Living Behind the Veil

I'm often asked what I wear in Afghanistan and what it's like to wear a veil. It's freedom. Freedom to have a bad hair day, freedom to arrange my chadar to conceal the curve of my breasts and backside, freedom to not be an expatriate for a little while. It means freedom to hide even on the street from the Afghan men's eyes which seem to strip me naked.
When I relax my shoulders and walk less purposefully, less confidently, my eyes downcast and covered by sunglasses, I pass for an Afghan woman. I hear the men whisper in Dari, "Is she a foreigner or local woman?" I chuckle but am silent. On the street, I'm also a free target....freely exposed to groping, sexual innuendos whispered to me as a man bicycles by, free to have stones thrown at me, freely seen as no one's wife, daughter, sister, mother, friend, or boss. I step inside my gate, and remove my chapan and chadar. Now I'm someone's boss, motherhood returns to me as little steps run to greet me, and I receive a kiss from my adoring husband. Now I'm free to his loving and gentle eyes which know and enjoy my curves, free to once again be under the protective umbrella of being a wife, mother, friend, colleague, boss, niece, sister, daughter, woman.

Friday, October 28, 2011

Better Than Gold Faith Part 3


James 1:2-4 “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

“We know”  ...with absolute confidence that the testing is not futile or random, but part of a plan by our Holy God with our personal best interests in mind. We rest in His Word, with an inner calmness and surity.

The testing of  our faith results in steadfastness. This means standing strong; a state of firm, inner strength; of orderliness in Christ; firm, persistent, determined; unwavering in growing in the knowledge and grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Deuteronomy 4:9 – “Only take care, and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things that your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. Make them known to your children and your children’s children

We need to continually be reminding ourselves of the numerous times when the Lord has been faithful in the past.  When have you most grown in your faith? Likely, you are reflecting on a past trial the Lord has brought you through. Have you told your children about that time?

There was one day in July during a real time of insecurity in Afghanistan.  Many in the community had left. Elections were looming, and everyone was nervous about what would happen in August.

I was walking by myself, having dropped off the children for a playdate.  As I looked down, I saw the dust swirling around my black chapan, covering my legs and jacket as usual. The dirt suddenly triggered all my sadness and loneliness to swell up and I cried out to God, "No one is praying for us!"  "No one remembers me."

Instantly, I felt a spirit of depression descending upon the back of my neck, and I cried to the Lord. I could feel myself nearing "the cliff" of overwhelming depression and paralysis.

He immediately replied, asking me what was in my purse. During the survival training we had back in 2006, we had been trained to always have on our person anything we needed to survive a kidnapping.

In my purse was a little booklet of verses and prayers that the women of my church had written out just for me. I remembered the book in my purse. And then God asked me how many people were receiving our e-mail prayer letters.  Of course I knew the answer - over 200 committed prayer partners! Surely someone was praying for us right then.

He continued, asking me to not look down at the dirt, but to look up and focus on His holiness...on Him, sitting on His throne.  As I began to focus my mind on His holiness, even though at that moment I didn't understand why, I felt the spirit of depression unable to attach, receding away from my neck.

I let the warmth of the fire of His holiness melt my heart, and remind me of all the injustices He will make right, that He sees me as His holy one. Then I could get back to my prayer walk and think about the Afghans walking by me on the street.

When I am not captured by His greatness, I am consumed by my circumstances.”  (Andrew Murray)

The summer months in country for us as well as for the whole community were amazing. We were small in number, but it was as if God was sheltering all of us in His hand. We felt His amazing peace, and we continued to see more fruit among locals result.

We were able to breath a bit – we were allowed to walk on the few streets around our neighborhood, and begin visiting again with our Afghan friends. There was electricity, so we enjoyed our cappuccino maker with friends.

I experienced His faithfulness at a dramatic moment on the street.  Who needs your help, your prayers, maybe a written word of encouragement to go through their tough time?

Pray for the national church, for men and women to rise up and stand against persecution.Pray for those seeing Jesus in their dreams and visions.  His Spirit is at work in amazing ways in Afghanistan

Go to Part 4

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Better Than Gold Faith - Part 2

James 1:2-4 “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

  1. Be Ready! When you meet trials – these will come, there is no doubt about it.
 What are you like when you are under pressure?  “If a sudden jar can cause me to speak an impatient, unloving word, then I know nothing of Calvary love. For a brimful of sweet water cannot spill even one drop of bitter water, however suddenly jolted." (Amy Carmichael)

Being ready means that we are prepared for the testing, to choose rightly.  In the New Testament, the same Greek word is used for trials as for temptation. What determines whether it is a temptation or a testing is your response to it. Every situation tells you something about yourself. So you can have two people, identical situations, one will go right and one will go wrong.

