Angels in Charge

In a second, our life almost changed.

We were heading into Nairobi for Caleb's first rugby match. Caleb had gone on ahead on the team bus, and Scott, Julia, Jack, Joop (friend of Caleb's) and I were in our vehicle driving to the International School of Kenya, on the outskirts of the city. We had come back from our overnight about noon, quickly done some prep for the dinner for our caring community that was to happen tonight (family time for boarding students, we have a group of 9 who spend an evening with us now about once a month or so), and then jumped in the car and headed out again. Driving in Kenya is not for the faint of heart, and in spite of rugby's violence I had said this week that the most dangerous part of the game was getting to it on the road. This was Scott's 5th trip into Nairobi this week, which is exhausting. We had almost reached ISK when Scott slowed down and turned on his signal light to turn right (remember we drive on the left, the driver's side is the right, and turning right means crossing the lane of oncoming traffic). The cars behind us also slowed, no one was coming, and he was about to turn into the intersection, when I heard an ominous, impending whoosh and saw something out of the corner of my eye, swooping forward in the same direction as us, but at high speed. I yelled, Scott jerked the wheel back, just as we impacted a racing lorry full of sukumu wiki (the cheap popular Kenyan spinach-like green). The driver, who it later became clear was slightly under the influence and not overly-bright, must have seen the cars slowing and decided to pass all of us. He of course didn't notice our signal light, or think to himself that it would be illegal or at least unwise to pass in an intersection. There was a loud bang and a jolt, but we were all fine. The truck, having passed us now, pulled off the road and so did we, and we both got out to inspect the damage.

The massive "bull bar" metal grill on the front of our vehicle was bent in half and sticking out at a 90 degree angle, ready to snap and fall off. And we had a dent and some scraped paint on the front right corner. The truck had matching streaks of white paint from their front left corner back towards the passenger door. The truck driver immediately began blaming us. We told him he was at fault, but we didn't want any money from him . . however if he intended to blame us we would call the police to settle it. Calling the police in Kenya is never simple. For one thing we had no idea how to reach them. For another they could have decided anything, so it was no guarantee that they would help us. But we didn't want to risk this driver or the truck owner later trying to sue us, their golden chance to get rich. It took about an hour and a half. . . meanwhile we were missing Caleb's game. We actually had a lady in a shop call us a taxi, and put Julia, Jack, and Joop in it (Joop is adult-ish) to go on to the game, sensing that the mess would take long to untangle. It was pretty wrenching to get messages from Joop at the game and find out that Caleb scored the first "try" (touchdown for those in America) of the season, and of his career (this being his first real game) and then kicked two conversions (field goals). And we were missing it, stuck on the side of the road, with a damaged car, hot sun, the inevitable drunk and mentally ill bystander who hassled us continuously, a stubbornly unreasonable driver, and his very kind pastor passenger who just kept trying to mediate some peace between us, dreading the involvement of the police. I texted about five friends to pray.

Well, to make a long story slightly shorter, the owner of the truck finally arrived bringing the police, and they were all respectful, thoughtful, calm people. They took statements, inspected the damage, looked at the marks and paint on the road, and found the lorry-driver at fault. No roadside breath tests, but I'm sure they could smell the alcohol involved too. The police wrote up all the details on plain white paper and told us we would have to come to the police station if we wanted an official report, they kept asking us if we were planning to file one with our Kenyan insurance, and Scott said no, our coverage was for third-party damage when we were at fault, but for this dent and front end work we would cover it ourselves. They dismissed us at last, possibly in order to then press the truck-owner for money in lieu of issuing fines and citations. Who knows. I felt bad for the truck-owner, since we weren't trying to get him in trouble with the police . . but I am consoled that perhaps this driver would have killed someone soon, careless and slightly drunk, so it was best to involve officials to get him off the road.

