Procrastination, Preparation

I am in the midst of packing up my house in Columbia and setting aside anything I might need in Rwanda. I move there on January 18th. I have to be packed by tomorrow. Consequently, as any natural procrastinator would, I find this to be the perfect time to begin my blog.

It is strange packing up the things that hold everything for you. My books, my pictures, my scraps of paper that contain momentary epiphanies, gifts I can't let go, letters, hairpins. Some of these things are practical, and some can't quite seperate from pieces of my mind itself. These are the things that have trekked through the last seven years in Columbia with me. They are the elite of my possessions, and they are not seperate from people. This is the most difficult part of packing away- the haunting that I am packing up parts of people to remember. The parts that, at some points, I thought were too dear to part with and so I stowed them away in some drawer or by my favourite page of a book. It's a little paradoxical. It is the the memory that is such a part of me, I can't imagine moving without it. It is the memory that, if incorrect in its posture, cripples movement as well. So, the question comes to my mind what stance does one take? What kind of love of a place or a people is a worthy love? I want the sort of love for people and places that doesn't have tightly closing fingers, that get white knuckled and numb. Columbia and all who fill it are my temptation in this way. There is an allowance of sifting through fingers that comes with honest love. I keep thinking about the Lord and how I can never damage him or myself because I cling to him. There is something in me that is made for clinging and steadiness. There has to be some sort of sense in the fact that Christ loves these longings of mine, and he has every strength and supply for each moment and experience. The beauty of beginning something new is not in what you are leaving, not even in what you are going towards, but what is not leaving. This is Christ. This is the love that cannot be sifted through my fingers even when I think it can. THis is the love that I cannot cling to too tightly. This is the love that upholds me in my clinging. This is steadfast. This is mine.

I'm beginning to think life is not fitting through a doorway with bags packed full of things and people we can't live without, but fitting through a keyhole with the Lord and trusting him for what is good and necessary, all the way to glory. This is my relief, my expectation, my joy.

This is the beauty of memories, they tell of his supply.