Jesus wept

I’ve cried a lot since I found out Thursday morning that Yo Han Lim, one of my tenth grade students, had passed away in a moto accident.  Sometimes I was crying for his family, sometimes for Logos students, sometimes for myself.  Sometimes I didn’t even know why I was crying. 

One thing’s for sure.  I wasn’t crying for Yo Han.  Everyone who knows Yo Han knows how much he loved Jesus and how dramatically God has changed his life in the past two years.  We know he’s having the time of his life in heaven.  He was just talking with another teacher, Tim Jones, this weekend about how much he was looking forward to heaven and what an amazing adventure it would be.  I’ve loved reading students’ posts about that.  "Have fun!  See you soon!"  One said when we get there and join Yo Han, he’ll talk faster than ever, so excited to tell us what we’ve been missing out on.  No, Yo Han doesn’t need any tears, because he’s happier now than he’s ever been. 

But I was crying nonetheless.  As I thought about why, I was so thankful to be reminded of a Bible passage I studied earlier this spring.  Some friends and I have been studying the book of John, including chapter 11, where Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead.  A lot of people know one verse from that chapter, just because it’s the shortest verse in the whole English Bible: “Jesus wept.”  But I’d never really looked at that verse till we studied it.

First, let’s set the scene.  Jesus is good friends with three siblings - Mary, Martha, and Lazarus - but he’s in another town when Lazarus becomes deathly ill.  So Lazarus’s sisters send a message telling Jesus, “Lord, the one you love is sick,” but Jesus stays put for two days before he heads to their town.  When he arrives, Lazarus has already been buried for four days. 

Mary goes out to meet Jesus as he arrives, and she collapses in utter grief and says, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”  What were you thinking?  You could have saved him!  Don’t you care?  Aren’t you powerful?

Jesus sees her weeping, surrounded by a crowd of weeping friends, and “he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled.”  And…here it comes…Jesus wept.  He weeps right along with them.

What the heck?!  He knows, far better than any of them, that death is NOT the end of the story – that by leaving earth, Lazarus gets to arrive in his real home, the place where his heart is fully satisfied.  He even knows that in just a minute, He’s going to bring Lazarus back to life on earth.  (Did Lazarus even want to come back?  No one ever talks about that part.  My theology here is quite hazy, but I’m hoping Lazarus didn’t consciously arrive in heaven yet, because earth would be such a huge letdown after a taste of heaven.)  They’ll watch Lazarus walk right out of the tomb.  Mary’s tears will turn to laughter.  Their friends’ mourning will yield to shock and delight.  Just one more minute till the sorrow is over!  Jesus knows that.  He could even forego the crying bit and skip ahead to the “raising from the dead” part.  So why on earth is Jesus weeping?

It’s because He loves us.  Jesus wept because when He became human, loving people started to hurt him just as much as it hurts us.  He wept because it broke his heart to see Mary and Martha so overcome with grief.  He wept for all of us humans, for the burdens we carry because of sin and death.  The broken relationships.  The things left unsaid.  The fear and jealousy and selfishness and bitterness.  The sickness and warfare and heart-wrenching pain.  We were helpless against it all, and He felt its weight firsthand with his dear friends Martha and Mary.  He wept because it’s so hard for us, this “being human” stuff, and His heart goes out to us.  And He wanted us to know that He knows, He really KNOWS what it feels like to lose someone you love dearly. 

A couple verses later, Jesus is at the tomb, asking Martha for an act of faith.  “Take away the stone.” 

“It’s going to stink in there,” she protests. 

But He tells her, “If you believe, you will see the glory of God.” 

They take away the stone from the tomb’s entrance and Jesus prays, “Father, thank you that you always hear me.  Please let them know it and believe that you sent me.”  He calls, “Lazarus, come out!” and Lazarus does, very much alive and well.  But Jesus is thinking bigger than just his friend walking and talking again.  That’s good news indeed, but He wants to spread bigger and better news.  God is good!  God is powerful!  God is about to rescue you, the human race!  Wake up, people, and behold God's glory!

Lazarus’ story is a hint of Jesus’ power against death.  But Lazarus wasn’t immortal after that.  After however long, he had to die all over again.  The dying process probably wasn’t comfortable.  His sisters and friends probably missed him just as much the second time around.  His resurrection in John 11 was a temporary fix to a universal problem: Our bodies don’t last.  They’re like tents, as 1 Corinthians 15 says, that can’t hold our souls forever. 

