Still With Me

Last year Sarah (Alling) and I went to the TWLOHA Move Conference in Cocoa Beach.  They had us do this blindfolded maze deal where we were not allowed to talk, which for some reason was really hard for me.  I kept reaching my hand out and whispering, "Sarah...Sarah, is that you?" only to get a "Shhh, no talking" in reply.  I guess I have an obedience problem, because in about 5 seconds I was again reaching and asking, "Sarah, where are you?"  I was groping strangers, whispering, "Oh sorry, you're not Sarah," and kept getting shushed until finally someone grabbed my hand and told me, "You have to be quiet.  Now, I'm going to put your hands on the shoulders of another person, and you just need to follow them quietly until I tell you what to do next."  I sucked it up and quietly obeyed as we wandered who-knows-where for a while. 

I remember being stopped and told to take my hands down from the person in front of me.  I was to stand silent and still, just waiting for someone to come lead me to the place I should go next.  Now, I'm a risky, dare-loving, world-traveling girl, but for some reason, standing alone on the beach, I started to feel vulnerable...really, really vulnerable. 

All I could hear were footsteps moving away from me. 

I reached out my hands in front and behind, and everyone was gone.  I remember feeling like a little child left alone in the dark, and I softly whispered:

"Is anyone still there?"

I'm feeling that way today.  I'm feeling blindfolded and silenced.  I'm feeling "sometimes led, sometimes not."  I keep hearing these footsteps moving away from me, and like a child left alone in a dark space, I'm whispering to Jesus, "Are You still there?" 

There's this story that I love in Ezekiel.  Throughout the book Ezekiel's writing about the devastation that is going to come down on God's people.  The worst of it culminates when, in a vision, he hears news from Jerusalem: "The city has been struck down."  Jerusalem - the beacon of hope for these people - has been struck down.  The worst has happened.  Hopelessness settles in among the people as they sort out their days in exile.  But the story doesn't end there.  The last chapter of Ezekiel prophesies of the rebuilding of this great city.  It details measurements and cubits, about which we usually go, "Ok, who cares....."  But each of these cubits are the baby-steps of restoration.  The book concludes by saying that the city will be restored, and "The name of the city from that day on shall be [Jehovah Shema] The Lord is There." 

"The Lord is There."

Last year I stood on a beach, blindfolded, listening to the footsteps wander away from me, and I felt very, very alone.  I, Tara Gentry, the queen of independence, was gripped by the fear that I had been abandoned, forgotten, and no one was coming for me.  After minutes of waiting quietly in trust, the sound of the footsteps turned.  Though so many were walking away from me, one set moved again toward me.  Whoever he was, he took my hand and moved me toward my purpose, toward community.  I had not been abandoned.  I had not been forgotten.  I had been challenged - challenged to believe, despite appearances, that silence does not mean desertion and that patience has its purpose.  

Tonight I'm remembering that stranger's hand and thanking God for it.  Though He's not talking, He's still with me.  He is always still with me.  I suppose it takes the best of friends to be comfortable with silence, so I'll consider it a compliment of sorts.  I don't always know where I fit in this story of His, but when I remember He's with me, well... that's pretty much all I need to know. 

So, Jesus... If You don't feel like talking, I'll say that's ok.  I'll just say I love You and I trust You, and we'll leave it at that.  I'm going to bed tonight wishing You'd wake me up with that song You sing.  I'm looking forward to the morning.  If You don't feel much like talking, I'll still sing for You.  I think it's gonna be a special day for you and Me.  

"When I awake, You're still with me."   

Africa is Easy

For me, Africa is easy. When people are hungry, it’s easy to get them to eat. Then I come home. I come home to the U.S., to Teen Challenge, to friends and family and life. It can be tiring spending your life in an effort to give the love of God to people who, by all appearances, don’t want it. We have a lot of those moments at Teen Challenge. And in those moments, I sometimes think it would be easier to just go back to Africa. To stay there, to give my life to people who recognize their need and want my help. In those moments, I just want those Swazi girls and boys to climb back up on my hips, to grab my hands and sing to me again... "Jesus loves me this I know...Jesus is so wonderful..."  In those moments, I begin to understand a little more of what Jesus meant when He asked us to take up our cross and follow Him.

