Ok, FINALLY, I have a few minutes to sit and write my thoughts about the last month of our life in Zambia. So much has gone on in such a short period of time, so I am going to write a series of blogs. This one is on a personal level. Mommy guilt and the difficulty of God’s will and all that sorta fun stuff.
We arrived home to Lusaka in the beginning of August and hit a big fat wall with the words WELCOME TO ZAMBIA THE REAL AFRICA written in bold letters across the face.
This time around it was hard coming back to Zambia. For the first time our girls are really beginning to understand what is there in America and what is here in Zambia. Leaving family and friends is always hard, but this time it was particularly painful. As a mother I wrestled a great deal with questions.
“Are we screwing our kids up irreversibly?”
“Will they ever forgive us for doing this to them!?”
“Are we being selfish by asking this sacrifice of them again?”
“OH GOD! I CAN’T DO THIS AGAIN!”
I remember on our last Sunday morning in church in NYC I was wrestling hard with God. “LORD PLEASE MAKE IT CLEAR! JESUS YOU HAVE TO SPEAK CLEARLY ABOUT MY GIRLS! I CAN GO BACK TO ZAMBIA BUT ONLY IF I KNOW THAT MY GIRLS WILL BE OK! LORD PLEASE!!!!!!!!!” I felt like Jacob wrestling with the Angel. Then God, in his amazing love, broke through the anxiety and the tears and brought such a calm and quiet to my heart.
“Amira Hannah and Brooklyn are safe in the palm of my hands and you don’t have anything to worry about. Keep moving forward and keep trusting me!"
It was like a clear soft voice that calmed the waves of storm in my momma heart. It was what I needed to have the courage to get my girls on the plane two days later and fly back to Africa.
God’s will chafes sometimes. God’s will isn’t fluffy pink marshmallow clouds of spiritual bliss and happiness. BUT GOD’S WILL IS THE SAFEST AND MOST SECURE PLACE YOU CAN BE! God’s will is lonely sometimes, and God’s will stretches us is ways that we never thought. (as in I am on the wrack of my own life and I can feel my bones cracking and my joints popping stretching, not a nice soft gently post work out stretch)
The day we arrived in Zambia **THE DAY!** our dog was killed by the neighbors dog. We had only been boots on the ground 6 hours! I found myself holding our dog wrapped in a towel (he wasn’t dead at that point) screaming at God. LORD DON’T LET THIS BE THE START! GOD PLEASE! WWWWWHHHHYYYYY!!!!! MY GIRLS! LORD MY GIRLS!!!! (they loved that dog so much. He was in our family for 4 years) My husband took him to the vet and I went in the house, prayed with my tear filled babies and put them to bed.
Louie died in the night. When I woke the kids up in the morning to break the news to them I was FLOORED at the grace of God on them in that moment. I was fully and completely expecting ranting and raving and angry tears and begging and pleading to go back to America. But all three of them spoke of how God already told them that Louie was gone and that everything was going to be ok. They were understandably sad, but WOW! We talked about finding comfort in God when our hearts hurt and that God deserve the praise even when things go bad. Nothing changes who God is.
I see God at work in my kids right now in such beautiful ways. I see them growing in the knowledge of Him and in the understanding of who God has made them to be. Through the experience of Louie’s death they are beginning to understand the gentle merciful hand of God for themselves and learning to find comfort in God’s Word.
I never wanna give the impression that because we are missionaries we have our stuff together. BBBHHHWWWWWAAAAHHHAHHAAA!! I wanted to share my recent experience as a missionary mamma mom who wrestles with God’s will and the fact that it ain+t pretty. But I also wanna encourage you! God hears your cries and he sees your heart! Don’t be afraid! Worship and let God take care of the rest! I promise, he will see you through!
Just ten days after we arrived from spending a short summer in America we hosted a team from our church in the States….Times Square Church. 
It was such a beautiful time, and such an intense time! WOW! We experienced things with this team that we have never experienced before with teams in the past. We even ended up going to a funeral for a street kid the day before they left. They got to experience life here from all its angles. They really got to get into what we do on a daily basis. One team member even helped take a kid to the hospital who was in desperate need of stitches in his mouth. Some kid had beat him up for the equivalent of 5 dollars. 
We held community outreaches at Mrs. Nyrenda’s house. Mrs. Nyrenda allows us to use her yard to hold community outreaches for the neighborhood children. We launched that effort while the team from TSC was here. 
We held an outreach directed at the girls on the streets. The ladies from the team set up a wonderful manicure table and brought fun crafts for the girls to come and enjoy. It was a pleasure to sit with these precious girls and allow them a few moments of peace to simply be teenage girls. 
We had loud fun dinners every night in our house. Every night there were at least 18 people at our table enjoying company and food and laughter. 