The bigger and better news comes a few chapters later.  As Jesus is crucified, all those burdens we’ve carried from sin and death weigh heavy upon him.  The broken relationships.  The things left unsaid.  The fear and jealousy and selfishness and bitterness.  The sickness and warfare and heart-wrenching pain.  All the sources of his tears with Mary and Martha, he battles against their full force.  His last words were, “It is finished” – the battle was won. 

Two days later, we meet another Mary outside a different tomb – Jesus’ own.  She too is weeping... until she sees angels where Jesus’ body should be.  Just then, a gardener appears: Jesus in disguise.  This time, instead of joining in, He asks her, “Why are you crying?”  He knows well the ache in her heart, but it’s time to announce that those burdens have lost their ability to paralyze us.  They remain for us while we are on earth, and they may weigh on us for years and years, but they are only a shadow of their former selves. 

So now, we're living between Lazarus' first resurrection and our final one.  Relationships still break, but they can be mended, and our most important relationship is assured.  We've been given peace that can daily replace our fear, our jealousy, our selfishness, our bitterness.  Sickness and warfare still claim lives, but our goodbyes to those we love are only for a while, because in the span of eternity, the longest lifetime is soon over.  When we lament to God, Where are you?  Don't you care?  Aren't you powerful? we know the answers can be found at the cross.  And when we leave earth, God promises to wipe away every tear, because there's no room for death and mourning and crying and pain in our new, joy-filled lives with Him (Revelation 21).

Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting?
-1 Corinthians 15:55

Your tears are over, Yo Han.  Mine will be too when I see you soon.

Coopers in Cambodia

My parents came to visit in April, during Khmer New Year.  It was a long-awaited visit; finally their time off work, the frequent flyer miles, and my holiday all coincided.  For months before that, I was filtering everything I experienced through the lens of “What will my parents think about this?”  Things that had become normal sights for me suddenly struck me afresh.  And so when they came, I was eager for them to encounter my world – from everyday Phnom Penh to the ins and outs of Logos to the countryside where we visited.  They came equally eager to take it all in.  Their first impressions are some of my most lasting memories from their visit.

Our first full day together, we took the bus up to Siem Reap to see the Angkor Wat temple complex.  Why was I not surprised that while waiting for the bus to arrive, my dad made friends with a Dutch family standing near us and proceeded to chat with them for the next half-hour?  Nor was it a shock when he asked for a fried cricket at the first rest stop, pronouncing it "not too bad."  (It reminds me of a potato chip, as long as you don't look at it.)  My parents got a solid introduction to traditional Cambodian music and dance since music videos were played during the entire six-hour trip...there weren't enough DVDs to last the whole time, so they played a few twice.  They were not especially eager for more.  Khmer music has grown on me; there's some that I love, but on the whole I find that it's not my favorite either.

In Siem Reap, they fell in love with the night market, which amused me because they realized that vendor after vendor had the exact same wares, but they didn't realize that other markets had more variety.  It's baffling to a lot of foreigners how Cambodian stores or vendors tend to carry whatever their neighbors carry.  In Phnom Penh, there's a street where every shop sells wicker furniture, a street lined with toilets, a street for stuffed animals.  Every shop is nearly identical.  But this market was especially limited; it had almost nothing beyond T-shirts and jewelry.  My mom says she'd love to see vendors taught some marketing strategies and ways of distinguishing themselves from neighboring stalls, like selling banana desserts instead of plain bananas.  My parents thought of several potential niches for ministry.  I'm so not a visionary - I prefer to implement what others have thought of - but I love hearing new ideas.

Angkor Wat was of course great.  Not for nothing is it considered an ancient wonder of the world!  I enjoyed the lush greenery in between the temples, some of which are about a mile apart.  And it's mind-boggling to see what humans were able to accomplish with essentially no technology besdies the wheel.  Still, my dad and I got into a cool conversation with a Khmer-American Christian guy who's ministering in inner-city LA.  He says it's heartbreaking to him that ancient Cambodians endured this backbreaking labor for so many decades when it has no lasting purpose.  Modern-day Cambodians point to it as the nation's crowning achievement, but their country has not made significant progress since that time, instead being oppressed by neighbors or squandering its resources.  My dad agreed: as impressive as it is, it's built to honor long-dead kings and a religion (Hinduism) that Cambodia stopped practicing soon after its completion.  It doesn't seem to benefit Cambodia (besides the tourism it brings) in proportion to the massive sacrifices Cambodians made to build it.  