Jesus was never shy about counting the cost. He said it and He showed it - loving others hurts. The work of love can be hard and tiring. It can be painful, and it will cost us greatly. But in Africa, with children singing to me about the love of God, I was challenged to love again…and to keep loving. I was reminded to never let my love grow cold, but to stay on the cross with Christ and let His work be completed in me.

So today, I’m back in Indiana at the TC house with 20 teenage girls, and honestly...I'm tired. Here at TC, they’re not quite as cute as those sweet little African children, but they are loved. Beneath the tough exteriors and all of the make-up and masks, are little girls inside wanting someone to sing to them that Jesus is wonderful, and yes, He does still love them, too. Though many in our lives have yet to admit it, they are hungry. When Jesus said, “I was hungry and you came to me…” He never specified where. Our ministry to Christ may be loving on a child in Africa, counseling a teenager in rehab, taking care of an ailing grandparent, showing kindness to a co-worker, or just taking time to have dinner with your family.

So under the weight of our cross, let us not grow so weary that we forget to sing and to live, that “Jesus loves me this I know…Jesus, He’s so wonderful.”

In God's Kingdom, the King Dies

Got sucker-punched by Jesus this week. What's new, right? Why do I love it so much when He does that? It just hurts soooo good. Well, we had this moment, we were chatting about "kingdom" - His, not mine. Realizing, as if I shouldn't already know, how much the kingdom requires of me... how much living like Jesus will cost.

He's pretty expensive, Jesus. But most great things are. The best things are the most expensive things. And I guess nothing can be of more value than a life. So...in the expensive pursuit of living like Jesus...the cost is me. The cost is me and all my dreams and hopes and desires - all the ways I try to make His Word fit my promises (you know, the ones I strain to believe are on the top of God's agenda). I have these moments where I get all excited to live God's kingdom, God's way - but if I'm honest, the excitement is usually born out of a certain idea that is still mine - a picture that is still, somehow, about me.

And then He crumbles my kingdom, my ideas, and my dreams with a whisper:

"Tara, in God's kingdom, the King dies."

Of course I thought about Jesus. And I thought about Jim (Elliot...my hero).  I thought about Peter and Paul and John the Baptist, and all the other "greats" I wish I was more like. And I wonder what would God be pleased to crucify in me? If I want to be like Jesus, somebody's gotta die. He already did, and He invites me to join Him. To die with Him and live with Him. To die to the ridiculous notion that all of this is about me and my story - to live in the extraordinary adventure that is knowing Jesus and being like Him ...whatever the cost.

So help me, God, I want to live like Jesus. I have plenty of pictures of what I wish that looked like. I have no idea what that actually will look like. Absolutely NO idea. In a kingdom where living means dying and dying means living...I get a little confused. But I believe You know what You're doing, and "though none go with me, still I will follow...to the death."

Dare to die; dare to live.

Looking forward to whatever You have in mind, Jesus. I may need Your help sorting what's me and what's You, but this mess is fun when we're rolling in it together. Sloppy yet satisfying :) Love You.

I Want to be More Like These Children

"I want to be more like these children."

That's about all I could journal after walking through the squatters' village in Swaziland on September 24th. As we took a stroll away from the Children's Cup care point and down the dirt roads of the village, children began to come alongside us, grabbing our hands, climbing our hips, searching our faces.

I'm stopped in my tracks. Stopped in my tracks trying to write this, because I feel those tiny hands stroking my cheeks, those brilliant eyes searching my soul... Blahhh, how I can even try to put words to this...

Holding kids on each hip, several grabbing each hand, we walked. As we stopped for a few minutes to wait for a friend, one of the children looked up at me...and began to sing. Through broken English, I understood two words.

"Wonderful"...and "Jesus."

"Wonderful Jesus. Jesus, He is so wonderful. Wonderful Jesus."

I'm embraced by these children, with their bare feet and tattered clothes. We're walking the dirty, littered roads of their village, soon to be taken away by the government. Their homes beside us are nothing to be desired, they're hungry and they're left wanting...