We arrived for the last minute or so of the rugby game. RVA was winning so dramatically by half, and the other team had an inadequate number of players, so the coach asked for volunteers to switch sides, and we found Caleb in an ISK uniform. As he climbed into the car, with raw skinned knees, limping, happy, having played very well in his debut, he gave the quote of the day: " the thing I love about rugby, you look down at your arms after a game, and you have no idea if that's your blood or somebody else's . . . " Yikes.

At first I confess I was bitterly disappointed to be spending the afternoon on the roadside, missing the game. Scott noted the pattern in our lives: whenever we would go to Semliki Safari Lodge for our once-a-year birthday/anniversary get-away, we would have drastic car trouble on the way home that erased all our rest and turned the journey into a survival challenge. Here we were again, a few hours from peace and cottages and fireplaces and flowers and delicious food and friendly conversation, thrown again into the hassle and danger and uncertainty. We were frustrated with the aggressive driver of the truck, unsure of how to proceed, at the mercy of the police. Vulnerable and shaken. But by the time we drove away, though, we were just thankful. Thankful to be alive. A few more degrees into the intersection and the full-speed impact of the heavy lorry would have hit Scott and Jack' side head on. They could have died. We could have spun around and lost control, or involved other vehicles. We could have had a car that we were unable to drive away. We could have been unjustly blamed, taken to jail, fined, who knows what else. Yes, we missed the glory of the rugby game. But we were alive, intact, innocent, and free to go home, no small thing.

The words from Psalm 91, that Patrick gave us during ebola, echo in my heart tonight, "He will give His angels charge concerning you . . " Once again we were so close to disaster, but walked away unharmed. We don't deserve such rescue, but we are thankful that the angels in charge of us pushed us from devastation to inconvenience today. Sobering.

and made them cry

Tired of making moms cry.  Post-partum women are emotional, so am I, but it isn't fun.  Last afternoon it was the mom of a baby delivered breech at another hospital, only they couldn't get the baby's head out for about half an hour after the body was delivered.  Half an hour of no oxygenated blood to the brain is pretty devastating.  Babies are resilient, but I don't think this one can make it.  It is so hard to find the balance between leaving room for miracles, and not giving false hope.  When the silent tears start to drip down their face, as they lie in their beds, in pain and alone, I know they understand the gravity of the situation.  Today it was a frustrated mom who just wanted to go home and couldn't grasp that her febrile baby could die if she left.  I am rarely so adamant, but I could see she was irrational, and she would someday be glad someone pushed her to a little more patience.  

One last call from the hospital and I'm out the door.  Scott and I have our 24th anniversary Monday, and Dan and Gini who are visiting had their tenth yesterday, so we're all four going to a nearby inexpensive cottage/garden/dinner sort of club where we can have an evening of friendship and an overnight away.  Three teens home alone.  Caleb with SAT's tomorrow, then his first rugby game, then we have a dozen teens for dinner tomorrow.  So praying to find an intake of breath, of spirit, of grace in the next 12 hours.  Prayers appreciated.

+ and -

+ Kangaroo Care--this is how we had moms incubate preemies in Bundibugyo, and it is a well-proven boost for small infants. However at Kijabe with its big plastic warming boxes, monitors and alarms, few moms seem to take our suggestion. So I was very happy today to see that after I had put one preemie skin-to-skin under his mom's gown, I found two moms holding their babies that way. Samuel and Precious are both feeder/grower types, out of the worst part of the dangerous woods, but still vulnerable. Both babies gained an ounce since yesterday.

+ Noreen, came back for a check-up, now quadruple her 620-gram birth weight. And no longer jaundiced. And with beaming parents.

+ I asked Julia to bake cookies with our part-time houseworker during the school break hoping she could teach her how. Now the kids are back in school. And I'm not exactly relaxing at home baking cookies either. So I asked Abigail if she could try. Abigail is wonderful, a dose of mopped floors and wiped shelves and folded clothes that helps us survive. But she is extremely reluctant to COOK. So I was quite delighted (as was everyone else) to come home and find three racks of perfectly shaped and baked colossal cookies waiting.

