Disclaimer:  this is kind of a combination of a couple of blogs I have written, but this stuff is just hitting me so hard right now.

I have been having a hard time lately.  We only have a few days left on the race.  I look back and remember all the amazing people I have met.  With that, I also remember all the hurt people I have met.  I remember the abused, the lonely, the sad, the abandoned.  It makes my heart ache.  I get to wondering, God where are you?!?!  I found myself getting angry and confused. 

I heard this quote recently. 

"It costs God nothing, so far as we know, to create nice things; but to convert rebellious wills cost Him crucifixion."

~ C.S. Lewis

He is with us.  He is EVERYWHERE.  He shows us how to live.  He has been telling us the whole time.  We just haven't been listening. 

God is not a God of our circumstance.  I don't think he ever tells us to live out of our circumstances.  Why do we? 

He tells us over and over again not to look to the world for our value.  It doesn't matter where we were born.  It doesn't matter if we live in a dirt floor shack in Togo or in a mansion on a hill.  God is the same God he says he is.  He is the same today, tomorrow and forever.  He is love.  What he is concerned about is where our identity lies.  What does our character look like?  What does our heart look like?  What do you live for?

The poverty mentality is killing us.  It doesn't matter if you are in a dirt floor shack in Togo or a mansion on a hill.  I know that I can go home, live in the suburbs and not feel guilty.  A of all, guilt is not an emotion from God, I don't deserve to live in that.  Second of all, IT'S JUST OUR CIRCUMSTANCE.  I look at people and I see their heart, not where they live.  I have met so many people living in shacks that are so much happier and joyful than a lot of people I've met that live in a mansion on a hill.   

The more I learn about this God I serve, the more this world gets flipped upside down.  I have seen the world and the people in it destroy one another.  I have seen the church come in and restore. 

I'm at home.  I took a week to see my grandmother who is very sick.  I thought it would be very difficult to come home.  I was expecting to be overwhelmed.  I am a bit overwhelmed but not in the way I thought I would be. 

This trip is almost over.  In a few days I am meeting my team in Ukraine for our final month.  I have been so attached to so many places we have visited.  I have met incredible people, been a part of ministries that are making a difference.   I thought by coming home I would feel like I was all of a sudden useless, I am not making a difference.  When I talk about what I have been doing or tell people for the first time so many respond by saying "what am I doing with my life", or "I wish I could do something like that".  Being here, I can see I make a difference wherever I am.  I am so attached to the nations.  I am attached in a way that runs so deep.  Taking a step outside has made me realize God is everywhere.  He is working around this globe whether I'm there or not.  I cannot do everything, I cannot be everywhere.  The nations are not mine to be had.  I see the way God is taking back his children in the bars in Thailand, the villages in Romania, the orphanages in Guatemala.  My sister once told me s#*@ happens.  What are you going to do with what happens in your life?  Who are you going to give it to?  We cannot help where we were born.  We cannot control our circumstances sometimes.  If you live in a village in the middle of the bush, what are you going to do with that?  I did not go to the nations to change people.  I did not go to make them more like me.  It doesn't matter where God's children live; we are still God's children.  We deserve to be loved.  We have a grace that surpasses human understanding.  I have loved.  I have learned that I have so much love to give.  I plan on pouring that out wherever I am.  The nations are not the only ones who need it.

We took a train.  Sometimes it's the simplest times, the most unexpected moments that God will lay something on my heart.  He will break my heart for what breaks his.  We had a crazy travel from Prague to Moldova.  It was something like 32 hours, 4 trains, 3 layovers.  At the end of it, when we crossed the Moldova boarder, I got hit...hard.  I found myself in the middle of the second fight that day.  This man who worked for the boarder came up to this woman I was sitting with and started yelling at her.  I had no idea what he was saying but afterward she started crying.  The only word that came to mind was injustice.  Injustice.  Injustice.  Since arriving in Eastern Europe, I have seen first hand more injustice and prejudice than I have ever seen in my life.  It's Gypsies vs Romanians vs Hungarians vs Moldavians.  And this woman, this beautiful woman was brought down to a pea size. 

Here is my question...  why.   Why is it so important to be better than the next person?  My mind started racing as I was weeping for this woman sitting across from me.  We are killing each other.  Literally and emotionally.  It's the words that come out of our mouths or the actions towards one another.  I have lost dear friends and had my heart broken because of this.  What is this I keep hearing about nuclear war?   Have you ever stopped to think about what we are doing to each other?  What is your purpose, what is your motive?

I met this man from Cameroon on the streets of Prague and had one of the most amazing conversations.  He was bold.  He was a dreamer.  He said why should I blame you for something your fathers' fathers' fathers did to my fathers' fathers' fathers?  He also said why do we need passports?  This is one land; this is God's land.  We have so much hate in our hearts because of lines drawn on the same land.  I could go into so much more dealing with generational stuff but my point is we don't have to live in the past.  The hate we have in our hearts, that is not ours.  We don't have to live in that.  He believed in the idea of world peace.

These are bold statements, but why not be bold.  I watched the movie The Green Zone the other day.  There was a man in Roy's group who just wanted to do what he was told.  Didn't care about the reason.  He wanted to do his job and go home.  Roy had bigger dreams.  Roy was bold.  We can go through our lives with the hate in our hearts.  Not caring the reason it's there, not caring to get rid of it.  Or...  we could live as God has called us to live.  With love in our hearts.  Love for the people around us... ALL the people.  It takes work to get the hate and bitterness out but it's possible.  Can you imagine a world where we actually love one another?  I can.  That is why my heart breaks.  It's possible.