hold fast

When I moved to Bolivia the first time with Dan, we tried out a number of different churches. We were always rolling up with like 6 or 7 kids - so that is a pretty good test for how loving/understanding/accepting a church is. We never came across any who really didn't want us there, but we often felt bad because the kids were noisy and unsettled and that was distracting and being stared at as the white person with all the Bolivian kids is really my least favourite thing (and it happens every. single. day.) Fast forward to November 2014, and we finally tried the church recommended to us by our Spanish teacher. I don't remember the service, or the sermon, or much else. But what I do remember is walking out and saying to Dan, "well, I think we found it..." When I came back I started straight back up and it was like I never left. (Outside of the kids, it was the thing I was most excited to get back to.) The pastor is awesome, he's a great speaker, goes through boo...

As I picked him up and lay him down to change him, he was in that half-awake, calm and cuddly state. I pulled his onesie over his head, and I saw it, probably for the hundredth time. That scar that runs down his chest, right over his heart. And I realised that today, seven months after it’s owner, that scar turned two years old. Two years ago today, a doctor opened his chest, and fixed that little fighter of a heart, holes patched, good as new, and sewed him up again. And now all he has to remember it by is the white line, long since healed, but still visible. As I set him on his feet and watched him run about, I was awestruck. Grateful, that God gave him this chance, grateful that I had the chance to know him. So incredibly grateful for the amazing people God had lined up to care for him back then. Few of the kids in the hogar have been quite as spoilt as him. And as I thought about this surgery that undoubtedly saved his life, and as I watched him running around in f...

So, I had to type something up for the Mission Partner's Breakfast this morning. I thought I would cheat, and use it as a blog post - because really, I have exactly zero time to type any other one. --- I couldn’t choose one item, so I’ve decided to choose all of the millions of photos I take on a minute-by-minute basis. Each of the photos tells a story - some are stupid, like the day I walked in to find the girls in Casa de Amor had used hundreds of bobbles to make their hair stand on end, or the day the boys in my class decided to give the teddy bears a bath in the water tray because they were dirty (they have yet to fully recover). Some are sad - photos of families who have come to visit nieces, granddaughters, only to be refused permission for the children’s welfare - photos taken because maybe it is all they’ll know of their relatives. Photos of goodbye parties as children come and go with their missionary families, and children learn to say goodbye much earlie...

So, a couple of weeks ago I recorded an interview for Encounter on doubt. Since I haven't blogged in a very long time, and I don't have the inclination to actually write anything new - I thought I would post  what I wrote for it. You may not see the video, ever. It was recorded first thing in the morning. 1. What part have doubts played in your faith as you learn to follow Jesus? I am a doubter by nature. It’s just a part of who I am and how my head works. I’m not talking just God stuff, in general life too. (TV shows really bring it out in me…) But it did show itself most clearly in my relationship with Jesus. I had crippling doubts from I was 9. I remember clearly the night it started, and I lay in bed crying because what if God wasn’t real?! But I was scared to admit it incase people thought less of me, (or less of my parents) and so I just chose not to think about them. But that obviously didn’t work - and it certainly didn’t help with growing in my relationship wi...