The Final Update

As I have reflected on the past 7+ years, I remember looking out the window of the bus in Malawi, watching Flora and Rebecca jump for joy at the arrival of our intern group to Chiwengo Village. In 2003, I spent several months living at the Chitipi Farm with Alice, one of my sponsored children. Who can say they have done that? She is now in her final years of high school and hopes to be a doctor. In 2007, I recall as we acquired and set off fireworks for Malawi Independence Day. I remember watching the kids and staff run for cover back into the house!

Soon after my initial year in Malawi, I accepted the offer to move to Orlando to open a “Satellite” office, a new notion for Children of the Nations (COTN). Within five years I had the opportunity to lead nearly 200 people into our countries. With each trip, I had the enormous privilege of watching Alice and others as they transformed into beautiful women and men of God. Each trip taught me just how much I didn’t know about each culture and how much I wanted to learn. I can’t begin to list all that the national staff taught me. Perhaps most importantly is how much I have yet to learn about serving others.

In August 2010, I had the opportunity to bring my sister, Sonya, to meet Alice, Nester, Henry, Telina, Edria, Martha, Felegatsi, Tali and the widows. Finally, she was able to see my world and my Malawian friends were able to meet our “first born.” (Of course, everyone kept telling me I looked older!)

For seven years, Children of the Nations (COTN) has been a significant part of my life. When I returned from my first year in Malawi, I had begun a new faith. I had experienced being involved with a vision with which my heart deeply resonated. The past several years have only served to increase my love of that vision—the transformation of the human heart as a result of knowing Christ. I would even say that this vision has become my life vision for both the local arena as well as the global arena.

In light of some recent structural reorganization with COTN as well as my recent move to Atlanta, I have decided that the time has come for me to step away. With that being said, I am writing to inform you that I have resigned from my position with COTN effective October 22, 2010.

My plan is to use the remainder of 2010 to reflect, debrief and process my experience with COTN before transitioning to a new job after the New Year. What job? I do not yet know. This year continues to be a practice of faith for me. It’s both wonderful and terrifying!

Thank you to each of you for your ongoing investment in my life and the vision raising children who will transform nations. I cannot say enough how your faithfulness, sacrifice and generosity have blessed me over the years—and continues to do so.

Nester

While in Malawi earlier this month I reconnected with Nester, a young girl who I met during my first year in Malawi (2003). She and her younger siblings had lost their mother, "orphans" by African definition. By age 13 Nester was caring for four younger siblings.

I have walked with Nester through secondary school and count her as my Malawian daughter. Last year she was married and became pregnant. What a sight it was watching my daughter trying to manage her active, active baby boy. Luntha, or Wisdom as he is called, has certainly kept Nester on her feet! She had lost a significant amount of weight and baby Luntha looked bigger than Nester! I was overwhelmed watching her.

After receiving counsel from my Malawian friends about the most appropriate and helpful way to help Nester, it was suggested that we arrange an emergency relief fund for three months. Each month, I would send $50 to help cover basic needs. At the same time, I would also provide a business loan to her and her husband so that they would have immediate help and also a boost for a sustainable future.

At the same time, my move to Atlanta had a number of cost demands, requiring a bit more creativity in honoring the commitment to Nester. But, God is faithful. One day after I was sharing this situation with a friend a check for $50 arrived in the mail from a supporter in Oklahoma- just enough to cover September's relief.

You may think this is one of those cheesy "check came in the mail" stories- and it is. But, I am so thankful it came when it did!

Nester, Ellivet and Eliphaz (2003)

Nester at secondary school (2005)

Nester and Luntha (2010)

Only Now

It is my last evening at the COTN Casa in the Dominican Republic. I am soaking in the opportunity to process all that my eyes have taken in during the past weeks. There is always so much to learn from the generous people I meet in-country.

For instance, I am amazed by the way they manage to find blessing in distress. There is great need in distress, but perhaps the pure recognition of "need" is a blessing. The pressure of relying on one's self is not even an option. For so many other cultures, this seems to be a given. But, I find that for me and many others, as an American, we have somehow lost the ability to recognize the blessing in need. As if, "having stuff" numbs the reality of our greatest needs.

During the past two weeks- for the first time in my life- I seem to have begun to understand the detriment of self-reliance- especially with regards to my faith. For instance, the following statements pertaining to living as a Christian are all statements beginning with "I:"

• I need to...
• I should...
• I shouldn't...