+ Taught the lunch conference today, and felt very ill-prepared. Just as the intern who was to present the case stood up, he was paged to the delivery room, leaving me on my own. However there are several new residents rotating from the USA, and one in particular kept nodding, answering questions, and appearing generally interested and encouraging. Perhaps this person AWLAYS looks that way, but it was very helpful when standing in front of a few dozen medical students, interns, residents, and even a couple of consultants, to TEACH, to find someone tracking with me in such a positive way.

+ Star, our dear old dog, who loves us. Nice to have a living creature so excited to see me every morning. Nice to see her revel in her new environment, runs and space and exploration.

+ Half-way through the first week of rugby practice. Major abrasions needing bandaged, concern about a banged nose (not fractured), one lost toenail, one jammed finger. But all that is pretty minor. No broken bones or concussions or major blood loss. Yet. This sport is a bit of a medical-mother's nightmare. I try to remember how much they love it (the camaraderie, the teamwork, the exercise, the proving oneself) and try not to focus on the injury potential.

+ First JV girls' volleyball game. Julia did quite reasonably well. We were the only fans for JV, so we cheered a lot. The girls won 2 games to 1. Varsity plays best of 5, and boys and girls both won there too.

+ Caleb finished AP chem and calc. He's exhausted. Me too.

+ Went to the first delivery of the morning--full term twins, babies being born to a 40 year old mom with no previous successful pregnancies and a lot of loss. One boy and one girl, pink and squalling, very alive. Nice.

- Chapel ended this morning with a security announcement, which went something along the lines of, "the one who was killed has many brothers who come to our hospital, so keep a careful eye on them." It felt a little creepy, a little racial-profile-prone. I tried to imagine the thin mother of our baby with severe bladder and bowel anomalies as part of a plot against Kijabe. Couldn't see it. Yes, we have a significant patient population from an unstable m.sl.m country. But they come because they have sensed love and care, not because they want to overthrow or destroy. And most of the convicted Al Qaeda after the embassy bombings in Kenya, or other bombings in Kampala, do not appear middle eastern or north african. They look like everyone else around them, which is how terrorism works.

-Reading blogs and fb and talking to Kenyans about Osama's death. Felt guiltily unpatriotic day one when I didn't want to rejoice. Now feeling relieved by people like Grant Walsh who are introspectively trying to apply some of the tough Jesus sayings (pray for your enemies and those who persecute you) to the current world situation. Justice, it seems, but who really wants justice for themselves? Finding that there are Christians who are soberly cautiously grieved, which seems most appropriate.

- Falling asleep waiting for the slow crisping of granola. Barely keeping up with the food consumption.

-Telling parents of a week-old baby with severe hydrocephalus and total-body infection that their daughter will not survive. Praying Psalm 23 with them. Resisting the urge to soften the truth too much, to hold our the false hope that somehow we can fix all this, the one thing they really want me to say. Exhausting.

-Nelly, below in her traveling duds, a baby with cleft lip and severe heart disease, on day 40 of life and at her parents' request we transferred to a private hospital in Nairobi for expert cardiology management. A 36 hour nightmare later (they asked for a several THOUSAND dollar deposit pre-admission, transferred her to the public hospital, where the impatient dad wouldn't wait for the cardiologist) she came back, weight down a little but miraculously not much the worse for wear. This is a hard medical system to navigate for parents of special-needs kids.

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Three Kijabe Social Events

In the last 24 hours, no less. When it rains it pours.

