vulnerable

First off, apologies for the lack of blogging lately. Internet is sketch. And things have been pretty busy. If I could just record my entire life here, all 500 emotions I experience on the daily, I would just post that instead. But this will have to do. And probably for your benefit, as those emotions get kinda crazy over here.

Mark, my brother, left just over a week ago. I moved into a precious cottage by myself that I’m renting from a friend who is spending a few months in the states. Clothed in Hope just had it’s first full week of production, and the women received their first profits from the items they made. I became obsessed with and watched the first 2 seasons of Downton Abbey (judge if you want, but watch it first). I’ve met new people, I’ve taken myself to the new shopping mall for a few hours of normalcy. It’s been a week and a half of adjusting to a brand new lifestyle in a third-world country 6,000 miles and 6 hours from home, by myself. An interesting time to say the least.

Before I get ahead of myself, let’s rewind last Monday and Tuesday. Mark and I decided to celebrate an amazing first couple of weeks with a overnight to a safari lodge at the Kafue National Park in the east. We were welcomed with great food, a wonderful chalet on the Kafue River, listening to hippos fight each other as we slept, and enjoyed silence, something we didn’t realize we missed/needed so badly. After going so hard every day, rest was necessary. Monday night I had to turn in early after not feeling so great and turns out I got a nasty bit of food poisoning, making for an interesting 6am safari game drive on Tuesday morning. I’ll save the details, but one thing I managed to hear from our game drive that stuck with me was a detail about the Kudu, a big antelope kinda thing.

He explained this weird mating process of the male Kudu with his ladies (obviously irrelevant), and how after he’s finished his mating season, he spends the rest of the year completely alone. No Kudu bros or babies running around him. What stuck was that it’s known that the Kudu is the most vulnerable animal in the entire park. Not the slow, pudgy bush pig, but the big and strong Kudu. Because he’s alone.

(You'll have to google the Kudu if you want to see him, because going on hour 2 of uploading one photo just wasn't working out.)

My intention in this post is not to invite y’all to a full-fledged pity party, but to share with you where I honestly am. Without Mark here and living in a place to my own is so different. It makes me a Kudu- vulnerable. I don’t have my herd of friends right here to listen to the bad days, laugh with the good ones, or even to call with this time difference and technology woes. There is risk to this vulnerability. Trips to the market, even with Elina, are exhausting with people always calling out to me as the oddity I am in the middle of an African market. The simple errand is quite the ordeal. I’ve faced emotions in depths I didn’t know I was capable of feeling over this last week, but I’ve also experienced a peace I shouldn’t feel.

Yes safety is important. I don’t go out after dark. I have a driver when I go far. I have 2 phones. I don’t carry much cash. And the list goes on. But there are some things I just can’t avoid. I can’t change the color of my skin and I can’t dye my hair for life. I can’t make someone magically appear. I can’t afford a bodyguard. That’s just how it is. But I don’t think me being in this “vulnerable” state is a surprise to God. Maybe to me, okay definitely to me at times, but not to Him.

Sometimes I get so comfortable in my own routine, in safety, in comfort, that I put in some earplugs and go on my merry way, in my own will and by my own strength. Not so much here. Two weeks ago I still rocked my neon earplugs but then the shouting started. I’m thankful for the comforts ripped from my hands, because I can experience the ultimate comforter, desperation in its beauty, not its burden. On days when I seem further from understanding this culture than ever, I can rest, not because it feels normal or because it’s my first reaction, but because Jesus is loving me so much to affectionately scream at me to stop trying to know it all. There are moments of fear, moments of bliss, but I’m coming to find that there are riches far greater than a “good” day.

Moments like when I hear “I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.” Moments when I step outside of my gate feeling the protection of the Lord, and a peace unlike any other. Moments of beautiful affirmation of His will for me to be here. Days living in grace and love of such magnitude I’m only starting to understand. That’s Jesus.

I’ll conclude this post with a prayer request. Yes it would be great if y’all wanted to pray for my time here, but I had a different one in mind. This “Christian nation” is a dark place. Incredibly. There are things happening here that haven’t happened in the history of the nation, there is a rise of witchcraft that’s crippling the people. I’ve talked to too many women about their husbands dying within a week of a bug bite. It’s not even material poverty that’s the huge issue. It’s spiritual poverty, a stronghold over this nation that shouldn’t be here. Pray for Zambia. Pray against darkness and evil and for light to radiate in every village through every tribe of people here. Especially for Lusaka. Maybe even be as bold to pray for God to tell you if this is where He wants you. I know He’s equipped His people to be here and it’s up to us to say “yes.” I know it's me. Maybe it's you too.