choices

It is hard to pick up and move to a foreign country, for various reasons, but for me I think it is because I have such a great community of friends that I had to leave in the States. When people ask me if I'm homesick, I say no.... because it's not that. It's more that I'm "people-sick"... I miss the relationships that I had at home. But the joy of living in a time with such great technology is that I can still be in communication with them pretty easily... Still though, skyping with someone is not quite the same as living life with them on a daily basis.

I read a poem this morning by George MacDonald that captured how I was feeling and challenged me all at the same time. It was essentially about God calling us in directions that are outside our comfort zones. He compared our comfortable places to living in the light, in a field that is covered with flowers, and the place that God is calling us to a dark and hazy city. The light is easier and prettier and more familiar, and sometimes (by sometimes, I mean usually) the darkness can be scary. And we like to make all sorts of excuses for why we can't go, why the path we have set in our minds is better than where the Lord is asking us to go. In the poem, MacDonald goes through several of the common excuses we make, and the one that struck me most was the excuse of community. Community is good. It is Biblical. But even good things should not get in the way of us following God.

Here is the excerpt of the poem I'm talking about:

I said: "I shall miss the light,
And friends will miss me, they say."
He answered me, "Choose tonight
If I am to miss you, or they."

That simple little four line phrase hit me so hard this morning. It reminded me that even though it may be hard to be away from close friends, that is a much easier thing to do than be away from my God. And if I chose to stay with them when He was calling me elsewhere, that's what I would be choosing. When I look at it with the same heart as George MacDonald had in that poem, it really doesn't even seem like a choice to me. Of course I am going to follow God where he calls me, and right now he has me here.... in Kampala.

I'm sure many of you have heard about the bombings that took place last Sunday night.... I'm fine and all my friends are as well, but the city is pretty on edge right now. People keep asking me if I'm just going to stay in the US when I go back for Claire's wedding in two weeks. That hadn't even crossed my mind until the question was asked..... No, I'm staying here. God has me here for a reason, and I will remain until he calls me elsewhere. But I would ask that all of you keep Kampala and my time here in your prayers.