The morning we were meant to depart, I shook her awake in the dismal light of early dawn on the tiny bed we were sharing in my cousins’ flat, and we asked God together what we should do. From that prayer meeting we ended up completely rerouting our course, heading East instead of West, with no planned places to stay and little cash in our pockets.

But it seemed like from that moment on, God was the third person in that car. All conversations reverted back to him, prayer and worship flowed freely, there was a sense of peace and security that followed us even in the strangest of places or precarious of circumstances, a feeling of divine providence as tangible as a cloud by day and fire by night.

I think in total we spent $16 on lodging between the two of us for the whole trip. That was at a campsite north of Crater Lake, where the campsite owner, not even knowing that we had only one sleeping bag between the two of us and a tent that wouldn’t zip closed, brought us his own 40lb sleeping bag and extra blankets out of the blue. The night was warm and we were grateful but baffled.

When we woke the next morning it was below freezing.

A few days later, we stumbled into a little, shabby looking street fair in a little wine town outside San Fransisco. It was put on by a local church to raise money for a prayer rally they’re planning in—of all places—India! And a couple of wonderful old (in body, young in spirit) ladies at a booth ended up praying with and prophesying over us. I’ve rarely felt the Spirit come so suddenly, so tangibly, in any place.

In the same town we were given some antique handkerchiefs sewn full of lavender, and it seemed like everywhere we went from there the fragrance of that place followed after us.

Which brings to mind something one of the women prayed. She said she saw me as shimmering, like with fairy dust, and where I went things I touched would begin to shimmer, too. That image, and other things they mentioned: healing, and music, and BOLDNESS, have been very present in my prayer life as I anticipate this move to India.

I’m learning about the beauty of the Lord as His presence which makes beautiful situations which could not possibly be beautiful without Him.

One night on the trip we found ourselves six hours from home in Fresno, California, sitting in a Winco parking lot by the porta-potties, sometime after midnight, and instead of praying in earnest about a safe place to stay we ended up singing, “Great is Thy faithfulness, morning by morning, new mercies I see. All I have need Thy hand hast provided…”

That is the presence I want to shimmer with like fairy dust and leave behind me like the scent of lavender in the wind.

A frightening title for an email from one’s father. But I was less shocked by the content than he was. Mostly because I’ve been watching for it.

It’s crazy to think that when I was a freshman in college (not too long ago) this was pure mythology. You’d hear whispers of it here or there (the ones I listened for), only from the most well-informed. The common-sense of the time said quite the opposite.

In an abortion talk several years ago at my church I asked the question, “What do I say to my friends who are worried about the overpopulation of the planet?” to a stunned audience with no answer. It was still a valid question then. Now it’s laughable. Only, we won’t be laughing for long.

And yet, even now, when it’s a well-known and highly publicized global crises, sending tremors through the psyches of those wise (or educated) enough to understand the implications, it’s the old view of the world that reigns supreme in the mind(s) of the masses. Our modern fast-past world has out-paced our social conscience, our ability to perceive and adapt, and I fear we will be left in a cloud of dust, unaware till it’s too late to matter.

I sometimes like to ask the question—to, say, a Youth Ministry major— “What do you think of the idea that, throughout your entire career, there will always be more people older than you than younger than you?” Maybe there should be such a thing as a Caregiving Ministry major.

This is from the email, stats originally published in The Future Church: Ten Trends that are Revolutionizing the Catholic Church, by John L. Allan Jr.:

“What we know for sure is that by the time today’s twenty-year-olds reach retirement age, the population of the world will be contracting. The decline will be most aggravated in Europe and parts of Asia, including China, which could lose 20 to 30 percent of its population every generation beginning around mid-century. Declining fertility, coupled with the aging of the “baby boom” generation, means the elderly will be the fastest-growing segment of the global population, leading to substantial increases in the median age in most countries …”

“It took the United States fifty years, from 1950 to 2000, to increase its median age by five years, from 30 to 35. In the first fifty years of the twenty-first century, by way of contrast, Algeria will go from a median age of 21.7 to 40, a jump of almost 18 years in the same span of time. In Egypt, by 2050 the elderly population will be growing twice as fast as the working-age population. In China, the ratio of elders to young people will swell by a factor of four, with 26 percent of the population 60 or older by 2040, meaning some 360 million people. Demographers describe China as facing a 4-2-1 problem: Each young adult will potentially be caring for two parents, plus four grandparents. Brazil is aging at a rate 2.1 times that of the United States and 3.1 times faster than Holland. By 2050, according to the UN numbers, one quarter of Brazil’s population will be over 60, a total of 63 million people …”

