Emails With Kendra About Trusting God

November 15, 2017

Me: 

[...] What will I do in eight months when I get off the plane from Morocco? I basically need to step into a job right away, and I cannot yet imagine what that will look like. And rightfully so, because it's maybe too soon for me to have the next step lined up. Would you pray with me about having peace despite not knowing? Would you pray that I would know which of the many adventures to choose, in good time? 
It's like the light shines just steps ahead of all of us, for us to walk at full speed always straight into the darkness, illuminating it as we go. May God have glory in all our lives! 
Ugh. Please... don't tell me I should fast. I know you're gonna tell me I should fast. Okay. Okay. 
Thank you for reading this. I'll pray for you, too.  

Love,  

Carolyn 

P.S. If you don't let me know how to pray for you, I'll just pray that God would "bless" you with a litter of kittens at your back door some morning. So, this is like a cosmic chain letter, and for most of you, that is a threat.

K.G.: 

Lol.You know the "threat" goes both ways as we pray for Him lighting the path just enough so you know He's there, but not enough to have a clue where you're going neither with your [...] relationship or future who what when and where after Morocco. I mean, we don't even know what tomorrow will bring. So it can be threatening to free Jesus to release His best for us. 
I am excited to pray ”threatening" prayers that free Him to bring you to places you never could have dreamed. Heck, you've already been to a lot of these places. Hard ones. Lovely ones.
I love you, Sweetness Seasoned with a Bit of Tart. Pure sweet is sickening. Your tart makes you special to me.

May 12, 2018

Me:

Thank you for your emails and for praying for me in the fall. I've had a little bit of heartache since that email asking you to pray for clarity. Clarity came. [...]
Now, in the time of searching for jobs and wrapping up my work [...] I'm trying to push aside all my concerns about money! I have a lot of options for temporary living spaces, and no job offers yet.[...] I am praying not to miss the boat by being lazy, to keep doing my work diligently. That's always been a tough call: when is the work enough, and you can just trust? Is this terrible theology? 
[...]
Thank you for praying for me and loving me from a distance. I think of you often. 
Love, 

Carolyn

K.G.:

I feel that I have to resend my last response to your previous transparent sharing.
You are so right with the push pull action of faith-listening, and action. I'll just say it is a lot easier to turn a massive ship while it is in motion.
With a sense of excitement about where our Jesus is moving you next, you can open doors by applying for jobs, etc., but retain the listening ear. Carefully balance action and trust. Neither one without the other. Faith only, sitting there, expecting God to drop things in your lap is ok at times and with some people. But faithFULL
listening is mind-blowing, faith-building relationship. I speak of relationship as a verb, less of a noun.
You are so very beloved.
A visible, towering sunflower, lightening our world, bringing sunny times into my life.
Mwah!
Huggle!

Forming a Philosophy of Life

I have recorded my college experiences here, and my first few years of teaching and advising. And now I wonder what comes next. Because, unless I die accidentally, there will be a next thing. And more people. I realized recently that I have been forming a life philosophy, and I am as disturbed as you are that these are not verses from the Bible.

1. People are the same everywhere. 
That's not to say that individuals are not special to me. Individuals are irreplaceable in my life. But so far as I can tell, people present the same problems and the same solutions, the world over. People are going to be petty, ridiculous, overly-serious, and suddenly-political no matter where I live or what job I have. And people are the answer to that particular lonely feeling I get, and that disheartened loss of faith I know so well, and that cluelessness I feel in new places.

2. We can do no great things, only small things with great love.
Ken gave me a bracelet with this inscribed on it, and Mother Teresa, apparently, said it. I have longed to make a difference in the world. I have longed to use whatever is special about me, my sensitivity, my ability to say words backwards, my peculiar family background, whatever I am, to bring some good to the world, to really get the ball rolling toward this goal of bringing people to Jesus, all in their own languages, at the same time, yes, thank you. It's not gonna happen like that. I'm not gonna do this alone. I'm not even at the center of Jesus' plan of salvation. He's assembled a vast team that spans time and space, in which I'm a pinprick of His light; to think that I could do anything greater than small, daily deaths to self as I look for His face in this world of loss, is ludicrous and possibly idolatrous. Thank you, Jesus, for this freedom! May your Kingdom come!

Third Year Goals

School has started, and God is just as good as ever! I feel unsettled and unruly in my heart, though, and I can't imagine what would quiet me. I doubt I'd do it if I knew. I am ready to call it fatigue and leave the question to be sucked up by the fan in the window.

I'm undertaking a few challenges this year, friends. The first is a prayer challenge: to pray in the girls' lounge for a half an hour two nights a week, from about 10:15 - 10:45. The second is to read one book from my writing class's reading list every two weeks. I often say, rightly, that I don't have time to read; but I want to make time, because I enjoy reading and because I have the happy excuse of calling it career development.

This being my third at the residence hall, I have two points, and am able to finally draw a navigation line between them. Year one, I thought my job was tough, filled with apathetic or annoying teenagers who were inherently my excuse for not building community. Year two, I thought it was my sole job to build a community, to pray it into being, and then, when I failed, to accept that I should have done more and better.

Year three, it seems obvious now that building a community is not something a person can do alone. There's no amount of willpower or hard work that can form it. No way. It takes a friggin' village, and the grace of God. The residence hall is a village. Sorta. By the end of last year, it was time for me to admit that the students of the RH were a big part of my community, and therefore my calling and my ministry.

Also of note, a writing student informed me today that she is considering getting a tattoo of a semi-colon, because though the sentence seems to have stopped, like life, it goes on. Awesome.