Angkor Wat was crowded with Khmer and Thai tourists, since both were on holiday while we were there.  There were even thousands of Thai people in red shirts who came especially to show their support for former Thai prime minister Thaksin, who received amnesty in Cambodia and became an adviser to the Cambodian government my first year (2009) after being ousted by his own government and charged with numerous shady dealings.  But the ones who made the biggest impressions on my mom were the monks.  There was a group of 30+ monks, among them many boys as young as 6 or 8, who passed us right as we were leaving.  My mom literally gasped aloud.  "I'm sorry," she said.  "I knew monks took in little kids, but it's so hard to see them in real life."  Many poor Khmer families send their young boys to monasteries because they receive a free education.  Some monks are very honorable; others are quite corrupt and mistreat or even abuse the children.

Back in Phnom Penh after the holiday, I was busy teaching, while my parents ran programs each morning for elementary students.  (My mom runs the children's programs at our church, so they've got experience.)  I wish I'd had time to go watch them, but I was at least around to help set up and hear stories after each session.  They did Walk through the Bible, an interactive presentation of the central storyline of the Bible, with older elementary, and ran Wednesday's chapel for lower elementary, which involved lots of silliness.  It was neat that they had their own experiences at Logos that didn't involve me.  When we were in the cafeteria during elementary lunch, kids I'd never noticed before were grinning and calling, "Mrs. Cooper!  Mr. Cooper!  Thank you for teaching us!"  The fourth-graders wrote some pretty spectacular thank-you notes afterwards.  My parents didn't really get to know any of my students, except Krumm and Veassna, who graduated last spring and are now interning at the guesthouse where my parents stayed.  However, they got to come to the middle/high school chapel led by my homeroom, the juniors.  That was cool for me that my parents could see my students in action, leading worship music, MC'ing a goofy game, and telling brief stories about how God has changed their lives. 

That weekend, we went to visit my friend Sovannary's brother, who has a banana plantation two hours outside Phnom Penh.  That involved a lot of firsts:
our first time picking mangoes using what looked like a lacrosse stick with an 12-foot-long handle...
their first visit to a traditional Cambodian wooden house on stilts...
their first conversation with a man wearing only a krama (large cotton scarf) around his waist...
their first interaction with people who spoke literally no English...
their first time showering out in the open.  (Men wear boxers; women wear a sarong, like a loose cotton dress.) 

Sovannary brought along her mother, her husband, and her two daughters; her brother lives with his wife and three kids, plus his in-laws; nearby nieces and nephews and neighbors galore clamored to catch a glimpse of the barangs (French/white people).  And since we rented a taxi van to get out there, the driver hung out with us too.  So there was always a crowd around us. 

One of my favorite moments was during dinner, when we found out that the guys had been banished to the ground level, beneath the house, so they could drink beer.  (Sovannary knew we were Christian and didn't know if we'd be offended by beer.)  My dad asked if he could go down and drink beer with the guys, so for the next 45 minutes, they hung out together, relying on Sovannary's husband's hesitant English and lots of laughter.  I also loved seeing my parents bond with Chrismoon and Elizabeth, Sovannary's daughters, ages 7 and 8.  They're really good at English and huge teases - especially Elizabeth, who's quite the ham.  But even Chrismoon warmed up to them.  Me, I preferred practicing Khmer with the nieces and nephews, ages 3 to 11, and the two grandmas, none of whom spoke English.  That night, my parents got one of the beds (no mattress - just a bed frame and some blankets) while I was assigned to a woven bamboo mat on the floor with the two grandmas.  Why both grandmas?  I don't know!  One of them lived there with her husband, and their double bed was inches away from the mat we three shared, which was a hair smaller than the bed.  Somehow I managed to sleep in those close quarters, probably because it was amazingly cool there compared to the city and had great ventilation - no windows, just openings in the walls.

