The Place Between My Own Two Feet

This month marks a year since I left Haiti. It has been a year of aching, restlessness, discernment, confusion, and re-discovering truths about the Lord and His love for me in the midst of all the chaos. He has never left me. God is here. He is Father. He is good. In the past year, I have moved three times (four if you count a move from a dormitory to an apartment in the same town). These moves began when I moved from Haiti to Florida to spend time with my parents, then from Florida to Kansas to work at a boarding school, then from Kansas to Nashville, Tennessee where I have been for about a month and a half (with a quick flight to Uganda in the middle of the move, leaving all my personal belongings both in my car and at a friend’s house). This past year has felt crazier and more difficult than the three years I spent in Haiti. I have slept in many places, bought a car, paid my taxes, switched jobs and locations, and most recently started grad school. I have met new people, upon ne...

At the risk of sounding like I have it all together (because I don’t), here are some things I have learned in the past almost seven months of being out of missions. 1. Everyone needs some humble pie... even me. I have learned that I was never holier or better than anyone else just because I had the title of missionary. Since being in America, one of the most encouraging things has been meeting other Christians who are living with missionary hearts in the midst of the world. God very quickly showed me people who have deeper and more committed prayer lives than I do, and who have been living lives of evangelization much longer than I have. So alas, I must confess, I am not the bomb diggity that I thought I was .. unfortunately. 2. I will never stop being on a wild adventure with a loving Savior. Despite leaving a life of frequent transition, lots of community, multi-cultural living, and radical amounts of prayer . . . I am not done being a Christian. Jesus has never left me,...

Mariah (one of our summer volunteers) & Niva It is hard for me when we talk about the poor. I wouldn't want to be characterized and defined by my financial status, because there is more to me than how much money I do or don't make. So why do we do that to some people in the world? To be honest, I sometimes wonder if “the poor” or “people in 3 rd world countries” or any of those phrases should be used at all. Saying “the poor” is actually very impersonal. So I want to break that open today, and shatter it a little bit. Let me introduce you to some people I love. When I try not to waste food at a restaurant, it is not the poor that I am thinking about. I am thinking about Niva. Niva is a sixteen-year-old girl who lived a couple miles down the road from me in Haiti. Niva is very shy and sometimes covers her mouth and hides her face when she talks to me, which means I can’t hear what she says. I have to ask her to repeat herself often. When she repeats herse...

I often wonder if St. Therese was insecure. I don’t mean that as an insult to her. I mean it as a vulnerable window into my own soul. I connect with St. Therese because I love when she talks about her littleness. And I think, “Gosh, I thought I was the only one who feels this way almost every day.” Now I am beginning to wonder if it’s not all of us, or most of us at least. Or maybe it is the youngest child syndrome. In any case, the way St. Therese turned her littleness into a reason to have confidence in God rather than herself helps me to give meaning too to my own feelings of smallness. If I think, “I can’t do it,” well then, I know that I am right. But God in His infinite goodness, power, and might CAN do it, and will do it in me. Therese’s weakness becomes her strength, and I hope this will prove true in my life also. Today, I was reading about how St. Therese became the patroness of missionaries in 1927. I found myself in a moment of panic as I realized that I am not techn...

I just want to take a moment to say thank you to every person who has donated a dollar or said a prayer (or many dollars or many prayers), or who has given me their love and support to help me be on mission for these past six years. I am so thankful to the Lord for this time that I have been blessed enough to spend as a missionary for Him. What a gift! Thank you for your yes to being on mission with me. The three years that I spent in Haiti were some of the hardest and best times of my life. I had to wrestle with a new language and culture, with suffering, with poverty, with my own human weakness, but ultimately learned to trust more in the goodness of God the Father and His deep, unending love for me. While I am convinced that my time in mission will never really be over, I know that God is calling me forward to something different and new. I left Haiti on August 21 st and am confident that this is exactly what the Lord is asking of me at this point in my life. I cannot c...

