We were out for a walk on the beach last night. We were looking at the stars and pointing out a few constellations, and Stephen referenced the planetarium we visited in Dallas a few years ago.  We were trying to remember when we went and which trip to Dallas it was.

“How did we get there? …Wait, did we drive? We had a car! …Wow, we just had a car, and we just got in it and drove wherever we wanted!”

We then proceeded to discuss how nice it was to have a car that we could just go wherever we chose: we didn’t have to stay within motorbike distance, or bike to the office to sign out a truck to borrow, or buy a bus ticket and find someone to drop us off and pick us up. We just went and put whatever we wanted in the back seat!  We had a radio, a cover for rain, and aircon.

The idea seems so far from our lives now, when I leave the house with a helmet.

It’s done. All 90 pages, written and/or compiled by yours truly, with some assistance from other wise souls.

It did require that I read more books, website articles, and constitutions than I would like to admit. But I am so excited about the trainings to come.

And here’s what I learned:

Considering the fact that I have a degree in this field and have read a number of related academic books, I use Wikipedia far too frequently.

It’s surprisingly difficult to separate myself from America and the American system of government and democracy that I know to present an objective view. This took considerable effort and additional research.

And last, I am a nerd. I do find politics intriguing, particularly the role it plays in social development. I am thrilled to be teaching these courses, because for me, politics inspires my faith. It inspires the Kingdom to come through sin-ruined structures. It shows me Christ’s presence in the very forms that save us from ourselves.

So there you have it. The curriculum is finished and sent off, ideally to be translated. And I am off, in just hours, for rest!

Writing your life into a blog is quite intimidating.

I worry that what I write will be misread from what I actually meant. Or that what I write will be simply wrong. I’m prone to be swayed by my current surroundings, my current influences, and my current concerns, which in essence promises foolish commentary. This is heightened by my lack of experience, immaturity, and human nature.

Sometimes I am tempted to take a blogging hiatus. I get overwhelmed. I become fearful that my foolish opinions or misperceptions of these opinions that could offend someone, mislead someone, or embarrass me.

And then I write again. But I feel required to warn you.

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I’m fearful that we don’t help our community enough.

We have tried to be wise. We have established boundaries: the children can play outside, but they know the rules not to come inside; we close our gate when we leave.  We try not to help all the time, but be available to help with medical needs and food.

Often when we tell people that we help with the medical expenses, they are openly skeptical that we are being taken advantage of. If we mention that we help with this or that, we are challenged with long-term development strategies and hindrances.

I do worry about this, primarily because I love them, and I want what is best for them. I don’t want to hinder development or growth. I’m not so worried at being taken advantage of.  Perhaps because I do have more wealth than they will ever know.

But more than anything, I worry that we are letting the hungry go hungry and the thirsty remain in their thirst.  I look at Matthew 25:31-46, and I worry that in turning away a neighbor–telling the kids they can’t come inside or not providing food–I have turned away Christ. I am much more fearful that in the name of “protecting our boundaries,” we have not truly welcomed them in love.  I’m fearful of living in a castle right beside their homelessness, or cherishing fresh oven-baked bread right beside their hunger. And when the kids ask for another drink of water from the oh-so-fun water cooler–and I’m exhausted of bringing it to them day after day–that in saying no this time, I’m turning away Christ.

What if I turned away Christ in the name of sustainability, development, healthy boundaries, and logic?

Further, the horrible human side of me wants you–the reader, the listener, the responder–to put this to rest. To tell me that I am doing something; that I have made an impact in the lives of these children and this community! To tell me that I am doing enough. 

That is a very dangerous word: enough.

But really, you don’t know. I don’t know. The sheep didn’t know they were sheep, and the goats didn’t know they were goats.

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And herein lies a problem I have with “missions”: there is disconnect between “overseas mission work” and the Church. To be overseas, serving the people, feeding the hungry: it’s over-glorified. And really, it’s no different to the calling we have all received, it’s simply in a foreign setting.

We have a really wonderful home church in Mae Sot, but it is sometimes difficult to find enough speakers and musicians to lead each week. When teams or churches are visiting on short-term trips, they are often invited to speak or lead worship. And almost inevitably, guest speakers always begin with something along the lines of, “I was really intimidated to come today and speak to a group of missionaries…” or “What do I say to a group of missionaries on the front lines?”

I specifically remember one sermon where an American pastor kept referring to us–separating out “the missionaries”–as the “hands and feet.”  When we left, Stephen vented, “Doesn’t he realize that he is the hands and feet, too? We left America in his hands!”