Of course, all too soon, my parents had to head back.  I knew it would be too short for them to meet all the people and do all the things I'd hoped they could.  Still, they packed a lot into their 12 days here!  I'm really looking forward to talking more with them about Cambodia this summer.  It's so nice that they've seen my world here and can relate more than before.  And I think it'll take us a while to unpack all the experiences and impressions that accompanied their visit. 

The Jogger

The other day on my way home from work, a man caught my eye.  There were several reasons he stood out:
1. He was jogging.  That's not a particularly popular pastime here.  If you want exercise (which not everyone does), you could play badminton in front of your house or do aerobics in the park.  But no, he was jogging, and not halfheartedly either.
2. It was around 5 PM, while it was still hot.  It takes a special person to exercise while the sun is up, especially during April, the hottest month.  My rule is before 8 AM or after 6 PM, when the sun sets.
3. It was rush hour on a busy road.  It has no sidewalks, and people don't even really walk along it, let alone jog.  There's just not much room.
4. He had a prosthetic leg!

My first thought was "must be a land mine victim," because they are many in Cambodia, starting back in the Khmer Rouge era of the 1970's.  But you won't find them out jogging, nor are they wearing shorts that reveal the prosthesis.  I usually see them outside the Center for the Disabled or maybe selling souvenirs near a tourist site.  Even scars are looked down on here as marring a person's worth, and there are no anti-discrimination laws.  To my knowledge I've never seen an amputee employed by a Khmer business.  I'm guessing the majority of victims never make it to Phnom Penh, but stay at home in the provinces, where most of the still-unexploded land mines are.  Families tend to keep their imperfect members out of sight.

The next thing I noticed was his apparent wealth.  Jogging is definitely an activity for the middle- to upper-class, and his clothing looked pretty nice.  How did this land mine victim become wealthy enough to make jogging a habit?  How did he become strong enough to jog with ease?  How did he become confident enough to display his prosthetic leg with pride? 

Around me, I could see younger guys turning and staring at him.  And well they should!   You keep feasting your eyes, boys.  You take in the significance of this man.  You appreciate the statement he's making.  Go ahead and applaud, while you're at it.

I was getting pretty excited by now.  What a testament to perseverance!  What a symbol of the tenacity of survivors!  He reminds me of my older Khmer friends at school.  Thearey, who before age ten trudged through the jungle to safety in a Thai refugee camp and a new life in Minnesota.  Thavy, whose gentle, timid personality belies the courage to tackle snakes, heights, dire poverty, and floods up to her neck.  Chantorn, who lost her husband and all but one child, then learned English and became a "mom" figure to so many in Asian Hope.  The Khmer Rouge, the subsequent civil war, and other hardships left them, like Cambodia as a whole, battered and bruised but not beaten.

Amazed and inspired by him and his compatriots, I came home and told my roommates his story.

"Jogging on that road?  Isn't that pretty dangerous?"

And the thought crossed my mind - what if THAT'S how he lost his leg?

Malaysia

I've been feeling the need to escape Phnom Penh for a while.  I contemplated leaving the country at Christmas, but ended up staying in town.  While that offered me some much-needed rest, it meant that I've been in Cambodia, surrounded by Logos people, constantly since early last July.  (They recommend that we leave the country several times a year, and I'm starting to understand why.)  Cambodia was getting to me: the exhausting heat, the dangerous drivers (babies perched atop laps while they swerve around trucks), the gulf between rich and poor, the catcalls as I go by.  Every airplane that passed overhead made me dream of America.

That's why I was counting on my trip to Malaysia to boost my spirits, and it was every bit as great as I'd hoped.  I finally got to visit a good friend who studied at Penn State but has returned to her hometown near Kuala Lumpur.  At PSU, she told everyone to call her "Ku," but since that's part of her family's name, I switched on this trip to "Ezreen," her given name.  She and her family hosted me during our 5-day weekend for International Women's Day a few weeks ago.  The trip left me refreshed and ready to press on.

My first night there, floods rushed through houses on her street and inundated her grandma's house miles away, to the point that her refrigerator floated!  We stayed dry, thankfully.