The first was yesterday afternoon, a British nurse decided to put on a party for the Royal Wedding. She arranged for a projector and screen to hook up to the live newsfeed, and baked scones and all sorts of sweets and tea, and invited people over. This is someone whom I really like and respect and relate to, and the same person whose birthday party I missed a couple months ago due to crisis in the NICU. I don't think I've made it to any of the women's Bible studies, showers, or other parties . . . So I wasn't too surprised when the time for William and Kate to walk down the aisle approached (1 pm in Kenya) and I was in the ICU with the surgery team putting a chest tube into our most severely ill patient, after a non-stop morning (and night before) of trying to figure out which of his many failing body systems was the priority and what to do about it (his name is Baraka, and his father told me in the midst of all this: just do your part, and God will do the rest. Which I thought was sage advice, and not a bad overall treatment plan. Baraka's prognosis is very guarded, and heroic cure unlikely, but we keep doing our small part, and the big picture is up to God to heal or to take more quickly to paradise). But back to the wedding--about 3 there was finally a lull in admissions and problems, and though I figured I'd missed most of the party, I still went over to see the Balcony Kiss and taste the goodies. The host was so proud of her country, of the pageantry and beauty, of the loyal crowds, of the handsome royals. It was fun to chat with the few die-hards left at the end of the party for a half an hour, to escape the hospital, to be caught up in something bigger . . and to eat. And then back to sick babies.

The second was today, a party at our neighbor's house in honor of their finally-official adoption of the little girl they've been fostering since she was born. She was an abandoned baby in the nursery at the hospital, and my neighbor just volunteered to help out by feeding and holding her, until the staff finally asked her to just take her home temporarily . . . and they bonded. Though they have five kids, three of whom are in college and grad school, they made room in their home and hearts for one more baby. But adoption laws are stringent in Kenya, for good reason, to prevent child trafficking and abuse. Which means that even though they jumped through every legal hoop, with court appearances, lawyers, home visits, child protection officers, embassy letters . . . and even though Hope knows no other family, calls them mom and dad, and is a healthy amazing precocious little girl thriving in her situation . . . the final approval was touch and go. So when the judge refused to rule on Wednesday, and called them back on Thursday, they feared the worst. So many people around the world prayed. And against all predictions, he granted the adoption. Today they invited the whole Kijabe community for cake and ice cream and gave a testimony of God's goodness, and prayed for Hope. Who was sporting a new pink chiffon dress and enjoying the party, though I'm sure she has no idea what it was really all about, since she has no concept of any other life.

Right after her party, a good portion of us headed up the hill to RVA for the final day of Rugby "hell week", the last phase of try-outs which have whittled the field from 80 to 50. There was about a two-hour long scrimmage divided into four shorter games, so that the coaches could cut the last 6 or 8 guys and set the final teams for JV and Varsity. Which means every kid was playing his heart out. But since they are brothers and friends, the atmosphere was festive. It is actually the first time I've watched Rugby, and thankfully I sat next to an extremely helpful and knowledgable 9th grader who had already been cut, and who explained the nuances of scrum and try and conversion and ruck, who is a hooker and who is a fullback or a prop, and what's a line-in. Caleb played well, kicked 2 of his team's 3 conversions, tackled and ran and punted. And mostly just looked like he was having a blast. It's a game with continuous action, strength, risks, smart plays, and constant team work, there are few solo moves. A great paradigm for life. After the scrimmage there was the "Golden Boot" contest. All 50 players start off kicking the rugby ball from the 22 yard line through the uprights, round after round it gets harder (less direct, from the sides, further away) and if you miss you're out. The final round was only 3 boys: Caleb, Aneurin (the boy who stayed with us last week) and a freshman. They all three missed the first attempt, but on the second round after Caleb and the other boy missed, Aneurin got it through, and won. It was fun to see Caleb do so well when he only just started kicking about two weeks ago!