When the Church over-glorifies overseas missions, I think there are significant negative effects. For one, it disconnects the Church overseas from the Church in the West, when really, the same Kingdom is moving forward and the same ailments plague us all.  From my perspective, I would rather hear the Church communicate that they are equally a part of this. It seems more encouraging to feel that we are on the same team, with the same vision, facing the same broken world.

I think over-glorified missions also fuels pride in overseas circles. And I think it does reckless damage to interpersonal relationships and ministries around the world. It seems that church is fueling it, and Satan has seized the opportunity.

Each of us faces the hungry, thirsty, and homeless each and every day. Equally, each of us will be surprised at the sheep chosen, and perhaps questioning when we turned Him away.

If I think of the times where in just a split second I instantly just wanted to go home, I can think of three situations.

The first is pretty sensible: my dearest friend got engaged and my sister had her second baby on the same day in March 2011. That was overwhelming, and I just wanted to be stateside to see a ring and hold that sweet little bundle.

The second is absolutely ridiculous: the week I just couldn’t get my hands on the Hunger Games movie; I couldn’t see it in theaters five hours away, I couldn’t find a copy, and I was suddenly so aware of our removal from the society I once knew.

And the third is still too close to evaluate. Last night, I joined a group of girls for football at the local pitch. As we started to play, I quickly realized the common language used on the field wasn’t English. And then as I listened, it wasn’t Thai, or Karen, or Burmese either. It was Spanish.

And I really just wanted to scream.

Another language? Really? I have been working my mind to shreds for Karen, and recently began desperately squeezing minimal Burmese and Thai phrases in between.  And now you’re going to shout in Spanish?

It was then that I decided this would be an effective form of imprisonment or torture: place a group of people who don’t speak the same language in a room, or have speakers play conversations in foreign language. I think it breeds insanity.

For the first few minutes of the game I was just running on frustration. Eventually, I settled into the life I’m so familiar with, where I only know a small piece of what is going on, and I loved the game.  I’ll be back next week, and I suppose before too long I’ll probably pick up a few Spanish phrases, too.

I found a sister-of-a-friend’s blog titled Over Thinking Everything, and she had this tagline:

It’s what I do. It served me well in the scholastic setting. Its benefits are questionable in real life. If it gets on your nerves, you’re not alone. Most of the time it gets on my nerves too. But I’m stuck with me, so I decided to exercise some of it here.

That pretty much describes me–and this blog–perfectly.

This is a crazy little border town, and languages are a mess here.

We’re still studying Karen, and it’s still exhausting.

And yesterday, I had my first Burmese lesson. Well, I suppose I have known “hello”, “thank you”, “milk”, and “don’t have” for quite some time. But this was more official, and for the record, it followed a 90-minute Karen lesson.

We returned from our Karen lesson–with the standard language learning headache–at 5pm with the plan to go swimming before dinner and meeting for prayer with some friends. But we opened the door to swim, only to find a very big crowd gathered round.

First Burmese word of the lesson: police.

The police were coming, so a number of adults and kids had come inside the gate to wait it out. We decided to stay; in general, less occurs with white eyes looking on. We sat down with the kids and quickly became live jungle gyms.

After about half an hour, the police still hadn’t come, and it had been quite a long time with a tense atmosphere. I asked the girl sitting next to me to teach me to count 1 to 10. This is always a great place to start, because it can easily be used in the markets. I actually started working on my Thai numbers for this purpose a couple weeks ago. It was another time filler, actually, but instead of waiting for the police, I was waiting at the hospital one of those many times.  Numbers are also easy to practice during workouts: counting repetitions in different languages, counting backwards the last thirty seconds of a run, or keeping track of laps. I’ve been practicing both Karen & Thai numbers this way, why not add Burmese to the mix?

But that was only the beginning.

It quickly turned into a community activity. I had adults gathered around and more interactive than I’d ever seen. They seemed so pleased, and so happy to be teaching! By the end of an hour, I think I learned how to ask: what your name is, what her name is, and what his name is. I also learned to state: what my name is, what your name is, what his name is, and what her name is. And something about eating fish that I didn’t really understand. Of course, all of the name discussion led to me learning the names of more adults in the community, which is actually really hard to remember when you’re already learning the language they are telling you in; it’s difficult to determine where the new vocabulary ends and the name starts.

At one point, I had a Karen woman explaining in Karen about Burmese grammar, which is one way to throw your mind for a big loop.

It was almost just a teaser of exactly what I’m hoping for in learning Burmese. I am thankful to be learning Karen, but I’m anxious for our sweet friends to be teaching us regularly and helping us practice constantly. I think it will come a little quicker, but may involve day-long headaches, I suppose.

We’re hopeful. And we really are still trying desperately amidst the chaos we call our lives. Can I use this blog as a plug to ask you to please be praying that language would come for us?  We are so ridiculously hopeful, and we’d love to see miracles!