21 July 2014

Great is Thy Faithfulness

Sometimes hard, ugly, painful, scary stuff happens.  Watching the news (or my Facebook newsfeed), it seems rare that there is ever a time when hard, ugly, painful, scary stuff isn't happening. Seriously. While the media can certainly desensitize us to the ugly things of this world, it can also wrench your heart into pieces and send you to your knees in prayer.

Today I woke up to the news that an infection took the life of a young missionary girl in Thailand. In the last few weeks, I had one friend lose her mother and another his son. Good friends from our church are learning a new normal after their three-year-old lost his legs in a lawn mowing accident. So many others I know are dealing with hard decisions, struggling marriages, and a whole lot of other ugly, painful, scary, stuff. I can't even begin to think of the struggles of those whose loved ones were on the Malaysian flight, or are on the front lines in the Gaza strip or the conflict in the Ukraine.

And not to discount the small, everyday weights that may be bearing on you and on us right now. You know, those little things that add up and just push you right over the edge but you stuff them down because it all seems so petty compared to the big, ugly stuff of the world. The car that won't start. The argument with your boss. The cookies that get burnt or the toddler who won't sleep. I hear you brother, sister, and those feelings are very real.

We live in a fallen world, folks. Whether your trials are small or immense, they're hard. I get that.

Our house was broken into yesterday. Really, our office, which is attached to our carport, separate from the house. Everything was thrown around as the perpetrator searched for money (not just speculation - he actually wrote "I need cash" in the dust on the hood of our vehicle). There wasn't money to take, but he did make off with an external hard drive, several flash drives, and other small items he could try to sell for the money he needed.

Despite living in a culture that is overwhelmed by poverty and desperation and material "stuff" is just that, this sort of thing can shake you to your core. For Luke with all that he's been struggling with lately, this put him right up onto the edge of burnout. Admittedly, I was shaken for sure, but I felt immense peace in the midst of it. In fact, I think it actually annoyed my husband when I didn't flip out. I just got mad at him for waking Michael up in the middle of it all. I don't know what it is, and I'm not trying to sound super strong and righteous, but God has just filled me with peace lately.

When we received a $700 water bill that our renters didn't pay - peace.

When we discovered that our electric line is sparking in the middle of a tree by our house - peace.

When we struggled to get the ownership on our new vehicle changed - peace.

And when we discovered the office ransacked and things missing - peace.

"I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world."- John 16:33

I can't explain it, other than that maybe God has given me an extra measure of peace at a time when Luke and Michael most need me to be strong.

We've been told that different terms of service on the mission field have different significance and purpose. We've only been here a few months, and I feel like I'm here more for what God is doing in me than what I'm doing for Him. Over and over again He has drawn me into prayer and given me great peace. In these trials - ours and those of the people around us, I just keep seeing His faithfulness.

Friend, He is so faithful. For real. I could basically type out Romans 8 right now and leave it at that.

"For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us." - Romans 8:18

We have hope. Brother, Sister, we have Hope in the hard, ugly, painful, scary stuff. We know the verses. We sing the songs, but I think it is in the midst of that very stuff - the hard, ugly, painful, scary stuff - that we can bask in His face and His glory and His faithfulness. And we have hope.

"For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience." - Romans 8:24-25

Luke often sings Great is thy Faithfulness to rock Michael to sleep when he's upset. Today, I found myself doing the same. And he calmed, released, and fell asleep in my arms. Perhaps it was the familiar sound. Perhaps it was the words. Perhaps it was the calm and peace he sensed in me as I was engulfed in the recognition and awe of His faithfulness.

Faithful in His Sovereignty and Grace and Redemption. Faithful in providing all that we could ever want or need. Faithful because He Is all we could ever truly want or need. Faithful in His unconditional Love for His children. Faithful in the promise that He will return and wrong will be made right and good will triumph over evil. Faithful as that very day draws nearer every moment. Great is thy Faithfulness.

"What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died - more than that, who was raised - who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, 'For your sake we are being killed all day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.' No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." - Romans 8:31-39 

Friend, in this world we will have troubles. The everyday battles are real - even hard, ugly, painful and scary. But the ultimate battle has been won and faithful is the One who has overcome the world. And we can cling desperately to that hope when the broken stuff of this world threatens to rob us of our strength, our joy, and our peace. He is faithful, and His promises are true - and oh so good.

"He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away. And he who was seated on the throne said, 'Behold, I am making all things new.'" - Revelation 21:4-5a

He is faithful.

"Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow. Great is thy faithfulness, Lord unto me."

Come Lord Jesus.

07 July 2014

What happens when you wait on God....

So since the Wesslers are all about candid honesty today, I thought it only appropriate to give an update on how it's been coming back. I mean, how it's really been.