They are statements of behavior modification which place the responsibility on the Christian- not Christ. As a result, the above statements negate the very miraculous thing which Christians profess Christ has accomplished for us.

The Christian believes:

"I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life that I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me." Gal 2:20

"...My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." II Cor 12:9

"I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean. I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws." Ezekiel 36: 25-27

If these statements are true, it is not a matter of I, Jody, doing or not doing or needing or performing anything to be a Christian, to be loved by Christ. I am not the focus of the Christian life- Christ is the focus. "It is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose" (Phil 2:13).

I no longer need to love others well (a noble Christian act). I no longer need to forgive or surrender or give or sacrifice (all noble actions of a Christian). I no longer need to live FOR Christ!

The beauty, the miracle, the perfection of the Christian life is that no one need live for Christ. That would suggest He needs us, that the Creator needs the creation. Rather, as one who trusts that Christ has given me a righteousness that I couldn't accomplish on my own, and who has accepted the gift of His Spirit, He only asks that I live FROM him.

I am beginning to believe that one of the greatest, most damning tragedies in history is the misunderstanding of this truth.

Personally, I have exhausted myself living for him, always trying to do more and to do it better. Yet the Bible continually speaks about the Christian life being a life of rest and peace. Let's be honest- anyone trying to live for God will never be at rest. Well, we may take a sabbatical or a long weekend... However, until we recognize that God never intended for us to do His work for him, we will never experience the freedom for which Christ gave his life.

And, for my dear friends who have not trusted Christ- I can only apologize that we Christians have not rightly represented what he offers.

Trusting Christ is not "asking Jesus to forgive your sins." Rather, it's trusting that through the cross He already has. Then, it's continuing to learn to lean into him to finish what he starts in your life.

Behavior modification is so B.C. Don't sell short what Jesus has done by focusing on what you need to give up. Lean into him and as I can attest, your desires will naturally begin to look more like his- not by force of changed behavior.

It has taken me 29 years to realize this truth. I have been a performing Christian for most of my life. I can't express how much I am looking forward to the next 29 years as a free Christian.

Recommended Reading: (I have not gotten through all of these yet...)
Grace Walk by Steve McVey
Abba's Child by Brennan Manning
The Rest of the Gospel by Greg Smith

Photographs from Haiti

Distributing bread to a camp.

Distributing bread to a camp.

A church building

From the window of the van.

Women waiting in line for food.

Holy Hades!

Holy Hades (as in Hay-deez)! I had a Fiery Furnace Experience last night.

Immediately upon arriving at the Children of the Nations Casa (mission house) in the Dominican Republic, I fell asleep to the loud hum of the A/C unit in my room. The air was cool and it agitated my lingering chest cold a bit, but it was so welcome.

In the middle of the night it stopped. The hum stopped, the coughing stopped… the cold air stopped. Enter Fiery Furnace. Of course, to keep a fire ablaze would have been a supernatural feat, as the air in my room was holding strong to it’s 110% humidity …directly above me… around me… on me.

Finally, I peeled myself out of my pool of a bed to replenish my own hydration, which had now been fully sapped into the Casa air. I wandered through the hall, down the stairs and around to the water machine. Since I may have forgotten to pack pajamas, I was sporting a black dress and praying the married couple in the room next to me would not be on the same late-night trek for water.

As I wandered by the light of my iphone, I considered the newest iphone App- the H20 App- a mapping device which would lead one to the nearest source of drinking water.

The water machine at the Casa didn’t even see me coming. I grabbed a plastic cup, filled it and drank like I was at mile 24 of a marathon. I basically dumped it on my face and slurped in anything that came near my now-swollen tongue. Cup after cup I drank… and one for the road.

After my dousing myself at the water machine, I headed back up to my bed with all notions of healthy and safety far removed. I decided I would grasp at my last hope- that the outside Caribbean air would be even one degree cooler than my sauna, my personal Bikraims studio if you will. The air was, indeed, a full ½ degree cooler. In my daze, I jumped at the opportunity to sleep with the door open to the outside world. Somehow, the mere possibility of creating air movement in my room trumped the risk of anything (tarantula, bat, etc.) or anyone (thief?) entering my room during the night.

By the time the loud jolt of the generator started to sound in the morning, I was up and standing with my finger on the A/C unit on/off button, ready to usher the manufactured air back into my room and lungs. Alas, it happened. The gates of Hades opened and the cool breeze of the Sunbeam window unit entered and with it’s breath came the best hours of sleep I have ever had.