When my Dad came to Haiti, I remember him commenting after mass one day that for a people who don’t have much, Haitians sing a lot of songs that say, “Thank you, God.” This has stuck with me especially in returning to America. While there are many temptations to say “Well, that didn’t go the way I expected or wanted,” or “What do I do now that I am not a missionary?” I am trying to remember just to be thankful for the past six years that I was blessed enough to spend serving the Lord with every moment of my time. What a gift. And when I doubt or struggle or questions what the Lord’s plans are for me next, I am trying to remember to find my inner Haitian and remember to thank God for His many blessings in my life. While I sometimes feel directionless and confused about where God could be leading me, I have to look back and remember all the ways that He has led me already, and the joy that has come from following Him. I must thank Him for getting to have relatio...

“You just came back from … wherever … you deserve a candy.” “Do you have a job yet?” “Don’t put that food in front of her. She’ll think about starving people and then she’ll have to eat it.”  The things that people think are appropriate to say to a girl who just got back from three years of foreign mission are rather astounding sometimes. Mostly, I enjoy talking about Haiti. I enjoy when people ask me about it because it’s the only thing that I really know how to talk about right now. It’s the most recent passion on my heart. Haiti is what makes me lean in during a conversation. Talking about Haiti may be the only way to get me to say anything significant that I have been thinking. I may even talk about my feelings about it if you are special enough – if I think you can handle it. Mostly, the people who ask enough questions are the ones who are willing and ready to hear it. Other people ask and after a few sentences seemed to be overwhelmed and I feel like I shouldn’t go...

A few weeks ago, we planned to go on a home visit. We went to see Mari-Carmel who lives about a mile away. She was supposed to have twins soon and we heard that one of the babies was turned the wrong way, so she would have to have a c-section but didn't have the money. As I am typing this right now, she is in labor at the hospital. Thankfully, the baby has turned back around. When we got to Mari-Carmel's house, she wasn't home. So we went across the street to one of our teens house's named Lourdy. She also wasn't home. By this time, I was really beginning to ask the Lord what He had in store for us. His plans that day were obviously very different than our own. We started to walk down the street again to visit a woman that Amy, one of the other missionaries, had met before. On the way, we met Pierre, a woman who has three kids that she often can't feed. She has come to us before to get some rice and beans for them. Amanda, Paul, and I are going to be the god...

The Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage came out a few days ago, and I have to confess, I am angry, hurt, and ashamed. But I’m not angry, hurt, and ashamed by the government, same-sex couples who are choosing to get married, the gay pride parades, or the LGBT community. I am angry at the many Christians who have chosen to point fingers and “stand up for what they believe in” while cowardly hiding behind their computer or smartphone screens. I’m angry at the way my fellow Christians are ostracizing people because of their choices, and I want it to stop. I am also ashamed at what I myself have failed to do. Every time I read an article that a Christian has posted, I think about a couple of good friends I have who I once went to Church with, and who have now chosen to live a gay lifestyle. I think about a couple of Catholic friends I have who, despite the same-sex attraction that they feel, are choosing to live celibate lifestyles, seeking grace in the Lord. There are very, very f...

Going back to America consumes my thoughts lately. What will I do? How/when will I find a paycheck? Will I still work in ministry? Will I still be able to serve the poor and preach the Gospel with my life? Or worse, will I forget all that I have seen here? Will it seem less serious when I am not looking at the faces of my hungry brothers and sisters, and serving with them, praying and worshipping with them, helping them find solutions for their school problems and food to feed their children? Will it seem less serious when I don’t see their sandals with holes in them, or when I don’t see Remerson wearing girl’s clothes all around town, or when I’m not listening to Wendi tell me how he wants to go to school? I’m nervous that it will be easy to get sucked back into life, into consumerism, and all that America has to offer. Will I really “GO” again, to make disciples of all nations? Or is this it? Sometimes I don’t even know what I want. I don’t know if I want the things...