It has occurred to me tonight that all three events are pictures of the Kingdom, straight from the Bible, which explains some of their power and draw. The royal wedding, the prince and his bride, the consummation of longing and the promise of true love, these are the way that Revelations and Psalms describe the future. We are the bride, dressed in white, beautiful and desirable and chosen. The adoption, straight from Galatians and Romans, we are the child who was hopeless and abandoned, now brought into the family, loved and longed for. The battle or contest, from 1 Corinthians and Hebrews, the training and effort and teamwork and concentration on the goal, we are encouraged to push for the prize. All three were times to witness the truth, and times to be encouraged by the reality of the cloud of saints which surrounds us here.

Evil abounds

Some days the reality of abundant evil just slaps one in the face.

Last night, three men armed with pangas and at least pretending to have guns, stormed into the casualty department (ER) at 2:30 a.m., made all the patients and staff lie on the floor after giving up their cell phones and shoes, and proceeded to ransack the place for money, forcing their way into the pharmacy where they stole over a thousand dollars worth of Kenya shillings.  Which is a LOT of money here.  Two people were hurt in the process, a patient who was cut on the head by a machete, and one of the hospital guards who was thoroughly beat up and is now in the ICU. Many more were traumatized and terrified.  

Mercifully, we were obliviously asleep at home at the time, a couple hundred yards away.  We did not learn of the incident until we encountered the shaken staff at chapel at 8 this morning.  Our chief administrator led us from Habakkuk 2:  the proud, the violent, the blood-shedders, will come to woe, when the glory of the Lord covers the earth, when all keep silence before Him.  

Later we heard that the 5-year-old daughter of a Kenyan man who works in the welding/shop department at RVA was abducted from a church a couple miles' away on Sunday, picked up in the congenial chaos of Easter, and her body was found two days later, violated.  

There is no softening or making sense of this kind of evil.  These are incidents that cry out for justice, for God's reign on earth to be as clear as it is in the heavens.  Such evil lurks in every community.  The homey cottages, flowers, friendliness, common purpose, freedom of Kijabe might have lulled us into forgetting that we are still caught in the same broken human society that produces genocide and drug-abuse and child-trafficking and terrorism, from Nairobi to New York.  And of course there are abundant evidences of less gruesome, but equally lethal evil today, as a 30-year-old mother dies of a rare brain infection, or a newborn succumbs to the debilitation of severe dehydration.  

This is the real context of Easter--no bunnies or lilies, instead the shocking hubris of desperate men, the hate and terror that must be radically healed before our world is redeemed.  Our hope lies not in minimizing or softening evil, but in overcoming it by love.

Girls' Football

When we were in Bundibugyo a couple of weeks ago, Julia was delighted to practice with her old football team.  A number of women missionaries have put some effort into girls' sports, but the most consistent was Miss Ashley, who formed a viable football (soccer) team that represented the district at nationals the past two years.  There was a fair amount of momentum and pride, yet we didn't know what would happen when she left.  So it was a joy to see that Madame Illuminate (who didn't really play as a student herself, but gamely came out for practices and gave it a shot) and Master Bwampu (a star player as a student, and an assistant boys' coach) decided to continue with the girls.  And it was even more exciting to see that instead of being the only team in the district, this year there were (in theory) SIX TEAMS.  Which meant an in-district tournament to play for the right to go to nationals.  

The Saturday after we left we exchanged sms's with Illuminate, and learned that the girls had won their games and advanced to the finals, but due to rioting by another school's male team and fans, the tournament was cut short.  We weren't sure what would happen, but in the next week the rioting school was disqualified (a verdict the headteacher ignored, sending his boys' team to regionals where they lost) and the CSB girls advanced to nationals (there are many fewer girls' teams, so no regionals).  So for the third year running, the CSB girls will represent Bundibugyo in a national tournament.

