Sweet Jesus

Sometimes God is just so good.  Today He made me cry again.  This morning before the sun came up I was so blessed to read through a testimony email I received from Don Shannon.  I couldn’t help it, I was a little jealous, I guess.  For the past months as I have been reading other stories about Burundi, I can’t help but feel a little sad that thanks is not expressed here.  There are rarely hugs from the adults, and definitely only from the Fulani in the camps.  Even when a boatload of goodies show up, there is not much of a demonstration.  We aren’t offered much from our fellow Christians (OK – three exceptions and we thank God for them!), but we are frequently asked, or even things are just taken.  We are always offered drinks and food in the Fulani camps, so I struggle with how we are showing Light.  We aren’t hearing wonderful stories of transformation.  It would be nice, tangible, fulfilling for ME.

So I was talking with God about it, and of course it isn’t news, but He’s just so sweet the way He got me to tell Him it just doesn’t matter.  Don’t these people who take, and don’t thank, and struggle with wanting more much of the time, still deserve His love through me?  Don’t these people who are Christians and claim cultural permission to erupt in anger, cheat the system, accuse each other and us, take what isn’t theirs, bend the truth… didn’t He die for them?  Didn’t people spit on my Jesus as He died for me in perfect love?  I was praying through a part of Ephesians, knowing that the moment of my need for anything from man had passed as I sat on the back porch with my monkey, watching the sun come up.

I knew some trouble was brewing this morning, so I jumped in the van and went way out the Fulani camp road to drive in with the kids.  I love that!  I got out and went to a close camp and delivered a bag of beans and my leftovers (I know – that’s weird – but it was liver and onions and greens, very healthy for a new mother struggling with anemia).  You should have seen her face as she thanked me.  OOPS, tears again as I write.  God, you didn’t have to do that.

Tears again in the hallway around noon after almost four hours of the meetings where the troubles were talked out.  Phyllis came back from the bank with GIFTS.  Very cool shirts for Devin and I and a table runner from a new teller at the bank.  He’s an Ethiopian man I haven’t even met, but his wife is Fulani, and he just really appreciates “all we are doing.”  Now, we’re just here, God’s doing this, it’s not our work, but that’s not the point. 

When I didn’t need thanks, I got it.  God is just sweet; that’s it.