This has been ruminating in my mind, a quote from one of my favorite authors, Fredrick Backman in Beartown.

“Hate can be a deeply stimulating emotion.
The world becomes much easier to understand
and much less terrifying
if you divide everything and everyone into friends and enemies,
we and they,
good and evil.
The easiest way to unite a group isn’t through love,
because love is hard.
It makes demands.
Hate is simple.”

I’d gladly recommend anything he’s written. He’s a brilliant analyzer of the society that surrounds us and the realities that make us. But this quote from Beartown is so well said, as I watch the world right now–in particular my American world. It is so close, and yet so far away from me.

And it is so divided.

Love IS hard. It demands so much of us.

I have just been letting this roll around in my mind for a few days, wondering where I’m contributing.
Am I adding to the love or the division?
Am I creating a we|they or an us?
Am I dividing or unifying?

In 1 Corinthians 13, we see all the demands of love: love is patient, love is kind, love does not envy or boast, love is not arrogant, love is not rude…love bears all things, love believes all things, love hopes all things, love endures all things.

{Love is HARD.}

I’m trying to love anyway.

I think I’m with many–dare I say all?–when I say that it’s been a challenging season.

There have been so many beautiful moments that came out of our quarantine, and I don’t want to miss that.

Oh, I don’t want to miss it. This season with our son and as a family of three: to have so much time together just before we celebrate one year with him, while still living so engrossed in a community? This is something we are so grateful for and will forever cherish as a gift to us, just as he is.

And while I don’t want to miss the beautiful moments, I also don’t want to ignore the messier, uglier ones.

While we can’t host classes yet, we have welcomed our employees back to work. It’s been truly harder than just going back to normal: without normal routines of school and church and a neighborhood full of stir-crazy kids (including our own), we are trying to produce something. It’s a lot of work.

This week we hired a new employee, in somewhat epic proportions for our little home. He’s nearly full time, and–if I’m honest–it feels risky. It’s a risk of our time and energy and investment. It’s a risk for our family and our time together. It’s a risk for us financially.

Today, I was talking with one of my best friends in the community. I love her, respect her, learn from her often. We talked about her family, her kids; my family, my kids.

And for some reason, today I saw that she is in poverty. She is thriving more now than before, but in poverty. She is still there, her kids are still struggling to get out of it. Her kids are still walking in the challenges of it, as they go to school and marry and have kids and live life. The cycles are there, in the life of one of my best friends. And even ten years later, and with years ahead where I’ll keep fighting for her: there is so little I can do about it.

The cycles. The investments. The risks. The work. The choices.

That’s what has felt the most significant to me: it is a choice to create work and produce things together amidst the chaos. It is a choice to risk and hope and believe that God is making something grow. It is a choice to keep fighting cycles. It is a choice to keep hoping for wins when you see losses.

_____________

Late tonight, after all the [necessary] to do list items were completed, I took the recommendations of a husband who knows me better than I know myself, and I jumped rope and did my yoga.

I breathed in and out. And I listened to It Is Finished by Passion.

It is done, it is finished
Christ has won, He is risen
Grace is here
Love has triumphed over death forever

Strongholds
Bowing to the Savior
Resurrection power
Over every circumstance
His word stands final and forever
It will not be shaken
He alone has won it all

…This is how I fight my battles | This is how I fight my battles

I thought of our home and how grace is here. I thought of every circumstance, a God who is unshaken and winning. I thought of my battles: being fought over a day of making things work, of taking risks, of hoping.

I’m fighting my battles my jumping rope while being reminded that Christ has won. By breathing in and out over my yoga mat reminded that His word stands final and forever. By getting up and investing again tomorrow, knowing strongholds bow to the Savior. By taking risks believing in the power of the resurrection.

I want to choose honesty here and just say that sometimes I’m not sure if we’re getting this right. I’m not sure if we’re getting anywhere. I’m not sure if the cycles are being broken. I’m not sure if the seeds are growing or things are changing.

And while I make the choices and risks and investments of myself, I worry about the ones that affect my son. I worry about the thousands of dollars invested in this neighborhood, in us, and in our friends.

Grace is here.
Grace is here.
Grace is here.

This is how I fight my battles.
This is how I fight my battles.
This is how I fight my battles.

I’ve been sitting in the stories of Ahmaud Arbery as I come across them. Sitting, reading, listening, praying, considering, mourning. I ran with them beating on my chest.

I’ve been sitting on this from @JahnaRiley: “Question for the white folks on my tl: What are you doing to make sure that you’re raising children who won’t kill mine?”

And then we watched Becoming this weekend and felt more American pride than I have in awhile. I remembered why I loved the Obamas, why I read all their biographies, and why I’d vote #michelleforpresident any day. One scene in particular stayed with me, though: a little boy, maybe about ten years old, screaming and celebrating as the Obamas entered the White House. A little boy of color celebrating a President of color; someone that looks like him, entering the White House. 

Today, my son laid on my chest as I read Blink by Malcolm Gladwell, where he writes about the snap, subconscious decisions we make. He talks about race, about our implicit biases, about the dark judgements we want to pretend aren’t there. 

But they are.

Gladwell quotes Aronson, a psychologist, “After the O.J. Simpson verdict, one of the jurors appeared on TV and said with absolute conviction, ‘Race had absolutely nothing to do with my decision.’ But how on earth could she know that? What my research…show(s) is that people are ignorant of the things that affect their actions, yet they rarely feel ignorant. We need to accept our ignorance and say ‘I don’t know’ more often.”

