We spent the month at the University of Nations YWAM headquarters in Phnom Penh– basically a 7-story dorm, church, and hostel. And the best part– the open rooftop.
That rooftop was a refuge for us– not that we were going through anything particularly difficult. But it just felt like, as we climbed those seven flights of stairs (slowly and with much labored breathing, even after three weeks of climbing up and down) we were leaving all of our crap down below and just entering into a Holy place. A place to gain perspective, to be alone, to feel the wind and just breathe deep His glory and His Spirit.
The Lord taught me some incredible stuff this month, particularly about two things: choosing to love, and choosing joy.
These lessons in choosing joy were especially important for my last three days in Phnom Penh, after my wonderful computer was stolen.
Yeah, it still stings a bit.
I won’t lie to you, I cried that first night after it happened. My computer was my way of contacting home and editing pictures so that everyone could see what we were doing over here! It had my daily travel log of what we did every day, because I have a terrible memory, so it helped me remember the little things. It had a ton of pictures and videos of my precious nieces and nephew. I mean, there are some seriously personal journal entries on that computer! And I had just downloaded the Decemberists new album! Now someone random is enjoying all of that, or it’s been stripped and is now being sold in one of those markets I love so much.
Jerks.
BUT… The Lord did something really cool through this. The next day I was really upset and just went up to the roof and kinda talked to Him about it. And this is where He brought me: even though I was going to continue to pray for it to be returned, I was thankful for the following reasons:
1. I had on that very same day been talking to Andrea about how I wish I watched fewer movies and tv shows. There is so much other stuff I want to do, to learn, to read, and I waste an abnormal amount of time watching movies. No computer, no temptation to watch movies! More fun things get done!
2. THANK YOU LORD I had just backed up all my pictures to an external hard drive that very same day. AND the thief didn’t take my hard drive– even though it was plugged into my computer! He unplugged it and left it there. He also left my ipod and speakers, which were next to my computer, and he didn’t take Jonathan’s camera or iPod, which were both sitting on the bed. He walked past all that other stuff to take only my computer. The Lord definitely protected me in this.
3. My pack is lighter! Granted this depressed the crap out of me as I was packing it up for the first time, but I was thankful for less weight in the end.
4. I can now return to good ol’ pen and paper! I even bought a KILLER handmade journal that I’m going to make into a kick ass scrapbook, since my computer was my scrapbook before.
It’s just a computer. I still have to remind myself of that every once in a while, but it’s still true. It’s just a computer. And even in that, the Lord protected me and showed me the joy in a crappy situation. He showed me that sometimes, we just need a new, higher perspective.
P.S. This also means waaaaay fewer blogs from me. I really did a terrible job at blogging before, but I at least would do picture blogs sometimes. Now I can’t even do that! I even had 6 picture blogs all planned out to show you guys about last month in Cambodia, but now I don’t know that I’ll be able to post them. :-/ I’m sorry. I’ll try to get better at just writing blogs!