“How far and how fast population will drop remains to be seen. The UN’s “low scenario,” which assumes that fertility rates will stabilize at 1.85 and stay there, puts the global population in 2300 at 2.3 billion, which would be a stunning decline by more than three quarters from where population levels are estimated to peak in the second half of the twenty-first century, around 9 billion …”

This is what I’m hoping to do in Kansas City: http://www.ihop.org/Group/Group.aspx?ID=1000041317

I’m planning on taking the May 5–28 Intimacy track and the June 2–25 Intercession track. However, with being stranded here in Turkey, I may only make it to the latter one. I’m praying about how God would like me to go forward from here with this change of schedule.

Acts 6:4 says the disciples “Devoted themselves to prayer and the ministry of the word.” And I believe IHOP’s ministry is just that. I can hardly go anywhere these days without running into someone who’s views on Jesus/scripture have been profoundly radicalized by intersection with IHOP. They are not, in dad’s terms, “about where the Kingdom isn’t” but about where the Kingdom IS. And I believe they take their role in edification of the body seriously.

Like I’ve said before, I believe writing to be my calling, not M-work, and not prayer. But as I explained to a friend the other day, up till now I’ve been spending 5 hours a day working at a high-end clothes store. Meanwhile Ms in North India perish for lack of knowledge. I’d rather be spending 5 hours a day praying and mobilizing for N.I. I don’t believe it puts my calling in jeopardy because I’m able to do other work for the kingdom that desperately needs to be done. I don’t believe I have an excuse to do nothing simply because it would be more convenient for me to stay in California and sell clothes. I think mobilizing is one of my gifts and I believe prayer is an essential and life-long skill that I will use in any country or career in the world. So this path makes sense on a very practical level, too.

On a spiritual level, I’m learning that if we truly believed that “Life is War” we would live very differently. What I am trying to learn is how to declare war in the spiritual realm. I believe that’s what prayer is, I believe that’s what we do when we do God’s Will in a place where His Kingdom has not yet come, and I believe writing can do that, too. I’m going to IHOP and Pleasant Valley to try and glean from them how to do it in the ways they do it best, not saying that either place has everything right or the full picture of what God’s work in the world is. I don’t think I have that, either.

Does that clarify my motivation for you a little more? I absolutely want to keep first things first in this whole process, and let other things fall to the wayside. According to Jesus the first thing is to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” I see writing, prayer, India as part of that. But as I continue to seek his face (another biblical command, per Ps 27) I hope to get a greater vision of the full reality of that in my life, from “my heart will not fear, though war break out against me” to seeing “the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.”

Feel free to pass this on to dad or other’s in the family that ask you questions about this decision-making process. I’m trying to keep everybody up-to-date about where my head and heart (and body) are, all at the same time, and not finding it easy!

I love you and thank God daily for giving me you as a mother.

Love,
Emily

http://www.latimes.com/features/books/newsletter/la-ca-endurability7-2010feb07,0,5302903.story

Writer or non-writer, what do you think? Should we mold to the times, or fight for (as one of the comments says) “a place where writing can be created that’s actually worth preserving”?

“Actually, it IS Christmas,” said Carrie dryly.

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Retail Glory

“Can you wrap that for me?” asked the lady.

“Actually, we don’t gift wrap,” I said.

“You don’t gift wrap?”

“No, sorry. But I can give you a box and some extra tissue paper.”

“That would be fine!” she said. “Oh, is the box unassembled? Would you mind just putting the box together for me? I’ll never figure it out.”

“Here’s an instruction manual that tells you how,” I said. “It’s quite simple.”

“Would you mind?”

“Not at all. There you are.”

“Oh, lovely! Now could you just put the glasses inside the box. I don’t want them to break on the way home. Oh, take the price tags off before you wrap them, would you? I always forget. Thank you, dear. And put the extra tissue paper right in the box with them. Like that. Lovely. Now, do you have any ribbon?”

“Of course, here’s one of our ribbon packets. Have a happy—”

“Wonderful, I’ll take it! Just tie it around the box.”

“I’m sorry, but we don’t gift wrap.”

“Oh, no no. I don’t want you to wrap it, darling. It’s already wrapped. I just need help with ribbon.”