Before I do that, I'm going to add to Luke's list of things missionaries won't tell you but we'll tell you anyway. We are not superheroes.  We hosted a team last year that likened our missionaries to members of The Avengers. It was encouraging (humbling), but the only superhero talent I possess is knowing exactly what size tupperware I need for the amount of leftovers we have. (Ask my husband - I'm a champ). We are not more righteous or holy than you. We do not have an amazing channel to God that enables us to know exactly His will in every situation and He hasn't spoken to us through any burning bushes (yet?). We even go through times when we feel He isn't hearing our cries. Seriously.  *cue current favorite song* In fact, I think it's knowing our own brokenness and sin and desperate need for Jesus that makes us passionate about sharing who He is and what He did with the world (and we don't even do that very well sometimes). We're not here because we're awesome. We're here because He's awesome, and willing to use us despite our propensity to pretend we're superheroes and try to do things in our strength and end up walking straight into a wall of kryptonite.

Now that I've put that out there, I'll share a bit of the nitty gritty. As we were preparing to come back, we shared our concerns regarding Michael's health. In my mind, the only reason we wouldn't return is if we didn't feel it was safe for him. Personally, I felt a bit like Abraham. We prayed and prayed and prayed for a child, and who were we to tell God we wouldn't continue His work because we were afraid He couldn't handle Michael's health needs. I never considered that His work for us might not be Sports Friends. Might not be Zambia. Might not be international missions (don't freak out - just keep reading...). So when all the lights flashed green for Michael to come, I started packing bags and booking tickets.

If you know me, you know I'm a bit impulsive and headstrong. I was ready to come back and didn't consider asking Luke how he really felt. In all honesty, we left our first term absolutely burnt out. Exhausted. Hurt. In hindsight, most of my struggle fell around two things - bitterness and unforgiveness with particular individuals (that has since been resolved), and our struggle to conceive (also resolved, obviously). So as I experienced that healing, along with awesome encouragement from a conference last summer, I felt my cup starting to refill. Apparently, Luke was still running on empty. But once I get an idea in my head (the idea that all was well and we were coming "home" to Zambia), there's usually no telling me otherwise.

Fast forward to April, and we arrived back to a lot of work to be done on our house and only a handful of our churches using their training to impact their communities, and it was hard. As I wrote about in my recent blog, I know my calling right now is to support my husband in his calling and care for our family. But when I saw my normally passionate husband in a lonely, depressed schlump, I literally told him, "I'm not convinced this is still your call."

Ouch.

He'd been wondering the same. But I just put it out there and opened the scary, ugly door. Talk about crying out to God.

Over the next several weeks, we cried out. We prayed. We emailed a handful of people that we knew would give us honest responses and prompt critical questions. We considered the options. We asked ourselves and God those critical questions, and even sat down with some of our Zambian brothers and asked the same things. Does Zambia need Sports Friends? Does it need missionaries at all? What is the biggest need of the church here? What is the goal? Are we equipped and called to help meet those needs? And we waited.

Now before you freak out (or jump for joy (sorry Mom)), we're not leaving. At least not now. Had to put that out there before going any further. All that praying, questioning, refocusing... allowed us to do just that - refocus. One night while we were both waiting for responses from some trusted friends, God gave us each, separately, the same new vision for the ministry (still no burning bush, but it was clear nonetheless). I won't go into all the details, as this is already looking more like a book than a blog, but basically, we both woke up knowing that, yes, we're supposed to be here, and exactly how to move forward with Sports Friends in a way that will help to meet discipleship needs of the churches with whom we work and prepare future leaders for service and mission. We'll hash that out more in future letters/posts.

Some might say we wasted our first two months here, dragging our feet to get going. But sometimes in ministry (especially when "reporting" all of "our success" to supporters back home), I think there is a risk of moving forward in the ways we know or want to do things instead of waiting on God. Those weeks of waiting were hard (did I say I'm impulsive?). Really hard. But I wouldn't trade them in. Why? Because we now feel we are moving forward the way He has shown us rather than just doing ministry for the sake of ministry. Because it's His mission, not ours. And because, sometimes, He's doing a mighty work in us while we wait. *cue second song*

Moses spent 40 years in the wilderness before leading the Israelites out of Egypt. Jesus spent 40 days in the desert before starting his earthly ministry. Paul is said to have spent three years in Arabia and Damascus before starting his missionary journeys in Acts 13. So yeah, maybe we needed some extra time on the front end here. But now we're ready. And we can't wait to see how He uses us in this chapter of His story.

Four Things This Missionary Won't Tell You (But actually will, because he just did...)

There’s a blog post that’s being shared all over facebook that describes the 10 things missionaries won’t tell you. And I’ll admit, I read it. I resonated with a lot of it. And I shared it along with 10,000+ other people (incidentally, that one post has been shared almost as many times as this blog has been seen in the last 7 years combined). It was on my timeline for all of 7 minutes. Then I took it down.

I took it down because, though there’s much I agree with, there were parts that I, well, didn’t so much. It could have been his point, it could’ve been the tone, but either way, I realized that I didn’t want everything he said to be taken as what I would say. It’s not.

And then I realized, I’m a missionary. I have thoughts. And I have a blog. It may be a blog that nobody really reads, and it might need some serious updating, but it’s out there. And I can use it to write my own “things that this missionary won’t tell you but really does because we are open books in this house”. So here’s my list. I’m not speaking for other missionaries here – this is all me.

