i will follow You.

had one of the best breaks i've had in a long while.

the first half of my fall break was spent in southern california with several of my classmates.  at first, dreaming of couch potatoes and immobility, i was hesitant on going.  but i'm thankful that i decided to go.  not only am i grateful for the relationships that were built on this trip, but i'm also thankful for God's presence throughout my time in cali.  my biggest prayer going into this trip was that i could represent Christ to my classmates, that i would exemplify Him well, and that if and when the opportunity arose, the Holy Spirit would take over my cowardly self and enable me to share my faith.  on this trip, as i got to know these lovely friends, i also felt as though these classmates witnessed how important Christ was to my own life.  they asked about where i would slip off to in the mornings, and God allowed me to share about my devotionals.  when they asked me about being "damnation" and hell while driving to the joshua tree national park, the Spirit helped me speak boldly and honestly about what i believed.

thank You, God.  thank You for giving me the opportunity to see how much You love these classmates of mine, thank You for gently rebuking me on how little i had loved them these past months, and thank You for being with me every single day of that trip. 

at the Getty Museum, not only a comprehensive art museum, but also an architectural triumph

down the Hollywood stars

in front of the Hollywood sign

at the Santa Monica beach

 

at the Joshua Tree National Park

watching the sunset on Zuma Beach in Malibu to close out our time in cali

we left LAX at around midnight wednesday evening and arrived in chicago at 6 am this past thursday, where an hour later, i was picked up by members of my school's christian fellowship to drive down to louisville, kentucky for the global health missions conference.

best $75 investment i've ever made.  hands down.

rewind a week before the global health missions conference.  i was driving home from another sunday service, sharing with a brother from the christian fellowship about how awesome the sermon was for me.  his response?  he agreed on the quality of the sermon, but said that when he heard such sermons, he thought of his pre-Christian friends and roommates, revealing how much he loved them, how much he yearned for them to be just as blessed.  hearing his genuine love and desperation for these non-believers completely floored and humbled me.  when i'm sitting in a sermon, very rarely do i think of anyone else besides me.  i've never had the perspective that this brother had that afternoon. 

after that sunday and the whole week prior the global health missions conference, i was a mess.  all this time, i thought that God was calling me to missions.  that's the whole reason why i went to PA school in the first place!  but really, lisa?  what were you thinking?!  you're selfish.  you're self-centered.  you don't care about the lost.  you lack any kind of evangelistic heart.  you're a coward when it comes to professing your faith.  you're a people-pleaser.  you're a creature of comfort.  seriously, lisa...what were you thinking?!  how could you think that you were called to missions?  you must have been delusional.  maybe that crazy idea of missions stemmed from some moment of idealistic fervor at some prayer gathering last year.  maybe that notion of missions signified more of a humanitarian desire to "help people."  or maybe i was doubting a legitimate conviction b/c i was being eroded by the secular values that i was facing daily at my school..... 

for a good week, i was distraught.  while i was in cali, knowing that the missions conference was sitting on the horizon, my primary prayer was that i would come to the conference without an agenda, that i would come like mary, wanting simply to sit at Jesus' feet and listen, that i would come with the singular desire of wanting to learn more about God and His heart for the world.

and i felt like that was exactly how the conference played out for me.  

brothers & sisters from my school's fellowship, lounging around after another good meal

at our generous host's place

a pastor i met at the conference from congo -- connecting over my lamentable french and his fairly good english

from the very first seminar to the last plenary session, i felt like a child listening to her Father, a Father who spoke intimately and personally.  i wish i could share all my notes from all seven seminars and all four plenary sessions.  but overall, what i extracted from this conference as a whole was just how worthy, wonderful, holy, and awesome our God is.

yes, lisa, you suck.  yes, you're a people-pleaser, you're a coward, you don't love the lost, you're not naturally evangelistic, you're selfish and self-centered, you're obnoxious.  you are so completely ordinary.  but that's not the point.  yes, you're ordinary.  but you are loved by an absolutely extraordinary God.  and that's the point of missions.  not what you aren't, not what you're incapable of, not who you are, but who God is.  missions is about God, the incredible and wonderful and beautiful God who you have come to know and love.  missions is about the all-powerful, merciful, loving, compassionate, and holy God who loves you and this world unconditionally.

