A Million Times

To say the last five years have been hard is to put it mildly. From 2019-2022 I endured a lot of hard. I wrote about the bulk of the hard in this post. 

Then one day earlier this year, wallowing in self-pity, I complained to the Lord that I felt as if I had been left all alone in a desert. Then he reminded me of the truth of scripture that I can't go from his Spirit - I literally can’t be apart from him. No matter what I feel the truth is I'm not alone. My feelings were false. 

To replace the false image, He gave me a new image. This one was a visual of me in the desert with a 3D spiral of Father, Son and Holy Spirit surrounding me.

 

A week or so later my mental image was expanded - I was in a wilderness inside a spiral of the trinity with a pillar of cloud by day and a fire by night. There was also a group of people who regularly pray for me acting as my rear guard.

Then I did a debrief retreat processing the hard of the past 4 years. I talked about this in my last post. I spent the week in Psalm 139 and listened to a song called “Never See the End." 

It says 

"Though we pass through the fire 

Or we pass through the flood 

You will be with us 

Though we walk through the valley 

The darkest of night

Your love will be our light”

I’d done a timeline of the past 4 years - valleys & hills showing how dark, how hard, how low, how fiery my time had been. My mental image was expanded. As in the night when one can't see the sun, in dark valleys we often can't see Christ. But it doesn’t mean he’s not there. The clouds or the darkness may hide his face but it doesn’t change the truth of his steady presence. 

Then I read this:

"Not only is God all around us 

Not only is Christ with us 

Not only is the Spirit within us 

We are forever in Christ Jesus." 

-Adam Ramsey

Completely filled, completely surrounded, he’s inside of us and we’re simultaneously inside of him. So no escaping his presence. Nothing can penetrate the shield unless he allows it. Never alone. Safe in him.

After all of that, I stumble upon this song my old friend Patrick Mayberry recently wrote. He sums up this journey pretty well.  

A MILLION TIMES

I've seen my fair share of ups and downs

I've walked some hard miles on shaky ground

But from the place that I am standing now

It's clear to see

You were right there with me

All You've ever been

All You ever will be

All You ever are

Is faithful, faithful

At least a million times

I've seen it with my own eyes

All You've ever been

Is faithful, faithful

I've had plenty and I've seen drought

I've been on fire and I've burned out

But from the place that I am standing now

It's clear to see

You were right there with me, yeah

As sure as the sun's coming up every morning

I'm sure of the promise my Father is for me

His grace, His kindness, His favor keep coming

What a faithful, faithful God

What a faithful, faithful God

Psalm 107 and My Story of Redemption

“Has the Lord redeemed you? Then speak out! Tell others he has redeemed you from your enemies.” - Psalm 107:2 

This is a story of redemption. This is a story of living in darkness, feeling abandoned and forsaken from the Lord for more than four years. But I’m here to say that the dark valley will come to an end. 

"Has he redeemed you? Then speak out! Tell others he has redeemed you from your enemies.” He redeems but he does it in his own time. For me, it took four and a half years to finally be able to see the beginnings of redemption. I wish I could say wildernesses will take 4 hours or 4 days or at most 40 days. But I can’t.

Earlier this year I did a debriefing retreat. My assignment was to to map out a timeline of the last four years, the worst four years of my life. Many do a linear timeline. Being the visual person that I am, I decided to show it as a series of hills and valleys. 

“Some wandered in the wilderness, lost and homeless. Hungry and thirsty, they nearly died.”

Psalm 107:4-5 

In January of 2019, I was plunged into deepest darkness. Sleepless nights, lots of weeping. The losses of the first four years overseas finally crashing down on me. I began feeling intense, almost daily, spiritual oppression. Honestly it was so intense it felt like Satan had moved in with me. I didn’t feel safe in my own home. I experienced the worst anxiety of my life. My body would shake involuntarily. I often couldn’t eat. Even when I was reading the Word, it felt like Satan was screaming at me. He infiltrated my dreams as well. 

In addition to these attacks there were other crushing factors. I was facing a probable visa rejection for the first time in my city. I was living alone and hated it. And there was a situation that had shattered a short-lived hope for a spouse. I had the biggest pity party. I railed against God. No husband! No roommate! Satan’s attacks! God seemingly absent. I can bear all things with His kind face but I can bear none of it without Him.

“Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them from their distress.” Psalm 107:6

This turmoil went on for months. I cried out to the Lord and there was some relief. Finally around May, the intensity of Satan’s attacks had lessened but not without leaving me with daily anxiety. 

You can see this season on the timeline above in the first valley with the fire. I was in the deepest darkness I have ever been in my life. The season before had been one of the best and the depth to which I felt I had plunged was overwhelming.