 It was fascinating for me to see a Southeast Asian country that felt so different from Cambodia, though the flight to KL was less than 2 hours.  Thailand and even Vietnam are more developed than Cambodia, but there are still some similarities in transportation, food, landscape, etc.  Buddhism is predominant in all three, and their cultural heritages have influenced one another.  Malaysia, on the other hand, is a melting pot of Malays, Chinese, and Indians, with Islam, Zen Buddhism, and Hinduism all prevalent.  I saw next to no motos on the smooth modern highways, and the rolling hills were blanketed with lush trees.  Some of the architecture looked very European - I felt at times as though I were in Germany.  It even got considerably cooler in the evenings and mornings than Phnom Penh.  While her house had some typical SE Asian features like the "wet bathroom" (where the shower goes directly onto the floor), it also had cozy carpeted floors - something I hadn't seen since leaving the US.  That and the lack of tile on the walls made it much cozier and less echoey than most Cambodian homes.

Left to right: Syafia, Uncle, Auntie, Edhura

Ezreen's family was amazing!  They all spoke excellent English, except her 2-year-old niece Syafia, who is officially as cute as a button.  (We still became great friends, though...she shared her Barbie butterfly toy and I helped her put together puzzles of fruit.)  Her vivacious and goofy older sister Edhura, Syafia's mom, studied at a German university, so I even got to practice a bit of rusty German with her.  Nadhira, a soft-spoken younger sister, took some great photos when she came with us on a day trip.  Ezreen's boyfriend/fiance Faissal tirelessly chauffeured us all over Kuala Lumpur and Malacca ("Melaka" in Malay), mostly preferring to listen, but offering some great insights into my questions about Malaysian culture.  As for Ezreen's mom?  "Auntie's" full-time job was to tempt me with Malaysian culinary delights.  I think she gave me 5 different homemade foods my first afternoon - rice puffs, beef and vegetables, dried fruit, pasta - and then we went out to dinner.  I was never in danger of going hungry there!

Ezreen eating tasty satay - like barbecue with peanut sauce - at a local restaurant.

I knew Ezreen was fun and outgoing, but in KL I got to see more of her artsy side.  She's started a vintage clothing business with Faissal, and often sported her wares with funky belts and colorful shoes.  It's quite a switch from her previous plans: she majored in biotechnology.  We didn't have time for me to shop while I was in town, but I'm hoping to order a dress or two soon from her website.  Apparently most are from Japan, with a few from the UK.  They're so fun!

Ezreen (R) with her younger sister Nadhira, touring a Portuguese fortress in Melaka. 

It was my first time in a Muslim home, and it brought up a lot of questions for me.  Ezreen stayed at my house for a week one Christmas vacation, so we'd talked a bit before about daily life as a Christian or Muslim.  But there were lots of things I hadn't realized.  For example, I knew that females in her family would wear the hijab (head scarf) around non-related males, but her mom was conservative enough to wear it in the house around me, since I'm a non-Muslim female.  The call to prayer interrupts pop music five times a day on the radio, reminding them to complete each prayer within the next few hours.  When we were on our way home from Malacca (a 2-hour drive), they pulled over at a rest stop specifically to pray...there was a big prayer room for that purpose.  They told me Malacca was famous for its pineapple tarts, but since we could only find them from Chinese vendors and not from Muslims, they didn't want to eat any.  "We can't be sure it's halal - it could have been cooked in the same pan as pork."  In a non-Muslim country, they wouldn't be so picky, but since there were plenty of halal vendors selling other goodies, they didn't want to take the risk.

When we were walking around downtown KL, we saw an old Indian mosque famous for its architecture.  We wandered around it for a bit, and as we were leaving, the employee handed me a stack of pamphlets on Islam with a Quran translated in English.  One document showed a timeline of key figures in Islam (many of whom overlap with Judaism and Christianity, like Abraham).  I knew they considered Jesus a human prophet, but was surprised to see him called "the Messiah."  I started asking questions and found out that they believe Judas died on the cross in Jesus' place, while Jesus was taken to heaven, where he waits for the world to end so he can return and give true Muslims an extra boost toward salvation.  For Muslims, you can never be sure if you will go to heaven.  They say Allah is forgiving, but they're never sure which sins he will forgive and which will remain on your record.  Your only hope is to avoid sin, do good works, and pray that he'll be lenient. 

Us at the mosque - you're required to cover up before you can tour it.