Why did the Lord God test the Israelites? "I did it so that I would know what was in your heart." Deuteronomy 8:2-3: When the testing times came, what was in them was what came out. And it was obvious what was in their hearts. They did not have gratitude, it was not obedience, not love for the Lord their God, it was not covenant keeping.

It WAS grumbling, it WAS an attitude that was all wrong, their hearts were lusting after evil things, Paul tells us, and that was the essence of their failure. They failed to appreciate blessings.  They did not obey, and immediately engaged in idolatry. 

Idolatry sounds strange to us today...so what is it? It is the substitution of God by man for something man prefers over God.  A decision on the part of man not to honor or, worship, not to glorify the one true God, but to honor and glorify what is a substitute for the one true God.  So humans now worship that which they created, that which they control…a most heinous of sins.

DO you have any substitutes for God?  Things you control, trust, worship?  

"...When you meet trials of various kinds..."The Greek word for "various" refers to a variety of colors – the nature of external temptation is  attractive coloring that is pleasing to the eye and wooing to the taste. For the Christian, it is hard to resist. Temptation has many colors.
  
Only through temptations can the genuineness of faith be established. Temptations allow our faith to be tested. Do you have temptations right now? Or are you so complacent that you don’t feel any pressure?  God promises in Romans 5:3 that trials and temptations work patience in it, making our faith complete.

Jesus did not find his trials enjoyable. He prayed often during His trials, spending time with God. He prayed for them to pass, but said He would obey. He was overwhelmed. But he went to the place of overwhelming sorrow, so that he might glorify God. We behold the face of God where sorrow and blood flow mingled down. Glory is possible, but not without gory. 

Our Experience
In 2008, we began to live in the expectation that something bad would happen. Dear Husband and I had secretly agreed back in 2002 before we returned to Kabul after evacuating at 9/11, that when we returned, that should the Taliban ever starting shooting/attacking innocent civilians, we would consider that our time to leave Afghanistan. 

It was in 2008, there was a 300% increase in incidents against foreigners from the previous year, and all the data we were reading indicated the trend would continue, especially with elections looming. There was the attack on the Serena, kidnappings and killings of aid workers occurring all over the country,  friends leaving, lock downs, threats upon threats, more kidnappings, killings, threats, demonstrations. We realized that as leaders of a large organization, we could not leave. 


Our concern was compiled with constant daily stresses of : dirty dirt (the Germans had tested the air quality in Kabul and it has a high percentage of fecal matter due to the open sewers); dust storms, culture fatigue, compassion fatigue, sickness, death of mom, cancer of sister, friends leaving, things constantly breaking, feelings of self-disappointment, hardness, compassion, faced with the impossibility of the task, overwhelming, anger, frustration, loneliness, misunderstanding, mullah’s preaching against us; government officials criticizing us; Christians calling us irresponsible for being there.

My husband scolded me for going out without using the buddy system. Constant randomization of schedules, I got sick everytime I went out shopping, due to heat, wearing a chadar, bad traffic, and the dirt...so I did it only once per month or every 2 months. As foreigners, we were isolated and pointed at, the children have had stones thrown at them on the street, bb guns pointed and fired right at them by local children, sexual harassment is constant on the street.

Afghans who associate with us may be harassed, even killed, Taliban check phones of our Afghan friends and if they have numbers of foreigners, the Afghan is usually detained then killed.  Satan is trying to do everything he can to get the foreigners out of there, to keep Afghans from foreigners, and to kill the efforts of raising the Church.

It was during that Spring and Summer as I meditated on the lives of the prophets, that their families didn’t get up and leave when the going got tough. They stayed through it all, suffering with the people. They kept telling the people to repent.  They endured, and they persevered. 

And I realized that this is what we were called to....and our children had to be with us. To this day, the government has chosen not to listen; not to repent, and is following the same path as the kings the prophets were preaching against in the Bible, and the people suffer....oh how they suffer.

Then G. was killed. She was walking two blocks from our home and killed point blank.  The war lord known as “the vampire of Kabul” claimed responsibility. We knew we were entering a new stage of insecurity in Afghanistan with this kind of attack. 

