Lucky

Recently a lot of people have been telling me that I am lucky. They all say it for different reasons but they are all right. I am lucky. But I prefer to think that instead of a random falling of the dice, I am blessed.

This Lent I have been keeping a gratitude journal. Basically, every day I write down three things that I am grateful for. It is incredible how many things in life there are to be happy about. But I think that it's also something that we have to notice. If you think every day, or even just once in a while, about all the things that are good in your life, there seems to be more and more each day. Also, you go through each day looking out for things that are special, that make you feel good, that are a blessing in your life.

These things are different for each person. It could be a baby sleeping through the night, a husband coming home earlier than expected, someone else cooking dinner, a sunset you managed to see because you were stuck in traffic and had the time to look, a candle-lit dinner you had because the electricity was switched off that became a wonderful romantic evening with a loved one. Sometimes, out of bad situations, good things come out. It's very important to see that in your life.

This past year has been full of new things for me - new country, new language, new friends, new relationships, new family members. And there have been many times when things could have gone wrong. Miraculously they have gone right, sometimes very much so. I like to think that there is a guardian angel out there, looking out for me and I am very aware that I need to say thank you regularly. To my family, to my friends, to random strangers who help me out, to my guardian angel and to God. One thing this past year has taught me is to be grateful: to be aware of the good things in my life and to say thank you for them.

I hope that when you count your blessings, you are surprised by how many there are. God bless you!

Clutching at the steering wheel

It’s been a year of big changes in our household- well, not so much a year but all in the space of month. New house, new job. Good things. Having to adjust the completion date of your masters degree- bad thing. Well so I thought at the time. Maybe growing up and looking back over the past year taught me that things which may have seemed really bad at the time are just subtle ways of learning to be patient. I grew up achieving most things at school that I set my mind to within a set time frame - a mindset that is being challenged more and more frequently in my young adult life.

Going back to varsity, writing exams and handing in assignments on a regular basis all took on a slightly different format in the context of a full time career. I realise now how self-orientated we are, of not selfish, in our pursuit of schooling. I was one of those lucky enough to live at home and have my parents provide for all my needs. They were so keen for me to focus on my studies that I was encouraged NOT to get a job so that I could focus on my studies. Privileged, spoilt, protected from the real world.

So studying while working and running a home makes you realise that cars do breakdown, electricity fails, computers play up, children get sick, toilets leak and at times your family needs you more than you need time in front of yet another literature study. A distinction is more an indication of how much time you were able to spare on a certain task rather than how well you understand the topic. And anything over 75% is just an impossibility in the context of sanity.

I am so grateful for the blessings showered on our family over the past year. We have a lovely new home, and my husband’s new job means that we are able to afford a few luxuries that we have been budgeting to live without. I have learnt that spending time with family is far more important than how long it takes to hand in a thesis. I have learnt that the frustration of taking a little longer might mean handing in a superior product, albeit begrudgingly. I have learnt that you have to believe in your power and abilities in order to market yourself and your product effectively. And I have learnt that plotting out my expected timeline requires a lot less planning on my part, and a lot more trusting in God’s divine plan. You see, the past week has included many moments of looking towards the end of 2012. What I have come to realise is that I don’t know whether I’ll be in India or Japan or South Africa in December. I don’t know whether I’ll be looking after someone else’s children or adopting or waiting for one of my own. I do know that I will have completed my degree. And I do know is that it’s up to me to make myself available for the opportunities that might cross my path in one year.

An Indian Journey

At the end of 2009 my husband and I decided to mission off to an Indian orphanage in Rajesthan, a "closed" province of India where there is still a lot of persecution of Christians. Something was pulling at our heart strings, and when people asked us why we were going, it was more a case of "why not?". There was nothing in out lives that could not be put on hold for 6 weeks.

Incredible India. The experience there was shocking and amazing. The overwhelming amount of people. The filth. The fact that you can fight your way onto an overcrowded train and sit for hours without ending up in the open coutryside. Just people everywhere, and poorer than anything I've seen in Africa, even in the rural communities. Then there's the caste system - the senseless and ruthless division of class and rights and the lack of them. The ridiculous rejection of humanity.

Now I've grown up thinking I've had a normal and easy life to date, and while one should only be grateful, that life also gives one a subtle arrogance. The idea that you have something to offer the rest of the world. But anyone who spends a day in an orphanage with the poorest children who've been rejected by society cannot help but be overwhelmed by the love they have to give. Some have lost their parents in gang wars. Some rejected by beggars. Some orphaned by political wars. Some disowned by their own mothers so that they could remarry. I got more in the time there than I could give in a lifetime. More love. More caring. More understanding. More sharing from those with nothing but their personalities and the love of their Saviour to share.

We left those 600 odd children perplexed by the reversal of roles and the mind shift we had to make from the experience we thought we would have. It took a year to work through the challenges presented to our faith, the little voices and faces in our dreams and the poverty that plagued our consciences. And a year later we went back, hopefully this time with something real to give.