would be a crucial time in her life. My heart cried out: “We need to help her settle into a new job in a different town and a different state!”

 

I also knew that if joining Wycliffe was not God’s plan for us, He had power enough to prevent it. I gave Him every opportunity to show us green lights and send us to Africa or red lights and keep us home. In the meantime, I kept taking the next step, and the next, all the while watching for God’s answer.

 

He gave us only green lights. He gave us only open doors.

 

I had my answer.

 

I could almost hear God whisper, “Now, about your children—don’t you know I love them even more than you do? You can trust Me with them.”

 

Knowing God’s answer didn’t take away the pain, but my heart melted when He asked me to believe He loved Matt and Karen even more than I loved them.

 

I could do only two things: trust Him to manage their consequences because of our move to Africa, and then turn and take an extreme, and blind, leap of faith.

 

"Christ wants not nibblers of the possible,” wrote C.T. Studd, “but grabbers of the impossible."

 

God was asking me to be a grabber

of what seemed utterly impossible.

Unthinkable.

 

And so it was that on July 3, 1993, we moved out of our home of fourteen years. We could call no other place “home” as much as that one. Karen and I shed tears when we pulled the door closed for the last time on our empty house.

 

Dave and I were on our way to Nairobi, Kenya.