...and these children are singing to me about the wonder of Jesus.

I'm looking on their poverty, and they're telling me how good God is.

They looked at me as if searching my soul - did I agree, did I know, too, how wonderful Jesus is? Playfully they began to sway my arms and one changed the tune to another, so familiar...

"Yes Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me. The Bible tells me so..."

So we stood in the dirty street and held hands and we sang. In the middle of their hunger, poverty and loss, we sang about a Wonderful Jesus. We sang about how He loves us. These children hijacked all of my doubt, worry, fear and distrust and reminded me that circumstance does not prove God's favor and situations do not eliminate His love.

Jesus, I love You. I trust You. Make me more like these children. Make me more like You.

My Grandma Doesn't Remember Me

My grandma doesn't remember me. She remembers Tara. She just doesn't remember me. To her, Tara is a little girl with long, blonde hair, wearing Smurfette tennis shoes. She still lives in Michigan, goes to elementary school and watches old movies on grandma's couch. She still rides a child's bike around the neighborhood, plays with kids across the street and sneaks into granny's jewelry box. My grandma forgot that I grew up, because my grandma has alzheimer's disease. She forgot that not only did I finish high school, but that she attended my college graduation as well. She forgot that four years ago we all celebrated my sister's wedding, and that two months ago, my brother and sister-in-law finally had a baby. She forgot that her mom died long before I was born, and when she remembers, it's like she's reliving that grief for the very first time. My grandma is here, but she's gone. She sits at the table but I'm not sure where she is. My grandma doesn't remember me anymore, but sadder still, is that she doesn't remember her.

If I had the choice of remembering me, or remembering grandma, she'd win every time. Her kindness, her generosity, her most gentle, tender and compassionate love. It's a tragedy that she no longer experiences the understanding of the great woman that she is - or maybe the not knowing makes her all the more beautiful. Unknowingly, without motive or intention, she is, simply, kind. She may not remember people or events or places, but she remembers compassion. She remembers laughter. Somehow, forgetting all else, she still remembers to be like Jesus.

I struggled with what to get grandma for Mother's Day this year. It's the first year I'm absolutely certain she won't even know who I am, what I gave her, or why I gave it. Worse yet, giving her anything at all will still be as if I gave nothing, and I'm left with a sorrowful, "So what's the point?" No matter what I give, she won't be able to know or appreciate it. Mother's Day will come and go, and she won't even know the difference.

She may not remember me, but I remember her. She has forgotten years-worth of memories, but in my mind they are as fresh as this morning. She is my grandma. She held me, and brushed my hair, and scratched my back. I love old movies because I watched them with her - over and over and over again. The smell of soap and Jean-Natte are still alive in my mind, blended with images of pink towels, lace doilies and purple butterflies. Precious moments, soccer games, walking the dog, crying with me after Grandpa Gentry died, handwashing dishes, endless nick-nacks, ice cream and backyard flowers, calling me her "angel" and asking me to sing when I was too afraid to try... I still remember.

I think grandma is giving me the most costly gift I've ever received. The cost has been losing her. The gift, learning to love without return. Without recognition, or appreciation, or invitation - to simply, love. To love her, not because it will feel good - the more I love her, the more it hurts. But the more I love her, the more I become the woman she always prayed I would be. Her greatest gift is finding she has left her mark on me.

So this Mother's Day, what do I give? If I get chocolates, she won't eat them. If I get jewelry, she won't wear it. If I get clothes, she'll think they belong to someone else. This Mother's Day, I gave her flowers. Ashamed to admit it, I wondered to myself, "Is it really worth the money? She won't even know they're hers." But grandma smiles over pretty things, and flowers are pretty. If for one moment tomorrow, grandma smiles over a pretty flower, a pretty flower that I gave her, even though she doesn't know it - then I guess for Mother's Day, I bought my grandma a smile. And when grandma can't remember anymore, I think a smile is money well-spent.

Happy Mother's Day, Grandma. You may not remember me, but I remember you.   You are still beautiful to me.