by Christie Purifoy | Apr 30, 2012 | God's Love, Home, prayer, Seasons, Uncategorized, Waiting
I have a picture in my mind, and I can’t seem to let it go. Maybe the picture has me and won’t let go. I honestly can’t tell which way it is.
I see God’s children in Egypt in the moment before he rescues them. I see them just on the verge of being carried away toward their true home.
They are standing, as God asked, with their cloaks tucked up into their belts, sandals on their feet, walking sticks held in their hands. They are ready. They are waiting.
They are also eating. Eating in haste, yes, but still eating. Roasted lamb can only be consumed so quickly, after all.
How excited they must have been. How afraid. Where did they get the strength to stand still, to chew and swallow, to wait quietly but in full expectation?
I want to know because I feel myself among them.
We are continuously arriving at new thresholds. What is on the other side? Sometimes we see quite clearly. A child’s birth. A new job. A move. Sometimes we see less clearly. We are filled with expectation, but … for what, exactly? We’re not sure.
And I’m wondering, given all the uncertainty, how to find the balance between readiness (bags packed, sandals on feet) and stillness (I will cook, I will chew, I will swallow).
We are asking certain questions in our house. Where will we be living this time next year? Where will our baby be born? In Florida? Somewhere new? How long will God ask us to live this in-between life?
I sat down in church this weekend, and the questions made so much noise in my head that I shut my eyes. I wanted to give them my whole attention. I wanted to listen to my questions more than I wanted to listen to Scripture. Or prayer. Or a song. So, I didn’t see the words of the next worship song flash onto the screen. I heard them.
There’s no place I’d rather be than here in your love
That startled me. In my mind, I heard new, much more insistent questions: can I sing these words? Are they true?
I don’t know if they are true for me. That, however, may not be the best question to ask.
Here is the question I am asking: how do I make these words true?
I sang those words. I’m still singing them.
They may not be a statement of fact, but I think that they are something better.
They are a prayer.
by Christie Purifoy | Mar 27, 2012 | Jesus, poverty, Stories, Uncategorized
A good friend of mine just returned from a trip to India, and she came by recently to share her stories. Stories of hopelessness. Stories of darkness. Stories of Jesus in the midst of it all.
In addition to her stories, she gave me another gift: a gorgeous, hand-sewn bag covered in the faded colors of vintage sari fabric. The label inside says it was sewn by Shamoli.
My friend told me about visiting Shamoli and her coworkers at SariBari in Kolkata, India. She described the laughter and happy conversation that fills the space where they sew blankets, pillows, bags of all sizes, and (this I’m really excited about!) baby blankets, changing pads, and diaper bags.
These women have been rescued from slavery. Their happiness testifies to the truth of another label tucked into my bag. This one says: “making life new.” And yet, for every woman given hope and a new livelihood, so many women and girls continue to be trafficked into the darkest forms of suffering. We wonder together, my friend and I, if it’s enough. What is a little happiness when set against so much ongoing evil?
Is Jesus enough? Is Jesus enough, even when the darkness remains dark and happiness is unimaginable? I think we should all be asking this question.
For me, it took being bedridden by asthma, pregnancy, and various nasty cold bugs (not to equate these three but, physically at least, none is a walk in the park) to acknowledge that I haven’t been happy in a long time.
Happiness. Maybe you prefer a different word, but I’m talking about that it-just-feels-good-to-be-alive rush. I’m talking about those days when we wake up singing “This is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it.” I’m talking about the days when we’re still singing that song as the sun goes down.
The truth is, I haven’t been really, truly, all-day-long happy since we moved to Florida two years ago.
My confession isn’t a complaint however. My Florida life is packed with blessings: a few friends, a good church, a comfortable home. But I’ve been living this verse: “Just as I watched over them to uproot and tear down … so I will watch over them to build and to plant” (Jeremiah 31:28). Well, I’ve been living the first half, at least.
For two years God has held me in his hand while uprooting old dreams and plans, while tearing down old joys and comforts. In two years I’ve gone from pursuing an academic career to staying home with my kids and stealing hours to write a book that may never see the light of day. I’m content with that trade, but it hasn’t been easy either.
