Longings

Lately I’ve been longing for life that’s predictable. Where day-to-day, month-to-month, year-to-year, you know what to expect: consistency. Living in a way that you do things in the same way that your mother did them. I’ve been longing for life where everyone knows that the whole family will get together for each birthday that comes around. Every year. The meal, the gifts, the cake: predictable, yet joyful and full of fun. A life where things do change, but slowly. Generations follow the same pattern. There are others to model and extremes are tempered by social norms. There you have a place; a home. Familiar faces surround you everywhere you go.

Here, there is no such predictability. As a stranger in a foreign land, there are no consistent family gatherings to look forward to. We haven’t been here long enough to figure out the “norms” or to have a solid base of friends. Everyday life is new, changing, and unpredictable. Which can be exhausting for someone like me. For some people new things are energizing; for others they are energy-zapping. At the beginning, even the first couple of months, the newness was exciting. Now however, I find myself longing for something easy, comfortable, predictable, and consistent. The unknowns we face every single day often leave me exhausted. Our lives are changing so much I can’t seem to adjust to this “new normal.” If I step back, I believe I am adjusting and it’s just happening gradually (but it’s hard to step back and get that perspective). At the same time I know I must not only adjust & settle, but also grown in my ability to adjust and change and be flexible.

Here are a few of the strange unpredictable things we face: one day there is sugar, the next day and for weeks afterwards, there is a shortage. One day it takes 25 minutes to get to church; the next Sunday 45. The electricity goes off without warning, and stays off for an extended period of time. One day our househelper doesn’t show up because of some Ethiopian holiday you had no idea about. Half the things on a menu the waiter says they don’t have available at a restaurant.

There are some consistent things here: I can get a half kilo of bananas for 3 birr anywhere in the city. Our two puppies are always happy to see us. When our househelper arrives she will do the dishes and hang out the laundry. Church worship will be wonderful. For all these things, I am very grateful.

When I stop and think about it, do I really want a life that’s always predictable and consistent? There are definitely some parts of it that I would love, but I can also see myself falling into a life of complacency. I would find myself “far too easily pleased” as C.S. Lewis would say.

I read an article recently about contentment and the author quoted John Piper. From her article: “Piper says that when he looks at all the atrocities and suffering in the world ‘it makes [him] tremble at the prospect of living a trivial, self-serving, comfortable, middle-class, ordinary, untroubled American life.’”

Pretty strong words (but that’s typical of Piper). For the missionary in Nigeria who wrote that article and for me, those words help me get perspective in the midst of my longings and feeling-sorry-for-myself times. I have the privilege of living for a period of time in a foreign land, in a foreign culture, getting to know God better and seeing Him work. There are days when the longings are stronger than others. There are days when I can get the proper perspective easier than others. In both of those types of days though, God is at work in me and around me and for that I can be grateful.