Things are changing...everything and seemingly nothing all at the same time. Two years ago we found ourselves sitting in a guesthouse in Ethiopia, completely petrified. We were in the middle of a complete "leap into the unknown". We felt an invitation into an unknown process (adoption) in an unknown country(ethiopia). But what we knew, was that we were holding God's hand as He introduced us to something unspeakably great that we had yet to taste. Loving His whole family.
We were introduced to a love, that day in Ethiopia, that we had yet to expierence, taste, touch or be touched by. It was indescribable to be introduced to a stranger...who had always been part of our family. Jericho Zelalem Emmanuel Oestreich, our son who introduced us to the most stunning story of all time. God's great big family...our Great big Family...love created and designed before the beginning began.
That day, our eyes were opened to All of our family that is scattered across continents. Our idea of love, became different as we felt God walking around and introducing us to all His beloved kids. Our family wasn't just increased by one...it was increased by a world!
Our old nationality slipped off our shoulders as we rubbed shoulders at this "family reunion" of sorts. All God's kids, each and everyone. We are connected by God's love. His love pursued me, and is pursuing each person on the planet who was made in His image. The shackles of an inbred, quarreling family felt so freeing to drop! Our country was one of the people that mattered at God's table...but oh there were so many more countries to see, meet and love!
I almost got the feeling that, as we were petrified to board the plane for Ethiopia, not knowing how or what would happen to our life. God was giddy like a parent at Christmas time...sitting on his hands to stop himself from spilling the beans of this beautiful present he was aching to introduce us to. After feeling Him introduce us to Jericho...and the bigness of our family in Him. We have never been the same.
Everything has changed...and yet its all still the same. I feel the drag of mondays, daily routines and the dread of cleaning the bathroom. Can anything be different?
This is a loud shout, "yes!" to myself. To remind myself to not scorn small beginnings. To look around for the small signs of a sprout growing..pushing up through the earth. Unnoticed...but not for long. Today I am recounting the goodness of God and the small, oh so small changes that are here because we fell in love with Jesus and His whole wide Family two years ago in Ethiopia. We just had a family who was put on the street come and stay for the weekend. Total strangers were invited to our dinner table and to rest and take refuge in our home. Of all the times I have started reading the bible in a year...I have never made it to Titus before! My kids play and make believe they are going on adventures to countries like Azerbijian, burkina faso and haiti. They are loving and learning about All of Gods kids. They are learning french so they can talk to the kids when they go to Haiti with me. Little do they know it won't be this year. They talk about our 5 sponsored kids like they are siblings...they care for them and about them. I usually would be planning some sort of family vacation this year for spring...and this march we are shooting to go to Haiti to serve, not be served by our money and time. Jake and I are praying for people together at church. Standing up there and offering people the only thing that really matters...god's heart for them. His love and His care for them. It feels new, scary and strong all at the same time. Its nothing....but everything, all at once. Discouraged, yet I hear a small voice that says to be "encouraged".
"Abraham had two sons: one by the slave woman and one by the free woman. The son of the slave woman was born by human connivance; the son of the free woman was born by God's promise. This illustrates the very thing we are dealing with now. the two births represent two ways of being in relationship with God. one is from mount Sinai in Arabia. it corresponds with what is now going on in Jerusalem- a slave life, producing slave offspring. This is the way of Hagar. In contrast to that, there is an invisible Jerusalem, a free Jerusalem, a free Jerusalem, and she is our mother--this is the way of Sarah. remember what Isaiah wrote:
Rejoice, barren woman who bears no children,
shout and cry out, woman who has no birth pangs
Because the children of the barren woman
now surpass the children of the chosen woman.
We are not children of the slave woman, but of the free woman."
Galatians 4;18
"It is absolutely clear that God has called you to a free life. Just make sure that you don't use this freedom as an excuse to do what ever you want to do and destroy your freedom. Rather use your freedom to serve one another in love; that's how freedom grows. For everything we know about god's word is summed up in a single sentence; Love others as you love yourself.
That's an act of true freedom. If you bite and ravage each other, watch out- in no time at all you will be annihilating each other, and where will your precious freedom be then?
My counsel is this: Live freely, animated and motivated by God's Spirit. Then you won't feed the compulsions of selfishness. For there is a root of sinful self interest in us that is at odds with a free spirit, just as the free spirit is incompatible with selfishness. These two ways of life are antithetical, so that you cannot live at times one way and at times another way according to how you feel on any given day. Why don't you choose to be let by the Spirit and so escape the erratic compulsions of a law-dominated existence?
What happens when we live Gods way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard- things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely.
Since this is the kind of life that we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives.
Galations 5 (message version)
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