I prayed, Lord, take this cup from me.  It felt so dark and scary to consider staying through that winter; I was glad my mother was not alive to see that day, and I could not imagine what our families back home were going through; I was so afraid. I didn’t want this for my children!

I prayed with my children: Psalm 23 – Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. Thy rod and they staff comforteth me...  As the winter and then spring months progressed, we experienced this amazing "bubble" of unexplainable peace around us. 

We really did have a table in the presence of our enemies, even as we were going into the valley of 8 months straight of almost constant "lockdowns" for families. Even though we still lived in the expectation that something bad would happen, we had supernatural peace. 

A friend wrote to me and he encouraged me, "There are two flowers contrasted in the Bible:  the Rose of Sharon, which grows up in the sunshine on the plain. As you go through the valley, you'll find the flower that only grows there, in the cool shady places. It's where you’ll meet the Lily of the Valley, Jesus Christ himself.  

And we did.  

Go to Part Three

Sunday, October 23, 2011

Better-Than-Gold-Faith - Part 1

There are 4 things James teaches us to help us become stress sturdy, to endure (stand firm) and persevere (move forward in the battle) and lead the way to better-than-gold faith. I will testify to His faithfulness in my life these past two years.

The First Step 

James 1:2-4 “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

 1. Our perspective:  Count it all joy – in the good times, and in the bad.

When people look at you, what kind of conclusion do they draw about God? Do they see joy in your life?  Do they see a demonstration of your awareness of the grace all around you? We are the articulation of the Gospel for many, in how we live, how we love, most importantly, how we deal with our failures and shortcomings. Life is messy, so how do we respond when things get difficult or when we mess up?

We need to be deliberate about choosing it.  “Count” is in the imperative form – an expression of command – not a reality of circumstances, but of possibility and volition; it is possible to really choose to do this.

In Hellenistic Greek, there is no passiveness to the verb’s meaning when it is in this form. It has to do with the internal attitude of the heart and mind that causes the trials and circumstances of life to affect us adversely or beneficially.

About 5 years ago, I was convicted of NOT having joy – a friend of mine talked about how easy she found it to be filled with joy in Afghanistan.  HOW could she find “joy” EASY in this culture? I immediately felt the conviction of the Holy Spirit, and heard Paul's words whispered in my heart, "In every circumstance I know how to abase and I know how to abound."

Guilty.

I wasn't applying Scripture to my life. (My husband much later confirmed it - he said I had been turning a bit into a complaining wife.)

Joy comes when we experience His grace; God’s grace is all around us. We let joy, complete joy, joy in every circumstance lead the way, and then the circumstance will be easier to bear.

“My brethren" – James is not on a higher pedestal – he is writing as a fellow traveler to those who have also committed their very lives to the Master Jesus

What is happening in your life right now that causes you to struggle with having perspective? We cannot have joy when we are complaining or being negative.

Sometimes we need help to have joy.  Help may come through any activity which helps us to withdraw for a little while, gain some perspective on our situation and have a bit of a breather to re-order our emotions, mind, and priorities.

This may include a listening, non-judgmental friend who doesn’t gossip, writing in our journal, spending time worshiping or watching worship videos.  Even taking a few minutes to have a good cup of tea or cappuccino gives us the space we need to remember God is still in control, He is still on His throne, He will some day soon restore all creation to rightful order and bring justice.

Once we choose to focus our minds on His sacrifice for us and where we are in His kingdom, we are able to put our current problems in it's proper position in God's view of us, and we cannot help but find joy even in the midst of horribly trying situations.

It's not a magic tonic. 

It's a discipline of the mind to choose to fix our eyes on Jesus and keep them there. 

Once we find joy in all situations, we persevere.

Go to Better Than Gold Faith Part Two

Friday, October 21, 2011

What Is 'Better-Than-Gold-Faith?'

How do we develop “trained faith”…faith that is more precious than gold mentioned in I Peter. Are we building the right “growth engines” into our lives so that we not only are prepared to face the storms of life but to also “keep the faith” to the final end?   Both encouragement and warnings are needed to help the Body realize the subtle threats which keep us from hearing the call of Christ to stand-firm-with-joy. 

I began to put words to this journey when I ready a tiny book by Jill Briscoe:  In “The Deep Place, Where Nobody goes: Conversations with God on the steps of my soul. 