I've been thinking a lot since then about how different Christianity is.  How preposterous it is that God would guarantee salvation to all who put their trust in him.  How unthinkable that He would enter our struggles, our suffering, our chaos, so that He could fully sympathize with our weaknesses.  How backward it is that He, the Holy One who cannot stand sin, would love us when we were drenched in it, would give Himself to purify us from it, would free us from it and its terrible consequences by conquering it.  Ezreen and her friends and family work so hard.  They're so devout and dedicated.  But they have no confidence that it will accomplish anything, because they understand that their sins make them unworthy of God.  It's really sad to me, since I am convinced that their good deeds are worthless, but that God's work has already been completed on their behalf.  I'm glad they asked me to explain how differently Christians see Jesus.  But I can see why it would be hard to believe from their perspective!  Hoping we get to continue the conversation next time we're together.

Countryside in the city

I've started biking to school this semester.  It's only a few miles from my house.  But before, I was always nervous about the sweat, the potholes, the danger of being the little guy cringing at every speeding Lexus and towering truck.  Logos is on the edge of Phnom Penh, and the road it's on connects to a highway out to the province.  So the route to school is busy, particularly at rush hour.  Bikes get shoved to the edge of the road, where it floods, where it's not quite paved, where motos that just turned left are driving on the wrong side straight toward you.  It didn't seem worth it when I already had a moto (AKA scooter).

Several friends had bikes, though, and said it wasn't as bad as it seemed.  I wanted the exercise and the freedom to travel alone when Sarah (housemate and moto co-owner) needed the moto to go elsewhere.  And I have no desire to augment Phnom Penh's pollution.  So I finally bought a bike over Christmas break, with the caveat that I'd still use the moto several days a week if biking took too much mental effort. 

Little did I know they were cementing the back roads!  These roads were barely passable several months back.  Their gigantic potholes every dozen yards, bricks and fist-sized stones jutting out left and right, and broken glass have now been transformed into a smooth, silent ride. 

Now, I can go 3/4 of the way on nearly deserted roads, with only a couple minutes of more chaotic traffic.  Rather than a stress factor, riding my bike to and from school has become a sanctuary of peace and beauty.  Traffic is rare, and almost none of it is cars.  So I can observe locals, soak in nature, and fantasize that I'm hours away from Phnom Penh.  Taking the moto isn't even tempting, at least for now while hot season holds off.  Here are some of the treats I look out for each day.

 

The little boy is in front of my house; the girl is across the street.  A bunch of kids live in the house across from me, and often play in the street or on the sidewalk.  One day, I arrived at my gate to find these two chatting away on their "phones."  How cute are they?

Bible camp or labor camp?

“On the first day, I really wanted to cry and go back home…”

We took the grade 11s and 12s to a new camp this year.  Our 9s and 10s returned to a leadership development/ropes course camp where Logos has gone for years.  But since we’ve outgrown their facilities, we branched out this year.  It seemed perfect: run by a UK organization, it’s eco-friendly, affordable for our budget, and lets students participate short-term in long-term community development projects.  We booked it and told students about its great reputation with school teams from all over the world. 

Students washed their hands with water from a traditional large basin (left).  All the buildings were either sod or thatch.

Our expectations were met, but our students’ were not.  It took a few days for the truth to come out that when they heard “UK” and “international,” they interpreted it as “luxurious,” which the old camp was not.  The rumors spread like wildfire before arriving: Brick buildings!  Fans!  Running water!  Instead, they were greeted with a compost toilet, painful red ants all over the cabins, no fans, and no trees for shade…the other camp's forest location made it cool.  They knew we’d be working every day, but they hoped for lots of free time in which to hang out, and many were unprepared for the tough manual labor Tuesday through Thursday.

 

 Local students, rapt as their school's shutters are repainted

On Tuesday, it was depressingly difficult to see progress.  My group sanded a school’s wall for three hours, using 3” by 2” squares of sandpaper already worn ragged.  After lunch, everyone moved dirt for a future community center at the Buddhist pagoda near camp.  Students couldn’t understand: as a Christian school, why were we streaming sweat and forming blisters on behalf of Buddhism?  We had some good talks about which would reveal Christ more powerfully: to proclaim our beliefs to the camp directors and abstain from helping, or to do the work cheerfully, knowing the center would benefit the whole community.  (To my knowledge, the village is 100% Buddhist.)  We developed an assembly line, all 50 of us working for two hours in heat and full sun to carry dirt about 1/3 mile from a mound to a giant hole that needed to be filled.  The hole seemed no smaller when we left.  

