A Stripping Away

Photo by Daiga Ellaby on Unsplash

I’ve been off for a while. The pandemic and all. I just didn’t know how to speak into it. So much pain and heartache and loss. Isolation. A re-routing on life, I guess. Maybe a stripping away.

I sat around the table last night with my kids. We talked and laughed, not about the things today, but stories of yesterday. My youngest son shared one of his earliest memories. He was two, and we were packing up for Mexico. Such a vivid memory for a little one. He remembers looking out the window at our garage sale one week before we left. All of our belongings scattered across the lawn. When he saw another kid pick up his race track to buy, he ran outside and tried to hand him something else—a different toy, so he wouldn’t have to part with his favorite track, his favorite matchbox cars. But I stopped my little guy because we just couldn’t take it along, and I let the sale go through. He had to let go. He was young for such a grand lesson.

Sometimes life doesn’t feel like “letting go” but “stripping away.” It sometimes feels as if we have no say in it. The decision doesn’t seem to be ours.

That day at the garage sale, we got rid of everything that wouldn’t fit in our van and travel trailer. With a family of seven, trust me, it didn’t feel like much came with us. And each of my children remembers something they lost that day. But we packed in everything we could—everything we thought we needed—waved to our best friends down the driveway, and drove 2000 miles to our language school in Texas.

I remember too the day we left Texas one year later with as much Spanish under our belts as we could grab hold of and the whole world open to what lay ahead for our family in Mexico. Our last stop before pulling out of the school was the bodega where our things had been in storage. For a good two hours, we worked in the sweltering heat to shove our belongings back in the places they should have fit. Believe me, my husband is the best packer around. If he can’t puzzle it in, it can’t be puzzled.

Yet, at the end, there were still six plastic bins on the sidewalk.

“We can’t take these,” he said.

“We have to.” There was no bending in my mind. No compromise. Not now. We had already given away so much. This was the bare minimum.  

“We can’t,” he said. Period.

I sat down on one of those bins and cried. It poured out from some untapped reservoir inside of me. The anger first. I already had nothing. Why more? God, will you take everything from me? I cried, not for the “things”—children’s clothing and pots and pans—but for the hope. The dreams. All that those bins somehow represented inside of me. My family’s chance to start again. To have a home. A new life together.

We took those bins to the school’s thrift shop. One by one the woman lifted the lid and explored the items inside. Oh, I had needed that … I had a place for those, I thought. Like my two-year-old trying to hold onto his race track that day, I had to let go. The woman smiled at all the items she could re-home, and we left.

I think I might have cried to the border.

And we entered a land so foreign to us. People we didn’t know. A language we could barely speak. Unspoken rules we kept breaking. When our first team came down from our home church—our friends, faces we knew and loved—I remember the sheer panic I felt as they boarded the plane to leave. Please, take me with you. Don’t leave me behind. When our friends left, I experienced a whole new level of stripping. Not things, but people I loved. And I felt very alone.

One day, a man came from the states. I don’t even remember his name or why he was there. But I remember him. I stood with him at the ranch while activity whirled around us. A team was digging a trench. They were laughing despite the dirt and grime and heat. The man told me about a ministry he was involved in back home. He said the old-timers would sit around the fire and talk about the good ole times. The inception. The beginning. The glory days. The days that were rough and hard and took everything from you. He said how he wished he could have been a part of the stories, of the life when it all began.

Then the man turned and looked at me and said, “Someday, you’ll be sitting around a fire talking about the ranch. Because, right now, right here … these are the glory days.”

You know what? He was right.

But sometimes we can’t see it in the moment. Sometimes, we just feel the loss. We feel like we don’t have a choice. That things are happening around us we have no control of. And every day something else is taken from us. But often we can’t see from where we’re standing. We don’t know what’s just around the corner.

And what we think is a stripping away … is actually a new beginning.

Photo by Danielle Macinne (Unsplash)

Saturated

photo by Nathan Cowley

The beaches in Mexico are out of this world. White sand, clear water. And empty as far as the eye can see. For eight years we lived sandwiched between the Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Cortez, our lifeline to survive the desert heat.

Every few days, when the work had devoured our energy, and the stress had cluttered our minds, we would pack a cooler and head to the beach. The kids would snorkel for Sergeant Majors and search the rocks for hermit crabs. I would stretch out in my chair under the umbrella and read my next novel. My husband, Peter, would get in the water and never leave.

You think, Imagine that. How awesome it would be. Only a short drive from one of the most beautiful beaches in the world. I would love that. And you would be right … at least in the beginning.

Somewhere, along the line, the beach began to meld into routine. It lost its glimmer and took on the form of a task. Another thing to be done. It became effort and boredom. A burden in the end. And no one wanted to go, except Peter. He hung on until he found himself going alone.

A beautiful thing became saturated in our world. We lost the eyes to see it.

I am amazed at how well our senses become dulled from overuse. This is a good thing, in some instances, to avoid sensory overload.

The cold water becomes tolerable.

The unpleasant odor dissipates.

The yelling becomes background noise.

But it’s not always good.

Our favorite song becomes obnoxious.

The food we loved, tasteless.

 We no longer recognize the beauty in our hands.

The day forgets its joy.

And life loses its contentment.

All from saturation.

Did you see that sunset? Yeah, I’ve seen it a thousand times.

 Again, I am no theologian. But, I wonder if that’s what Jesus meant when he said, “You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again?” (Matthew 5:13)

This is a challenge, especially for the one who’s been a Christian a long time. The stories get old and lose their spark. And time spent in scripture becomes a chore. A task. A burden.

 We stop hearing God’s voice.

