Habits

I have a hole in my right shoe.  It is right in the arch between the ball of my foot and my heel.  As a matter of fact, I have a hole in the exact same spot in most of my shoes.  It's not because I walk funny, although I do have this mix of western and Asian strolling going on nowadays.  I have a hole there because of the way that I ride motorcycles.

I got my first dirt bike when I was 10 years old.  It was a 1978 Honda XR 75.  It was a few years old when I got it, but it shined that first day.  I learned how to ride in cow pastures, on dirt roads, and the lake bottoms.  I graduated to a XR 200 when I was 14 (that's when I started breaking bones, too many to count).  Then to a KDX 200 my senior year of high school.  Since then I have had a variety of mopeds, dirt bikes, and street bikes in the United States and Asia.  I love to ride.  It is my primary source of transportation in Cambodia.  In our first five years of living here, I put 20,000 miles on a dirt bike.  That's a lot of miles riding primarily on semi-paved roads, dirt roads, and, on occasion, through rice paddies.

Because I have ridden for so long, I have ingrained habits.  Because I used to race a little and ride the lake bottoms a lot, I sit a certain way on a motorcycle.  I hold the clutch with two fingers, always.  When things are getting a little hairy, I slide up on the seat, never worry about the back wheel, just focus on the front, I pull my elbows up, and play the throttle according to the situation.  I rarely use my back brake, except to slow for certain kinds of corners.  So, I always put my right foot on the edge of the peg and it wears a hole in my shoe.

My riding style is a habit.  When things get really sticky, I have 32 years worth of habit to lean on to get me out of it.  My other habits, ones far more important, are prayer and Bible reading.  So, when life gets a little sticky, I have something that automatically kicks in and I can lean on and trust to get me out of the situation.

One Woman's Faith

I stood uneasily as the wooden floor beneath me creaked.  It was hot and sweat was dripping off of everyone in the room.  I looked around the room at this ragtag bunch of misfits.  Here we stood, the banana farmer,  the village mid-wife, the cook, the pastor, the single mother, and the missionary.  I looked at the woman lying on the bed and knew that unless God did a miracle, that she would be dead soon.  We stood, worshipped the One who knew her suffering more than anyone, laid hands on her, prayed for healing, cried, whispered words of love and encouragement from the scriptures to her, and left the room quietly to let her rest.  She was a young believer in Jesus, a mother, a nurse, and a survivor.  She had lived through the Khmer Rouge, she had survived the rebuilding of the nation.  But here she lay dying of cervical cancer.  Her husband had left her and her children years ago to take another wife. 

She represented to me the young Khmer Church.  The struggles that she faced I see daily in the Church in Cambodia.  She had given her heart to the Lord several years ago while a group of people met with a missionary weekly for one year.  After the missionary was unable to meet with the group anymore, her faith waivered and she returned to her former ways.  She was going to the pagoda again.  Offering sacrifices to the spirits.  Her life was filled with the terrible knowledge of knowing the truth and yet, rejecting it for a lie (Rom. 1:22-23).  She was trying desperately to make sense of life, to survive, and to take care of her children and now her grandchildren. 

When Vutha moved to Kampot, the group contacted him and asked if he could start meeting with the  few who remained.  For two years he has been meeting with the small “water fall” cell group.  The group remains small, but it is growing in the knowledge of Christ (Eph.  1:17).  After the group was meeting again and being strengthened, the lady asked if she could return to join them.  She was embarrassed that she had been so easily pulled away from pursuing the Lord and felt that she had failed when there was no one around to encourage her in her walk.  The group eagerly embraced her, loved on her, and rejoiced at her return.  She was still weak in her faith, like all of us, but she was growing.  She had been back for almost a year.

Five days after I stood with the brothers and sisters at the foot of the bed, our sister went to be with the Lord.  When I got the phone call, I cried.  It was a blow to all of us.  I did not cry because she was dead, I knew she was now with the Lord.  I cried for her family.  She was the only Christian in her family.  Her children demanded a traditional Buddhist funeral and refused to let Vutha speak or share the gospel.  They feared that it might bring bad luck to the family if Christians were involved in the service. 

Vutha visited the family after the funeral and shared the Hope that their mother and grandmother had.  He, once again, shared the gospel with the family as he has many times in the past.  I am thankful that to have known this woman.  Her struggle was our struggle, her strength was our strength, and her Lord is our Lord.  I am so thankful that we do not have to mourn her death as others do.  Though her body sleeps; she lives with her Savior!  Pray for the family to know her Savior and for the young believers here to be strengthened.

“But I do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who have fallen asleep,  lest you sorrow as other who have no hope.  For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who sleep in Jesus.”  1 Thess. 4:13-14

God of the Hopeless

I pulled out of my gate at 6:30 this morning and saw him ambling down the street a quarter kilometer away.  It is impossible to miss his silhouette.  Head down, shoulders slumped, and unshaven; he walks on as he does every day.   His feet shuffle down the dirt road with the familiar pat, pat, pat of flip flops hitting the dirt and rocks.  As I pass him, he refuses to look up, to make eye contact, or to acknowledge my presence in any way.  His clothes are familiar; I have only seen him in two, possibly three different shirts.  Today it is the dirty, green stripped button up with the small hole in the shoulder.

His look is the same that I see all over the city as I go about my day.  It is the look of a man who is hopeless. 

He and I are alike in so many ways.  We both have two sons that we dream will grow and become men with a future.  We both have a wife that we want to provide for, to take care of, and want to shower with love and affection.  Our wives are both spiritual people. 

We also are very different.  He has not job or source of income.  He gets up daily with no plan other than to hope that someone will ask him to help them and that he can get enough money to buy food for the day.  I get up with a full day and more than I can accomplish on my plate.  His sons are undersized for their age.  Mine are normal and non-descript by most standards.  His wife is a soothsayer. She is paid to summon dead ancestors, to predict the future, and to cast spells on people.  My wife is a Godly woman who people seek out for guidance, affirmation, and prayer. 

The most obvious difference in our lives is that his wife is HIV positive.  Without a miracle, she will be dead in a few years from a disease that has the potential to more damage to Cambodia that Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge ever did.  She knows she is dead, the children know that she is dying, and her husband knows all too well that the situation is hopeless.

I pray for him often.  I ache when I see his face.  I see one man among thousands enduring the same fate in this nation.  God sees every one of them.  His Son is Hope; the only Hope that my neighbor has.  I pray that his hopelessness will turn to hope in the resurrected Christ.    

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,”   1 Peter 1:3