this is for me

bela7 must write, and it doesn't have to make sense or have a purpose. it's just my stream of consciousness...or multiple streams consolidating into a tidal wave (okay maybe a just a splash) of thoughts that must be written, that's all.


Stream:
I'm reading Galations this week, and considering I've been reading the bible for 23 years, it's nothing new. But! considering scripture is ALIVE and kicking, I'm always pleasantly surprised to be hit by a piece of sharpnel. And so it goes: I'm just reading along, actually I was reminiscing a bit back to a year ago when I was in Mexico reading Murray and Spurgeon and devouring Paul's letter to the churches of Galatia with near obsession. I've been crucified...I AM cruficied...I don't live, Christ lives in me...it's not me, it's Him now....my flesh is DEAD....dead....crucified. There I was, on the beach in Boca del Rio, my spirit roared and thrashed about with this scripture, a stampede against the enemy, an army of kilt donning warriors boasting in the name of Jesus "FREEEEDOMMMM..."

ya so this is a familiar passage, blah blah blah, but reading it this morning...well this is exactly how it appeared in my mind's eye:

"If, while we seek to be justified in Christ, it becomes evident that we ourselves are sinners, does that mean that Christ promotes sin? Absolutely not! If I rebuild what I destroyed, I prove that I am a lawbreaker. For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God. I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!"

This is so random, but I just don't want to forget in an hour. Paul never met Jesus in the flesh, but he received a direct revelation...and he knew one thing: Jesus loved him. He just said Jesus loved him. How have I ever Not "read" that before? Paul really knew God's love, he just said it right there. Right there in Galations. Paul says "the Son of God loved ME and gave himself for ME." I have this picture of Paul the preacher, and preachers are always saying God loves YOU, gave himself for YOU. but Jesus loved Paul. Paul lived for that, for Him who loved him. oh man oh man!!!


Stream:
Aaaaaah I'm so sad. Rip the bandaid off already, all this slowly peeling off the tape and pinching each hair one by one HURTS! Leaving...I'm leaving...again. My sister. My life in Egypt is so far from here. am I making myself a stranger? I mean, I'm choosing a life there instead of here. Selling my car, student loans, two years of school. secret: I wish He would intervene with thunder and lightening....BAM!

speak now or....later....you know, whenever.


Stream:
"Sometimes the beauty of the world is so overwhelming, I just want to throw back my head and gargle. Just gargle and gargle, and I don't care who hears me, because I am beautiful." (if you can't guess who said this....um....let it go.)


Stream:

three minutes and fifty-nine seconds of Starlight

*smile*


Stream:
All we girls have to worry about is submitting to God. Ha! Take that!
i nefariously suck at submitting...to any and all authority.

(bela7 sits down)

Final answer

I'm going back to Egypt.



To be continued....

I'm so proud *tear*

Robyn has unveiled the inside of her brain in an oil painting...and she dedicated her art to ME!! I feel like the proud godparent of a small child...is that overreacting? nah.

I don't really have words to do justice to this piece, other than to say I've been inside her head, and this really is what it looks like. (She's been in mine too...they are quite similar.)

I desperately miss my honey.

echoes of my sojourning

"In the wisdom of the Acholi
Time is not stupidly split up
Into seconds and minutes
It does not flow
Like beer in a pot
That is sucked
Until it is finished."

Song of Lawino, an epic poem written by my friend's grandfather, Okot p'Bitek


I wonder, is this particular attitude something I can continue to value now that I'm back home? It's so contradictory with this culture...

Dearest Uganda,

I want to remember.


Uganda...I set you aside, didn't even take notice of you as I ate in your home and slept in your bed. How did I become so far removed...


But I see you. You're weeping, bleeding, wounded by false doctrine, by civil war, by disease and malnutrition. I see your children. They know no home, no future, no maternal love. I'm so sorry. I've neglected you, brushed off your cries for prayer. I've made a joke of my promises.


And through it all, you still call me friend...sister.



Joshua, Harriet, you are my family.


Praise, Blessed, Shammah and little Nissi, you are my little sisters and brothers.