For two years I’ve lived without almost every single thing that used to make me happy: my city neighborhood, my university, my large circle of friends, the apartment in which I hosted dinners and parties nearly every week.
I’ve missed winter, the city skyline, bumping into friends on every sidewalk. I’ve missed apple picking, drives through rolling corn fields, and long summer evenings when it seems that every neighbor you’ve ever known has come down to walk by the lake.
I know that happiness is possible, but I’m not sure that it’s a promise. Or, even, that it’s always in our best interest. Which is why it took a few months of being imprisoned near my bedroom air-purifier to tell God how much I wanted to be happy again.
I accept that the uprooting and the tearing down have been good things, but, oh Lord, am I ready for the building and the planting.
A few hours after my friend’s visit, I carried my new bag to the library. I had one book to pick up and the big bag was overkill, but I was eager to carry it around. Standing at the librarian’s desk, I saw her struggling my way under a tower of books. I expected one book, but it seemed that every book I’d ordered in a month had arrived this day.
I filled my beautiful bag with these long-anticipated library books until the bag overflowed. I stood, considering my bounty, and was suddenly bathed in warm, delicious light. I was standing beneath a skylight, and, I don’t know, maybe a cloud had just blown away from the sun, but it felt like a shower of grace.
In an instant, my heart was filled and overflowing with happiness. My bag – my cup! – overflowed. And then, I remembered the words that come just a little higher on the page: “Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for you are with me” (Psalm 23:4).
I knew then that Jesus is enough.
I don’t have the authority to speak that truth on my own. Honestly, I haven’t suffered enough. My own troubles are small.
I speak it because others who have suffered say it is so. They have shared their stories. The shepherd David. The Indian seamstress Shamoli.
Before giving me the bag, my friend told me story after story of Jesus’s presence in the darkest places. In my friend’s own words, this Jesus is enough because he “steps into our suffering and brings love, joy and peace where it just doesn’t make sense to have it.”
It’s true in the valley of the shadow of death. And, to my surprise, it is even true in the library.
We all know babies in need of welcome gifts, mothers in need of mother’s day presents, and nesters who would love a pretty pillow. The equation here is actually quite simple. The more items sold by Sari Bari, the more women will gain their freedom from either the reality or the threat of human trafficking and forced prostitution in Kolkata, India. Our dollars are one way we get to be the hands and feet of Jesus in a suffering world.
You can find more beautiful products made by women freed from Kolkata’s sex trade at Freeset and at Love Calcutta Arts (I can personally attest to the beauty of their handmade paper journals).
by Christie Purifoy | Jan 17, 2012 | allergies, healing, prayer
I have prayed for healing.
I have prayed for symptoms to disappear because that is what healing meant to me, but deep within I have suspected that my prayers were somehow too narrow. Too limited. How, then, should I pray? Is true healing more than the absence of some symptom?
I prayed that my boy would be healed. I prayed that food would no longer squeeze the breath from his lungs. God heard my prayer. When his throat began to swell, and I had forgotten the epi-pen, a stranger’s hand reached out with the medicine he needed.
What does it feel like to be healed? It feels like being held.
I have felt the breath squeezed from my own lungs. For one long, hard month I have despaired of ever again feeling strong. And I have prayed for healing.
I prayed for breath when what I needed was hope.
This is not a less-than prayer. I do not redefine healing in order to make it seem more possible. Lungs are made strong, allergies do disappear, the cords of cancer and disease are broken every day, but God can do so much more than that.
His healing is not limited to our bodies. His healing is not given only to those whom doctors will pronounce well.
To be healed by God is to know that death is a lie. That there is nothing to fear.
“He reached down from on high and took hold of me; he drew me out of deep waters.” Psalm 18:16
To be held in arms of love. That is what it feels like to be healed.
by Christie Purifoy | Dec 31, 2011 | God's promises, prayer, Seasons, Waiting
This is the view from where I sit on the eve of another year. Not literally, of course, but “literal” has never meant much to me. Literally, the view is more about scattered toys and laundry piles and cough drops (I’m trying and failing to remember a holiday season that didn’t feature some virus or other).
