All My News Squished Into One Post

So... it's been a while since my last post, and since then, a few things have happened. Let's see if I can remember them all.

1. I am going to Scotland! Yay! I did end up getting accepted to the LDC (Leadership Development Course) there, and so will be leaving NZ in April, right after my birthday. I'm gonna come home for a couple of days, and then head to Scotland! Seriously, I am very excited about this. I am hoping that it will really encourage me and help me to put more of an edge on my leadership.

2. The new DTS started! They got here... one day ago? It already feels like a week. But we picked them up, driving through a tropical storm, yesterday. They are a good bunch. I really like them. But I'm glad not to have the responsibility of leading their DTS. It's not them, it's me. :) But really, it is a little strange, after having led 2 DTS's in a row, to not have much responsibility with these guys, even though I really like them. I feel slightly wistful. And at the same time relieved. I feel like I have very little to give out after the last year, so am enjoying just being friends. So this is best for all of us. Heh. I know it sounds like I am breaking up with them, but I don't know how else to say it... All of that aside, I think it will be a really good school, and I'm already excited to see how God rocks their worlds while they are here.

3. Um... I must have more news. I can't think of it. Whatever.

So, for the next 7 weeks or so, I'm gonna be here, doing whatever I can to help out, and registering students, and hopefully helping change the website. And spending some quality time with God, too. Not that I don't ever spend time with God. But I was doing some teaching for staff training last week, and I was reminded of some things. First of all, I was walking down the driveway, thinking about what to talk about. Which was a surreal moment, because... I don't know. I feel like I have all these big questions about what I do and how I do it and what kind of direction I want to take the ministry I am involved in and all this stuff. And suddenly none of that mattered a whole lot, because what I really needed was to figure out what to talk about for a couple of hours the next morning. And it kind of hit me anew that God wants to provide for me in the moment. Not that he's not interested in My Life: the Big Picture. But maybe I can relax a little bit about it, precisely because he IS interested in it, and precisely because he can also help me figure out what to say tomorrow, and that's what I needed to be listening to. And it's probably a lot more related than I know, and if I would just pay a little attention, the answers to my "small" questions might not be so different than the answers to my "big" questions. Maybe. Speculations from my walk down the driveway. Which, by the way, is a good place to walk and pray, and has seen the footsteps of probably thousands of people doing just that. Which I think is cool.

So, by the way, in the end, what I talked about was "Loneliness in Leadership". And I talked about courage and knowing God in that loneliness... I will not go on much more about it. I read a few chapters out loud from Prince Caspian, which was not one of my favorite Narnia books until recently. But there is this awesome part with Lucy and Aslan, and nobody else believes her, and... well, it's good. I like it, not just because of Lucy and her total need and dependence on Aslan to lead the people with her in the right direction, but also because she was not actually the "leader" of the group. Anyway, I could go on, but I won't. But I will say that it was a good session. I wasn't sure how people would do just listening to a story, but I think they're all hooked on Narnia now.

There were more things to say from my walk on the driveway, but this is getting long, and I am getting sleepy, so I will save them for another day. Good night!

For Your Viewing Enjoyment

New Zealand in February is a good place to be. Luckily, Trumpet ice cream issued this "public service announcement" to help keep it that way. :) It's been on TV for a couple of years, now, but I still think it's hilarious. Warning: this may not be for the faint of heart. Whatever that means.

She rambles...

This morning I woke up to the sound of Sam, my four-year-old buddy, delivering the mail to our house. I did not get up for another hour. (Just to clarify, I got home from the airport at 3am, which is why I was sleeping so late this morning.) The awesome thing is that it was raining and not stiflingly hot for the first time in ages. This meant that I could stay in bed without suffocating under my metal roof. And also, I forgot about how good the rain is. I am such a Portlander. I mean, I do like summer. I like sun and warmth... but there's something about the rain. Actually, I don't know if this is because of where I grew up so much as it is about personality. I love it when it rains after a long dry spell. And I love it when it's sunny after a long rainy spell. I think I just like to feel like I earned my weather. Like somehow I had the choice to stick it out or not, and I did, and now I deserve to have some relief from the heat for a day. What all of this pretty much means is that I'm a little crazy. But I'm okay with that. Today.

So... staff training started today. I have spent a ridiculous amount of time on the computer in the last couple of days, trying to get last minute details for DTS students sorted. We are combining with the DTS that runs in Auckland for this coming school-- actually, their students are coming up to Oak Ridge to do their DTS instead of doing it in Auckland, and so there is some serious coordinating to do. Oh, administration. How I procrastinate with thee. But I can't procrastinate this time, so that's... good? Anyway, that's my life right now. It's time for bed now. I've been up too long.

Oh bla di...

Well... life goes on. It's been a good week, actually. It has been low-intensity, which is good: just some work in the office to get ready for the next school and several "planning sessions" at the beach. I must say, some of my best work is done while lounging in a towel on the sand. And also I am tanner, which is very important. (Is it "tanner" or "more tan?" Whatever.)

