To be honest, I don't even know where to start with this post. And I know it won't do the topic justice.
As I was thinking through my time in Chad and my time with the Vanderkoois, I was struck by the enormous amount of patience, obedience, and faith they demonstrated. To go to undergraduate and graduate school (along with a number of years of other such training that I never quite got an exact count on) to learn to translate the Bible, travel to a different country (not to mention learning French before getting to that country), and devote 25 years (so far) of your life to translating the Bible into a language that about 75,000 people in the world (less than the population of Peoria) speak in one remote part of the remotest continent of the world, pray constantly and fervently, serve tirelessly, work diligently, love abundantly, all in a land that isn't your home, to see a few individuals transformed by the message of the gospel, a social structure beginning to see positive changes, and a few seeds planted for the future of the church in Chageen that will go on to impact thousands and thousands more in generations to come that you will never see... gah.
In an age of instant gratification where everything is accessible at the click of a button, I find Mark and Diane's example one of the most encouraging models of perseverance and faith in God's provision that I have seen firsthand in my life. This small blog post doesn't do nearly enough justice to all the steps of obedience, big and small, that the Vanderkoois took each day I was in Chad. They are living proof of the power of the gospel in the lives of ordinary humans that choose faith in God that produces obedience beyond human capability. I am forever grateful for their perseverance in the faith that spurs me on as I reflect on God's work in their lives and in mine.
Tuesday, June 24, 2014
All the Small Things
As I was laying in bed tonight, my thoughts turned to my trip to Chad. A year ago today, I would have been playing with the kids, visiting the clinic, doing language tutoring lessons with Luke. One of my fondest memories of my time in Chad was when Luke was helping me write my testimony of how God has worked in my life and why he brought me to Chad. I was trying to explain in French (more like telling Diane, who would translate into French for Luke, who would then translate to Kwong) the joy I felt when I first realized God's grace and His love for me. I still distinctly remember Luke searching for the right phrase, and after a minute of thought his face lit up and he said "bom bom bom! n doon si oyte bom bom bom!" I had no idea what that meant, so he gave me an analogy. He said, "It means your body did you joy, bom bom bom. For example, you aren't just an everyday sort of happy, this sort of joy is like if you came home and realized your dad had bought you a brand new car! You would leap up and down, and your body would give you joy BOM BOM BOM!" So that's what I said. And that's what I meant. When Christ gave me new life, it gave my body joy, bom bom bom.
How easily I get caught up in the small things in my life in the US. Not being able to find my phone charger. The Keurig not working. A bird pooping on my car (that, ironically, my dad did buy for me...). Those things are fleeting, and a year from now or even a month from now I won't even remember them, or I will have fixed them easily in my own strength.
And then I think back to the small things about my time in Chad that I will always cherish and that impacted my life forever. The joy that Luke had, bom bom bom, despite never owning a car his whole life. The joy Andire had as he sang me songs, having lost his eyesight at a young age. The joy of the women after communion Sunday singing praise songs on the dirt ground of the pastor's compound. I often let that joy get squelched in the troubles and worries of this life, but I learned a deep and valuable lesson from my brothers and sisters in Christ in Chad: Christ gives deep and enduring joy, in any and every circumstance.
How easily I get caught up in the small things in my life in the US. Not being able to find my phone charger. The Keurig not working. A bird pooping on my car (that, ironically, my dad did buy for me...). Those things are fleeting, and a year from now or even a month from now I won't even remember them, or I will have fixed them easily in my own strength.
And then I think back to the small things about my time in Chad that I will always cherish and that impacted my life forever. The joy that Luke had, bom bom bom, despite never owning a car his whole life. The joy Andire had as he sang me songs, having lost his eyesight at a young age. The joy of the women after communion Sunday singing praise songs on the dirt ground of the pastor's compound. I often let that joy get squelched in the troubles and worries of this life, but I learned a deep and valuable lesson from my brothers and sisters in Christ in Chad: Christ gives deep and enduring joy, in any and every circumstance.