I miss you dearly. I wish I had been present in both body and spirit during my last visit.

I thought living in Egypt would bring me closer to you, to my burden for you, but it nearly erased you from my radar. Maybe it's God's love for you that is taking me away from Egypt, back to a place where I can continue in the work He's given me on your behalf, a place where He can use me to bless your family and ministry. Afterall, He loved me enough to give me your precious friendship...

Uganda...I want to remember...always.

Here's a thought.

Rationalized decision making is futile without the peace of God. Forget the list. I'll wait on the Lord.

Cairo or Carpas

I'm going to make a list. It's called: "Cairo or Carpas?"

(Disclaimer: I know I can be honest cause it's MY blog, MINE!! but for personal boundries/tact-type purposes, several of the list items will be stated in "code". Please leave a comment for clarification on certain "coded" words and phrases, or if you have a witty guess. I make no blanket promise to enlighten you, though.

Also, I welcome any additional items for the list, it's a work in progress.)

Cairo:

good: super sweet Master's Degree in International Human Rights Law, working with african refugees, "dahab", my own life that i really like, cheap excitement, fuul and falafal, stella, learning arabic

bad: minimal and muted fellowship, sexual harrassment, "certain one from mars", major debt, long distance relationships, "need for resolve"

ugly: "tea", "moon worship", "war", "no honey at all whatsoever", "deafness"

Carpas:

good: REALITY!!!!, being close to my sister, shoulders and knees, running!!!!, making money, saving money, new macbook (w/out debt), endless movie nights, monday night prayer, singing in public

bad: ew job, normalnessness, "questioning the calling", "hometown haze", missing my friends like crazy aaaaaahhhhh, waiting, "proximity to mom", apathy

ugly (or potentially redeemable and therefore maybe crazy cool awesome, depending): "consumption", "circles", "greener grass", "ghosts"

oh man....I'm more confused than before.

Tricks are for kids

So this is what happens in the middle of late night study sessions. Alex bets my cousin Tony a 100 Egyptian pounds (like $15) that he can't swallow a small cup of cinnamon without drinking water. Tony enthusiastically takes on this bet, his hubris leading to a hilarious diversion from a rather monotonous evening (I'm the only one present who's not in school, and it's no fun watching med students memorize doctor stuff!)

Everyone should do this to someone they know.



If you missed the projectile vomit...watch it again. ;-)

Flashback: Easter in Jerusalem '07

Kjeare made an awesome video from Reality's trip to Israel last year, and since I was just there a few months ago during Easter, I thought I'd show the singing I heard at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Beautiful.




But don't miss my little story below!
;-) Bela7

on why I identify with dates

After living in Egypt for a while, one realizes that it's more than possible to go do things on the weekend that average people only dream about, like ride horses at the pyramids, relax on a felucca on the nile, bask in the sun on the red sea, explore the library in Alexandria, and, well, climb Mt. Sinai. My friend Robyn and I have done all these things (and more), but our first adventure was a trip to sinai. One early morning, we hopped on a bus for a gazillion hour ride to st. katherine, the little town at the base of the mountain. For sustainance, we brought with us some bread, honey, and dried dates. I had no idea the implications of this decision at the time, but soon discovered that dates are the most delectible, sweet, satisfying snack known to man. mmmm my mouth is watering...

Anyways, when we arrived, the manager of a local bedouin camp invited us, along with some other travelers, to stay at his camp for a couple hours while we waited for a decent time to start climbing. If you want to see the sunrise, it's best to start the trek around 2 in the morning. Shocked and suffering because of the FREEEEEEEZING desert night air (deserts get cold...who knew?), we didn't even hesitate. Hot tea, blankets, a room to rest up...excellent. But this guy was weird. He really wanted to be our friend, made it seem like everything he did for us was a special favor, even though we were paying customers. He kept calling Robyn his "honey." Without getting into it too much, it got awkward, and we wanted to be alone, and we were really insanely out of control cold, so we locked ourselves in our room to wait out the few hours...

