This week has reminded me how introverted I really am- not that I am shy or don’t talk, but that being with people wears me out! Someone said yesterday, “If I have to sit around doing nothing Saturday night, I’ll go crazy.” I was thinking that if I couldn’t sit around doing “nothing” Saturday night, I would follow a similar fate.

I am especially grateful this week for the way Tim is getting drawn up into the vision and passion of South America Mission. For years this has been my thing. During this week he has really connected with the staff and fellow candidates and seems engaged in what we are doing. I think also he has appreciated the opportunity to lead worship in the mornings. It has given him an outlet for leadership and service within this community.

I have been particularly impressed with the women I have encountered here, both those on staff, wives of staff members, and candidates. These are women I really respect. They are full of faith, optimistic but realistic, have undergone suffering and are living on, down-to-earth. Mostly they seem remarkably real.

We have heard so many stories of suffering this week. I think one of the biggest challenges we have heard about is adjusting to a new culture. We will be attending cross-cultural training in September and October, and I am praying that it will teach us tools to deal with culture shock and culture learning.

If you have a moment, pray for us. I feel convinced that the single most important need we have right now is for discernment regarding the specific work that Tim will be doing in Peru. As for me, I’m fairly certain that I got into some poison ivy this morning. I will probably go to the doctor for steroids tomorrow, but I covet your prayers for quick and painless healing. Poison ivy generally devours me.

One more week. Our “appointment interview” is Monday. At that point we will probably have a more confirmed schedule and can consider ourselves hired.

We've been asked to spend some time in inductive manuscipt study during this orientation. That's something that I haven't done in a while, and it has proved very rewarding for me both tonight and this morning. Tonight I have been studying the story of the road to Emmaus from Luke 24:13-35. I have a few observations/rantings that I want to unload.

The disciples didn't know that Jesus was walking with them. They were too caught up in their disappointment when things didn't turn out the way they expected. They failed to see that God's plan was working out perfectly- beyond what they could ever ask or imagine.

What if things don't turn out "my way"? Am I going to be too caught up in my disappointment to see that the Lord is walking right beside me and that everything is turning out just how He planned? Better that I let Him lead the way and enjoy His path. He knows how to get me exactly where He wants me to go.
(PS- I hate having these kind of "revelations." They make me nervous about what is next!)

The disciples didn't understand either the events happening around them or the meaning of the Scriptures until Jesus explained them. They thought they knew what was going on and they thought they knew what the Scriptures foretold. They were definitely wrong. I guess I also think I'm pretty darn good at interpreting my little world and that I understand the Bible.

What am I missing? What perspectives and viewpoints am I closed to because of my own sin and because of the culture in which I live? I need to invite the Holy Spirit to open my eyes so that I can understand both the world around me and the Bible in my hand. I don't want to miss out on anything He has to offer.

HIGH: During our first talk on day one, I was really battling to stay awake. Falling asleep in classes, sermons, while driving is actually a complex and ongoing issue for me, one that I have been looking into medically. I was fairly concerned about the next two weeks. The next morning I woke up at 5 am and could not go back to sleep. I think I was mostly anxious about this very issue. For an hour and a half I talked to the Lord about this and begged Him to give me a supernatural alertness during the day, a scary prayer asking for tangible results. I was absolutely alert and focused in an extra-ordinary way. To read this, it may not seem like a miracle. If you were in my brain, you would know otherwise.

LOW: In our second interview, the interviewer knew that we come from an Anglican church but seemed to have some misinformation about what that might mean for us theologically. We did have satisfactory answers for all his questions (I think), but I hated the feeling of being on the defense. Once I had time to calm down and reflect, I realized that the issue was me and not the interviewer. He really did just have some incorrect information and was giving us the chance to correct it.

Overall, my defensiveness was an indicator that I am putting my confidence in me or in this organization but not in the Lord. I want to have a spirit of trust during this orientation and know that the Lord has a plan for me that cannot be thwarted. I’m not trying to impress anyone. I’m trying to disclose everything I can so that we can discern together the next steps.

