No wax here

I have so many thoughts swirling around in my head, its hard to pull out any that make a coherent paragraph. But I'll give it a valiant effort.

A couple days ago, a dear friend gave me a verse as encouragement for my trip. It's Psalm 37:23-24, which in NLT says, "The steps of the godly are directed by the LORD. He delights in every detail of their lives. Though they stumble, they will not fall, for the LORD holds them by the hand." In NIV, it says that "the LORD makes his steps firm."

Today in church, we sang a song that began "Everything You hold in Your hand, yet You make time for me; I can't understand."

Those two thoughts sum up what I've been mulling over the most - the amazing mystery that God is all-powerful, King of Kings, the Great "I Am" . . . and also the God Who Sees Me.

As I am preparing to leave, I've found that I have less to actually DO than I thought. I ran some errands last week, and I've been gathering things up from around the house that I want to take with me. They've made nice little piles on my dresser :) However, today the Holy Spirit impressed upon me that I need to pay attention to preparing my heart just as much as I am preparing my luggage.

When I thought about what I wanted most to be prepared for, I realized that my deepest prayer right now is that I would be genuine. I want to be transparent and real to the people that I meet in London. I don't want to miss amazing opportunities to see God's glory because I covered His light in me.

This reminded me of a sunday school lesson that I learned many, many years ago. In Philippians 1:10, Paul exhorts us to "be sincere and without offense till the day of Christ." The word sincere literally means "without wax" in greek. It came from the pottery trade; cheap or unethical potters would sell cracked pottery by plugging up the holes and cracks with wax. You could not tell the difference by just looking at the pottery - it looked as whole as a true piece. However, if you held the piece of pottery up to the sun and let the light shine through, you could see the wax glow and know that it was broken and would not actually hold up to much stress.

Many of you have asked how you can pray for me - and I ask most of all that you pray I will be genuine and sincere, without wax. I want to be the real thing, for my actions and attitudes to be so in sync with what I say I believe, that words are superfluous. One of my favorite quotes attributed to St. Francis of Assisi is, "Preach the gospel at all times; if necessary, use words."

Can I get a what! what!

Read it and weep (which I'm just about doing now) - my visa was accepted! The lady at the embassy must have gotten really sick of my voicemails and faxes :) Yay for knowing what you're going to do in two weeks . . .

. . . and a special, very heartfelt THANK YOU to all you wonderful people who put up with me during this ordeal. No box of chocolates would be big enough to pay you back (which is why I'm not sending you any :)).

Going beyond Paul's highest hopes

I love the way my grandpa prays. I was visiting him a couple days ago, and when we sat down to the evening meal we held hands and my grandpa blessed our food. I've heard thousands of meal prayers, and have given a few myself, but there is something incredibly special about my grandpa when he prays. His prayers are never rushed, never thoughtless. And they always start with humility and awe. He usually mentions something like, "Lord we stand before you in complete wonder at your majesty and grace." There is something about his unforced worship in such a simple act as giving thanks for food. Sometimes I struggle with a wandering mind during meal prayers, but the sound of my grandpa humbling himself before an Almighty Creator arrests me so much that I usually have trouble tearing myself out of it to eat when he says "Amen."

It seems unnecessary to say that I want to pray like that. I want to be in a place where my communication with Christ is first of all clothed in brokenness and reverance. I so often fall victim to the great American-Christian attitude of presenting God with a shopping list as my primary conversation with Him. Not that I think there is anything wrong with asking for help or sharing my desires with God, but its immature. Its milk and baby food, and it doesn't satisy me. I want my prayer to be worship.

Today was a day of great celebration at my Sacramento church - they held their first Sunday service in their new building. This little group of believers has given and sacrificed and worked and believed and served for 4 long years and today they were almost giddy with adrenaline and gratitude for finally worshipping in a place that was set apart for them. The pastor gave a really simple message of how to respond to God when you are blessed, nothing that was rocket science. But as always, he based his message in Scripture and God ministered to my need and brokeness from three of those scriptures.

The first was Gal 6:7-9, which encourages believers to "live to please the Spirit" because those who sow a life of discipline in Christ will make an eternal difference. Paul specifically exhorts us "don't get tired of doing what is good! Don't get discouraged and give up, for we will reap a harvest of blessing at the appropriate time."

The second was a passage in 2 Corinthians. Paul is bragging about the amazing spirit of the Macedonian church that gave generously out of their "wonderful joy and deep poverty," to the extent that they were begging Paul to be of use to his ministry in Jerusalem. What really grabbed me is what he says immediately after - "Best of all, they went beyond our highest hopes, for their first action was to dedicate themselves to the LORD and to us for whatever directions God might give them."

The last (bear with me hear, I promise to link these all together :) is a very familiar passage, Romans 12:1-2, in which Paul instructs us to give our bodies to God that we would be "living sacrifices." When we let God transform our thinking to Kingdom logic rather than Earth logic, we have the tools we need to understand God's purpose and plan for our lives, or as the NLT so eloquently puts it, "you will know what God wants you to do."