I don't know how to emphasize how annoying it was for Hamdi (the manager of the camp) to keep calling Robyn "my honey." She kept saying "Hamdi I'm not your honey" and I kept saying she's married (she's not). It wasn't like he was really hitting on her...but, it's Egypt, where the first question out of any taxi driver's mouth is "married?" But that's a whoooooole other story.

While hiding under the blankets, we intermittently ate the dates that were left from the bus ride. It was rediculous. We weren't hungry. The dates had taken over...in fact, we were so full and cold we couldn't bring ourselves to take the blankets off and leave the room to climb Sinai for sunrise...we passed out shivering, in a date-induced coma.

The next morning, we climbed Mt. Sinai, and it was so perfect! We were practically the only ones climbing, and it was bright and sunny and beautiful, and no one was at the top...such a great day. I'll never forget it.

We went back to the camp to get our stuff, and we looked at this box of dates...there were few remaining. We wanted to eat them, but there was like a supernatural force field keeping our hands from putting another date in our mouths...we couldn't eat even one more. And there was Hamdi, with his "my honey's"...we were ready to go home.

Somewhere in the middle of all of this, I started calling Robyn my honey too...obsessively. I even changed her name on my cell phone to "my honey"...and somewhere in there she started responding to "my honey" with "my dates"...and somewhere in there too we figured out the arabic word for dates: bela7. So from that moment on, i was bela7. When taxi drivers wanted to know my name, instead of saying rebekah which get's butchered beyond belief by native arabic speakers (wabaka...reminiscent of chubaka), I would respond with, Bela7. Usually the guy is so confused by a white girl with an arabic word for a name, and a common fruit no less, that he shuts up! It's magical.

To this day, I can't really eat dates, but I think of them fondly.

i'm on AIM now people, against my better judgement:

iambela7

by the way, bela7 sounds like belahh and it means "dates" (like the fruit) in Arabic. It's an alias, and a good story (in my opinion), so holla if your curious....

In a real dark night of the soul, it is always three o'clock in the morning, day after day.

F. Scott Fitzgerald

i miss bethany

My sister is going to China...she just walked out the door. I know I know I know, I've been living in all these far away places for the majority of my adult life, but my baby sister is going to China! For a month! What am I going to do without her? Lil thing just learned how to drive, and now she's going to China. To bless people. I'm so proud of her it's rediculous. Anyone who knows her can testify that she is the most awesomest 16 year old on the planet. period. I feel such a relief for my parents after the hellish teenager I was, and semi-tumultuous young adult I am today...I don't think my mom could have lived through another one of me haha.


In other news, one of my professors/"buddies" from college emailed me today to see how I was doing with grad school. I confessed to him that I was apprehensive about selling my soul to student loans, and he responded with characteristicly compendious advice, which I would like to quote because he says it best: "Don't be afraid of debt. EVERYBODY is in debt. Sure it's a plunge, but if you really want this, don't let debt hold you back."

Then he concludes something so simple, so revealing, sooooo....ME: "Besides, you seemed destined for the unconventional path." Aint that the truth. I have never followed suit with the world, and I never will, really, to the intsy-bitsy-ist dismay of my mom, who gets cryptic messages from far off lands asking to pray: "mom, I'm on a ferry to Jordan, please pray". Poor thing, she's such a prayer warrior but I know it's hard to have a daughter who, well, tends to prefer living in remote third world countries to Carp. I LOVE Carp btw...wow I love it. I'm so glad it's home.


I miss Bethany. Here's her blog. http://bethelovehere.blogspot.com/

i have nothing to say

Probably the earliest flyswatters were nothing more than some sort of striking surface attached to the end of a long stick.– Jack Handey

When I have nothing, Jack always comes through with a deep thought.

beware the rant

This is such a rollercoaster (I just went to magic mountain this week so I know what I'm talking about). This morning, I thought the storm had relented, the rain had faded to a trickle, the sun had broke through the clouds, and I was on my way...now it's the end of the day, and I'm drowning in torrential thunderstorms. I don't know what to do with myself, I can't open my bible or my mouth to pray, I give up so quickly!! I can't believe it's gotten this easy to get used to starting over, because that's what the last few weeks have been like, each day I tell myself His mercies are new every morning, and every night ends in wallowing. I thought today was different, I thought I had broken through the attack of the enemy. Turns out I'm a POW in this battle, subject to the whims of my captor. Where's the victory? How can I be stuck in these thought patterns of the past? Why can't I get through ONE day of fasting??? BAHHHHHH... Try again, tomorrow? After weeks of failure? I don't have it in me...