Asking Better Questions

In the teaching ESL class I took this month, we watched a video from the late 1970s about Mexican-American acculturation in southern California. They were experiencing all the racism, poverty, and loss of identity that comes with immigration. The most striking part of the video was when the interviewer asked some of the Mexican-American high school drop-outs, "what do you want to be when you grow up?" This is a familiar question, and it seems to me that it is really asking, "how will you make money when you are old enough to do so?" It's a good question for an individualistic, transitory, capitalistic society to ask of its members. But the teens in the video, who come from a communal, stationary society just stared blankly into the distance, and responded with a nervous chuckle, "I don't know."

I wish the interviewer had gone on to clarify, "You mean you don't dream of anything happening in your life?" Then it would have been clearer if they merely didn't know how they would earn money, or if they had not been encouraged to dream about their futures, and to picture life differently. The tragedy would be if they had not been given the power to view themselves as agents for change and betterment in the world. That possibility was heart-breaking, and everyone in my class felt it.

I recently attended a party of about 25 bright, enthusiastic young people. They are certainly exceptions to many rules. They carry the hope of Christ in their hearts. They walk with confidence wherever they go. They change the world by listening to God and people. If you ask them what they want to be when they grow up, they might also stare at you blankly for a bit. They are entrenched in that very battle of deciding how they will earn their bread. For them, too, the question doesn't have a more inspirational answer than a stare into the distance, and a faint, "I don't know." But, if we change the question a bit, and begin with "what do you want in life?" or "what are your hopes for the future?" we will get to the heart of the matter.

Here are a few of their responses:

• I want to be a father to children, and not just in the biological sense, especially for boys.
• I want to teach, and help build a community.
• I want adventure, love (maybe getting married, but maybe not), and wisdom (because I love to read books).
• I want to do everything, go everywhere, and meet everyone.
• I want to serve. I like where I am right now.
• I want to do one of the following before I die: star in a show, or start a camp for troubled youth, or...
• I want to write a novel, like War and Peace, that follows a person through all of life.
• I want to have a family, and have an outlet for adventure.
• I want to adopt four boys.
• I want to do something that matters, that no one ever gives me credit for.
• I want to have the ability to go off on thinking tangents for as long as I like.
• I want to play Encore all together with my giant family.
• I want to live outside of the ordinary.
• I want to know people and encourage them to know God better.

I'm far more satisfied with these answers than with those I gave as a child, "nurse, vet, waitress [ahem, little Carolyn, you mean 'server']."

How to Break a Legacy

The sun has set long ago,
and 11pm finds us on the back porch: starlight, yes, but mostly the neighbors' floodlight.
I wish we could talk more often: my brother, his wife, and I.

Tonight my brother and I ask, how long did they make it?
-Six years.
-No, they separated after four, divorced after six.
-So they made it six years.
-No. They didn't.

-They made it longer than my parents, his wife interjects.
-How long 'til they divorced?
-Four years, almost.

We stop talking, because we did the math.
And we all know these two have been together for eight years.
And we all stay stopped,
Because our hearts are broken.

We catch fearful gazes: paralyzed
Suddenly faced with a decision to either stop now,
before it gets worse,
or keep going into the unknown.

But we breathe again,
because we all know that quitting was never an option.

Possibilities for the Future

My niece, Aida, and I were playing this weekend. She's six. She decided we would play "Mommy's work." My sister-in-law helps people to find suitable jobs. So Aida brought down her kids' program computer, and sat at the coffee table in a folding pink princess chair. She began with some preliminary questions:

[We shake hands]

Aida: How can I help you?

Me: Uh, I need a job right away.

Aida: No problem. I can help you. What do you like?

Me: [in character] I like... to... put things together. And take things apart. And I like the color yellow.

Aida: [typing furiously on the computer] That's fine. Good. I have something for you: a construction worker!

Me: Perfect! But what about how I like the color yellow?

Aida: No problem. All the machines are yellow. I have some forms for you to fill out. [Draws four lines on a sheet of paper] Write your name, date you were born, place, and things you like.

Me: [struggling with "place"] Done.

Aida: Great! You start on Friday. Here's your schedule. [Hands over another piece of paper.] Do you need anything else?

Me: [hesitatingly] A house would be nice.

Aida: Sure. I can help you. [Writes out a "check" for $50 million.] Is that enough?

Me: Yes. I'm sure I can find something for that much. How do you get the money to give people for houses?

Aida: Work gives it to me, and I give some of it away to people.

By the end of our session, I had a huge house filled with a few other families, I had changed careers to become a novelist/baby sitter (her idea), and I had a husband named Tyler. And we were both parrots.

The End.

Así Son las Cosas

Señor del universo,

Yo confío todo al cuidado tuyo. Si yo no te pueda confiar, ¿en quién puedo esperar? Ya me ha fallado mí misma. Fine. Take it all.

Voy a tomar el consejo que dí a una hermana esta semana: voy a contarte como me siento a tí. Si me siento que me has equivocado, y me debes a algo, voy a decirlo a tí. Pero, por ahora, sé que lo que me falta es la descansa. Aun todavía, mientras que yo no este bien, puedo descansarme en tus brazos.

Future Self: have mercy. All is done except
today. Look not so harshly on the person
of your youth, of your middle age, of your
elder years. Understand ignorance as a
seed, a sappling, a living thing pushing
up and letting change blow over it,
around it. Only you can understand the
journey to now. Sever not this tie!
Call me you! I am! I am!
Own me as you own yesterday, as I
own tomorrow, even owning myself.
And look to Him for the mercy I have
not. Look to Him, self, for the grace to
own the journey.