Presuming to know the will of God

I'm not normally given to writing out lesson-ish type blogs (I feel grossly under-qualified to do so) but I feel that I've stumbled upon a fairly significant thought today (at least for me).

We all have spiritual weakness and spiritual downfalls. If we are seeking God and obeying him, I believe that he will put us into situations where we have to either strengthen those areas of weaknesses or work on eradicating those wrong doings. Moving to Indonesia has had me working on one area of weakness, asking for help and being dependent on others. I really don't like to have to ask someone for help. In my flawed logic, asking for help means that I have failed in some way because I was not able to do it on my own. As a teacher, I have preached over and over that asking for help is not a bad thing, that it shows that you want to learn and want to do your best. However, in my own personal life, I still don't like to ask for help. I also have trouble being dependent on others. I like to know that I am able to stand on my own two feet. I also feel like I'm bothering others when I am relying on them so that I can get something done.

Indonesia has forced me into a unique combination of these two things, where not only do I have to ask people for help, but I also have to depend on them. Before I bought my scooter and learned to drive (and learned how to get a few places) I was dependent on my host family for pretty much everything. They were super great about it, but I still didn't like having to ask someone to drive me everywhere that I needed to go or to take me to the ATM, or the grocery store.

In some ways this drive for independence and my desire to not ask for help have been a good thing. It pushes me to learn quickly and to figure things out on my own. It has also given me that ability to figure things out on my own, but like anything in life, it should be a balance. Too much independence or never asking for help can lead to isolation, not do/figuring things out when I should, and sometimes just makes my life harder than it needs to be. I'm not sure that I've gotten very far on fixing my areas of weakness, but I have been made much more aware of them.

However, this is not my great Truth of the day (great to me, maybe not to any of you). At church we have been studying the book of Joshua. Today's lesson focused on the battle of Jericho (Joshua 5:13-16, 6:1-23). I've studied chapter 6 multiple times for our church youth group competitions, but I had't looked at 5:13-16 much before.

13 And it came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, behold, there stood a man over against him with his sword drawn in his hand: and Joshua went unto him, and said unto him, Art thou for us, or for our adversaries?
14 And he said, Nay; but as captain of the host of the Lord am I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my Lord unto his servant?
15 And the captain of the Lord's host said unto Joshua, Loose thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so.

The imagery of these verses was what initially caught my attention. Joshua is met by a mighty man of war with a drawn sword. He asks him whose side he is on and the man tells him that he is the captain of the host of the Lord. The commander of the army of God has come to fight with the Israelite. It's a powerful image especially since we sang "Whom Shall I Fear" during worship.

"I know who goes before me
I know who stands behind

The God of angel armies
Is always by my side

The one who reigns forever
He is a friend of mine

The God of angel armies
Is always by my side"

One of the things that was brought out during out discussion of the text, was that while Joshua asks if the man is for the Israelite or for their enemy, the man doesn't tell whose side he is on. He merely states that he is the captain of the host of the Lord. God is not on your side, he is not against you. He simply is. We are the ones that have to decide whose side we are on. Do we follow God and serve him? Or do we choose his adversary, the devil? 

The other piece of insight that I've come to is perhaps the most important for me at this moment in my life. It's something that I've know for ages, but it was made fresh and new in my mind today. The will of God is not always logical. Sometimes God's path for our life makes sense, sometimes it is logical. We see that in the Bible. And then sometimes it makes no sense. None. Not one bit. The Lord told Joshua to take Jericho. Joshua probably thought that that meant a siege, some sort of attack on the walls/gates around Jericho, and a battle. However God gave him very specific directions that made no sense. "Take your mighty fighting men and have then walk around the city once for six days. Have 7 priests with rams horns and the ark march with them. On the seventh day, walk around the city 7 times then blow the trumpets and have the people shout."

The story of Jericho is one that we hear often as children in church so it's easy to take at face value, but think about what your response would be if you were going to try to capture a heavily fortified city and your commander told you to walk around the city and then shout. Humanly those actions have no power against well built walls of stone. But with God, that obedience resulted in the walls falling and the city being destroyed. 

It's easy for us to look at life and think that we've got the future all figured out. We can connect the dots and make conjectures. Logically, things should follow a certain path and go a certain way. It's easy to get into that mind set and think, "Okay, surely this is God's will for my future. This makes so much sense." I was reminded today that that's not how it always works. I'm guilty sometimes of trying to make decisions on my own, going off of what I think that I've figured out (can you see my independence issues causing some problems here?). I was reminded today that I need to slow down and wait on God. I need to stop and look for the captain of the hosts so that I can get my orders. I can see a path that looks good and makes sense, but perhaps that's not the path the he would have me to take. I may be planning for a siege when all I actually need is to take a walk.  

