God’s kinda left me floundering on this one.
I wish I could give you something happy or something that makes me seem full of grace and holiness and God’s presence, but, if you read on from here, you best give me some grace.
Because right now, I’m not sure what is making me sick to my stomach: reflecting on what happened or the rocking of the boat that I’m writing this on.
We got to spend the last five days with Aiel and his five family members: his wife Nancy, his son Janson, his daughter Lorenzi, and his grand daughter Lexi. The past five days have been a blast. A man from the village chose to believe in Christ and be baptized. Jessica and I got to open up to our hosting missionary family about our thoughts on Scripture, concerns with what mission work should look like, and honest discussion of what the church should look like. I got to watch the cooking of a chicken from start to finish. In other words, I saw it caught and killed and helped pluck the feathers. I got to give my first sermon, entirely in Bislama (I had a lot of help with translating).
Sounds like a neat time. Not to mention the gorgeous sunsets or the fact that their house was about a hundred feet from the ocean. Combine that with island time, the concept of doing life slowly and completing on major thing a day and just having little pressure to do anything. Now, it sounds even better.
Now, if you’re a little neurotic like me, you’re probably thinking that I made a mistake. I must have been counting Aiel with his five family members because I only mentioned four. Well, the fifth is Lius. And, if it feels like her presence so far in this blog has gone by unnoticed, then you have a pretty good idea of the past five days.
Lius slowly lost feeling and use of her body and for the past four years, she has been bed-ridden. This grown woman who is Isle’s sister has about the body mass of a six year old. Lius is beautiful. She has the sweetest smile. But, Lius’s body is broken and it isn’t fair.
Lius has her own house. And her family has made her a bed. They have a wheel chair for her, but it is rarely used. So, Lius very rarely gets to move. So, Lius lies there looking at the wall across from her and that his her life. Lius’s family feeds her and I didn’t get a chance to see them take care of waste but I’m certain they do that as well. Surviving bed rest for four years takes a lot of work from your care takers, especially when those caretakers probably spend at least five hours a day making breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
The first day, we got here Aiel mentioned but we were never introduced to Lius not until late into the second day and then it was by the Brandells. The third day we sang to her with Shawnda, our missionary mom. Every time, Shawnda would go to see Lius, she would check that Eric was taking time to read God’s Word with her.
The fourth day was a Sunday. The Brandells had pushed the issue to make sure that Luice was there for church. Usually, Aiel would worship with his family in Lius’s room/house, but with company with him, things were weird. Liuce was out of sight, out of mind.
Liuce seemed happiest on Sunday when she was with everyone. Lius had the biggest smile. I think she was starting to open up the most to us then.
Lius’s house was right next to the one my bride, me, and The Brandells were all sleeping in. Any time we went to get anything, we walked past her door.
Sunday was the only day she was with all of us. The day we sang with her, I could hear Eric leading a Bible study with some of the men. Each of the five days we were there, we had at least one Bible study and singing. Four of those days, she wasn’t a part of any of it.
Monday, I spent a lot of the day discussing with Eric, Shawnda, and my bride about the hallmarks of the true church. Loving our fellow Christians came up a lot. I didn’t go see Lius Monday.
Today, Tuesday, we left incredibly early. I managed to say goodbye. I had to cajole my PMSing bride to say goodbye and take a picture with Lius and me (I mean PMSing in a technical, non-degrading way; periods in the bush where toilets are a hole in the ground aren’t exactly fun).
This whole five days I’ve been crushed with an incredible guilt that I’m not doing enough for Lius, that I’m not loving enough, that I’m not spending enough time, that I’m not praying enough. But every time I saw Lius, I came face to face with my powerlessness in this world, face to face with brokenness that not only I can’t fix but I probably also can’t even make better.
I hope one day, when God asks Luice who cared for her as one of the least of these, who loved her as He loves, Luice has grace and remembers the little that I did do for her and not the times that I failed to give so much more.
Maybe reading this, you are angry for Lius … Angry at the fact that I honestly do not know the last time Lius sat and looked at the ocean 200 feet from her door.
Maybe, you’re angry at my bride for not wanting to walk back to Lius’s door to say good bye.
Maybe, you’re angry at me for even taking two minutes of my time to say hello yesterday.
Maybe, you’re angry at the Brandells for not demanding a higher level of care for Luice.
Maybe, you’re angry at Isle and his family for not providing that higher level of care.
Maybe, you’re angry at God for not preventing the situation in the first place.
I don’t have any good answers for you. I figure in the next year or two, Lius will no longer be with us. I hope that God keeps her happy until then.
The only answer I have for you is grace, the belief that all of us are just trying to do the best we can with what we know how, the honest truth that none of us are perfect and that all of us have times when selfishness wins and the love we are supposed to show just isn’t there, the realization that being angry or judgmental for another human’s failures comes from a deep-seated feeling of self-righteousness.
I wish I could tell you that I learned how to give unconditional love these past few days. If faced with the exact same situation again, I’m fairly certain that I would be different, that it would be better, but I’m pretty sure that I would miss the mark of what m called to be in Christ.
But, one thing that I have maybe learned is unconditional grace, this concept that I don’t need to believe that I’m better or more righteous than anyone else or that I would do a better job than anyone else, that truly all that I can and truly should ever be able to do is beg God to be merciful to me a sinner.
Because, all I can hope is that He has more grace for my soul than hatred for my failings.
Tata, Lius, mi glad tumas blong meetem yu.
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