“Some sat in darkness and deepest gloom, imprisoned in iron chains of misery.”

Psalm 107:10 

 

As I mentioned, things improved a bit but I still felt unsafe (in a spiritual sense) in my home. I still had daily anxiety. But thankfully the attacks of Satan had lessened. As the year wore on I began to have a glimmer of hope. 

"“Lord, help!” they cried in their trouble, and he saved them from their distress.”

Psalm 107:13

Hope, it’s so powerful. Hope causes the darkness to flee. 

YET I DARE TO HOPE.

“Some went off to sea in ships… He spoke, and the winds rose, stirring up the waves. Their ships were tossed to the heavens and plunged again to the depths; the sailors cringed in terror. They reeled and staggered like drunkards and were at their wits’ end.”

Psalm 107:23-27 

The hope was soon smashed to smithereens and waves of yet another overwhelming season was upon me. You can see this on the timeline in the valley of waves. By January 2020 I was basically burned out and wondering how I could continue. Lucky for me a world pandemic shut the world down just two months later. While the pandemic was extremely difficult in some ways, in other ways, it was a respite I needed. No pressing responsibilities. Nowhere to go. Ample time to rest and reconfigure my life. 

That summer, as things begin to open once again, more waves of heartache, stress and anxiety came my way. Again I was wondering how much more I could take. I was burned out, depressed and dealing with anxiety almost all day every day. In the Fall of 2020, I went to the States for a three week visit. When I got back to a place of familiarity, I began to realize just how bad I was. My parents noticed it too. The day before I was to fly back, I made a last minute decision to stay in the States and get some counseling. I thought I’d be there two months tops, get my act together and head back to my host country.

Often counseling makes things worse before better. That was my experience. It took months for me to just get some coping mechanisms for dealing with my anxiety much less get to the root of it. It would take almost nine months to get back to some days with no anxiety. I would end up staying in the States for an entire year before returning to my host country.

““Lord, help!” they cried in their trouble, and he saved them from their distress.”

Psalm 107:28

My counselor encouraged me to return to my host culture because I needed to experience God’s faithfulness there again in order to continue healing. There was debate as to whether I should even return to my city with all the bad memories and experiences there. In the fall of 2021 I eventually decided to return to my city but with a plan to move into the apartment complex of my close friends there. I returned and within two months received another blow. My close friends, who were like family, were moving to another city. 

A dark, dark cloud of sorrow moved over me. You can see this represented in the third valley on the timeline. I was depressed, crying almost daily. I began having panic attacks. I went to see a local psychiatrist to get some adjustments to medicine to help me function. The appointment went horribly. Without really listening, he “figured me out” and said I had low self-esteem. He told me what I needed was not a change in medicine but that I needed his wisdom in my life. When I told him the overwhelming sadness was not passing, he said in a creepy vampire voice simply, “It will passssssss.” I said, I can’t keep persevering like this. Again in the creepy voice he said, “Oh but you cannnnnnn.” After each statement he looked at me eagerly as if he had just solved all of my problems. Needless to say, I left his office in even more tears, desperate for some kind of relief from the dark sorrow. 

Eventually I found a psychiatrist who listened to me, prayed for me, encouraged me AND gave me some medicine to help me be able to semi-function. As the months progressed in 2022, there were some gains and losses until late summer. Some major conflict came my way. It felt metaphorically like the time I had been bitten by a dog. I was minding my own business on a leisurely walk when a small dog came at me and attacked, biting my ankle. In this real life situation of 2022, each time I would try to resolve the conflict, it’s like the dog would bite me again. It was all too much. By November, I was at a breaking point. With regular therapy, 2 different kinds of medication, 3 kinds of supplements, I was still barely functioning. Tears were my daily food. I needed a change in my life. Continuing with things the way they were was the very definition of insanity.

““Lord, help!” they cried in their trouble, and he saved them from their distress.”

Psalm 107:19

“Give thanks to the Lord for he his good, his love endures forever.” Psalm 107:1

Then some good things started happening. The “dog biter” apologized after months of accusing me for the entirety of our relationships’ problems. Then my mom came for an unexpected visit. Both of these things felt like miracles and like I was seen and loved by the Lord. Then I went on the debriefing retreat where I began seeing redemption in my life. I also was reminded of the truth that Jesus was walking with me through each of those seasons. This is represented by the tiny crosses underneath each of those valleys. 

We will never see the end of His goodness. Even if it’s unseeable for a season and we walk through the darkest valley, the darkest of night, his goodness is still there. That is what I came out of the debriefing retreat knowing. In the timeline, yes, there is a season of walking through fire. Yes there is a season of walking through the flood. Yes there is a season of walking through intense darkness. Yes there is a season of being in the wilderness. But even if the fire, waves, darkness hide his face, it doesn’t change the fact that he’s still there undergirding everything. That he hears us when we call. That he gives respites along the way. Just like the clouds block the sun sometimes, it doesn’t mean the ever-present sun isn’t still there. We just can’t see it for a moment. 

