heavy heart for addis.

recently, my heart has been heavy for ethiopia all over again.

my brother just got back from a trip to ethiopia with buckner international. the lord is using buckner to do some incredible things in that country. it's absolutely beautiful. please check out his blog for more pictures and stories.

i was at a convention earlier this week for texas baptists. while working the booth for truett seminary, i noticed a mom walking by pushing a stroller that held the cutest girl i've ever seen. i was instantly drawn to the little one. she was stunning for a 17-month-old. while tickling her feet and trying to make her laugh, i couldn't help but think she looked ethiopian. even more crazy, i couldn't help but think she looked familiar. long story short: sweet little maya was in buckner's baby home in ethiopia when i was there in august!! she just got adopted in september. i remember the caretakers telling us that her new parents were coming just a few short weeks after we left. isn't that incredible?! a little girl that stole my heart in addis ababa, ethiopia, captured it again in houston, texas. i also met a man that is in the process of adopting a little boy i saw in the baby home. here's a picture of the two little ones playing together in august:

the little boy in the middle is the one being adopted, and sweet maya's on the right. i wish you could see her face. isn't it crazy to think that those 2 little ethiopians are now texans?! i love it. adoption is such a beautiful thing--not because it's trendy and cool and philanthropic, but because it's such an incredible picture of our relationship with god. also, as believers, i think we should almost see it as a duty or a responsibility. there's really no excuse for us to allow there to be 143 million orphans in the world.

pray for ethiopia. and pray for more families to feel the call to adopt.

prayer.

i was asked to give the benediction at truett's chapel service this week. i'm not one to be easily intimidated, but for someone who doesn't really understand prayer, the idea of praying in front of fellow students and renowned ph.D.s made me a little nervous. i thought about using a liturgical prayer, but i just wasn't comfortable with that. i wanted to sound scholarly and eloquent, but i couldn't get christ's words in matthew 6.5 out of my mind.

all of that to say, i decided to write my own prayer. it's certainly nothing profound, but it's definitely honest and pertains to questions i wrestle with daily. just thought i'd share it with you.

pray with me.

god, we want to know what it means to love you today, and we recognize that part of loving you is obeying you. so thank you that your commandments are not burdensome, but life-giving, as they force us to depend on you.

god, we want to know what it means to know you today, because we recognize that all else pales in comparison to the surpassing worth of knowing you as lord. so may we count all else as loss in order that we may be found in you.

so give us strength today to love you, even when we're not sure we trust you, and to know you, even when we may not feel you.

and now may your peace, which is far beyond anything we can understand or comprehend, guard our hearts and our minds in you today.

amen.

questions.

i found this quote on my professor's blog (dr. michael stroope) and can't stop thinking about it. let me know what you think.

"Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart...

Try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms

and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue.

Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you

because you would not be able to live them.

And the point is, to live everything.

Live the questions now.

Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it,

live along some distant day into the answer."

--Ranier Maria Rilke

if i ever write a book, i think this quote will be on the first page.

hymns.

tonight a couple of friends and i attended the waco community hymn sing. we didn't have to go for school, we weren't being forced to go by parents...we just really wanted to go. i know that might seem abnormal for a group of 20-somethings, but if you know me, you know i like hymns--a whole lot. we sang some oldie-goldies like "when the roll is called up yonder" and "i'll fly away," but we also sang some favorites like "come thou fount" and "in christ alone." that last one is never easy for me.

it probably goes without saying that we were the youngest ones there by about 40 years. i loved it. it's been a while since i've worshipped alongside wrinkly hands, white hair, and walking canes. as i looked around, my heart was so encouraged. sometimes all this faith stuff can be so confusing. sometimes i think it might just be easier to throw in the towel. but then i look at the beautiful people i was surrounded by tonight and realize they've been doing this faith thing for longer than i've been alive, and who knows what all they've seen during their 60, 70, 80+ years on this earth. what an incredible testimony of the lord's faithfulness.

proverbs 16.31: "gray hair is a crown of glory; it is gained in a righteous life."

psalm 145.4: "one generation shall commend your works to another, and shall declare your mighty acts."

oh how i long to be singing of the lord's faithfulness when i have weekly appointments at the beauty shop and my husband has hairy ears--and that it might possibly encourage some crazy young girl to keep pressing on in the lord. 

conversations.

i just got back from a weekend in alabama with some of my closest friends in the world. it was so fun to pick up right where we left off, eating at some of our favorite places, cheering on our auburn tigers, and just enjoying being with each other.

through the course of the weekend, i had a few really thought-provoking conversations. i'm not sure how to make them all relate,  so how about i just make a list? 