I'm really looking forward to taking a bit of a break during this coming school. I just don't feel like I would be very useful if I were to help lead it... and so I am not going to. I'm HOPING to get into the leadership course in Scotland that I am currently waitlisted for; it would be awesome to get a little outside input into my life at this point. And then home for a little while! Yay!

Anyway, I wasn't really planning on outlining my entire future today, so I think I will stop there. Today, Becks, Scotty, and I are venturing down to Auckland. A BLS student is coming in to the airport at some ridiculous hour of the night, so we volunteered to pick her up. Because that means I can spend the afternoon in Borders, which, I think I have already mentioned, is pretty much my favorite way to spend an afternoon. Also it means I get to eat at Burgerfuel, which is not too bad, either. It's the simple things...

It's Over

On Saturday morning I dropped my students and some of my staff off at the airport and said good-bye for the last time. It was weird. Graduation was Friday night, and it was fun, and then I stayed up late talking and hanging out with students, and then on Saturday I got up and went to the airport for what felt like the thousandth time, said good-bye, got back in the van, and drove away. It was all very routine and easy, and I was sad, but I think what I was really sad about was that I could not really bring up the energy to let myself feel as sad as I am that I will probably never see most of those people again. These beautiful, amazing children of God, whom I have prayed for and hoped for and watched grow and change for the last six months, left New Zealand. In their uniqueness, they still ended up on an airplane headed home, just like the ones six months ago, and the ones six months before that. Which is where they should be headed. And as much as I love them, I'm too tired of this routine to really allow myself sadness at their going.

It strikes me that this is not really healthy. But then again, I kind of have this theory that we in the West are a little bit spoiled in our ability and willingness to be concerned about every little aspect of our emotional health, and are nevertheless no more emotionally healthy than those who are more concerned with other things. So... I don't know. I am still going to ramble on about myself, but you can know that I DO know it's not the most important thing in the world.

Anyway, I got to thinking about sacrifice. Because for me, it is a sacrifice to love people and allow myself to be known by people (at least to a degree) that I know I will not see again after a DTS is over. And I do it over and over again, and I guess I feel like I have somehow given up a bit of emotional normalcy because of it. I am kind of dreading the moment where I finally realize that these people that I have loved are gone for pretty much the rest of my life on earth.

I have a hard time with the idea of sacrifice, because... on the one hand, it is kind of at the core of my belief system. Jesus, of course, made the ultimate sacrifice of his life so that we could be reconciled to God. That is one heck of an example. On the other hand, there are these things we call "boundaries." Every once in a while around here, somebody goes on a boundaries rampage, telling us all that we need to take time for ourselves and set limits and not always be available and etc., etc. Which is a nice theory. And I tell my own staff these sorts of things, although I use different language, because I am not a huge fan of the pop-psychology word usage that seems to go with boundaries. I do send my staff to take days off when I can see they need one, and try to make sure that they are doing things they enjoy and looking after themselves.

But then, how does that fit in with this whole sacrifice thing? I mean, I've given things up to be here. I miss my family and friends and Portland and the convenience and familiarity of living in America. Does that mean I don't have to sacrifice anything else? I can just live here and do my job and keep good emotional "boundaries" and it's all good? The problem with that, of course, is that my job kind of entails NOT having those boundaries. It's pretty much my job to love people. I mean, I do lots of things, but at the very core of it all is to love others. And even if it wasn't my job, it's still pretty much the main thing that Jesus told us to do, only second to loving God. I can't really imagine Jesus being like, "love your neighbor as yourself, but only during office hours..."

The other day I read a comment by a guy who brought up William Wilberforce and the fact that he totally sacrificed his health for the cause of slavery. And he was passionate and driven and ultimately successful. According to the theory of boundaries, your own health is not an acceptable sacrifice. But if Wilberforce had not made the sacrifice, he would not have made such an impact in the world. I was talking to Patrick Dodson, one of our speakers about this, and he made the excellent point that worldwide slavery is perhaps not on the same scale of importance as what I am doing... but then again, maybe it is. Maybe one of the students that comes here is going to be the next William Wilberforce, and my decision to give up something in order to love them--even though they are only a very temporary friendship-- will be a key in their life. I guess the thing is, ultimately, to decide whether what I'm doing is actually important enough to make the sacrifices that I do make. Which are fairly paltry, in all honesty. But if what I'm doing makes no impact, then even paltry sacrifices could be put to better use elsewhere. And that is a very hard thing to measure.

Which is why I guess it comes down to trusting God. I do believe that when I committed to this place, it was what God was leading me to do. I believe that he can use me and does use me to show himself to the people around me. I don't know if it has to be the way that I have done it, exactly, or if there's some way to do this without feeling like I'm giving up my ability to connect in a normal emotional way to the situations around me.

Maybe next time I should just cry at the airport when I say good-bye. It might save me a lot of thinking. And also, does any of this make sense? Oh well. If you made it this far, great job. Now you know that I am actually crazy. And on that note, it's time for bed. For me. You can do whatever you want.