lisa, take lessons from the lives of moses, gideon, isaiah.  God was not looking for certain set of skills or traits in these men.  all He sought was a heart that passionately loved and worshiped Him.  that's all He requires from you, lisa.  and honestly, that's all you can give.  and Lord, i want to give that to You.  my entire being wants to give You that kind of wholehearted love and worship.

by the end of the conference, after listening to powerful teachings, being surrounded by believers who were passionate about both medicine and missions, i felt my paradigm, my mindset, and my heart shift.  shift from "i don't know how missions is connected to me" to "missions is the call to every disciple of Jesus Christ, and therefore my call."  i'm a disciple of the one and only Savior.  my life is not my own to live.  Christ did not purchase me a new life so that i could be comfortable here on earth.  but i am called to advance His Kingdom here on earth.  and Lord, idk where you will send me, but i say "yes" to you in advance.  people call it "long-term missions," but i see this as not only my call, but the call.  

Lord, i say "yes" to you now.  i'm not saying "yes" to a place, to an idea, to a people group, to a profession.  i am saying "yes" to You.  and wherever You call me, Lord, i say "yes" to followership.  until You call me wherever, i pray, Father, that i can be faithful to the mission field at present.  and i pray that You will help me to surrender everything in my life until then -- my friends, my family, even my very own life -- for You.  remind me that all these things are so little compared to how worthy You are.  You are worthy, Lord.  You are worthy.  there is nothing in this world that will ever compare to how worthy You are; there is nothing in this world that will ever compare to the salvation and new life that i have in You. 

"All your ways are good
All your ways are sure
I will trust in you alone
Higher than my side
High above my life
I will trust in you alone

Where you go, I'll go
Where you stay, I'll stay
When you move, I'll move
I will follow you
Who you love, I'll love
How you serve I'll serve
If this life I lose, I will follow you
I will follow you"

"And the Good News about the Kingdom will be preached throughout the whole world, so that all nations will hear it; and then the end will come" (Matthew 24.14, NLT).

like a cup of coffee.

i wasn't much of a coffee drinker back in ann arbor, but once school started, i drank a thermos of joe every morning.  in the beginning, for much of that first quarter, i would put a ridiculous amount of sugar and cream into my coffee, an amount that i'm sure would send coffee afficionados into fainting spells.  over time, i slowly weaned myself off the sugar and merely used cream.  now, i drink my coffee black, and i enjoy it that way.

i think this absurd coffee analogy sums up how i look at this first half of the school year and where i am now.  sorry for breaking another record, but yes, moving back, the transition was difficult, and in huge part b/c of the lack of spiritual community.  i think the toughest part was that even when i was actively searching and praying, the community that i had envisioned was still not there.  i went to dozens of small groups and gatherings at the churches i visited when i first moved back, and through that process, i learned that even when you're with Christians, you can still feel spiritually lonely.  b/c the spiritual community that my heart was yearning for was someone who understood me, someone who wanted to love and follow God on the same level, on the same plane, someone to share genuine conversations with about what we were learning about ourselves and about God.

and that's reality.  what was presented before me was simply the reality of life -- black coffee.  this is life.  life is not going to be ann arbor.  life is not going to be hmcc.  life is not going to be a la-dee-dah-everyone-wants-the-same-things-everyone-is-on-the-same-spiritual-page.  reality is that "Christians" are on different planes of heart and mind.

in the beginning, how did i take this reality?  i took it with a buttload of cream and sugar.  i prayed with faith, but i prayed with this image of a raucous small group in mind, this obscure painting of some future point in time, of what i thought spiritual community was going to look like.  and as i lived my days, i looked forward to that day and that season.

i'm thankful for the initial challenges b/c literally, all i had was God.  i didn't have a mentor, an accountability partner, roommates, or a life group to run to.  i could only run to God, and those times with God truly resembled times of refuge.  i know this sounds a bit exaggerated, but it's true -- there was a point last quarter where i couldn't wait to get some time alone either during the lunch hour at school or back at home before bed where i could just spend time with Him.  through those times, God gave me the peace that i needed.

so i weaned off the sugar.  b/c life, this black coffee, over time, tasted pretty good without the sugar.  by His grace, i really felt like i learned to spend the whole day with Him, and not just in that carved-out hour.  i felt like i was learning what it meant to study with Him, to be in class with Him, to have conversations with classmates with Him, to walk with Him, you know?  and i found so much peace and joy from the day b/c He was there, b/c He was in the day, b/c He was simply in my life.