I think today I just need to sit in the I don’t knows.

______________

This weekend Stephen and I finished reading Generous Justice by Timothy Keller. In the last chapter he writes, “God created all things to be in a beautiful, harmonious, interdependent, knitted, webbed relationship to one another…This interwovenness is what the Bible calls shalom, or harmonious peace. ‘Shalom’ is usually translated ‘peace’ in English Bibles, but it means far more than what our English word conveys. It means complete reconciliation, a state of the fullest flourishing in every dimension—physical, emotional, social, and spiritual—because all relationships are right, perfect, and filled with joy. …Specifically, however, to ‘do justice’ means to go to the places where the fabric of shalom has broken down, where the weaker members of societies are falling through the fabric, and to repair it. …The only way to reweave and strengthen the fabric is by weaving yourself into it.”

This weekend was also American Mother’s Day. My first since we brought home our son, and falling exactly one week before we celebrate one year as a family of three. 

We’ve been weaving ourselves together for nearly a year. 
We’re trying to weave ourselves into a community that speaks a different language than all of three of us.
We’re trying to figure out how to weave ourselves into the healing of racism around the world. 
We’re trying to weave ourselves into justice.

But I am ignorant in all of these things. 

I don’t know how to use my privilege to bring reconciliation.
I don’t know how to raise a son of color or adoption; of shalom, of reconciliation.
I don’t know how to reweave the brokenness of my neighborhood, nor our world.

______________

Somehow, all of these are colliding together, demanding connections and conclusions that aren’t my specialty. 

I’m overwhelmed. 

Overwhelmed for myself, and how I blink; how to weave myself into shalom. 
Overwhelmed by my own ignorance. 
Overwhelmed for my country, my friends, my family, my son.
Overwhelmed for justice.

On 20 March, when we heard the first word of Thailand closing down for Covid quarantines, I hated the idea of stopping everything we were in the middle of.

We had plans for the summer months here: English classes and Bible classes, extra training for The Reinforcers that were just taking off, youth nights and movie nights, a Bible study leading up to Easter. We would still continue Flour & Flowers and sewing and guitar lessons. Oak was loving school and thriving; learning three languages and making friends across so many cultures.

And then it all stopped. So suddenly.

I felt disappointment, like so many other people around the world. The fear, the unknowns, the questions. We all felt it.

And then I felt some thing else, but I’m not sure every one else did or not…

I wasn’t sure I wanted to go back. And even more, I wasn’t sure I could.

There are parts of me that have wanted to get out of this community nearly since we got into it. So many days I love it, and so many days I want to run in the other direction. So many days I think we might be making it, and other days I know I’m so far in over my head.

But, whether for personality or situation or Jesus, we just kept going. We knew it was right, so we moved forward. We knew we could do today, so we did it.

There was enough good that we hoped.

But we’ve never stopped quite like this before. We’ve never had the community pulled out from under us and found ourselves all alone in our house.

I’ll admit I loved having the kitchen to myself. I loved that I knew exactly where everything was every time I went in there. I loved that I knew it was my fault if the ants got into this or that.

That was the first thing I noticed: I wasn’t sure I wanted to share my kitchen again.

But I also loved that I didn’t have to be showered and dressed by nine every day. I loved that we had all our evenings together, just us. No English lessons or guitar lessons or anything. Just us.

I sort of loved speaking English all the time. It’s so much easier. I just studied my language every day, learning a few new vocabulary words, and then it was back to easy-peasy English.

I loved spending so much time with my son. I didn’t worry about who he was attaching to or if I was giving him enough of my attention. He most definitely was getting enough attention all day every day. I didn’t worry about his exposure to drunkenness or profanities I don’t even know or toy guns. No one tried to show him a phone of something I wasn’t sure what it was; or tried to feed him yet another snack.

I loved the time I got with my husband, not struggling to stay on top of our to-do lists or what had to be done by tomorrow; not jealous for his time with teenagers and projects. I loved the time we spent on bicycles and walking; the long conversations. I loved how many times we made breakfast together in the kitchen that now had space for both of us.

In short, it was just easier.

Community living is hard. Opening your front door is hard.

And a part of me just wanted to keep it closed or moved away or just…choose easier.

I’m not even sure that would be bad. I think more importantly, it’s caused me to ask all the questions.

Maybe just because it’s easier doesn’t mean it’s really what I want.

I want to be a person who shares, whether it’s food or money or kitchen space or control or life or time.

I want to be a person that is sometimes uncomfortable for the sake of someone else being more comfortable. I want to value connection enough to work for it, study for it, and perhaps literally groan for it as I struggle to recall the word on the tip of my tongue.

I want to be a person that lets my child experience life, and I just want to experience it right along with him. It’s okay if that pushes us to talk about both drunkenness and asking before eating snacks at age three.

I want to be a person who shares my husband because he can contribute so much to so many. I also want to be someone who cherishes the time with him, even if that is in muddy mess of doing life together.

So in some ways, we’re going back to complicated next week. We’re opening up our doors again. There will be more languages and more chaos and more drama and more mess.

I’m just hoping I’m up for the challenge.
I’m just hoping there is enough good to keep hoping.