1. justin hefner. this boy grew up in lubbock, lived the dream in austin, then fell in love with my best friend and up and moved to birmingham to be with her. he's absolutely experiencing the culture shock that comes with moving from texas to the southeast (exhibit a: me in 2004). it was fun to talk about texas with him and to make fun of him for living in birmingham, but it was more fun to talk about the reason why he's living in birmingham. it blows my mind that a boy would love a girl so much that he would give up everything he loves and everything that makes sense, and step into her world to show her that he values her. wow. maybe i'm making too big of a deal out of this, and i hate to over-spiritualize things, but is that not a picture of christ? pretty cool.

2. katy crane. this girl just spent 6 months traveling the world with ywam. now she's back in birmingham going to ot school at uab. she's a different person--she's the same katy crane that i grew to love, but with a different perspective on life. it was so cool just to be around her and see and hear about how she approaches life in a new way. it was fun to see her bedroom covered in pictures of children's faces from literally all around the world. beautiful.

3. rachel wilson. this girl spent her friday night with people from her church serving dinner to homeless people in downtown birmingham. she talked about how she had always viewed the homeless as untouchables, but friday night completely changed her perspective. she met a homeless man that loved the lord and knew scripture backwards and forwards. it blew her mind. he told her about how he ended up homeless--not because he's lazy and helpless, but just because of a certain course of events. it's so fun to see people be exposed to people that are nothing like them--it HAS to change them. it's so fun when people see the bigger picture of the church and catch the passion and desire to be a part of it. 

4. benji and michael. these are the guys i sat next to on my flight back to texas. they grew up together in a small town in texas. michael is a little slow mentally, and growing up, benji's family was always a safe place for him. michael loves college football, so every year benji takes him to a different college football game. this time they went to see the vols play in neyland stadium. when benji found out i was in seminary, he very point blank asked me what i thought about the church in america. as a believer and an attender of a mega-church in dallas, he had a lot of thoughts to share on this topic and was eager to hear what those of us that study this topic have to say about it. the more we talked the more i realized that benji got it much more than i did. i could talk about statistics i've learned and issues i've observed, but he wanted to talk about matters of the heart. why doesn't the church spend more of its resources on others than on staff salaries? why can't we figure out a way to give all of the tithe money away? why is the church more focused on buildings than community? wow. i didn't know how to answer these questions, because they are questions i'm asking as well. in the end i realized that benji's life--the way he loves the lord and the way he loves michael--is more of a picture of jesus and the kingdom of God than some church buildings i've been to. 

5. bernie moraga. this man works for the cooperative baptist fellowship (cbf). he's in town for something going on at truett, so he and my roommate's dad took my roommate and me to dinner last night. we sat across from each other and had a great time making fun of his english and my spanish. during the meal, he asked me the token question: what do you want to do after you graduate from seminary? of course i tried to dodge the question at first, but then i just started dreaming out loud, sharing with him all the crazy ideas i've had about my future. when i finished rambling, he looked at me very seriously and told me he thought i should get into public relations. i laughed and told him it was too late for that. then, still serious, he told me he meant public relations for the kingdom. i had a hard time not laughing again, because the idea sounds pretty cheesy, but once he started explaining it, i wanted to jump on board. he talked about how the kingdom has too many people talking and not enough people doing. he said i had the option to be pepper and be overbearing, or to be salt and be seasoning; the choice to blend into the darkness, or to be a light. wow. pretty convicting, huh?

sorry this post is long, but i can't get these five conversations out of my mind, and i wanted to share them with you. i hope they challenge and convict you as much as they do me. i hope people can see jesus when they interact with me in the same way i have seen jesus by interacting with these people.