hello all! long time no see! this month we are on a compound three hours outside the capital of ethiopia (one hour from the nearest place with wifi). the organization is HOPEthipoia, & their main mission is to be a place of hope to the surrounding village. one main way they accomplish this is by providing housing to 32 children who have been orphaned. our day to day ministry looks drastically different. some days we are playing with the children, teaching them bible lessons or helping them with homework, gardening, cutting the grass, helping replant trees, laying cement in new children’s homes, praying around the compound, helping in the kitchen & other miscellaneous tasks that can help our hosts. while the day can include a lot of hard manual labor, many hours are spent relaxing with a good book, movie, playing cards, talking with friends, coming up with odd games no one would ever play with access to the outside world, having ping pong tournaments, throwing a halloween party, working out & laying in our sleeping bags under the most beautiful stars i have ever seen. i have absolutely loved my time checked out from social media & honestly from anything happening outside our little village.
one of my goals this year was to read The Chronicles of Narnia, & this is the month it finally happened! currently i am halfway through the fifth book, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. while they have been a very simple read, & honestly a wonderful way of checking out & getting some alone time for a little while, they have really made me think about the way i view God, which as i have blogged before is a big theme i am pressing into. the ways c.s. lewis describes Aslan & writes him into the different stories is such a simple yet complex, beautiful way of describing God. in book one we see creator, in book two we see the sacrifice for those who deserved to die, in book three we see breath of peace, master orchestrator & comforter, & in book four we see leader & healer. there are many more adjectives used & i would highly encourage you all to read the books to hear how lewis writes.
here is one of my favorite scenes thus far: he was no longer afraid that the Voice belonged to something that would eat him, nor that it was a Voice of a ghost. but a new & different sort of trembling came over him. yet he felt glad too. he turned & saw, pacing beside him, taller than the horse, a Lion. it was from the Lion that the light came. no one ever saw anything more terrible or beautiful. but after one glance at the Lion’s face he slipped out of the saddle & fell at its feet. he couldn’t say anything but then he didn’t want to say anything, & he knew he needn’t say anything. the High King above all kings stooped toward him. it touched his forehead with its tongue. he lifted his face & their eyes met. “
as the scene later explains, Aslan had been orchestrating the events in this boy’s life so that he could save a city from an impending army. however, all the plans the boy had had been going utterly wrong & he felt so unlucky. Aslan says, “i do not call you unfortunate” & begins to explain that he was the main cause of all the boy’s “misfortunes.” what a beautiful image of God. he is always present, orchestrating our lives, bringing all things for his good, even if we can’t understand. he is the great I AM & yet he still listens to our sorrows. he is so holy that we cannot see his face, yet he still stoops down to us, as Jesus, & lifts our face & opens our eyes. he always has my good in mind, even if i must suffer along the way. because he’s not safe, but he’s good. he’s not a tame lion, but he’s good!