The next two days also involved plenty of hard work – mixing concrete, tilling soil for gardens, carrying water – and many had never experienced work of that intensity.  We were sweaty and smelly by 8:30 AM, and stayed that way until 4:30 or 5 after returning.  For middle- to upper-class Asian kids, academic excellence is essential, but chores are not: they’re left for moms or house helpers.  Some students didn’t know how to hold a broom until they got a work detention at Logos, let alone a hoe or a pickaxe.  But besides the physical labor, our students also have a deep aversion to sweat, dirt, and sun.  They’re a necessary evil for many Cambodians, but I don’t think any social class embraces them.   Food vendors trudge the streets all day, but they wear long sleeves and hats, and pause often in the shade.  Laborers prefer to be crammed into a truck bed with 40 others rather than to walk to their job site.  Showering is likewise a high priority for most.  So it wasn’t 100% “rich kid” prissiness, but they sure were awfully excited about showering every evening, even from a bucket. 

 This guy pulled out his "Little Bo Peep" hat while gardening - better than to risk tanning

“I really tried hard to see God’s work being done at the work site as the teachers told me, but I still struggled to find it…" My first real sign of hope came Tuesday evening, during devotions.  My small group and others were really open and thoughtful during our discussion.  Yes, our students were disappointed with the facilities and less than excited about the side effects of hard work.  But on the other hand, they were soaking up our theme that service reveals God to us in unique and transformative ways.  As we talked about the widow who bakes her last bit of bread for Elijah, the boy who shares his loaves and fish with the crowd, Abraham surrendering Isaac, and a Cambodian general who stayed in Khmer Rouge Cambodia to advance the Gospel, they saw more and more purpose to their seemingly fruitless tasks.  

 "Pajama mamas," glad to be clean again...I couldn't believe one girl packed both these pairs for our 4 nights there.

It also helped to see Cambodians working hard all around us.  Much of our work was at an elementary school, where the school provides breakfast.  Even the youngest ones had chores watering their vegetable gardens and washing dishes with water from the nearly dried-up pond.  We learned from them how to use a stick to lower a bucket 20 feet down to the water’s edge, then bring it up full.  One of our tasks was to expand the gardens so they don’t need to buy any vegetables, and it was gratifying to see the progress we’d made and imagine the kids harvesting them in a few months.  At the pagoda were several orphan kids, whom the monks have been raising.  Both they and the monks were busy with physical labor alongside us: moving dirt with us or wrestling a giant vat of pond water onto a truck for showering, cooking, and drinking.  In the province, and often in Phnom Penh, work happens the hard way and the old-fashioned way.  One student wrote, “As a Cambodian…I was able to reflect on how this is actually what my family used to grow up in.  The more my friends complained about it, the more I was thankful.  I was able to experience some of the hard work that the local people had to do.”  

Making coconut milk by hand for yummy banana dessert

Maybe that’s why many Cambodian parents – even rich non-Christian families- seemed to appreciate the purpose more than many Korean families, even missionaries.  One girl, who in 9^th grade was forbidden to attend the other camp because her parents were so protective, said her family was glad to hear about the work she did this year.  (Even if they also were horrified that she’d gotten one tiny pimple.)  On the other hand, Korean parents responded, “You look like an Indian!”  “Sounds like the military.”  “Maybe next year you can break your leg right before.”  I’m hoping others affirmed their children’s work more, but I didn’t hear of any that did.  It makes me more grateful for all the students who, despite their culture’s disdain, embraced the hard work as they saw God’s presence saturate it.

Here’s some feedback from students: 

“On the first day, I really wanted to cry and go back home.  However, [on Wednesday] I realized nobody wanted to work, but they did not complain.  From then on, I tried to work eagerly.  I started to like working really hard.” 

“The work led to good conversations and it made me really question why I was doing this and what my heart was behind this.  It wasn’t only for school or because we were getting to benefit from it, or even to get a ‘thanks.’  This week was all for God’s glory.  God used my hands to serve him this week.”  

“God doesn’t always put you in places you want or like to serve.  It is actually up to God…Just because you are in a bad place doesn’t mean that we should be all grumpy and complaining about it.  If you change your perspective on things, everything won’t turn out that negative.” 