Lend us weaponry to reinforce our souls with the muscles of Your might: faith, hope, and love.  And Oh, dear Teacher, show us how to model Christ in all, His sweet simplicity and strength, that seeing Him in us our children shall inherit gold faith,Trust tried in the crucible of life, our gift to them – a godly heritage! Amen.”  (p.119-120)


I Peter 1:7  …so that the tested genuineness of your faith – more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire – may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
  


What is 'better than gold faith?'

It is a certain quality of faith that develops  as we live life.  I’m not talking about saving faith – the time when God is invited by you to sit on the throne of your life.  We’re talking about living the life of faith in the one true Supreme God who sent His Son, Jesus the Christ, to rescue us from God’s wrath.

If we have accepted Jesus by faith, we love him by faith, and if we love him by faith, we obey him by faith, and as we obey him by faith throughout out life, this special type of righteous faith… high quality faith may develop.

But not everyone gets it. Many don’t make it – they fall away.  There are no shortcuts to better-than-gold Faith, no “7 Easy Steps to a Blessed Life.”

Faith, as defined in Hebrews 11, is not just a matter of belief, but matter of behavior...based upon belief.  Moses, Abraham, Daniel, Peter, Corrie ten Boom, Joni Erickson Tada, - their hardest tests were at the end of their lives.  What did they do that helped them in the hardest trials? They never gave in to the tendencies of old age to let down, live a mediocre life. They also didn't burn out before their time.

So how can we be among the few, the remnant within the church, to be characterized as having better-than-gold Faith to our last breath?

Psalm 1 and Psalm 92:12-15 gives us another picture of this, “The righteous flourish like the palm tree and grow like a cedar in Lebanon. They are planted in the house of the Lord; they flourish in the courts of our God. They still bear fruit in old age; they are ever full of sap and green, to declare that the Lord is upright; He is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in Him.” 

We are to be like a tree – stress sturdy – standing against the winds, standing in chaos, standing in the storm, standing in the sunshine, standing until we are called home.

Several years ago, I used the following passage on a home leave to describe a bit of our life in Central Asia up to that point.

2 Corinthians 1:8-11 “For we do not want you to be ignorant, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength, that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves, but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. You also must help us by prayer, so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many.”
What I didn’t know was that just a little over a month after that, it would get much, much more worse in Afghanistan.  James and Peter knew a bit about what it was to suffer for Christ. And it is in James, I found a bit of a road map which described my own faith journey of the past 10 years.

There are 4 things James teaches us to help us become stress sturdy, to endure (stand firm) and persevere (move forward in the battle) and lead the way to better-than-gold faith. 

Go To: Better Than Gold Faith Part 1


Thursday, October 20, 2011

No Time To Grieve

I made my sister promise to call me the minute Mom passed away. She had been sick with cancer since right before 9/11, and I had been in Afghanistan since 2000.  It was agony not being there with her at her bedside as she took her final breaths.

The call came around 9pm in April, 2006. My husband was already asleep, needing to get up at 4am for an early flight. Aid work in Afghanistan never stops.  I had no one to talk to, so I woke up my 6 year old son and told him that Grandma had died. I felt a little human comfort as I hugged him and sent him back to sleep.

The next morning, while my dad and siblings were beginning to plan mom's funeral, we started three days of intense training with Security Consultant trainers, learning how to survive being taken hostage, kidnapped, or detained by foreign governments. They started out the training by singing worship songs. I couldn't worship - the first song was Blessed Be the Name of the Lord, the chorus of which includes, "He gives and takes away...."

I walked out for a few minutes because I could not get control of my sobbing. But no time to grieve - I needed to get back in there and learn how to survive, because little did I know how bad it was going to get in Afghanistan once the Taliban started targeting aid workers. I had to stay strong - as the wife of the leader, everyone was watching me.

Five years passed. I never had time to grieve. Dear Husband was busy being the Country Director of a very large, international, mult-million dollar aid operation, and we had a large team of expats to care for.  The first year Dear Husband was in this job, I got horribly sick -twice - in bed with influenza and literally could not move.

Because I never ever got sick like that, it was a major signal to me that I had to cut back on most outside-the-home activities, anything which would drain me, so that I would have the margin of energy to serve my family, deal with the abrasive culture, and be able to have some left over for emergencies and for me. We still had one baby in diapers, and I had to focus on homeschooling.  No time to grieve...it would just take too much energy, and I didn't have any to spare.