Saturday, April 26, 2014
I don't even know...
My roommates and I were talking tonight and somehow conversation turned to my trip to Chad. I was thinking about my time in the clinic, and all of a sudden I realized something I'm ashamed to say I hadn't thought of before.
I took pictures of a dying woman and her family.
Took pictures.
How did that family feel when I pulled out my camera in the middle of their reality, their pain, so I could share the pictures later with all my upper-middle-class friends and church-goers once I left? Was I weeping with those who a day later would weep for their mother? Was I mourning with those who were emotionally, financially, mentally destroyed by this loss? Was I really concerned for her or, rather, for how well my camera would catch the deep depressions in the emaciated face that could have been my mother's?
A few days later, I attended Masana's funeral. Her daughter sat with us and made us tea. She brought us to a place where we could sit in the shade. She gave us fans to cool ourselves with. And she sat and gave us company. How deeply I want to thank her now and apologize.
I took pictures of a dying woman and her family.
Took pictures.
How did that family feel when I pulled out my camera in the middle of their reality, their pain, so I could share the pictures later with all my upper-middle-class friends and church-goers once I left? Was I weeping with those who a day later would weep for their mother? Was I mourning with those who were emotionally, financially, mentally destroyed by this loss? Was I really concerned for her or, rather, for how well my camera would catch the deep depressions in the emaciated face that could have been my mother's?
A few days later, I attended Masana's funeral. Her daughter sat with us and made us tea. She brought us to a place where we could sit in the shade. She gave us fans to cool ourselves with. And she sat and gave us company. How deeply I want to thank her now and apologize.
Monday, April 7, 2014
Still Failing... What's my motivation?
The last time I posted on this blog, I was feeling guilty for not studying enough for my physiology exam, thinking back to the moments in Chad, the reality of the luxury and privilege I live in and the poverty I saw while I was there. My well-intentioned guilt prompted me to write the last post, and as I leave yet another physiology exam hoping I didn't fail, it prompted me to look a little deeper. Why aren't my actions changing? What's my motivation?
I don't have much else to say besides this: Christ is sufficient.
I could send myself on limitless guilt trips, dwell on all the ways I am not living up to the standard of holiness I am called to, listing all the resources I squander daily - which would be pretty lengthy. Or I could stuff the guilt, pull myself up by my bootstraps, and try it all again, falling on my bed from exhaustion as another busy, fruitless day passes by. I could struggle to be free from the sin that so easily entangles, struggle to see the future God has for me, struggle to see what in the world God had planned for my time in Chad.
Or I could sit.
I could rest in Christ's sufficiency.
To some people, that solution seems like a passive excuse to sit on a couch all day and waste even more of my life. To be honest, I don't blame them for thinking that. I'm still trying to figure out what resting in Christ looks like from day to day (obviously figuratively, and full of Christianese vagueness … maybe in another post I'll rephrase as I learn more about it myself). But what I'm finding more and more is that as long as guilt is my motivator and my own willpower is my engine, my stamina in running the race set before me is slim to none. I barely start the race before I sputter and die.
The minute I take my eyes off of the gospel of Christ, I might as well be blindfolded.
I refuse to see the truth of what Christ has already done for me. I ignore the strength he has given me to conquer sin. I refuse to trust that he has already planned a future for me that is drawing me closer to him. And I forget that I am forgiven already, by Christ's death on the cross.
And even in this, Christ is sufficient.
Please pray that God would continue to reveal that to me each day.
Monday, February 24, 2014
Getting an F
We had just left Sunday School when a girl was brought to our attention - she had a hole in the front of her calf, down to the bone. She had fell on a plough ten days before, and had gotten the wound checked out by a quack doctor at the market. It wasn't bleeding, and looked pretty well cleaned out to where a roll of pennies would have fit neatly in the hole, but it was oozing, and there were flies swarming on it. We promptly took her to the clinic, where the nurse took a look at it, with the rest of the staff gathered around to see the "exciting" new case.