 But, one day, we went to the beach. My husband had found a new cove where the kids could jump off the rocks into the water. Same beach. New discovery. For hours they jumped, and laughed, and played. Before we were home, they asked if we could go again the next day. They had found the treasure. It was always there. They just hadn’t seen it.

Today, I opened my Bible and read, “I have engraved you on the palms of my hands.” (Isaiah 49:16). I’ve been a Christian my whole life. I never read that. The idea that I am engraved on the palm of God’s hand is beyond comprehension. And suddenly, I am swept away into the magnificent reality of God’s love for me. It’s life changing. And I want more. I want to go back and discover the treasures hidden there.

Why did my husband never tire of the beach? Because he never lost sight of its glory.

May you find the beauty of the new hiding in the normal of today.

I Don't Like People

Image by David Clarke

Some days, I don’t like people very much. Not just the mean kind. Not only the thieves who break into my house or my car, but those who break into my time. Who steal my energy, my focus. Those who ask me to step out of my world, put down my program, and pay attention to them at just the wrong time. Even those who want to do life together when I don’t want to. When I want to do it alone.

You can imagine choosing life as a missionary would disrupt this plan. Open someone up for the deluge of “other.” And Mexican parking lots are a great place for life lessons.  

Walk with me through the build-up.

I leave home on my way to the grocery store. Five children in tow. I usually send my husband for these trips, since I’m not comfortable still with all I need to learn in another culture. At the gas station, a young man pumps my gas. He finishes and waits for a tip. This is how he makes pocket change to survive. I’m on board. I dig through my cup holder and come up with a good amount of pesos. He is grateful and tucks away the change. At the first intersection, the light is red. While I wait, someone fire-breathes in front of my car. A slightly talented performance with the added risk of swallowing gasoline all day. When he approaches my car, I dig for some more change and drop it in his hand. He needs to eat too. At the next intersection, I get another red light. Someone washes my windshield (even though I said, no thanks). But they’re working, right? A few more pesos. I arrive at the grocery store, and someone attempts to direct me into a space in a wide-open parking lot. That’s insulting because I’ve been driving for over 30 years and certainly know how to park a car. He’s not a store employee even. Just some guy with a whistle. When I pretend not to see him, he curses me out for taking the space he suggested and not paying him for it.

Inside the store, I drag my five kids up and down the tight aisles. I buy what looks like the food I’m used to. At the check-out counter someone bags my groceries and waits for another handful of change. I dig through my purse to give her the rest of my pesos.

Meanwhile, I’m still agitated over the guy in the parking lot. I haven’t totally let it go. I don’t like being cursed at by strangers. And little by little, my annoyance meter has risen. My kids are tired and hungry and sick of being stared at for being different. I’m feeling a bit used and abused with all the hand-outs. Especially the entitled ones. I’m hot and ruffled and my generosity has tanked. I pity the poor soul who asks me for one more thing.

And here he comes.

An oversized teenager offers to help me with my cart before I can take two steps from the cashier. He’s got a hand on the metal basket already blocking my forward progress. I politely decline, but he follows me out the door. He looks both ways and guides my cart across the drive. As he shuffles next to us, I say, “Thank you for your help, but I’m fine. I have my own children to help me. Please, I don’t need you to walk me to my car and unload my groceries. Have a nice day.”

My Spanish is okay. I think he understands, but he follows me anyway. My kids cast wary glances, as if this over-assertive person could be a danger. When I get to the car and open my trunk, he reaches for a bag.

“Really, I’m okay. We can do this. I don’t need your help. Thanks anyway.”

Please, just go away!

Of course, I don’t say that. I just feel it. It crawls under my skin and into my bones.

With all the composure I have left, I corral the kids into the car, grab a dollar from my wallet and stand by the trunk to wait for the teen to finish unloading my groceries. And to make sure he doesn’t walk off with anything.

He is meticulous. Conscientious. Too absorbed in perfecting the task than any teenager I know. He lines the bags up perfectly—all part of the tip gauge. A job well-done surely demands a higher wage. I just want to chuck in my own groceries, slam the trunk, and be out of there.

When he’s done, he closes the trunk softly and smiles.

When I attempt to hand him the dollar, he waves it off.

“No, please,” I say. “Take it.”

He waves it off again and shakes his head, no.

I offer once more, because now I have to live with my attitude.

He says good-bye, and walks away.

And as I climb in my car, the rear view mirror reflects the depravity in my soul.

How often do I misjudge someone right in front of me? I tag him with motivations and intentions that I take the freedom to make up. If someone cuts me off, he’s a jerk. If I cut someone off, I’m sorry, I didn’t see you. My motive is pure. My intentions, certainly wholesome.

On the flip side, how often do I serve expecting nothing in return? Absolutely nothing. Not only expecting nothing, but accepting nothing. When that something could also be the very thing I needed most.

I heard a message soon after that moment by John Maxwell. It broke my heart and stayed with me until this day. He said something like, “Every morning when I wake up I ask the Lord to help me bring value to each person He puts in my life. And when I lay down at night, a think about how well I accomplished it.”

John Maxwell understood something so profound. That his job, his goal, his motivation for the day was not for himself. It was not for A, B and C. Not for the task or the outcome. But for the people. And miraculously, if I take the focus off me (i.e., I need to speak well, write well, perform with excellence) and put it on them … how, O Lord, can I serve them—value them—today, the pressures and stress of my day vanish like vapor. Because it’s not about me trying hard to be something I’m not. And every new day, every new moment becomes an opportunity to place value—the highest value—on God’s most treasured creation.

 And I find that I actually like people … a lot.

For me, the message came from a teenage boy who broke all odds. A kid who, though he had little, demanded nothing. A kid who served, just to serve.

A kid who changed my heart.