This is not my first time to be in the "insecurity pressure cooker" having seen and even helped evacuate my colleagues out of Côte d'Ivoire on three separate occasions (2002, 2003, 2004).
As a third-grader, I lived through a week in Lebanon when fighter planes were flying overhead and we had to stay inside. Then in Yemen there were 2 different occasions when the President was assassinated and there was more staying inside. I remember it being tense and uncertain, and also the fact that we had no school.
These past few weeks have been different, the first time in the midst of the situation myself as an adult. In the past, I have been on the outside helping to get others out before and there is intense pressure and then a relief when they are all out.
This time I was on the inside, coordinating with my team, making decisions and trying to get everything in order for those we leave behind, trying to manage resources in the face of an economic embargo, and trying to pack up my own stuff.
The first group of our expats left on March 31 and April 1, getting across land borders. Others left one or two at a time by plane over the next week and the last 4 of us left on April 11. We hope we can go back fairly soon..
It was an intense time, likely one of the most intense I have ever lived. I'm going to try and blog some about it as that helps me gather my thoughts and process things.
Thought 1: God meets us there. Isaiah 43:1-3
In the midst of curfews and troubled times, our normal Bible studies and church times and meeting places were disrupted. However, we managed to come together spontaneously for prayer and worship and sharing of scripture where we could. Perhaps it was the uncertainty of the situation, the rawness of our emotions in the midst of harried preparations, or the stripping away of unimportant things, but these were times when the prayers were intense and heartfelt, the worship glorious, with the Word of God ministering simply and profoundly without explanation needed.
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| The remnant |
We also were taught a new song by our resident ethnomusicologist, Rob Baker, who has been writing a song every week this year. He shared that the Lord had given him this one before the troubles and it ended up being one that would speak to both his heart and ours deeply. (check it out here).
The third Sunday in the pressure cooker was Easter Sunday! Our numbers had dwindled to 20 and we were all exhausted, but we gathered together on the lawn for a "sunrise" service at 7 a.m. The generator was blaring just 30 feet away a reminder that all was not well in our immediate world. The preparations had been hasty, nothing was polished, but again God met us in the powerful songs of old.
In our sharing time, many of us remarked on how we were so busy doing so much to get ready to leave, but Easter came unfettered by all that was going on around us, bringing hope once again for victory when all looks dark.
After our service, we had our traditional Easter morning "breakfast food" potluck, again hurriedly prepared by tired people. The normal baked goods and sausage and egg casseroles were replaced by some Easter eggs we had managed to color the night before, some croissants from the store, bread and cheese. . . A simple meal but one shared with great fellowship and joy. I recalled how the original passover meal was one eaten in haste with ordinary sorts of food.
So there you have it. Lesson 1.
In the midst of trials,
the simple becomes profound,
the "important" gets stripped away to insignificant.
God meets us there in simplicity in his Word, in a song, in the people he surrounds us with.
And when we get to the other side, wherever that might be, we find that He has gone on ahead to prepare the way.
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