The final season on the timeline is one of wilderness but with some sunshine to help light my way. I don’t think this journey of following Jesus will free us completely from the wilderness. I am thankful that he hears our cries and rescues us from our distress

Burnout and Two Talents

A few months ago I read ‘Spiritual Depression’ by Dr. Martyn Lloyd Jones. In one chapter he covers the Parable of the Laborers. He says about God:

“He does not count service as other people do. He is interested in the heart. WE are interested in time, we all clock in and count the time we have spent, the work we have done.” 

In the parable, the first and the last get the same wage. 

“It is the widow's mite He is interested in. It is not the amount of money, it is the woman's heart.”

As I read this, I thought of Mary and Martha. God’s desire is for Marys to sit at his feet rather than Marthas with their long service to-do lists. Again it’s not about what we do but about our heart.

“The wasted years, the barren years, the years the locusts, canker-worms and caterpillars have devoured until there was nothing apparently left. [Of those years] He says, “I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten.” If you think of it in terms of what you can do in your strength and power, then time is of the essence, of the contract. But we are in a realm in which that does not matter. - He can give us a crop in one year that will make up for ten.”

Frederik Buechner said, “People are prepared for a God who strikes hard bargains, but not for a God who gives as much for an hour’s work as for a day’s.”

This was a good word for me. As someone who has been dealing with burnout and lowered capacity over the past few years, I found this refreshing. God is not a whip-cracking slave master. He doesn’t expect production or even hard work. He wants our hearts.

I found comfort in the Parable of the Talents as well. It feels like in the past, perhaps I had five talents to invest. But lately it’s felt more like I have only two. But I haven’t just sat down and buried what I’ve been given. I have been using what little I have for the Lord.

And so dear friend, perhaps you are where I am with limited capacity for whatever reason. God is not expecting you to invest 5 talents if you only have 2 to begin with. Give what you have, yes, but recognize honestly where you are and give your 2 mites’ worth if that’s all you have to give. Let God give the increase. Perhaps he’ll give a year’s worth of crop that will make up for ten.

My Big Fat Greek Trailer Park Vacation

Vacationing in Greece sounds exotic and fancy. When I told my sister that some friends and I had rented a villa there, she began looking at plane tickets. Luckily the flights were too expensive for her. This particular vacation was rife with problems.

The vacation began with one of the families missing their flight. It’s a bummer to start a vacation missing three people. The other seven of us eventually made our way to the villa. Seeing the uncut grass and overgrown weeds should have been an ominous warning to us. We went inside and we were underwhelmed with the place. It was fine but kind of old. 

From there we went to the grocery store. There wasn’t anything there for us to make any kind of meals. Not even salt and pepper. There wasn’t any soap in the bathrooms or a starter kit of toilet paper. There wasn’t even filtered drinking water to quench our thirst. Making a trip to the grocery store became a top priority.

When we returned, we discovered that the pool was dirty. It had sand and some trash in it. Oh and there was a cat that kept running inside the house. We ended up naming her Rhodie. She was my nemesis all week and would stalk me anytime I went outside.

The next day I woke and used the bathroom. After flushing the toilet, I heard a gurgling sound and felt water splashing my feet from the bathroom drain. Later when I went into the common space of the house, I learned that another bathroom had the same problem and the air conditioners weren’t working. Someone used an air press to make coffee because the promised coffee maker was MIA. A moldy mug was found in the cabinet. Yuck! Upon further exception many of the dishes were dirty as well as the cabinets. We ended up running all of the dishes through the dishwasher and cleaned out the cabinets. We also spent that day waiting for an electrician/air conditioner repair guy and a septic tank guy. 

Our friends who had missed their flight had finally arrived. However, one of their bags had not. There was a flurry of activity as we tried to figure out where the bag was and how we might get it. Eventually the septic guy and air conditioner guys came but we still needed a plumber to come. 

The villa’s owner stopped by to make sure the workers had come. He also brought a coffee pot because the villa had promised one but it was missing. He also brought some toilet paper, soap and a frozen dessert. He then filled us in some of the gaps of why the villa was in such disarray. The previous guests had wrecked the place. They trashed the pool and filled the toilets with toilet paper clogging the septic system. He also said they had left the villa with all the ACs running at their lowest setting and all the doors open. He said the yard looked like a jungle because most of the lawn equipment on the island had been burned up by wildfires. 