Having been to two nationals, once as a week-long-in-the-dorm chaperone and once just to cheer and see a couple of games, I am a huge believer in this process.  Young women in Bundibugyo do not experience much success, praise, competition, team-work, travel, or fun.  Very few advance beyond primary school, and fewer still go to college.  Most measure their life by surviving childbirth and wrestling enough food out of a small garden to feed their children.  So the entire process of discipline, practice, wearing a uniform (!), traveling on a mini-bus further from home than they will ever go, meeting girls from all over Uganda, being cheered for, being part of a group . . . not to mention the personal discipleship that occurs by the coaches along the way . . .all of these things are invaluable in the life of a young girl.  There is good evidence that girls who play sports wait longer to get pregnant, go further in school, and develop leadership skills for life.  

Thank God for this opportunity, and for the staff who take time from their evenings and vacations to make it happen.  Thank God that several donors have emerged in the last week to cover the bulk of the gap between our meager CSB sports budget and the costs of sending a team of 20-some people across the country.  Of course CSB can always use financial help for programs like sports!  But mostly pray that the girls would emerge from this trip with a sense of God's love, and of the potential He created in them.

Easter Call: glory and wounds

This Easter weekend was spent mostly in the hospital, as we were both on call.  Which can be a little stressful when trying to cook nice meals or spend time with kids, but thankfully they're an understanding crew (including the delightful A.H., British classmate of Caleb who came back to school almost a week early to train for rugby, and is staying with us).  There were about seven new babies admitted to the nursery in a day and a half, the sickest at about midnight last night when a woman in a nearby town called her nurse neighbor to give advice on her stomach pain, after living in denial of being pregnant for nine months and in labor for a couple of days.  The neighbor convinced her to come to Kijabe, and she was quickly taken for a C-section.  I hurried through the quiet night into the bright buzz of the operating theatres just as the baby was laid limp and lifeless on the warming bed.  I haven't assigned an apgar score of 1 (on a scale of 1-bad to 10-good) very often.  It took a long five minutes of intubation and pushing oxygen into the lungs to get a response, and as we whisked the baby back to the nursery I wondered if he would pull through.  But now almost 24 hours later he's holding his own.  As is another premature baby, and a set of premature twins where the big boy is twice the size of the small girl.  Blinking, coughing, grimacing, crying, purplish and slippery, so easily winding down their heart-rates due to coldness or stress, these fragile bits of humanity land in our care, and the weight of responsibility is inversely proportional to their meager two or three pounds.  Then there was the lumbar puncture to do on a baby who was born with a huge ballooning cyst of brain fluid protruding from the middle of his face.  The neurosurgeons removed it, leaving a gaping hole in his split nose/mouth which will have to be fixed later, but unfortunately, he caught a serious infection, probably in the OR.  He looks somehow frog-like with his bizarre split-open face and his surgical scars, but in a loveably pitiful sort of way.  And of course the children on the older ward that I know less well, some gasping for breath, others too listless to feed.  We did manage to join the sunrise service up at RVA for staff, quite lovely, and communion this evening.  But no easter eggs, no baskets of chocolate, no hunts, not even a real church service, this was an Easter spent in the hospital.  One hand on the babies, the other on life, trying to hold them together.

Which, according to the book I've been immersed in through Lent, Surpirsed by Hope, is the proper way to celebrate.

The book focuses on Romans 8 and 1 Cor 15 to show that Easter is the reality of the new-heavens-and-new-earth breaking into time, the first-fruit demonstration of a re-made bodily life that will one day flood the world.  There are many deeply thoughtful passages, but I will just close with one that encourages me on call with visions of purpose and glory:  This brings us to 1 Corinthians 15:58 once more:  what you do in the Lord is not in vain. You are--strange though it may seem, almost as hard to believe as the resurrection itself--accomplishing something that will become in due course part of God's new world.  Every act of love, gratitude, and kindness; every wok of art of music inspired by the love of God and delight in the beauty of his creation; every minute spent teaching a severely handicapped child to read or to walk; every act of care and nurture, of comfort and support, for one's fellow human beings and for that matter one's fellow nonhuman creatures; and of course every prayer, all Spirit-led teaching, every deed that spreads the gospel, builds up the church, embraces and embodies holiness rather than corruption, and makes the name of jesus honored in the world--all of this will find its way, through the resurrecting power of God, into the new creation that God will one day make.  That is the logic of the mission of God. . . (p 208)