“Camp made me think about those people who dig dirt for a living, and how easy my life is.  I have things easy, but yet I still complained.  I should try to be more considerate and grateful for what I have.” 

"I would like someone to appreciate my work and honor/respect me for doing that.  But as we could see in the Bible, there was no verse or chapter that said anything about rewarding the kid [who shared his fish and bread].  I thought he could be one of the heroes that day with Jesus for providing his food for all those people, but he didn’t do that.  He just stayed quiet and let Jesus get the fame and honor.  This boy really inspired me.” 

“I can’t just shovel dirt for a week and that takes care of all my service.  Service needs to be a lifestyle.  Wherever I go as a Christian I want to leave and people say, “She was a servant.”  Camp was good because it really pushed my focus outward while still making me think about all the parts of me that God is working on.”

How to slow time

Last spring, my friend Sheryl mentioned a book, One Thousand Gifts, and its challenge to write down a thousand specific things you’re thankful for.  I took up the challenge without even seeing the book, and since then, my roommates Megan and Angela have read it and extended the challenge to their homerooms.  I love adding to my list – someone described it as a perpetual treasure hunt for God’s blessings.  Yesterday, having listed 535 items and counting, I finally opened the book.  Its author, Ann Voskamp, poetically chronicles her journey from loss and fear to gratitude, weaving in the Bible and Christian classics.  The chapter on time particularly challenged me; I'm certainly what she calls an "amateur."  Read on for excerpts:

“They say time is money, but that’s not true.  Time is life.  And if I want the fullest life, I need to find fullest time.  I wipe a water spot off the tap; there is a reflection of me.  Oh yes, I know you, the busyness of your life leaving little room for the source of your life.  I’m the face grieving.

God gives us time.  And who has time for God?

Which makes no sense.

In Christ, don’t we have everlasting existence?  Don’t Christians have all the time in eternity, life everlasting?  If Christians run out of time – wouldn’t we lose our very own existence?  If anyone should have time, isn’t it the Christ-followers?

[I think back to an interview with an elderly pastor.]   What was the pastor’s most profound regret in life?  I hear the answer of the pastor ring. 

'Being in a hurry.  Getting to the next thing without fully entering the thing in front of me.  I cannot think of a single advantage I’ve ever gained from being in a hurry.  But a thousand broken and missed things, tens of thousands, lie in the wake of all the rushing...Through all that haste I thought I was making up time.  It turns out I was throwing it away."

In our rushing, bulls in china shops, we break our own lives.

Haste makes waste.

And I hear this too, words of another woman seeking: 'On every level of life, from housework to heights of prayer, in all judgment and efforts to get things done, hurry and impatience are sure marks of the amateur.' [Evelyn Underhill]

I scrub the bowl hard, try to scrape away the regret of a life lived amateur.

Because that is the way I have lived.  The time, always the time, I’m an amateur trying to beat time.  In a world addicted to speed, I blur the moments into one unholy smear.  I have done it.  I do it still.

I speak it to God: I don’t really want more time; I just want enough time.  Time to breathe deep and time to see real and time to laugh long, time to give You glory and rest deep and sing joy and just enough time in a day not to feel hounded, pressed, driven, or wild to get it all done – yesterday.

I just want time to do my one life well.

A soap bubble, skin of light and water and space suspended in sphere.  Who has time for that?

Hadn’t I?  Only because I was looking.  Because that list of one thousand gifts has me always on the hunt for one more...and one more – to behold one more moment pregnant with wonder.

The wonder right in the middle of the sink.  Looking for it like this.  I lay the palm under water and I raise my hand with the membrane of a life span of moments.  In the light, the sheerness of bubble shimmers.  Bands of garnet, cobalt, flowing luminous. 

362. Suds...all color in sun.

That’s my answer to time.

Time is a relentless river.  It rages on, a respecter of no one.  And this, this is the only way to slow time.  When I fully enter time’s swift current, enter into the current moment with the weight of all my attention, I slow the torrent with the weight of me all here.  I only live the fullest life when I live fully in the moment.  And when I’m always looking for the next glimpse of glory, I slow and enter.  And time slows.

But there’s more.   I awake to I AM here.  When I’m present, I meet I AM, the very presence of a present God.  In his embrace, time loses all sense of speed and stress and space and stands so still and holy. 

Here is the only place I can love him."

-Ann Voskamp, One Thousand Gifts