coming home is deleterious

So I totally didn't anticipate getting knocked on my back by this short summer back in the states, but I have slowly fallen lower and lower since coming home so that now i'm completely prostrate...someone would love to point out I'm sure that all you have to do when you're on your back is flip over to be on your face before God. Anyways, it's a familiar tune...one grows up, moves out, and comes home briefly only to regress back to infancy apon entering the family residence. I'm even slightly tempted to slam the door of my room on occasion in obstinence. It's so counter-evolutionary, and it's soffocating...

Actually what it really feels like is a fog, like I've lost all clarity since coming back. To the point where I'm stagnant. That's a bad place for me, a very bad place. I need to be moving, usually toward something, but moving in an unspecified direction with the sole purpose of moving in an unspecified direction even is a good place. Sitting here, abulic, and tormented by doubt, is not. When I began to question my return to Egypt, I lost all of my resolve to fight the good fight this summer. But I awoke this morning to...i don't know...almost an andrenaline feeling, like this is what I'm doing, I know what it takes to get there, so let's MOVE. I kinda feel this urge to run or clean my room or something...maybe the fog is clearing.

Around 6 weeks till I leave. That's about as long as I was in Uganda earlier this year, and God did so much awesome stuff during that period. If I look at it like that, and move toward the 21st of August with purpose, I just might get through this summer. Who knows, I'm taking it hour by hour at this point. 30 days begins today though, more about that when I am more confident that I'll follow through...

Ambivalence

Ambivalence:

1.
uncertainty or fluctuation, esp. when caused by inability to make a choice or by a simultaneous desire to say or do two opposite or conflicting things.
2.
Psychology. the coexistence within an individual of positive and negative feelings toward the same person, object, or action, simultaneously drawing him or her in opposite directions.

This is a state of mind that has often characterized my life, and now is no exception. This time is unique, though, in the sense that I am aware of untapped power to be decisive, instead of feeling helpless to walk without compromise. I feel like I'm turning my head left and right back and forth looking at my life in Egypt and the life in Carp I left behind, muddling the absolutes I associate with each place...it makes my head spin. In the blurred images I've started to see the outline of a very familiar story, something about slavery and a promised land...but I don't know which course of existence is "egypt" and which one is the "promised land". I really like living in Cairo, I mean I really like it. For me, that's saying something, something that in all of my sojourning I haven't been able to say honestly...until now.

At the same time, my life in Egypt has been characterized by compromise (on the convictions I have, based exclusively on the word of God), and I wonder to what extent, in my disobedience, I'm squandering the wealth of His will and His blessing. I don't think it's a question of "does God want me to go back to Egypt?"; "does he want me to go to grad school in cairo?"; or "does he want me to stay in carp?" I think it's more of a question of adhering to His word as a foundation for all courses of action. In some ways, it would be a lot easier to resist certain temptations or associations by staying in carp, especially being rooted in the body at Reality, but I wrestle with stuff here too, things that may appear innocuous to the world, believers included. Simply put, it's hard (for me) to be a Godly young woman among my friends in Cairo , but it's equally as hard to love my God with faithfulness while living in Carp. It's like, you can have all this wickedness, or you can have ONE burdensome affair that keeps you from His fullness...either way sucks. It's not about where, it's about a relationship.

So where does this all leave me? Ambivalent. Should I stay or should I go? Grad school, International Human Rights Law, in Cairo. Egypt, without the grad school, indefinitely. Carp, Reality, my family, the dreaded american life, but friends that love Jesus with their whole lives. I don't have friends in Egypt that love Him like that, maybe because I didn't look for them, or I wasn't one myself.

I kinda want to put my foot down. 30 days. seek the Lord. pray for my sister. abstain. purify. I just hope there's enough grace to cover it all and sustain my resolve.