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Tally of Christmas Presents (in no particular order)

#1 being called by my name

It’s apparently a hard one to say. Because of this, until recently, my niece Sophia referred to me as “Auntie Enemy.” Purely coincidently, for a while she was also calling my sis-in-law, Melissa, “Auntie Messiah.” This became particularly humorous when would play tag games and she would run from me to Melissa yelling, “Messiah! Help, help Messiah! Enemy is after me!” Although she’s been calling Melissa “Missa” for a while now, the name “Enemy” (by some encouragement from David) stuck. It was not until two days before Christmas that I asked Sophia what my name was and she responded:

“Eni . . . Eminy . . . Em . . . Aa . . . Em . . . Aa . . . Leee!!”

#2 laughter

At a Christmas celebration with my immediate family Abe and Melissa handed out gifts, each accompanied by by a long note written by one of them—heartfelt and meaningful on Melissa’s part, and of a more humorous nature on Abe’s. They were too funny for me to even attempt to recount here, but they had my whole family in stitches and, believe me, we’re a tough crowd. I do wish I could share that moment with you. I’m still glad I was able to share it with them.

#3 this

#4 new family members

Not just the little ones. Since last year I’ve acquired both a sister and a cousin. And, although Melissa has been more of an immediate blessing (understatement of the year), this recent rash of holidays has shown Kevin to be, arguably, the best maker of green bean casserole on the face of the planet.

Joy to the world, indeed.

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“Auntie Eminee?” said Sophia. “I love you!”

“I love you!” I said.

“Too!” she said.

Currently listening:
Sara Bareilles, Ingrid Michaelson - Winter Song
Vienna Teng - The Last Snowfall

Okay, I’m not really in the snow drinking hot cocoa. I stole this picture off my friend’s Facebook album because it made me happy.

I’m still in Southern California where the sky is drooling and I’m busy. (Those were unconnected thoughts.) I live in a house with a bunch of other busy people. We love and care deeply about each other, but on some days the closest we get to one another is when we’re competing for use of the microwave. Without a common social group, a common history, a common stage in life, commonality in our daily endeavor, shared experience, hobbies, loves, without even, at times, a common perspective on God, finding a deep connection in the hours sheared off at the beginning and end of days can be hard. I’m commonly amused at the irony of applying the word “community” to such a motley  lot, however much I love them.

Modern life doesn’t lend itself to authenticity, even when you’re suffering. Or more so then. And when real relationships fail,  real words can help. Whether it’s saying them, or hearing them, writing them, reading them, finding them. I’ve been reading a lot lately. I borrowed some books of poetry, and some on poetry and one on India from the library, and they have a way of tying me up when I’m unraveling internally, or making me feel like less of a sham when life seems purposeless. I’ve read the preface of one of them, “Good Poems for Hard Times” (ed. Garrison Keillor) over and over again. Keillor writes,

People complain about the obscurity of poetry, especially if they’re assigned to write about it, but actually poetry is rather straightforward compared to ordinary conversation with people you don’t know well which tends to be jumpy repartee, crooked, coded, allusive to no effect, firmly repressed, locked up in irony, steadfastly refusing to share genuine experience – think of conversation at office parties or conversation between teenage children and parents, or between teenagers themselves, or between men, or between bitter spouses: rarely in ordinary conversation do people speak from the heart and mean what they say. How often in the past week did anyone offer you something from the heart? . . . Forget everything you ever read about poetry, it doesn’t matter – poetry is the last preserve of honest speech and the outspoken heart.

He goes on to talk about in culture what I was just talking about in relation to my house mates. A loss of commonality:

The common life is precarious. I fear a future in which America becomes a loose aggregate of marauding tribes — no binding traditions, no songs that we all know, not even ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ or ‘Silent Night,’ no common heroes, no American literature . . . There are no more TV shows that everyone knows: 10 percent of audience is a huge hit. The last singer recognizable to everyone was Frank Sinatra; the last poet known far and wide was Robert Frost. There are no replacements in sight. Today celebrities are people whom most Americans haven’t heard of.

This, I think, is a question that matters. It matters for life, for friendship in this distant, expanded, digital and post-modern world; it matters for marriage and it matters for ministry, especially cross-culturally.

How much can you really share of yourself with someone whom you share nothing else?

A little tired and a little and bruised and scraped on one side, but otherwise perfectly happy.

You’ll have to ask me in person about the adventures and revelations.  My sincere apologies to those of you who can’t;  I’m starved for looking into faces that I love.

~ ~ ~

N: “Did you return the motorbike?”

E: “Yessir, I did.”

“Did they charge you for the damages?”

“Pshh.  No.  What damages?”

“Well, why are you all scraped up?”

“I got into a tussle with a Frenchman—they’re tougher than they look.”

“What?”

“I mean, there wasn’t any damage.  The key was bent is all.”

“And how did that happen?”

“I have no idea.”