Our African "wildlife"
First off, communication. We know we need to write more updates and send more thank you notes. We are constantly talking about how we need to update our blog. And it’s not because we aren’t writers that we don’t update. (Well, that’s part of why I don’t update. Tiffany’s a writer, so that’s not really her reason.) I don’t write many updates because, as hard as this might be to believe, there’s really not that much to talk about most of the time.

Yes, we live in Africa, but we don’t have wild animals wandering around outside our house. We have two dogs and a cat. Our neighbors next door have some goats. Across the street, more dogs. Want to see traditional African wildlife? We can take a three-hour car ride to the game park and see some there if we’re lucky.

Yes, we are missionaries doing full-time ministry. But, much like those in full-time ministry in the US, that doesn’t mean we are seeing people trusting in Christ by the hundreds on a day-to-day basis. It doesn’t even mean we are out in the community spending countless hours building relationships with the local people. Because the people we work with have jobs, and families, and lives, just like we do. We build relationships and spend time with them when we can and when they can, but it’s not an every day thing. In fact, my typical day involves waking up (probably way earlier than I want to because the dogs are barking or Michael decides to wake up), doing my quiet time while I drink my coffee, then spending a bajillion hours holed away in my office reading and researching and planning and writing training materials. A few times in the week I’m able to have a brief phone conversation with a local sports minister or pastor. Wednesdays I spend most of the morning working in our garden, and then in the afternoon I make macaroni and cheese for my lunch/dinner. Basically, if you spend a day with me, you’d be bored out of your mind. And so I don’t write about it, because it’d be about as interesting to read as Little Women (which I will admit I haven’t read, but if it’s anything like the movie, I would imagine passing a kidney stone to be more enjoyable).

Which brings me to my second point: prayer requests. We need your prayers, and we deeply appreciate everybody who has been and continues to pray for us. We try to keep you all updated with our more pressing and immediate concerns, whether it’s illness or upcoming meetings or something involving the people we work with. But, that’s not all we need prayer for. Life in full-time ministry is hard, living and working on a spiritual battlefield. It’s true in the US, and it’s true here. We get down. We have bad days (weeks?). We question our effectiveness and even our calling from time to time. But we don’t always share all of these requests with everybody. In fact, I’ll even say that we probably need the most prayer when you haven’t heard anything from us in a while. Sometimes it gets so hard, we don’t know how to articulate it, so we don’t say anything at all.

Next up, money. Not all missionaries have to raise support; we do. But we haven’t found this to be some great burden that we must do in order to do what we want to do. We have been blown away time and again by the way God has provided for our needs, as we have never found ourselves under-supported and unable to continue. I have a friend who recently wrote a book about support-raising as worship, and really, it is. It is an opportunity for us to share what God is doing around the world, and it is an opportunity for people to join in this work. It’s not our work or our ministry; it’s God’s work. We may be on the front lines, but we aren’t the only ones involved. And assembling this team has been one of the greatest encouragements in ministry. Thank you to all who are a part of it.

Finally, loneliness. Yes, we are lonely. I mean, is that really surprising to anybody? Missionaries leave their friends and family behind and move to a new and different place. Obviously we are lonely. And that gets amplified by a number of factors. Yes, I have a relationship with Christ so I’m never actually alone. Yes, I have a wonderful wife who I love spending time with. But, I’m an extrovert, so not having people around me with whom I can relate is extremely draining, and I can’t put the responsibility on introverted somewhat-less-extroverted-than-meTiffany to keep me energized and entertained all day every day. The longer we live in Zambia, this becomes less of an issue as we are better able to relate with the Zambian people without necessarily feeling like we have to be “on” in order to be culturally relevant and appropriate. But, it’s still an issue.

But sometimes loneliness comes because the people around us, with whom we should be able to relate well, we just don’t get along with for one reason or another. Yes, everybody deals with conflict between coworkers from time to time. I get that. But when you live in a completely different country and these are the only people around who share a similar background, it’s hard. You can feel like you have nobody else to lean on, and so you end up feeling…lonely. (Caveat: I’m not saying we don’t get along with our fellow missionaries here. I’m simply saying that, even a small disagreement can seem bigger and more difficult because you’re not on the same page with the people around you who are inherently most like you.)

And though we are lonely, we are often too proud to say so. Or, we don’t know how to say it. I mean, do you get on facebook and say “I’m really lonely today. Maybe somebody should say hi”? But we do get on facebook. And we do appreciate when people “like” what we say. I actually click through to find out who “likes” it. Because it tells me that, though you may not have anything to say back, you at least acknowledge our existence, and that makes us feel a little bit more connected to somebody. (Interestingly enough, facebook stalking is just as creepy to us here, so if you’re going to mention one of our posts in a future conversation with us, please at least like what we had to say.)

This isn’t really a cry for attention – well, maybe a little one. It’s just a simple request from this missionary. I don’t often say write much, but when I do, I like to know if people are listening reading.


So, that’s my long list of only four things that this missionary won’t say but actually just did. I’m sure there are more, and this may be followed by an addendum or two in the future.