But, the real view, the shaped-by-a-river-of-prayer view? It looks like this: quiet, peaceful, empty, yet hopeful. There is something just over the horizon … I can sense it … almost see it. I don’t know exactly what it is, but I know that it is good.
It’s a far cry from last year’s view. Having moved to Florida only a few months before, having just determined to take a break from university teaching, the future looked blank.
Then, it was emptiness. Now, it is expectation.
What happened in the between? What has brought me from one to the other? The answer, I think, is month after month of not-having and not-doing. Waiting, you might call it, though it often felt more like grieving.
I stopped teaching. I didn’t start serving in our new church. I didn’t make many new friends (though, there are a few – you know who you are!). I didn’t organize or join a church small group. I watched my husband volunteer in the kids’ classrooms while I moved in small circles between house and yard and house and library.
And what am I left with at the end of this year of nothing? A finished manuscript for a memoir, this blog, and many, many new plans and dreams. Dreams that are entirely unrealized yet somehow substantial in their promise and their beauty.
I am living the upside-down values of Jesus’s kingdom. That which looks empty is full. That which has died brings life. Beneath the piles of laundry and the scattered toys, between the crumpled tissues and half-empty medicine bottles, there is water becoming wine.
We may still be living in darkest winter, but I sense the nearness of spring. And, so, I dip my toes in the river and pray the season in. My prayers are merely a welcome for all that God long ago determined to give.
“Ask the Lord for rain in the springtime … He gives showers of rain to all people.”
Zechariah 10:1
by Christie Purifoy | Dec 15, 2011 | Advent, Chicago, Waiting
When my life is in waiting mode, I sometimes wish I could go to bed and just sleep for a few months. Oblivion seems so much more appealing than the hard, day-to-day of waiting.
Waiting is painful, and it often feels pointless too. So much so, that I fantasize about hitting some kind of cosmic fast-forward button.
The firstborn feels it too. For weeks now she’s been murmuring the same refrain: “I wish that today was Christmas Eve!” From my grown-up perspective, I can clearly see that she, in her impatience, is wishing for the lesser. The not quite-as-good.
I always tell her, “No! You don’t want that. It would mean that Christmas is almost over.”
What I’m trying to say, but can never quite convince her of, is that Christmas will certainly come, so why wish away all of the good that happens in the meantime? The daily Advent calendar, the classroom parties, the cookie baking. It may not be what we’re waiting for, but it is good nonetheless. And Christmas will come. Speeding it up doesn’t make it any more of a sure thing.
Other times, waiting is less enjoyable. That’s when I fantasize about becoming a modern-day Rip Van Winkle. God, just wake me up when it’s all over. Wake me up when it gets good.
This is when age comes in handy. It’s good to no longer be eight years old. Because I can remember.
I can remember the painful waiting of our first few married years. All we wanted was to leave Texas and live in a big city. We had exciting dreams but felt painfully cramped by our current circumstances. An uninspiring white box of an apartment. The heat and humidity of a Texas river valley. The fact that we couldn’t go anywhere unless we started up the car.
Moving to Chicago was a dream fulfilled, and the magic of it never really wore off. I could still feel it even ten years later. There was our corner apartment in a converted jazz-age luxury hotel. Our windows were at tree-top height, and the views included the lake and the museum’s grand front lawn. There were the honey locust trees that gave every neighborhood street a golden canopy each October. There was a downtown skyline that glittered, and a lake that sometimes looked like a wind-swept arctic wilderness. And there was snow! But best of all, we could walk everywhere.
I could hardly step outside my door without being grateful that God had brought us to this place. I would often marvel to myself that this – this! – is what he’d had in mind all those years of our waiting. The friends. The church. The old, ivy-covered buildings. The bookstores like underground caves stuffed full of treasure. It was good, but it was made even better because we had longed for it before we ever even knew exactly where it could be found.
I remember these things and know that it is precisely the discomfort of waiting that urges us forward into the plans God has prepared for us. The people. The places. We long for them before we even know their names. But this is good and necessary. Because when the things of God are finally revealed in our lives … we recognize them. We know them. And we know exactly who to thank.
“Many, O Lord my God, are the wonders you have done. The things you planned for us no one can recount to you; were I to speak and tell of them, they would be too many to declare.”
Psalm 40:5