Where is God?

This morning I listened to two accounts of the immediate devastation from the earthquake in Haiti- one from a doctor who spent 87 of her first 90 hours on the ground in surgery and another from one of our COTN Venture staff who was on the ground coordinating medical teams.

Rubble, war zone, guillotine amputations, children crushed by buildings, brutal injuries, hopelessness. These were the words I heard over and over. Finally, Brandon, who has served with COTN for over a decade, said, “Where was God?”

I know the feeling- I know the question all too well. When things seem at there worst- when anguish seems to triumph over joy or even life, where is God?

I have been on the two-year plan to read through the Bible. As I enter year two, I have come to David’s psalms. I am so grateful to have first read through I and II Samuel, which tell so much about the life of this great king. The psalms are David’s expression of his joy, his adoration for a God he knows intimately, his celebration of life, his commitment to the righteous law, his confidence in his covenant with God, his remembrance of the faithfulness of God, his pain, his anguish, his suffering, his loneliness. The Bible, like few others books has the unmatched ability to so accurately account the condition of the human heart in all of its states.

Here is what is incredible and unique about both David and Brandon and any other person who knows God- in the face of hopelessness faith has something, even when it doesn’t.

Frequently, David will cry out in anguish for reprieve, for justice, for mercy. Don’t turn your face from me, hear me, listen to my prayer, save me, answer me… David cries these words time and again (I know because I have been underlining each time he does.)

In Psalms 13 David cries out, “How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me?” I once heard a man pose this question, “Where do you turn when the God you serve abandons you?" The answer? To the God you serve.

The tragedy in Haiti can only remind us again that things in this world are not as they should be- and we cannot control or save ourselves from that which may come, that which does come each day.

But, let us not be mistaken, the question, “Where is God?” is far from the anti-theistic claims of Nietzsche when he suggests that God is dead. Rather, it is an honest question that has an answer.

Just as David concludes Psalms 13 with, “But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing to the LORD, for he has been good to me,” already, we have seen great hope for many of the children in Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

I was so grateful to hear Brandon continue his account of his time in-country. “But there was hope, too. We eventually took our teams and a group of children back to the COTN casa. Imagine if you were a child who had survived an earthquake, spent several nights in a refuge camp, had lost a limb, and now you found yourself on a helicopter with a bunch of white people taking you to a new context, away from the chaos of the situation.”

In just a matter of weeks, nearly 100 American surgeons, nurses, physical therapists, trauma counselors and other medical professionals have had the opportunity to be a part of answering the prayers of these children.

God is very much alive and present. He hears the cries of his children, and He answers them. He is loving, merciful, compassionate, good, and righteous. If only we would turn to him more often.

The Road to Mtsiliza (12.29.05)

I have begun the great task of organizing my photographs and journal entries from the past six years since my first trip to Africa with Children of the Nations. Revisiting each memory has brought me immeasurable joy and gratitude for the great things that God has done in my own life, as well as the lives of so many children. That is all He asks- that we love Him and forget not His goodness to us.

For those of you who have been before, I am confident that you will recognize the road I speak of, it is a road that exists in so many villages, so many countries.

The smokey scent of Africa assures me that I am home. Wide eyes and opened mouths sound off "azungu" as I bounce on my way down the dirt path. There is no tarmac on the road to Mtsiliza- just dust and rock throwing itself behind the van. It's no wonder why vehicles fall apart so quickly . Each jolt and twist in the deep ruts of the path loosens the bearings until I am sure I will arrive with one less wheel.

After a short time of winding through the bicycles and people and village dogs I come to the final stretch. I love this finale. Children from all the surrounding houses run to the edge of the road, both hands waving straight in front, eyes ablaze wanting just a glimpse, just a smile before they give way to their irresistable giggles. I am always sad to have to continue from this point.

My arrival at Faith Academy offers me a similar experience. As my foot begins to hit the ground little knees are buckling in excitement all around me. I am surrounded by tiny toes covered in clay soon to leave their marks on my dress! My only trouble at this point is deciding which little one to swoop down and steal for a moment. If only I could know each one by name!

Runny noses, stained and filthy clothes, sores- the whole package melts my heart. The beauty of heaven held in the smile of each child. This is what my heart loves when I am here and misses when I am gone. The little ones of Malawi are thieves in the day, stealing my heart each time I am here.