A year ago today my husband boarded a plane alone to Rwanda. He carried more baggage with him than a 3 day trip required. Not just the baggage filled with treasured goodies for expat friends, but the phantom weight of the emotional marital baggage we'd carried, wrestled through, fought, ached, cried and longed over. Baggage that had left us weary, humbled and broken. Baggage that by God's grace had largely been resolved and restored. Would this be the next step in not only resolving but redeeming it?
The summer before we married I spent living with beautiful girls not unlike my daughter Lucy but who happened to be born in Zimbabwe. And who happened to have been orphaned by AIDS and poverty. I arrived back in the States five weeks before we said "I do" and I came home with a newly planted but deeply rooted part of me. A part of my image bearing dignity had been catalyzed in those months away.
As I deplaned and set to life in Richmond, VA, I thought that catalyzed seed was a fully formed plant. Oh, but it was embryonic at best, and I had no clue. It seems that God planned many years of nurturing and carefully cultivating that desire, but I thought it was ready for launch. And so obstinantely, passionately but with good longings, I demanded that it be launched immediately. And so it sort of was. But not without its years of tantrums, demands, self-centeredness, and judgment that belies a lack of grace and wisdom. Though plenty of other parts of us thrived and developed, the incongruence felt in our marriage regarding how terribly I dealt with my good longings and passion created many painful and difficult conversations, fights and years of marriage.
But through many "I'm sorry's" and "I was so wrongs" and a generally humbling seven years, God healed that part of me and us. And He maintained and sustained in both of us a part of the LORD's image created and purposed in us before our parents celebrated our births: a desire to show what God's kingdom is like by using our gifts among the least of these.
Despite deep wounds inflicted, our desire and passion and dignity still had a pulse.
But in August 2012 when Hunter (somewhat accidentally) initiated a potential job in Rwanda at Karisimbi, we walked with trepidation, knowing the marital minefield surrounding us. We walked slowly and we walked together, neither of us rushing ahead. Both of us still very aware of the scars of past wounds. Both of us still feeling the desire and hope for what could be.
We walked together until November 8th when he boarded the plane alone. And we both knew that this choice and decision was his to make. The decision, final interviews, in-person impressions--all of that was his responsibility, not mine. Yes he would yield to and obey God if it felt like that was how the LORD showed him to make the decision. But we knew it might not come down that way; God doesn't always make our choices matters of obedience. Making the decision felt like a weighty responsibility to him, but by God's grace he didn't feel pressured or like I wouldn't support him if he said no. And he was ready to make that decision.
I wish I could say I only delighted in the reality that the decision rested with Hunter. I certainly had an appreciation for how that was Planned. But OH how my heart cried out over that weekend, wrestling with God, writhing for power I didn't have and control that wasn't mine. Until the LORD quieted my soul. But he did quiet my soul.
As I drove to the Dulles airport to pick up my husband knowing very little about how the weekend and interviews had gone, God settled in my soul that my main desire and pursuit that day was toward my husband. He was not a means to an end. As he arrived I felt curious about how he felt, how God had moved in him. I didn't rush the conversation along wanting only to know "SO, DO YOU THINK WE'RE GOING TO DO THIS OR NOT?!" I wasn't manufacturing that patience, I actually felt different. I was less concerned about the outcome and more concerned about knowing him. That was one of the biggest miracles and blessings of that weekend and of this move.
God wasn't only good on August 6th 2012 when Hunter initiated the job or on November 8th when he left for Rwanda. He wasn't only good when he came home on November 11th still shockingly (to both of us) open to the job. He wasn't only good on November 23rd when we got the job offer or on December 15th when we accepted it (don't worry I won't write anniversary posts for all of those).
He was good on September 4, 2004 when we said "I do." He was good on the most humbling and difficult days of our journey to living here. He was good on the days I wept in Richmond because He had legitimately made me want to stay and live and serve there.
He is always good.