Living in Haiti for almost three years seems like an eternity, but it is not very long when I remember that some people have lived here their whole lives. I am still just an ignorant American girl who has chosen to live internationally, while many Haitians were born into their circumstances, and many don't have the choice to live somewhere else. The very fact that I have chosen to live in a poor country means that I am privileged, and I can really never change that, aside from the option to take vows of poverty. I still don’t know how to process all the things that I’m feeling. I think because I understand more of the culture and language now, there’s a bigger burden on me for all the people that I talk to and the conversations that I get to have. I’ve come to the realization that when someone asks for food, their hunger is not a minority, but a majority of the situation in our neighborhood. When someone can’t send their kids to school, it’s the same situation. When a...

My feet are tired. Lately I have a pain in my foot that bothers me most when I wear flip flops or unsupportive shoes. It’s not very painful, but it is constant when it is there. My heart is also very tired. Tired from loving. Tired from wanting others to know Him. Tired from inviting people to mass, hearing them say that they will come, and finding a church that is somewhat empty. Why is my love not enough? Maybe because it’s mine and not His. I can invite, but when He invites they could not refuse, I hope. I am tired from being interrupted during breakfast by a woman who can’t feed her children. It makes me uncomfortable that I feel annoyed putting down my fork to go hear about her hunger. Isn’t that it? The poor make us uncomfortable because we know that we live a life that is unjust. So I put down my fork and let my eggs get cold while I pack up rice and beans, but she also can’t send her children to school. I give her money from my top dresser drawer because I don’t want ...

1. "A mission partner is the same thing as a donor or benefactor." False! A mission partner is really a partner for the mission. I need partners because I cannot go on mission by myself. This means a mission partner believes in the mission of "Leading Teens Closer to Christ", specifically in Haiti. I don't want mission partners who don't really care about what's happening in the mission and don't really want to support it. I want mission partners who love the mission, care about it, pray for it, and are invested more with their hearts than their pockets. 2. "Mission partners just give financial support." FALSE! It is my hope that all mission partners are also prayer partners. Some mission partners are also prayer partners who don't give donations. These are often my favorite mission partners because I know they are making real sacrifices for me. I have had mission partners who take cold showers as a sacrifice, give up drinking co...

Interruptions are a part of my daily life here in Haiti. It is nearly impossible to sit down for a morning to plan ministry, have a meeting, meet with a teen for discipleship, eat lunch, lay in a hammock, or whatever I am doing on any given day, without being interrupted by someone who walks into the gates of our mission base and needs something. It may be a parent who wants to send their child to school, or someone who needs food, or medical help. Sometimes it is just someone who wants to talk or say hello. While I know that this is a beautiful and necessary part of our mission, recently it has been very difficult for me. I often want to be able to finish whatever it is that I am working on. Sometimes I just want to be able to show the person in front of me that they are important, but someone else is hovering yards away, waiting to talk. Sometimes I just want to finish my lunch, or be free for a moment. I have been realizing over the past month or so that sometimes these moments ...

This summer, in our mission in Haiti, we helped nine young adults grow in their faith, be committed to daily prayer, and live out their missionary calling for four weeks. It was part of my job this summer to lead this part of our mission, although I think many of those responsibilities came by accident. When I began dreaming and planning, I had no idea what I would be getting myself into, and didn’t realize that I would be the one primarily responsible for carrying out that plan. Let me tell you all the reasons why I am unqualified for this. I cannot speak Haitian Creole 100% fluently. I have never led summer missionaries before, even in English. I am shy. I cannot think of hundreds of things to say in English, much less in another language. I am scared of people. I cannot sing. (It’s a cultural thing in Haiti that many people lead prayer by starting with a song.) I am lacking in confidence, and afraid of failure. And yet God used me. I’m not sure how or why. I am humbled ...