Sounds bracing.  But at almost 11 pm after only a few hours of sleep in this 48 hour stretch, I close with another quote too, (p 280):

It will, of course, be costly.  You don't get to share in God's life and escape without wounds.  Look what happened to Jesus himself.  

on the night in which he was betrayed

This phrase echoes in the wake of Passover.   Knowing that the rush of events was reaching a critical point, knowing that Judas had already moved across the line of betrayal in his heart, knowing that the most intense physical and spiritual agony was impending, Jesus reclined and feasted with his closest friends.  "He loved them to the end" . . . by washing their feat, inviting them to eat, breaking bread, reminding them of the huge story of redemption just as they were about to be plunged into a crisis of faith.  He created the context for meaning as they moved into the unthinkably painful hours of apparent defeat ahead.  Wine, bread, roasted meat, bitter herbs; scripture, promises, singing, conversation, encouragement; a moment of closure and a sort of good-bye before they walked out into the night of Gethsamane and the dark day of Golgotha. And he did this not just with those who "deserved" the attention, but with the very man who would within hours betray him to his death.  He washed Judas' feet; he handed Judas the unleavened bread; he poured Judas the cups of sanctification, plagues, redemption and praise.  Willingly.

We celebrated Passover last night, too, in remembrance.  This weekend is usually an intense time in our lives, the end of Lent, a team Passover, A Good Friday service with the local church with seven mini-sermons about Jesus' words on the cross, fasting, watching the Passion, a half-night or all-night prayer vigil on Friday, something for kids on Saturday involving egg hunts or acting out the story, a Sunday sunrise service with neighbors and team in the yard followed by Easter breakfast, a major-event church service again, then an all-afternoon team and friends meal with tables outdoors and games and leisure.  So it is a bit of another transition to spend our first holiday here, to rub up against the ways that it is different, to decide what to keep for continuity and what to let go of.  It is peculiar to find that in Kenya, at least here at Kijabe, there is no Good Friday service, and nothing about Easter was even mentioned last Sunday (no mention of it being Palm Sunday either).  We don't really have a team anymore to make plans with, which eliminates most of the traditions.  We will join the RVA-planned Easter Sunrise service and breakfast (hopefully, we're both on call . . .), but that is the only "happening" that I know of.   Mostly we are in observe-and-lay-back mode, trying to take this year as a sabbatical-sort-of time, trying to be OK with the periphery. But Passover is the favorite part of the weekend for the kids, and one of the non-negotiables of the holiday, so I invited the family we lived next to when we first arrived who have been so kind to us (Americans, long-term missionaries taking one year at Kijabe on behalf of the AIC's theological college), and the doctor I work with most closely with and his dentist wife (Indians who are here for part of a year in between finishing training in India and starting post-graduate training programs in the US).   This was a new tradition for them, so felt a little risky, but they were game for the hours-long ceremony and meal, candlelight and readings and parsley sprigs in salty water, the tears, or matzah dipped in sweet apple kharoset, the joy in the midst of labor.  

As I was getting ready, toiling over rolling out the matzah crackers and baking them, I know my heart was not like Jesus'.  No one here is going to betray me in more than the normal human friction of small disappointments and misunderstandings, but I'm sure I had less freedom of love in my heart.  I was trying to get things settled in the NICU so I could get the cooking done and feeling the push; I was wondering if I had invited an incompatible mix or if my kids would be OK.  I find my soul frequently weighted with uncertainty about what my role is, and grudging service.  So far from the way Jesus approached the night.