and that's where i feel i am at now.  maybe it's b/c the quarter is over (haha), maybe i'm going through a hormonal surge, but lately, these past couple weeks, i've been feeling a lot of joy.  joy and peace.  idk.  it's hard to describe....i just feel this deep-seated joy.  there hasn't been very many changes in my life.  i mean, i guess i found a great church that i hope to commit to, and i've also been able to have some really good conversations about God and about what we're learning about God and ourselves (aahhh i really miss those!) with several people at my school.  but those aren't huge monumental changes, and they for sure aren't the kinds of "improvements" that i was envisioning months earlier when i still drinking my coffee with cream and sugar.  but i see these small changes as God's provisions, provisions so specifically and lovingly tailored to me.  and b/c of that, i know that truly, He is all i need. 

yes, the life presented before us comes in the form of black coffee, something that's hard to swallow at first.  but Jesus is in that life.  He is in it.  He is in us.  and He lives this life dynamically with us.  He's with and in us today, tomorrow, in this minute, in this hour, and for however many hours are planned before us.  and i think that's what makes me able to enjoy and savor straight-up black coffee. 

as the song goes and as Psalm 63.3 iterates, "Your love is better than life."  but i'm also learning and experiencing that Jesus, Your love is life.

Healing

~"It doesn't matter what disease the person has, but what person has the disease." 
                    - a probably inaccurate paraphrase of a quote from William Osler, one of the founding professors of Johns Hopkins Hospital.

last week, a physician came into my class to give a guest lecture on hospice & palliative care.  he delivered an eye-opening and thought-provoking lesson, and during one of his many rabbit trails, he busted out this quote from William Osler.  for a good couple minutes, with that quote sinking into me like a heavy blanket, my eyes started to well.  ugh...im such a sap.  my threshold for emo-ness is shorter than the hair on a bald man's head.

the quote stuck with me all day, and while i was studying, i started crying again, and this 2nd time around, i realized why.

Jesus was the Great Physician, the Ultimate Healer.  and while us mortals tend to clump medical histories, symptoms, physical findings, lab results, and imaging to guide our treatments, what guided Christ's healing was always, always, always the person, not the disease.

John 5 depicts a man who had been lame for 38 years, unable to get to a bubbling pool and with no one to help him.  it wasn't the disability Jesus healed; no, Jesus healed the man.  verse 6: "When Jesus saw him and knew he had been ill for a long time, he asked him, 'Would you like to get well?'"  for 38 years, this man had watched as people ignored and abandoned him.  Jesus acknowledged him.  Jesus saw him and He knew him.  and while Jesus could have touched the guys' legs, instead, very specifically tailored to this individual, Jesus heals him by simply commanding him to stand up, pick up his mat, and walk (verse 8).  Jesus healed the self-pitying, helpless, ignored man.  and His last words to the man -- "Now you are well: so stop sinning or something even worse may happen to you" (verse 14b) reflects how Jesus did not merely heal the disability; Jesus healed the person.

Matthew 9 houses a good handful of examples, each so specific to each person.  the paralyzed man in verses 1-7 was healed as Jesus was "seeing their faith," saying, "Be encouraged, my child!  Your sins are forgiven."  the woman in v. 19-22 who had been bleeding for 12 years -- mocked, untouchable, desperate, unloved -- a woman who reached out to touch Christ's cloak, was a woman whom Jesus called "daughter," a tender and loving term i'm guessing this woman had not heard for 12 years.  Jesus healed the person, not the disease, not the paralysis, not the bleeding, not the blindness.  it was the man, the woman, the child He healed. 

there are so many examples of this kind of soul-healing.  including Mark 8.22-25, a passage that reminds me of my own personal healing, of how Jesus healed not only my blindness, but my soul.

what can be difficult about being in school with all these driven, ambitious, soon-to-be medical professionals is the danger of being sucked in.  sucked into their secular mindset, their secular desires, their secular motivations.  money.  success.  security.  prestige.  renown.  even sucked into the basis of how they practice medicine.

there are thousands of hospitals out there, millions of health care providers, billions of medications.  and all of these things can treat a disease.  but what does the world really need?  another hospital?  another health care practitioner?  another pill?

what does the world really need?

the one and only Healer. 

God, i don't know how You want to use my life, this education, this career.  but what i do know is that i have nothing to offer to the world except for You.

"We will run to you, we will run to you
Turning from our sin we return to You
Father heal your world, make all things new
Make all things new"