I am sitting in the kitchen of the apartment we'll inhabit for the next two weeks. I just finished unpacking, and Tim is in the "living room" (2 feet away from me) practicing his guitar in preparation for leading worship in the morning. I feel so happy, like all my dreams from the last ten years have been left behind in the dust of this new emerging wonder. Here I am really preparing to be a missionary AND I have Tim with me. More than I could ever ask or imagine!

We're at our Candidate Orientation for South America Mission and so far we are impressed. We had an overview lecture this afternoon and then a dinner together with the SAM staff, all the candidates, and children of both staff and candidates. As they unpacked their vision and values, Tim and I both felt a deep sense of peace about the way the desire of our hearts aligns with theirs.

I'm also thrilled to be here with tons of young kids and TWO babies (1 month and 2 months)! We have already volunteered ourselves to take over kid-watching some nights and have been assured that we will not be denied. Yes!

One other note. We have five interviews in the next three days, and I'm intimidated!

I just finished reading Darrow Miller's Discipling Nations and am struck by his suggestion that it is a problem of worldview (assumptions about reality and the way the world works) that is causing impoverished people and cultures to remain in poverty and not a problem of too little resources in the world, too many people in the world, exploitation, or imperialism. I am inclined to believe the guy, although I'm not ready to stake my life (or ministry) on it yet. I think the best explanation of what the book proposed is actually encapsulated in a quote from another author, who explains a third author's perspective (maybe I ought to just stop reading new books and go back to the ones written in the first 1000 years of Christianity).

According to Augustine, culture is not a reflection of a people's race, ethnicity, folklore, language, or heritage. Rather, it is an outworking of a people's creed. In other words, culture is the temporal manifestation of a people's faith. If a culture begins to change, it is not because of fads, fashions, or the passing of time; it is because of a shift in worldview- it is because of a change of faith. Thus, race, ethnicity, folklore, politics, language, [and] heritage are simply expressions of a deeper paradigm rooted in the covenantal and spiritual matrix of a community's church and the integrity of its witnesses.

The reason he spent so much of his life and ministry critiquing the pagan philosophies of the world and exposing the aberrant theologies of the church was that Augustine understood only too well that those things matter not only in the realm of eternity determining the spiritual destiny of the masses, but in the realm of the here and now determining the temporal destiny of whole civilizations.

George Grant, The Micah Mandate

Interesting thoughts. If they are true, they have serious implications for compassion work in developing nations (and for life in Charlotte, NC as well).

Why Supe? Most of the "experts" say I should be going to a people group that doesn't yet have a viable, reproducing church. Mainstream Peru wouldn’t fit that criterion. Some say Peruvians should be sending their own workers to Supe. So why am I going? The most meaningful answer I have come up with is that we honestly feel that this is where God is calling us. In that case, "missions strategy" is irrelevant.

One time, when Jesus was sending a bunch of disciples out to different cities, he told them, "The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few." (Luke 10:2) I don't want to drum up my own plan for where to go. I want to go where the harvest is plentiful, where there is plenty for me to do, and where there are people ready to receive what I have to offer! The mayor of Supe asked long-term missionaries Cesar and Grace Cubas to come work in his town. The Cubases have been in Supe for about a year and are begging SAM to send more workers. The town, they say, is wide open for all they have to offer.

So I'm going to forget strategy for today. I'm going to lay down my notions of what work counts and what doesn't. I'm going to respond to the spiritual and economic need perceived by the government of this town, the people of this town, and the missionaries in this town. I'm going to follow the Lord to the place He is showing me and trust that my greatest joy is in serving Him there. I'll let you know how it goes.

Well here is the world's cutest baby (I'm sure any parent who reads this will politely disagree, but so far I'm convinced).

Molly Caroline Metzl was baptized yesterday morning, and we are the uber-proud godparents.

