A life less comfortable

We are settling into our borrowed home on the hill. The house we are living in has been around since the first missionaries arrived in the 1940s. The main part of the house is made from really hard wood walls, a cement floor covered in tile and an iron roof covered in overlapping roofing sheets. From the air it is a square-ish shaped dwelling with a patchwork metal roof. It is at the top of the mission station providing the most spectacular views of the jungle and within sight and sound of the waterfalls that fuel the hydroelectric power plant. Our friends and teammates that were living in the house full-time before us had to unexpectedly stay in the United States for vital medical care of a family member. They have generously lent us their home and furnishings and other household goods. This has allowed us to move to the jungle with our suitcases and very little else. We are very thankful. The team has welcomed us and we are so looking forward to settling into a rhythm of routi...

The practical meaning of meekness has always been a bit elusive to me. It is generally defined as quiet, gentle, and easily imposed on; submissive. Some associated synonyms are mild, weak and timid. In the beatitudes (Matthew 5:5 ESV) Jesus states, " Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. " I have never really had a vibrant and full-bodied grip on this concept of being meek. This summer while serving on staff with icc (intercultural communications course at JAARS headquarters in NC) my co-facilitator and friend Inah shared with the staff a devotional on humility and meekness. It has transformed the way I understand and interact with meekness. She introduced us to the word Praus which describes Ancient Greek war horses. In Ancient Greece wild horses were gathered up and trained for battle. When a horse was declared Praus it meant the horse was meeked and could be trusted in battle: " to be meeked was to be taken from a state of wild rebellion and ...

Marseille is the setting of Alexandre Dumas classic book, “The Count of Monte Cristo” more specifically the prison featured in the book is Chateau d’If. It is a prison just off the coast of Marseille much like Alcatraz Island prison located in the San Francisco Bay off the coast of California. The fictitious character Edmond Dantes is falsely accused of treason and sent off to serve out his time without a trial at the grim island fortress.  It is a story with classic elements of love, adventure, justice, revenge, hope, and forgiveness. Steve and I took a short ferry boat out to Chateau d’If last week. It was a spectacularly beautiful day with clear cerulean skies overhead and glass-like blue-green waters below. The Chateau d’If is a small fortress on a rocky island rising out over the sea. Our crowded ferry docked and we began our short climb up to the medieval prison with curved turreted walls; a striking stark white stone structure against the aquamarine sea/sky backdrop. ...