I've been struggling this last week with not knowing what God wants me to do. I so desperately want to act in faith, to be a worshipper, to do what is good. And I've been losing the battle because I've been doing nothing. When someone asks me "Have you heard about your visa yet?" My reply has been borderline bitter, which does not glorify God in the slightest. I can't imagine how someone who was not a Christian would see me and what I believe in if they could really hear the thoughts in my head - would they wonder how I could claim with one breath to believe that Christ has written all my days in His book and guides each step I take and then in the next breath complain about not being privileged to details that I want right here, right now!

I realized in church today that I've been "acting" in faith - by continuing to plan for London - but not living in peace. And I'm not altogether convinced that you can act in faith without living in peace, the former is more likely a state of hypocrisy. Granted, its consequences are much better than acting in outright rebellion, but my witness (and overall frame of mind) are still questionable.

But . . . how awesome and gracious is our Lord. He holds the universe in the palm of His hand and yet condescends to KNOW me! He spoke over 2,000 years ago and breathed it out for me today - He encouraged me to continue acting in faith, because in due time I will reap a harvest. He reminded me that I want to be the kind of person that gives out of an overflow of joy, even in my deepest poverty, and that I get that spirit from dedicating myself to God for whatever direction He gives me. He gently prodded me to lay myself down again as a LIVING (as in active) sacrifice that I would allow Him to change my Earth logic (the reason I am panicking about London) into Kingdom logic (the way to live in peace) so that I know what God wants me to do.

Today, God wants me to just worship him. "Father, I stand before you in complete wonder at your majesty and grace . . ."

By faith . . . I pack.

You might notice that these first few posts were written at the beginning of August. Which means, I am still in Sacramento, not London.

Its completely in the realm of possibility that I will not go to London. Right now, I have a plane ticket to Heathrow with my name on it (on a very nice plane, I might add, courtesy of one of God's amazing children who just happens to also be a travel agent), my last day of work is set for Aug 18th, and my family has already arranged to drive me to San Francisco and see me off on Aug 31st.

There is one small snag.

I don't have a visa or a passport. I don't have a passport because the British Embassy in L.A. currently has possession of it with my visa application. I applied for this visa at the end of April. Yep, count it - 3 and a half months. As of two days ago, the status of my application was "deferred." And as the incredibly nice gentlement with a killer British/Scottish combo accent informed me, they were "not privy" to the details of why the embassy has yet to decide if I get my visa or not. He also told me in a most regretful tone that there was absolutely nothing I could do about my application except notify them in writing that I wanted it withdrawn.

As often as I feel like I'm stumbling around in the dark, stubbing my toes on the furniture trying to find the door, this was not one of those times. When the guy said "there is absolutely nothing you can do," I knew that for right now, "by faith" means wait.

This is one I get. I've had practice with waiting. I've already waited 3 months with no sweat, no worry. And I'm not really worried right now, either. But this little situation has led me to realize a couple things about myself and this London deal.

First, I haven't really gotten excited about it yet. In fact, I don't yet really believe and know that I'm going to live in London. The only part of me that thinks that is the part of me that makes friends with the characters in books and dreams about the multitude of possibilities for my life. For a while, I didn't get excited about it because it was too far away. Now, I realize that I haven't fully owned London because my visa hasn't come yet and I am really afraid of how disappointed I'll be if it falls through.

So, I admitted this to God a week ago while listening to a great message at church. His answer: Trust Me. By Faith.

I must have been just a little more surrendered, a little more sensitive to the Spirit than usual because normally, I will take that statement and make it match what I want. "Trust me that I will get your visa in time. Pack your clothes by faith. Trust that you will be in London." However, that wasn't what He was saying. Well, a little bit, but not the whole story. The real answer was "Trust Me with the whole deal. Trust me that I love you and that no matter what happens I have a purpose for your life and a plan for you to walk in. Trust me that I will make everything happen for you to go to London if that's what I want for you and trust me that I will help you deal with your disappointment if I have something else for you."

You know, even that much I can handle on a bad day. Its what came next that was hard to take. "By faith . . .fully invest yourself in getting ready for London."

I could psych myself out and pretend that God promised me London in order to give my heart permission to get excited and want to be there. Or I could keep myself guarded and not give London any place in my heart. But God wants me to live in reality and step out in faith. Make myself vulnerable. Venture into a desert before finding the land of promise. A desert gives no guarantees, no promises. You might find water the first day out, or you might be thirsty for a week. But just as God provided for Abraham through every desert, I know that He will provide for me too.

Which is good news, because I'm still having a hard time getting excited. Good thing I know that faith is action, "evidence of things unseen." You may not see me very excited, but I made a to-do list. I bought some things I need for the trip yesterday. I started this blog.

Prologue

This blog exists because friends heckle me (you know who you are). I'm not a true blogger by heart - but I do love to write and to talk to my friends. Sadly, I have this premonition that while living as an Englishwoman I will have precious little time to do either. Hence, the blog solution.

However, as I have started thinking about what to put on this page, I've been challenged to think of this as more than just an update forum on Brittney's life. As the title says, I'll be a stranger in a foreign land . . . like Abraham was a stranger in the land of promise, and like we as Christians are strangers even in our hometown. So, my prayer is that this is more a travelogue of what it means to live as a Christian in a place that is not our home rather than a mere photo album of a fun trip. My journey starts with the same two words that began Abraham's sojourn:

By faith . . .