Tim and I are determined that when we go to Peru, we go as the front line of an army of people, only the tip of a massive glacier. The further we get into this thing, the more I realize that I can't do it alone. And the further I get into it, the more I realize that financial support is the very least of my needs. I need a community of people lifting me up in prayer, helping me sort through the logistics of the thing, calling and writing, bringing me back to the truth when I start to feel hopeless. It feels like it was easy enough for God to find someone to send to Peru. I've been dying to go since 9th grade. The hard part (from my perspective, not His) is finding the people to stay behind and do the backstage work that makes this production possible.

Today as a group from church gathered at the Sircar's house to pray for us, I felt unworthily honored by the people God is raising up to be the bulk of that glacier. Four and a half years ago, I came back from a short trip to Honduras with the conviction that my time on the mission field had not arrived. I felt convinced that I needed to wait for the moment when I could be sent with a community and from a community. As we prayed, that hope came back to me, and I felt astounded by all that the Lord has done to bring answers to those desires. I want to acknowledge some of the ways that provision is being manifest right now.

Thank you, thank you...

• to the Lord for providing me a partner for life and ministry. Tim is more than I could ever ask or imagine.
• to Tim for stepping out onto a limb and giving this a shot. It won't be easy, but it will be good.
• to Marty Metzl for showing me the dedication and servant's heart of Christ as I have never seen it before in her eagerness to partner with us and to mobilize our church to do the same. When I grow up, I want to be like Marty. Seriously.
• to Anna Sircar for the woman she is and inspires in me, and for her hospitality today as she opened her home and invited our church to come and pray together with us for Peru
  
• to the Pinkstons for their steady care and love, from lunch my second week at Kings (in 2000) to a tasty chicken salad this afternoon

There are so many more people to thank, but in general I really do want to express my awe to God, who is crafting a community of partners for our work in Peru. A small and earnest excitement is growing in me about the grace, faithfulness and love I think I will encounter this summer as we work to recruit this team. I am not worthy of such an honor and calling.

Here's to my dad! Last week I had to fill out some personality tests, which basically tried to discern whether or not I am crazy. I had to respond to true/false statements like, "I am sometimes possessed by evil spirits" and, "Some animals make me nervous" (actually that one's true-- I really don't like raccoons). So one statement was "My father is a good man." These aren't really the reasons I answered "true," but they are at least some things I appreciate about him.

1. He looks great in rabbit ears, doing a duck walk, and kissing a fish.
2. He is a fabulous photographer. I have inherited from him a love of beautiful things.
3. He is a remarkable writer, thinker and reader. I see those things becoming more of a trend in my life and am pleased to watch myself becoming more like him in those ways.
4. He is creative and eclectic. My first musical influences from him were Leonard Cohen and the Beatles, both of whom I still love.
5. He is a sentimentalist and a lover of tradition.
6. He's a world traveler (lives in Istanbul right now) and lover of unique cultures. He has given me a fascination with exploring new areas and new people.
   

School will make you loopy! Here's a photo from the "fiesta" my Spanish 4 class had the last day of school. They're one spicy bunch.




Well I'm officially done and on to my next job- preparing for Peru. It seems like every other day someone asks me to give them my entire schedule, so here it is if you're interested:

June 13- June 23 at the beach! (home June 18 for Molly's baptism)

June 25- July 6 Orientation with South America Mission in Waxhaw, NC (I think this is the part where we finally get hired.)

July 7- July 18 visiting family and friends in Maine

July 19-Sept 4 home in Charlotte moving all my worldly possessions into storage, raising financial support, and wrapping up life in general

Sept 5- Oct 18 Cross-cultural training in Rutherfordton, NC

And then we're off to language school in Arequipa, Peru! After language school (at whatever point Tim feels confident with his Spanish) we will move to Puerto Supe, Peru for 2 years.

If you're interested in seeing some photos of Puerto Supe, click here.