Originally posted last May…now edited and shared again because it’s on my heart again…and it’s Thursday. So, I’m doing it.

__________________________________________________

He never knows what to get me. I can just picture Mark walking around the Beijing market, vendors calling out to the Meiguo ren showing him their pearls and silk. He sent me an email while I slept one night with the subject line “Found you an awesome prize” and these words: “Really cool and very excited about it! Hope you like it.”

He had ventured a little off the beaten path to an open market where digging for treasure is required. As he dug, he found an old heavy bowl made to look like a basket with characters on each side. It was made to hold grain and sit in the center of your table with the message translated: Every year, we have just enough.

It’s been sitting in our dining room since his trip to China last May, gently reminding my sometimes wayward heart. When he left his full-time career in the finance industry in October last year, our world dramatically changed. He called, we tested it to be sure, He confirmed, we responded with a yes, knowing that there was no place we’d rather be than walking in His will for us even if that meant releasing it all and depending entirely on Him for provision. And, what a paradox that is—feeling utterly weak and dependent and needy while at the very same time feeling utterly safe and certain and sure that every year, we will have just enough. Some days, the joy in that dependence and His provision is overwhelming; other days, it’s a battle to remember what I was so comfortable with only hours before.

We’ve fought a few of those battles lately, days of looking back and forth at the bowl before us and saying, “Really? Really, God?” Just like a good father, He smiled and answered our {sort of} rhetorical question and let us see it first hand.

I’m leading a team 3 weeks from today to an orphanage in Shaanxi. This summer, another team went to a different orphanage in the same area in China, and a young girl named April had committed to being a part of that team.

When God nudged her spirit to go, she responded, not letting her physical limitations due to cerebral palsy get in the way of her walking with power in His will for her. But, I learned that she was over $1000 short of the funds she needed to go, and those funds were needed that day.

Really? Really, God? Would you call and then not provide? Did she not hear you right?

I hesitated for a few seconds, that wayward heart wondering if God’s provision may have a limit. What could I do? We’re raising money too; in fact, we’re totally dependent on the giving of others and struggling to meet budget at that. If I tried to rally people to come alongside, would I be taking grain out of our own bowl to fill another, leaving ours in need of filling? But, what good is trusting God to give us our portion if we then stand guard around it, essentially believing that He may fill it once but that there must be a limit?

I shared her need, and people responded by giving and sharing. Trusting Him to supply a need that can only be filled by His hand is contagious. By that night, several hours after I first heard of her need, several hours after April had resigned that she would not be going to China after all, she was completely funded. Every last dollar. Paid in full. Just like Paul reported how the churches of Macedonia had responded to the needs they were made aware of, people gave according to their means and beyond their means, earnestly asking for the pleasure of taking part in meeting April’s needs so she could go (2 Cor 8:3-4).

My bowl from that market sits before me, forged by hands belonging to someone who likely does not love the author of the message it reads and brought home to me by a husband who knew the truth I need to see day in and day out.
Every year, every day, every moment, He gives us just what we need. And, not only does He meet us at our very point of need and supply it, but He takes great pleasure in doing it. There is no reluctance or hesitation, only a desire to bless us for His glory and our good, a desire with no limit that overflows and pours out into eternity.

My heart is overwhelmed as I consider so many have given according to their means and beyond their means, how they have “begged earnestly for the favor of taking part in the relief of our needs so that we could do what God has called us to do.” Our bowl has had a steady supply of manna this year. As we complete our first year in this gig in a couple weeks, we are finding ourselves looking at that bowl more often, asking again if He will fill it. To be honest, the current financial situation doesn’t look promising. We have about 55% of the monthly financial support we need.

Really? Really, God? Would you call and then not provide? Did we not hear you right?

But, we did hear Him. And, He’s still calling. In fact, we’re more convinced now than ever before that we’re doing what He wants us to do. And, while it is scary and hard, we are trusting that He will continue to supply even when we don’t see how that is going to happen.

I know. It’s been lamely quiet around here as of late. Let me assure you that I have a good reason. It’s because it’s been everything but quiet here in real life.

We just got home from this place.

I know, right? Add to the serenity that it’s where Mark and I met and it becomes a piece of heaven on earth.

But, it wasn’t for the romance factor that we were there (and the room filled with bunk beds shared with our children reminded us of that). We were there with all these people.

Those people there? They’re our front-line team. And, I don’t mean this kind of front line. (Note: I was so incredibly sad that having four children who couldn’t do this event meant that I had to be a spectator.)

Though our time included a lot of fun and games that made our children cry when we had to leave, there was more to our week than that.

20 dear friends are heading over to various cities in Chna to teach English and build relationships with students. We got to spend every waking hour with them over the last week to coach them along, encourage them, and prepare them for the field.  I honestly can’t think of any place we would have rather been and anything we’d rather be doing than that.

So, yeah, it’s been quiet here lately but not because of a lack of things to overthink and talk about…maybe more because of a lack of freedom to share it all.

It’s 7. 7pm and 7am.

I’ve been essentially in one place for the last 10 days, following all our predictable patterns of school drop offs, softball games, grocery store visits, and walks to the playground. I haven’t been outside a 30 mile radius of ground zero—home. Yet, here I am, living in two time zones.

A 12 hour time difference makes things convenient. There’s no need to count on your hand. And, there’s something strangely comforting knowing my watch face has the same expression as his on the other side of the world. But, a 12 hour time difference is so inconvenient. His alarm rings to start his day when our oven timer dings telling us dinner is done. When he’s breathing deeply and shutting down after a long day of being on, I’m breathing deeply midmorning and telling myself to keep going. This morning and this evening are used synonymously around here to the confusion of most everyone besides ourselves.

We’ve made 5 trips to Asia in the last 7 months since our big leap leaving corporate America to do nonprofit work full-time. Each one of those trips sent only one of us on a plane…or two or three…while the other stayed put to keep those predictable patterns. We live in two time zones now, Mark and I.

He’ll be home on Thursday which is a good thing. But, I’m not counting down the days because I know that every one of the minutes filling the 2 weeks he’s gone whether whether it is in morning or evening is being used in significant ways. It’s inconvenient, yes, and I’ve had a moment or two of putting my head in my hands wondering if I’d make it to the next morning…or evening. But, this is what it’s about. This is where He wants us. It’s crazy yet the one of few things in our lives that makes perfect sense. He called us to live in two time zones, and so we are, no matter where we physically are.

I’ll be starting the bedtime routine around here in minutes. I’m fairly certain Mark will text right in the middle of the chaos to touch base before he meets the rest of his team to start the day. It’ll be maddeningly inconvenient. But, I’ll press pause on everything and let the kids run wild while I hang on his every word on the little screen in my hand until 12 hours from now when we do it again.