Attacks on aid workers increased 300% in 2008. Friends kidnapped, murdered by Taliban, held hostage. Expatriates going into crisis. Pressures at work. Husband experiencing major physical symptoms of stress, including constant headaches. No time to grieve - I needed to stay strong for the children, my husband, the community.

I was later diagnosed with Panic Attacks, and knew I was on the edge of depression again. Looking back, I can see I had panic attacks for at least the last two years I lived in Afghanistan, which I mostly managed by controlled breathing.

We arrived home late in 2009, and went through extensive debriefing.  However, we were blindsided by an unexpected and major transition and it took a couple of years to work through the ramifications and loss of relationships. No emotional and mental space to grieve, and very few people to talk with about the reality of what we were living through.

The grief has been "oozing out" occasionally during the years, sometimes at inopportune moments, but I learned to control it with systematic breathing and mental distraction. 

Finally, late 2011: time to grieve my mother's death.

I have space, a little time, and the quiet to write. I am not near depression, and I am not experiencing emotional, spiritual, mental upheaval. We don't have a major speaking engagement coming up, no trips to prepare for next week, children away at sleep-overs, dear husband  gone for a week so I have my bed to myself to read, write, and sob.

I've re-read my mom's e-mails to me, and experienced the warmth of her love, re-read her version of her marriage, history, and just enjoyed re-experiencing my e-mail conversations with her during the seven years before her death. I find myself sobbing late at night, letting myself grieve and experience the pain of loss in the depths of my heart.

I do have two more tasks to do before we move permanently to Turkey - I have to go visit her grave site. I haven't been able to emotionally have the energy to go and grieve there privately.

I also have to re-watch her funeral, possibly with my children, who were really too young to understand much. I've only watched it once, but had too many people about the house in Kabul to allow me the privacy to watch it and cry.

I was pleasantly surprised to be reminded of a letter I had written to her from an airport in the U.S. on my way back to Afghanistan. I remember feeling like it was one of my last times to express all the love, appreciation, and admiration I had for her as my mom, not knowing when she'd die. I remember sobbing uncontrollably literally the whole time we were waiting to board the airplane as I wrote the letter - it tore me up inside to be leaving her once again.

Here's one of the most meaningful things she wrote in response to that last handwritten letter to her:

_________________________________________________________________
Dear [Anna],

I've reread your letter to me you wrote at the [USA] airport.  It still makes me cry. 
I want you to know how very proud of you I am, and that the life that you are living has been my dream since I was young.  Little would I have guessed that while I was not permitted to do the kind of thing you are doing, my dear daughter would be called to do so.
While I know that security is not a feeling, and I know that you will be wise in everything you do, I still have the natural concerns for your  (all of your) safety.  I know that you are as safe as you can be in His will and that He is ultimately in charge.  Of course, that is the greatest comfort in being so far away from you.

How I long to come to you and to help you set up your house, do the things that a Grandma would do.  I pray I will be able to in a few months.  In the meantime, please know how very much my spirit is with you, loving you, your husband and children, and sharing the excitement of reaching your goal.
I love you so much it hurts.

Mom

____________________________________________________________________

While I did send a video of myself giving a tribute to her which I Fedexed from Kabul and was played at her funeral, here is the short tribute I wrote after she died:

[My Mother's Name]

As Mom herself predicted, she would not make it to her 66th birthday (April 13).  After a four-and-a-half-year battle against cancer, she died Tuesday morning at 11:17am and was immediately ushered into Heaven.  Please remember Dad in your prayers as he transitions to not having Mom to care for.

I am proud to be her daughter and of the life she lived.  Her funeral will be a celebration of a life lived well for His glory.  She was grace-filled to the end as she walked the path chosen for her and saw her body decay faster than her mind.  I am sad to not be with the family in [the USA] for her funeral, but trust in His provision for my needs in this season of deep sadness.

I am deeply thankful to so many of you who have been lifting up Mom and our family during this long and weary cancer fight.  Thank you for the e-mails so many of you have sent.  I have been unable to respond to them all personally, but I am deeply touched by the outpouring of love for Mom as well as for me as I grieve far away from the family. 

_____________________________________________________________________

Sadly, my sister was diagnosed with breast cancer while Mom was still on her deathbed. Mom never knew that before she died. I'm fairly certain the stress of caring for Mom while she herself was a mother of young children was a contributing factor of her own health problems.