"Many, O LORD my God, are the wonders you have done. The things you have planned us no one can recount to you; were I to speak and tell of them, they would be too many to declare." Psalm 40: 5
"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--not by works, so that none can boast. For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God planned in advance for us to do." Ephesians 2: 8-10.
PS, In November 2011 (a year before the interviews), this was the email exchange between Hunter and me:
subject line "thinking about contacting Karisimbi again"
Hunter: you game? nothing imminent but I think I want to start the conversation that I thought about beginning a year ago.
my response:
"you just trying to get in bed with me?"
He was good that day too.
The summer before we married I spent living with beautiful girls not unlike my daughter Lucy but who happened to be born in Zimbabwe. And who happened to have been orphaned by AIDS and poverty. I arrived back in the States five weeks before we said "I do" and I came home with a newly planted but deeply rooted part of me. A part of my image bearing dignity had been catalyzed in those months away.
As I deplaned and set to life in Richmond, VA, I thought that catalyzed seed was a fully formed plant. Oh, but it was embryonic at best, and I had no clue. It seems that God planned many years of nurturing and carefully cultivating that desire, but I thought it was ready for launch. And so obstinantely, passionately but with good longings, I demanded that it be launched immediately. And so it sort of was. But not without its years of tantrums, demands, self-centeredness, and judgment that belies a lack of grace and wisdom. Though plenty of other parts of us thrived and developed, the incongruence felt in our marriage regarding how terribly I dealt with my good longings and passion created many painful and difficult conversations, fights and years of marriage.
But through many "I'm sorry's" and "I was so wrongs" and a generally humbling seven years, God healed that part of me and us. And He maintained and sustained in both of us a part of the LORD's image created and purposed in us before our parents celebrated our births: a desire to show what God's kingdom is like by using our gifts among the least of these.
Despite deep wounds inflicted, our desire and passion and dignity still had a pulse.
But in August 2012 when Hunter (somewhat accidentally) initiated a potential job in Rwanda at Karisimbi, we walked with trepidation, knowing the marital minefield surrounding us. We walked slowly and we walked together, neither of us rushing ahead. Both of us still very aware of the scars of past wounds. Both of us still feeling the desire and hope for what could be.
We walked together until November 8th when he boarded the plane alone. And we both knew that this choice and decision was his to make. The decision, final interviews, in-person impressions--all of that was his responsibility, not mine. Yes he would yield to and obey God if it felt like that was how the LORD showed him to make the decision. But we knew it might not come down that way; God doesn't always make our choices matters of obedience. Making the decision felt like a weighty responsibility to him, but by God's grace he didn't feel pressured or like I wouldn't support him if he said no. And he was ready to make that decision.
I wish I could say I only delighted in the reality that the decision rested with Hunter. I certainly had an appreciation for how that was Planned. But OH how my heart cried out over that weekend, wrestling with God, writhing for power I didn't have and control that wasn't mine. Until the LORD quieted my soul. But he did quiet my soul.
 |
| a picture of me from that weekend that captured my excitement and angst |
God wasn't only good on August 6th 2012 when Hunter initiated the job or on November 8th when he left for Rwanda. He wasn't only good when he came home on November 11th still shockingly (to both of us) open to the job. He wasn't only good on November 23rd when we got the job offer or on December 15th when we accepted it (don't worry I won't write anniversary posts for all of those).
He was good on September 4, 2004 when we said "I do." He was good on the most humbling and difficult days of our journey to living here. He was good on the days I wept in Richmond because He had legitimately made me want to stay and live and serve there.
He is always good.
"Many, O LORD my God, are the wonders you have done. The things you have planned us no one can recount to you; were I to speak and tell of them, they would be too many to declare." Psalm 40: 5
"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--not by works, so that none can boast. For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God planned in advance for us to do." Ephesians 2: 8-10.
PS, In November 2011 (a year before the interviews), this was the email exchange between Hunter and me:
subject line "thinking about contacting Karisimbi again"
Hunter: you game? nothing imminent but I think I want to start the conversation that I thought about beginning a year ago.
my response:
"you just trying to get in bed with me?"
He was good that day too.
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