So I pray for healing and love, for the Jesus-attitude of sharing himself freely, even on the night in which he was betrayed.  For the ability to recline and feast in the face of suffering, for the ability to enjoy the goodness of friends and family even when loss is imminent.  For the rhythm of connecting to tradition even when history is about to turn the defining corner.  For love that overcomes betrayal.  

poem for today

Seven Stanzas at Easter

John Updike

Make no mistake: if He rose at all
it was as His body.
If the cells' dissolution did not reverse, the molecules reknit, the
amino acids rekindle,
the Church will fall.

It was not as the flowers,
each soft spring recurrent;
it was not as His Spirit in the mouths and fuddled eyes of the
eleven apostles;
it was as his flesh: ours.

The same hinged thumbs and toes,
the same valved heart
that – pierced – died, withered, paused, and then regathered out of
enduring Might
new strength to enclose.

Let us not mock God with metaphor,
analogy, sidestepping transcendence;
making of the event a parable, a thing painted in the faded credulity
of earlier ages:
let us walk through the door.

The stone is rolled back, not papier mache,
not stone in a story,
but the vast rock of materiality that in the slow grinding of time will
eclipse for each of us
the wide light of day.

And if we will have an angel at the tomb,
make it a real angel,
weighty with Max Planck's quanta, vivid with hair, opaque in the
dawn light, robed in real linen
spun on a definite loom.

Let us not make it less monstrous,
for in our own convenience, our own sense of beauty,
lest, awakened in one unthinkable hour,
we are embarrassed by the miracle,
and crushed by remonstrance.

Source: 'Seven Stanzas at Easter, in Telephone Poles and Other Poems (London: Andre Deutsch, 1964), 72–3. 

Amen, as a doctor, we declare this is a holiday that affirms the holiness of the body, definite and material and redeemable.  

viewed through the tomb door

From old friend and fellow pilgrim MP working in a difficult place (and referring to another mk besides Tommy who fell and died this month):

 The celebration of life was tempered by the death of boy on their team the week before who fell from a height. Life and death. Joy and pain. It seems to only make sense when viewed through the door of the open tomb. Life conquers death and we rejoice but the pain is real. "We know the whole creation groans…" we walk and live amongst the groaning and look for redemption. "But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us." (quotes from Rom. 8) Honestly, I don't feel like a conqueror and often what I 'see' around me overwhelms. So, unashamed, I cling to the feet of him who is 'risen indeed' and ask for eyes to see, wisdom to choose and strength to respond in the fullness of faith. Is this not what Easter is all about? 

 

I like his image of looking through the door of the open tomb--here we are, in the place of death, but looking out at the Garden where the only fully alive human, the first-fruits of the renewal of the entire universe, walks.  In the cave it is musty, dry, dim.  All three of the babies I left struggling for life the first of April as we headed to Uganda, died.  That was hard to hear.  All were critically ill so it is not surprising, but there had been such an investment of work and hope and prayer.  Why not at least one save?  During our meetings in Uganda I prayed for Aidan to sleep, and no sooner were the words out of my mouth than he wailed, awake.  So I'm not seeing amazing answers to prayers these days, at least as far as babies are concerned.  Instead I feel the walls of the tomb, and can imagine the weight of the stone, blocking escape, trapping in the cause-and-effect reality of pre-Easter physics, where sick babies in Africa die, and tired irritable missionary kids cry, and friends' teens fall fatally, and we let each other down, and the bones collect.  Then it is hard to believe that a very real force already blew open that cave, pushed the stone away, so that we are crouching, glimpsing, blinking out at the sunshine at dawn, scent of flowers drifting in, the song of birds echoing into the place of death.  

Can we walk out of the tomb?  I suppose that is what Christianity is all about, exiting the trap of a deathly dark hole and stepping into the garden to cling to the feet of the One who removed the stone.  We still carry the reek of the grave, but by faith we walk into the grass and feel the sun.  At least some days.  Others, we hover by the door, still lingering in the decomposing dust, still squinting into the daylight, not fully free of the tomb until we pass through.  

Praying the stone rolls, the view is opened up, the Gardener beckons.