As they were gathered around, I walked out to the patio for some fresh air where a woman was waiting with a little boy to be seen. I had seen her waiting when we came in, but hadn't really paid attention. I sat down by her, and she shifted the boy nervously in her arms. He was probably 3 years old, wrapped in a blanket, breathing shallow, raspy breaths. After we exchanged names and the woman relaxed a little bit, I touched the boy's forehead. I had never felt someone that feverish, and as the shock spread across my face, the woman uncovered one of his hands to show me it was a yellowish color.
I knew right away that this boy had a lot less time to spare than the girl who was being seen.
What happened after that was kind of a blur, and I think I tried to motion to someone to pay attention to the boy, but after some futile attempts, I gave up and prayed to God that they would get to him in time. What was I going to do? I couldn't speak their language. I had no power to persuade them that he needed to be treated. I had no insight into the way their culture worked. I stayed with the boy a little longer as they put antibiotic and some gauze in the girl's wound, and then went home to grab some things before church started.
I took a physiology exam today. I had goofed off a bit too much this weekend, and was not real serious about finally sitting down to study. I found out I got accepted to medical school last week, and had told someone in passing today that I was ready to coast through the remainder of this semester. My prayer before the exam started went something along the lines of "God, just help me not to fail this test. I don't care if I don't get an A, or even a B, just help me not to fail and I'll make up for it later."
I left the exam feeling pretty good - I had actually done surprisingly well, and was already planning the things I was going to do tonight that didn't involve studying. I obviously wasn't going to have to study as hard for that class. I almost regretted staying up as late as I did last night to study for it since it went so well.
We were walking past the clinic later that afternoon, coming back from a friend's house, when we heard the death wail. My stomach dropped - even after hearing it every few days from the house, I was still unnerved when I heard it. Diane and I paused, once again taking in for a moment the reality that we were standing in.
I had dinner with a good friend tonight who I hadn't seen in a few months. We settled in, got some milkshakes, and started catching up on each others' lives. We were talking about the future, and she was asking me if it ever scared me to think about the responsibility I will have when I am a doctor. I shrugged it off, told her it hasn't really hit me yet, that I'm still just getting through exams and lecture material.
"You can't fail a patient like you fail an exam, you know. That's a whole different story. Have you had an interaction with a patient yet where you have felt that responsibility?"
The memory came to me effortlessly. I started to tell the story about the boy I had seen in Chad, who had been forgotten among the fascination with the girl we had marched in to the clinic right past him. I recounted the responsibility, but also helplessness, that I felt as I realized that I wasn't going to be able to get someone to pay attention to him until the commotion had died down. I drifted back to that moment, sensing the feverish forehead on my hand again, hearing the breaths coming quick and raspy.
My friend was staring at me with concern. "Uh… yeah. Sorry for dropping that on you. A bit too intense, huh?" I nervously laughed it off and changed the subject. We kept on talking and laughing, but I couldn't shake this feeling that I had just sold something off at too cheap a price.
Diane and I were at a funeral a few days later of a little girl who had died of typhoid fever. They hadn't buried her yet, her hands and feet were yellow, her lifeless body still having the traces of the stress of the past few days of battling the illness. She had been at the vacation bible school we had held just a few days before, and the illness came too quick to treat. We lingered for a while, and I saw the woman who had been sitting with the boy the other day in the clinic. I asked how he was doing.
"He died that day," she replied.
It was the death wail that we had heard from the clinic after church.
What if, instead of studying for an exam to get by with a certain grade, I studied in order to understand the wonder and beauty in how God created His people? What if I want to understand the human body so that I can give even just an ounce of the healing that Jesus gave while he was here on earth? So that I can show children and their parents the love of Jesus not just by my words, but in excellence in what I do to care and advocate for them? What if I studied, knowing that by God's grace my diligence would not pay off just with a better GPA, but with fewer children waiting to receive the healthcare that won't make it to them in time? What if I never gave up on another child, finding the mountains in the way of getting them healthcare too foreboding for my God to handle? Father, forgive my complacency!