Another long season of chemo and not being there for my sister as we were still in Afghanistan. Every time she received a bad white cell count, chemo report, or had a bad scan, it just about "ate me up" inside, knowing that if my sister died I'd be the last woman of my immediate family of 6.

Thankfully, Dear Sister is still alive and doing well after 5 years.

How do I view all of this time-lag in grieving my mom?

My Heavenly Father knew what would happen through the years, and gave me just want I needed at each moment. He knew what I could handle, and gently led me through it all. Even so, at times I've been desperately hungry for mother-love and father-love.

But He has been so faithful to me, bringing people into my life when I least expected it to give me the right words of encouragement and strength to go on.There are numerous examples of when He had someone send me an e-mail, call me, or just in some way communicated His pride of me and love for me as I've walked this journey.   I testify to His faithful, holy, and steadfast love for all those who love Him.

Here's our family purpose statement, one that Dear Husband and I wrote before we ever went to Afghanistan. It has helped me through the many scary times in Afghanistan and the many troubles we've faced together.

FAMILY PURPOSE STATEMENT:
Our Purpose is to live by simple trust and confidence in Him, unflinching, unawed and undismayed by the troubles we may face, holding staunchly to our calling and enduring steadfastly with our gaze fixed on Him.

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

The Robbery in Afghanistan


The emergency call to the aid network via VHF radio base stations had gone out across the city of Kabul that our house was being robbed. Tom Little ran into our yard and confronted the armed robbers as they fled our house, where they had held my husband, myself, and our two little children age 2 and 9 ½ months hostage as they ransacked and looted our home. It was the fall of 2002, and in the euphoria of liberation from the Taliban, no one realized the power vacuum had created the “Wild West” where only the strong…those with guns…could survive.

At 7pm that November night, during the month of Ramazan, eleven Afghan men jumped our wall, tied up our watchman, and entered our home. They waltzed into my kitchen and said, “Shhhhh, we are the police.” Never one to be called a fool, I immediately called to my husband, David, who was upstairs getting our son ready for bed, and he heard the strange note of fear in my voice and immediately ran down stairs to see what was up. The image of three Kalashnikovs pointed at his abdomen as they marched him backwards up the stairs is imprinted in my mind forever.

My next thought: “Where’s my cell phone?” I saw it on the kitchen table and hid it under my armpit just before the robbers motioned convincingly with their guns I was to go upstairs, too.

My husband and I kept trying to persuade the robbers we were guests in their country, that this was shameful of them to be robbing us. I could see they held my husband down on the floor in the children’s room with our son playing next to him. They began to get angry I would not go into the room with David. In a panic, I realized I could not go into the bedroom unless I held my blond-haired, blue-eyed baby girl in my arms…I had no idea if they would want to steal her, too. I kept telling them in Dari, “I have a baby… Yak tefl darum.” They wouldn’t listen to me.

Finally, the tallest robber began to get angry; he pushed me roughly against the wall so hard it cracked my head. My husband jumped up and yelled, “Don’t touch my wife.” Without hesitation, a long sharp knife was thrown towards my husband and son, and 3 guns were pointed at David’s temple, pistols cocked. I realized I was seconds away from becoming a widow. We didn’t know at that moment these men had already killed several people as they robbed two other homes before ours that day.

My five feet nothin’ was no match for the robbers 6 feet plus, but now “mama bear” was enraged. Seeing I was no threat as a woman in their eyes, I quietly asked my husband to sit down, and I leaned up into the robbers face with flint in my eyes, and said, “Yak tefl darum.” What possessed me besides sheer rage and fear and the awesome mother-courage which comes to us at moments like this? I recognized I would do anything for my baby.

Finally, the robbers understood, and four men escorted me at gunpoint to the nursery where I retrieved our daughter. When our little family of four was finally seated on the toshaks (floor pillows) in the back of the children’s room with one man left to guard us, they returned to looting our home. David and I sat on the floor and thanked God for sparing our lives thus far, as we gave back to Him once again every earthly possession we had. I quietly whispered to my husband, “I have a cell phone.” We agreed he would distract the robber as I tried to call out, using the baby as a shield to hide my phone’s glow light. I finally was able to get another mom on the phone. She speedily told her husband and another friend, and both men jumped up and began running to our house. Then she made the radio call which got the message out across the city.

