I’ve been really blessed this
week—even in the midst of sadness, grief, and in the joy of holiday preparations. One thing, especially today that has stuck
out—is the need to choose contentment. Daily, hourly, it is a fight for joy. A
conscious effort to choose to see the glass as half full; to have hope for a
future I cannot see or control. I have to opt to be optimistic. Not in a
careless or heedless way, but an optimism rooted in the reality of an
omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent Pappa Daddy who wills and works.
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Dreams may be
unfulfilled today, innocent lives may be lost, I may still have waves of grief…moments
where all I want is to book a flight back to Nairobi or at the very least have
a deep conversation with someone who understand the beautiful brokenness of Kibera.
But in those moments, I have a choice…I can choose to let the not given spoil the given (paraphrased
Jim Elliot), or I can choose to remind myself of the hope I have. The same hope
that fulfilled the dream of Kenya is still working, providing, and preparing
the way for my next steps. I don’t want to be so rooted in the future that I overlook
the blessings of today. Blessings such as sitting next to a writer with a past
similar to mine, running into old classmates, and meeting new friends, or the
laughter and smile of the precious boy I work with…to name a few.
There has been a ton of hoopla (and
hooray for an opportunity to include a word that is fun to type and say) about
the “end of the world”…and it’s been an interesting juxtaposition (an equally
fun word) to the outpouring of “26 acts of kindness” in memory of the lives
lost last week…we should live each day with that perspective—that it could be
our last, that we should seek to do the “golden rule” along with helping our
fellow man. So tonight, potentially the last night, I want to live rooted in
joy and hope, not because I know what tomorrow will bring, but because I know that
the Heavenly Daddy who brought me this far will bring me safely home.
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