As they were gathered around, I walked out to the patio for some fresh air where a woman was waiting with a little boy to be seen. I had seen her waiting when we came in, but hadn't really paid attention. I sat down by her, and she shifted the boy nervously in her arms. He was probably 3 years old, wrapped in a blanket, breathing shallow, raspy breaths. After we exchanged names and the woman relaxed a little bit, I touched the boy's forehead. I had never felt someone that feverish, and as the shock spread across my face, the woman uncovered one of his hands to show me it was a yellowish color.
I knew right away that this boy had a lot less time to spare than the girl who was being seen.
What happened after that was kind of a blur, and I think I tried to motion to someone to pay attention to the boy, but after some futile attempts, I gave up and prayed to God that they would get to him in time. What was I going to do? I couldn't speak their language. I had no power to persuade them that he needed to be treated. I had no insight into the way their culture worked. I stayed with the boy a little longer as they put antibiotic and some gauze in the girl's wound, and then went home to grab some things before church started.
I took a physiology exam today. I had goofed off a bit too much this weekend, and was not real serious about finally sitting down to study. I found out I got accepted to medical school last week, and had told someone in passing today that I was ready to coast through the remainder of this semester. My prayer before the exam started went something along the lines of "God, just help me not to fail this test. I don't care if I don't get an A, or even a B, just help me not to fail and I'll make up for it later."
I left the exam feeling pretty good - I had actually done surprisingly well, and was already planning the things I was going to do tonight that didn't involve studying. I obviously wasn't going to have to study as hard for that class. I almost regretted staying up as late as I did last night to study for it since it went so well.
We were walking past the clinic later that afternoon, coming back from a friend's house, when we heard the death wail. My stomach dropped - even after hearing it every few days from the house, I was still unnerved when I heard it. Diane and I paused, once again taking in for a moment the reality that we were standing in.
I had dinner with a good friend tonight who I hadn't seen in a few months. We settled in, got some milkshakes, and started catching up on each others' lives. We were talking about the future, and she was asking me if it ever scared me to think about the responsibility I will have when I am a doctor. I shrugged it off, told her it hasn't really hit me yet, that I'm still just getting through exams and lecture material.
"You can't fail a patient like you fail an exam, you know. That's a whole different story. Have you had an interaction with a patient yet where you have felt that responsibility?"
The memory came to me effortlessly. I started to tell the story about the boy I had seen in Chad, who had been forgotten among the fascination with the girl we had marched in to the clinic right past him. I recounted the responsibility, but also helplessness, that I felt as I realized that I wasn't going to be able to get someone to pay attention to him until the commotion had died down. I drifted back to that moment, sensing the feverish forehead on my hand again, hearing the breaths coming quick and raspy.
My friend was staring at me with concern. "Uh… yeah. Sorry for dropping that on you. A bit too intense, huh?" I nervously laughed it off and changed the subject. We kept on talking and laughing, but I couldn't shake this feeling that I had just sold something off at too cheap a price.
Diane and I were at a funeral a few days later of a little girl who had died of typhoid fever. They hadn't buried her yet, her hands and feet were yellow, her lifeless body still having the traces of the stress of the past few days of battling the illness. She had been at the vacation bible school we had held just a few days before, and the illness came too quick to treat. We lingered for a while, and I saw the woman who had been sitting with the boy the other day in the clinic. I asked how he was doing.
"He died that day," she replied.
It was the death wail that we had heard from the clinic after church.
What if, instead of studying for an exam to get by with a certain grade, I studied in order to understand the wonder and beauty in how God created His people? What if I want to understand the human body so that I can give even just an ounce of the healing that Jesus gave while he was here on earth? So that I can show children and their parents the love of Jesus not just by my words, but in excellence in what I do to care and advocate for them? What if I studied, knowing that by God's grace my diligence would not pay off just with a better GPA, but with fewer children waiting to receive the healthcare that won't make it to them in time? What if I never gave up on another child, finding the mountains in the way of getting them healthcare too foreboding for my God to handle? Father, forgive my complacency!
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