Tom Little heard the radio call go out, and he ran immediately from his house, heading for ours. Running courageously into our courtyard all by himself, Tom yelled, “O bacha, chee maykuni?” (Oh little boy, what are you doing?) …cultural words chosen to shame the robbers. They pointed their guns at him and he put his hands up. We yelled from the window, “Tom, we’re okay.” We didn’t want our friends killed when rescuing us. The robbers fled the house like cockroaches, leaving utter destruction in their wake.

Other friends soon arrived, and began to minister to us and put our house back in order. In reality, what seemed like hours was twenty minutes. Twenty minutes of terror followed by years of healing. Little did we know Tom only had 8 more years to live and serve the people of Afghanistan. Little did we know that it would take five more years for us to learn to let go of our anger towards the robbers and learn to love the Afghan people despite the robbery. We learned to see them through God’s eyes, not our pain-filled human eyes, and to keep loving no matter how they responded. Our children want to go back home to Afghanistan.

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Mom's Hands

Her Hands

I tried desperately to memorize the feel of her soft hands as I held them for the very last time.

They had been so gentle with me my whole life. Her hands were handsome, not beautiful the way the world calls beauty. They were especially handsome when she put nail polish on – she had strong hands and fingers, worn, muscular, feminine.

I always loved the look of her gigantic diamond ring on them – her fingers wore them well. She worked hard— harder than any woman I have ever known. She never frittered away time – her hands were busy, knitting a baby blanket, crocheting roses on to a wedding blanket, writing a will, typing an article, cooking, baking, cleaning. Her hands drove me to countless basketball and volleyball games, spending time with me in the car.

She had long before, the first time we left home for Afghanistan, given me permission to never return and see her again. She had released me from the normal familial obligation to care for her in her old age, and then when she got sick with cancer, she released me from caring for her to her death.

She knew my place was next to my husband, and we had been called to Afghanistan during the time of the Taliban. She let me, her 4th baby, take my first baby away from her to that war zone. She never whimpered or complained, but gave me her blessing.

She wrote to me in January of 2006, and asked if I could come home...now would be the last time to see her before she died. She often told me not to bother about coming home for her funeral. So I traveled half way around the world to spend my last few precious days with her.

I held her hands, and tried to memorize them with my eyes and fingers...It wasn’t enough time.

I finally had to tear myself away – the children and dear husband needed me. We had to go back. In her bedroom doorway, I couldn't help not turning around one last time to my mom on earth.

As she lay on her bed, too weak to get up, a tear ran down the side of her head as she said “I love you one last time” with her eyes. I was only 36, she was only 65, but in a few weeks, she’d be dead, and I would be in Afghanistan. It's my last glimpse of mom which stays in my memory.

I miss her hands.

Mine are getting like hers – as I age, I see the veins and the spots. I want mine to age so they look like hers. I miss her so. Maybe if my hands look a little more like hers, I’ll feel her closer to me.

I miss her.


Monday, October 17, 2011

I Promise to Hate You

ODE TO A NARCISSIST

The Crazy Cycle begins again
Once the Applause has died.
The doors have shut, and he is alone
With her.

Relentless arguments, unpredictable moods, outbursts of anger,
Condemnation, twisting of words, of truth, Threats
Inflicts pain worse than bruises.
She can’t leave,
Insecure, Unsure, Agony, Guilt, Fear
Depression, Anger.
So much anger.

Accusations, slander, gossip
He destroys her word-by-word
His tongue like knives
Isolating her from help.
Power over another,
He-over-Her
Sick-not-love, Un-Christlike,
Physical, emotional, spiritual paralysis.

Silent, the Church stares
At the faces of women masked
Hiding the pain and slow descent into hell-on-earth,
Abused by their Pastor-Husbands,
Tortured by Christian-Husbands,
Un-defended Women,
...and does nothing.

Guilt and Gladness twist together
At his death.
She loved him.
But,
She is finally free at last
To Breathe
To Move
To Be.

Check out the book, "I promise to hate, despise, and abuse you until death do us part."  You can find it at Amazon.com or at www.bookendpublishers.com

Wikipedia Description of Narcissistic Behavior
To the extent that people are pathologically narcissistic, they can be controlling, blaming, self-absorbed, intolerant of others’ views, unaware of others' needs and of the effects of their behavior on others, and insistent that others see them as they wish to be seen.
People who are overly narcissistic commonly feel rejected, humiliated and threatened when criticized. To protect themselves from these dangers, they often react with disdain, rage, and/or defiance to any slight criticism, real or imagined.