Airports

I don't have any pictures from the airport...so you get a rice paddy instead.

Right now, I'm once again sitting in airport. My family received news yesterday that my grandma is not doing well, so I am making an emergency trip to see her for what might be the last time. Flying is starting to feel normal. Life in transition is becoming par for the course. So much for coming home and settling back into routine. When I got the call yesterday morning from my mom less than 12 hours after I came back from Thailand so excited for life, I didn't really know how to respond.

As much as it was the worst news to receive so quickly after coming back to the States, I also felt prepared. I had just spent three weeks seeing incredible testimonies of God's providence and sovereignty. Our first flight to Thailand ended up arriving 2 1/2 hours late, and we were an hour late for our flight to Bangkok. We thought that we would be spending the night in Taipei. But in His mercy and because He is good, the airline held the flight for our team and four or five others. His plans are perfect.

In Thailand, I saw a beautiful picture of how the Lord knits together a story for His glory and the good of His people. I practiced trusting that goodness through illness, exhaustion, poverty, and disunity in our team. And so when I received the phone call yesterday, I felt ready.

More than that, I had just seen how the Lord changes hearts. My grandma is very hard-hearted...she does not know Jesus, nor does she want to. I have no false hope. The Lord's will is always done, even when it breaks my heart. My grandma may die apart from His grace.

But there was this thief on the cross...

I serve a God who softens even the hardest of hearts. There are hearts of drug addicts and broken women who now believe the gospel in a little village called Mah Oh Jo, a village that everyone else had forgotten or hated, but my God sought out and pursued. I pray that He pursues my grandma in the same way.

So as I sit in this airport, it feels strangely right. Life is an adventure, one that never stops. I am resting in the goodness of God that I have known so clearly. I feel empty; I'm tired, emotionally and physically. My body doesn't know when to sleep and when to be awake. But I also feel so very full of the right things. Full of trust, full of peace. The Lord's timing is perfect.