I’m bringing seven books: The Thief (Turner), Cry, the Beloved Country (Paton), The Handmaids Tale (Atwood), and Fahrenheit 451 (Bradbury). Only one of which I’ve already read. And the Bible, which oddly is the smallest book I’m bringing. My laptop–the largest. And only one notebook. That required some restraint.

Actually, my entire carry-on is only books and computer accessories. I should probably learn to write more by hand.

We’re flying internationally out of LA, but if they don’t give us one of those little travel packs, that’s okay, cause my dad has already given us each one. When I tried to refuse it he said I’d be in real dire straights if I got stuck on an international flight without socks or earplugs. Mom gave us little medi-packs with the instructions, “If you feel sick, just take ten of those pills.”

I’m looking forward to the elephants, and the weather. We’ve been running the swamp cooler non-stop here, and I’m cold.

Stay tuned for a video blog of the journey.

I guess that’s an object lesson in what our skin-cells look like after a day in the sun.

If you’re feeling inspired for lunch tomorrow, here’s an instructional which is a lot more nifty than my method, which was basically: egg on sidewalk, and splattered about a bit because I cracked it with one hand while talking to Katie on the phone and burning off the soles of my feet.  You know, the way I normally cook.

Speaking of nifty, here’s some great ways to cool down without hurting the planet:

• Hang several layers of dark curtains. Don’t go out and buy some, just use a couple, dark, bed sheets.
• Drink plenty of water. This will also help keep you from getting sunburned.
• Wet a hand towel and wear it on your head.  Turban or Pharoah-style.  People mock me for this (in fact, Nathan just did), but I’ve never died of heatstroke either.  If that’s too much, try rolling it and resting it on the back of your neck.
• Shower in the middle of the day instead of morning.  Don’t shower extra, just save it for the hottest part of the day and then let your hair air dry.
• Wear light colored clothes in cooler fabrics.  I’m chilling in a Goodwill linen dress right now.  There’s no excuse for wearing denim jeans and just running the air con nonstop.
• Plant a tree.  Uhh… it will cool off the earth for future generations.
• Anything you’ve come up with?

I feel like I can’t say anything about hurting the planet without tempering it by saying that, hey, there’s a lot more hurting on this planet than just the environment.  And if you’re going to pay attention to one issue and not another, please mind the following, not the former.

Tonight our all-church bible study is discussing the topic of modern-day slavery.  I’m praying it’ll be an enlightening, and for some life changing, time.  If you’d like to come you’re more than welcome to. I’ll be leaving from my house around 6:30.

Before I left, she said, somewhat embarrassed,  ”I’m sorry, but we somehow have Katie Bear.  I think you should probably take her home with you.”

As long as I can remember, I’ve had this little, scraggly,  stuffed bear named Katie.  She wanders around the house and garage getting occasionally stored away and then found again. Apparently, my niece had absconded with her several months ago without me realizing it.

“Baboo?” Sophia pointed to Katie.

“Bear?” I said.

“Baboo,” she corrected.

“This is Auntie’s bear.  It’s not Sophia’s.”

“Auntie!” she declared, pumping her fist in the air (the wonderfully appropriate ASL sign for aunt).  ”Peas?  Baboo?”

“Okay, but remember it’s Auntie’s.  Can you say ‘Yes, Auntie’ ?”

“Ice,” she nodded.  ”Baboo. Baboo,” she sang, patting Katie’s back and rocking her.

“Time for Auntie to go,” said Christine a few minutes later.  ”Can you give Katie Bear to Auntie?”

“Baboo?”

“Yes, Auntie’s bear.”

“Baboo,” Sophia shook her head.

“Say ‘Byebye, Katie Bear,’ ”   Christine took her from Sophia’s arms.

“Baaaaaaaaaaa booooowoah waaaaaaaboooooooo!” she shrieked.

“It’s okay, she can keep Katie Bear, I don’t mind,” I said.  ”No,” said Christine.  ”Don’t give in to her crying.”

“Hey Sophia, don’t you have a Pooh Bear?”

“Poooowoah?”

“Yeah, you want Pooh Bear?” I found him in the toy box and she grabbed him from me, concernedly, “Poooooh!”

“Stop whining, Luthien!” called David from the other room. Immediately she stopped wailing. ”Baboo, baboo,” she whispered inconsolably, trying to keep a stiff upper-lip.

“Can you kiss Auntie goodbye?” asked Christine at the door.

Still sniffling, she glanced at my bag where she knew I was keeping Katie Bear, stuck her little nose in the air, and pointedly gave Pooh a kiss instead.