November and December: Part 1

FYI: The names in my blog are pseudonyms. Most of the people that I write about wouldn’t mind having their real names in my blog, but I don’t feel like asking everyone, and since this blog is available to anyone, I prefer to play it safe and not actually identify anyone. Plus, it gives the people that I write about the chance to feel like they are spies with code names…

The Cliffnotes Version

Much has happened since my last blog post. Here is the short bullet version in case you don’t want to read the details, wait for the next post, or get bored further down the page.

·         Packed up the house in Manado (which included packing almost everything into a shipping container)

·         Flew to Salatiga (a city on the island of Java)

·         Started getting settled in the new house and the new-to-me city

·         Spent Thanksgiving day with friends

·         Flew to Singapore and back for my visa

·         Finished up the first semester of school with the kids

·         Sherry started a new job at the international school near by

·         Flew back to Singapore with Sherry for my visa

·         Spent Christmas day with friends

·         Enjoyed a few days off

·         Explored some ancient temples

The Move

Over the summer, Fred took a different position within Wycliffe Associates. Because of the change in position, the family was able to move if they wanted and they decided to move back to Salatiga, the city where they had done their language study when they first arrived in Indonesia. Salatiga is a smaller town, and has a large expat community due to the language schools here and the really good international primary and secondary school. 

So as October came to a close, the family started packing up the house. They planned to move the weekend before Thanksgiving, so many of our days in November were spent packing boxes. Slowly, bit by bit, the house was packed away.

The day that we left, several people came by, Fanny, the Priors, the family from Korea that had moved in next door a month ago. It was sad to say goodbye to the friends that I had made in Manado. I had met so many kind and interesting people. I was sad that I had only had a couple months to get to know them and to spend time with them. To loosely quote Bilbo Baggins, I knew them half as well as I should have liked to have known them.

Salatiga

We arrived in Salatiga after dark, so it took a while for me to get a decent sense of the city. Many people ask me which place I liked better or how they were similar or different. The two have distinctly different atmospheres in my opinion. Manado was a larger city, more modern, wealthier, and less conservative (due to the large number of Christians in the area). Though, at the same time, we didn’t live in the city itself, so the area we live in had a rural feel. Salatiga feels smaller and older, but much more compact than the area we lived in in Manado. In Salatiga we are within walking distance of several restaurants, shops, and the International school. The weather is also different. Manado had a truly tropical feel, whereas the higher elevation in Salatiga cools the weather slightly.

My grandfather and I, a long long time ago. :)

Upon arrival to Salatiga I met the legendary TJ, Sherry’s best friend here, as well as TJ’s family (husband, three sons, and two daughters, one of which is adopted). With that many people and a dog, multiple pet birds, a lizard, and a rotating string of guests and the kids’ friends, there is never a dull moment at their house. TJ’s big heart, delicious food, and big family means that holidays at her house are large and full of fun. She graciously invited the family and me to both Thanksgiving and Christmas dinner. It was wonderful to be able to spend the holiday with such a lively and kind bunch.

Being there at Christmas was especially nice. The weeks leading up to Christmas were tough ones for me. My homesickness seemed to kick into high gear after the move and left me feeling down. Then my grandfather passed away a week and a half before Christmas. He had been sick for a long time with Parkinson’s. When I decided to come to Indonesia, I knew that there was a good chance that he would pass while I was here, but it was still tough to deal with his death and knowing that I couldn’t be there for my family. Coupled with my homesickness, it made for a rough couple weeks. But with God’s help, I am making through.

Beep, beep, vroom, vroom

I did have a few other adventures. A big one for me was buying my own scooter.

In Manado, the family had a car, and we used that for most of the trips into the city or to other locations, but Salatiga isn’t designed with cars in mind. Many of the side streets are very narrow (just wide enough for one car). When we arrived here, Fred and Sherry bought two scooters, but with five people, two scooters weren’t really cutting it. So we checked around and had a couple leads on a used scooter for me.

One Saturday, I saw a post on the Facebook page where people can sell things in Salatiga. Someone was a selling a light pink and white Honda Scoopy. It was perfect! Honestly, if I had had to pick out my ideal scooter to go motoring around Salatiga on, it would have been this one. Ok, if I’m being completely and perfectly honest, I might have picked a blue, but still, it was adorable and so cute. I was just planning on buying whatever came up for sale first that was a good deal, I never imagined that I would get such a cute little scooter.

Once I saw the post, I did a little checking to make sure that it was a good deal and then got in contact with the woman selling it. It worked out perfectly because she was going to the same Christmas cookie exchange as me that day, so I could check it out there. Fred took it for a drive, to make sure that everything worked well, and told me that it was a great deal and that I should definitely buy it. So less than 12 hours after seeing the scooter, I became its proud owner.

Which then brought on the next adventure…. Learning to drive it. It’s not hard to drive, but it has taken me a little while to get used to my hand controlling the throttle and brakes instead of my foot, and coordinating all of the motions at once. Making a turn from a complete stop still gives me a little trouble, but I am getting much more comfortable with the whole process.