While his story did explain some things, I don’t think it’s the full story. We looked back at the airbnb photos and began noticing that more than the coffee pot was missing. There were no umbrellas around the pool. There was different/missing furniture in my bedroom. Light fixtures were different than the pictures. An iron and ironing board was promised but the ironing board didn’t have a cover. What really happened to the villa between picture taking and when we arrived is still largely a mystery.

The plumber was scheduled to come the next day at 9:00 am. But we still needed to take showers that day. I used minimal water during mine but there was still plenty of gurgling in our bathroom. My friend sharing my room took a shower and by the time she got out, her sandal was floating around the bathroom floor due to so much drainage/sewer water. Yuck!

The plumber actually came about four hours late. He was around for about an hour. Did I mention we weren’t allowed to throw toilet paper in the toilet? He said we had flushed “way too much toilet paper.” And by too much he meant about 3-5 toilet-flushings worth.

Since the plumber came so late and our whole bathroom/room had remnants of sewer water, I spent a while disinfecting our room and floors. Then I decided to have some food therapy and pulled out my rationed Ghirardelli brownie mix and use it for this special occasion. Since not all ovens cook the same way, I decided to set an alarm for half the baking time. Imagine my horror when I checked on the brownies at the halfway mark and they were scorched. I was ready to cry. 

Apparently the oven runs super hot. The next night, we decided to bake cookies. We left the cookies in for 4 minutes and when we pulled them out, the parchment paper had been scorched! We finally realized that the broiler was too hot or always on or something. So we began baking things on the bottom shelf and started it during preheat while the oven was not warm, greatly reduced the cooking time and sometimes still had to turn the oven off and let it finish cooking with the oven completely off. 

I figured out this hack for bad skillets.
No sticking and it's easy to clean.

It wasn’t until my 4th day at the villa before I actually began to enjoy my vacation. We had spent so much time just getting the place livable. Eventually we found both umbrellas in the jungle of the yard. One was broken but one was put to use. We found cleaning supplies scattered around the property. We were in the middle of nowhere and could hear roosters crowing. The area around the villa wasn’t much better, hence us naming it the Trailer Park villa.

Staged vs:

Reality

From there I went to some meetings at a nice, all-inclusive hotel. I had hope that all my vacation woes would end there and I would bask in luxury. I arrived to discover that the air conditioning didn’t really work in 75% of the hotel. Did I mention it was hot? And humid?

I ended up developing a cough that I’m pretty sure now was induced by all of the humidity. Then again it could have been the sewer water from the villa. Or the dirty pool water. Whatever the cause was, I ended up in the Greek Hospital’s emergency room with a wheezing cough. It’s not as dramatic as it sounds but since it was a weekend, there weren’t any doctors on call thus making it necessary to visit the ER.  

Needless to say, this time around to Greece was not my favorite. But it will be seared in my mind and I do have a lot of stories to tell. And I guess the beach view wasn't too bad, the two days I actually made it to the beach.

Below is a list we wrote to the next guests of the villa to make us laugh. Because you’re either going to laugh or cry right? We didn’t leave the list but it was therapeutic to write it all out. 

Dear next guests

ABSOLUTELY ZERO toilet paper in any of the toilets. 

Don’t run too many appliances or you’ll trip the breaker. When you do there’s a breaker box behind a painting in the wall and in the end of the house. 

Check the inside of all the mugs. There may be hidden mold. 

The oven will incinerate anything you put in there including parchment paper. 

Don’t worry about feeding the cat she eats all the lizards. 

There’s a hobo that lives in the backyard, but don’t bother him and he won’t bother you.

Don’t even bother opening the piano it’s purely aesthetic, horribly out of tune. 

There may or may not be a coffee pot. 

If you’re traveling with a baby make sure to pack an extra wall for the crib. 

The cat tries to come in the house. 

The bunk bed doesn’t have a ladder. 

Search the perimeter of the house for supplies like mops and brooms. Actually the coffee pot and other appliances may be out there too. 

Put skinniest guest in the middle room and who doesn’t care to be viewed while showering. Put your stinkiest guest in the room with a separate entrance. 

The door to the sitting room is hard to lock. Use the door to the formal sitting room for easier access. 

The dryer is older than you and looks like the front panel has melted but it actually works just fine. 

You can only use either the washer or the dryer at one time. Unplug one to use the other. 

The land looks overgrown because the island’s supply of mowers was destroyed in a wildfire. 

Wi-Fi only works in the two sitting areas and only at 15 minute increments at a time. 

The pool will be dirty and you’ll ask for it to be cleaned. The pool cleaner will show up at 8:30 am the day of your departure. 

Don’t be fooled by the website’s pictures. Some furniture is missing, light fixtures are different than pictured. Umbrellas are broken.