Faith. By Definition

Words are strange things. Basically they are shortened or condensed versions of what we are trying to say. Think about it. A single word has a meaning (or even multiple meanings) that requires many more words just to explain. Try to imagine what it would be like for us to talk in definitions. Instead of saying "I feel happy today" it would be "I perceive myself to be in a state of mind characterized by or indicative of pleasure." It reminds me of the way Eugene Melsner from the Adventures in Odessey radio show talked. When I am sitting in church here in Botswana and listening to a translator take an English phrase and turn it into understandable Setswana it sometimes seems like they are having to define the English words rather than give a direct word-for-word translation because they use so many words in place of a very few English words, or vice versa. 

I was thinking about words and definitions today as I read Hebrews 11:1, which is basically giving a definition of the word faith. The verse says, "Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see." That right there is a definition of what faith is. And yet, when I read it I am not satisfied. All of my questions about faith are not answered by that. So a word needs a definition and then a definition needs an explanation and the explanation may change depending on the application. See, I told you words were strange things. 

If we keep pressing on into Hebrews 11 after the definition of faith there are many examples of it and how it was applied in the lives of certain Biblical characters. Here is a non-exhaustive list by verse:

2. By faith men gained approval

3. By faith we understand

4. By faith Abel offered a sacrifice

5. By faith Enoch did not see death

7. By faith Noah prepared an ark

8. By faith Abraham obeyed God's calling

11. By faith Sarah received the ability to conceive

17. By faith Abraham offered up Isaac 

29. By faith the Israelites passed through the Red Sea

30. By faith the walls of Jericho fell

So in all of these instances people had confidence in what they hoped for, whether they were hoping for a child or deliverance or victory, and assurance about what they did not see, whether they didn't see how the world could flood or a sea could part or an old womb could be opened. Sounds simple enough. I think the problem comes with the definitions of confidence and assurance. Confidence means "full trust" and assurance means "full confidence" or "full full trust" if you will. That is a lot of trust. It leaves NO room for doubt. Zero. Zilch. Nada. And that, my friend, is not so simple - as least not for me. 

But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. (James 1:6 ESV)

Desolate

The word desolate has a few different meanings. It can mean barren, solitary, forlorn, dismal, or deserted. To me, this picture of a salt pan in Botswana looks desolate. There is nothing but hard packed dirt for as far as the eye can see in places like this. 

Sometimes my spirit feels desolate. If a heart surgeon were to open me up at times like that he might not find anything but hard packed dirt inside (or maybe not). But seriously, there are moments and places in our lives where we feel solitary, dismal, or deserted. Perhaps it's because of how someone we love has treated us. Perhaps it's because of circumstances that always seem to be going against us and beating us down. Perhaps it is even because we are not allowing the Holy Spirit to well up inside of us with a spring of living water like He promised. The only chance a desert has of getting any greenery to sprout up or plants to take root is if it gets sufficient water. Likewise, it is the living water of Jesus which is our only hope for growth and life. 

So whenever I see a desert I think "Wow, this place could use some water." Then when I see a person with a parched soul I think "Wow, this person needs Jesus to give them new life." But let's not fool ourselves. I can become a parched soul too if I quench the Spirit as 1 Thessalonians 5:19 talks about. An occasional rain in the desert does no real good. It takes good steady rains that come consistently for a long time to bring about any change to desolate salt pans. I also need consistent time in God's Word and in prayer with Him to be the fruitful follower that He wants me to be. 

Instead of living in desolation, I choose to dwell in the land of milk and honey - the only oasis in this dry and dying world. 

2,160 Hours Later...

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; (Ecclesiastes 3:1, 6 ESV)

The time for casting away the distraction of the Internet has ended for me, and the time for keeping in touch with the world again has returned. As of the 1st of April my 90 day hiatus from the World Wide Web (and I have discovered that it is world wide just like it claims) has come to an end. I am grateful for the time it allowed me to have for focusing on the Lord, getting settled in my new home, and starting to connect with the people God has surrounded me with here in Botswana. It was a blessed time that was beneficial in more ways than one. 

Not surprisingly, 3 months of being away from the world in a sense was not a cure-all that caused all of the problems and trials of life to go away, but that was not what I expected anyway. A recurring theme in my Biblical lessons learned recently has been about trials. Paul talked about them a good deal in his letters to the New Testament churches, and I have learned, or at least been reminded again, of the value that hardships can have our spiritual lives and the very fact that they are to expected as we follow The Lord and walk in His way. Trials and difficulties come up on a daily basis here at work, but as my supervisor likes to say, they are just opportunities to grow in grace. And there lies the key to it all. We must learn and grow in the midst of hard times instead of allowing them to make us hard, cynical, or bitter. The notion that hard=bad is neither accurate nor Biblical and yet it has been something that I have had to change in my way of thinking. It seems like an easy life makes a soft Christian, and a soft Christian makes only a tiny impact for Christ if any at all. That is not what I want. And so The Lord continues to work in my life day after day in both the hard times and the good times. 

The main changes that have taken place for me in the year 2014 are that I moved permanently up to the town of Maun, successfully went through a month of initial operating experience in the Cessna 206, and am now busy flying in and around the Okavango Delta region of northern Botswana. On the Sundays when I am free I attend services at the local Baptist church (which is quite an experience in itself) and I have been plugged into a small group Bible study that occurs most every weekend as well. In addition to the other Flying Mission personnel that I work with each day I have had opportunities to develop relationships with safari camp staff and a few local people that I come in contact with regularly. The flying is great, but it is the people that matter the most. 

Every day is a new adventure full of new opportunities, and not just because I am in Africa. God gives us all life that we may have it more abundantly. My life is abundant, and I am very thankful.

The End of an Age

The past decade or two has been called a number of different names – the information age, the digital age, the computer age – and has been a time of immense growth in computer technology and the internet, among other things. With the new technology many new opportunities, moral and ethical questions, scientific and medical possibilities, temptations, and much more have entered the everyday lives of the modern populace. Do the benefits of technology outweigh the negative influences it has exerted on culture and common life? That’s a debate that I don’t care to have. However, I am planning to do a sort of experiment on the subject.

On January 1^st of 2014 I am going to drop off the face of the earth. Not literally, of course, but in the sense of disappearing from the digital world of internet and computers. For personal, spiritual, and perhaps even scientific reasons, I am taking a sabbatical from the social media world of Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. I am turning my back on my numerous email inboxes (except for my work email, for hopefully obvious reasons) and even my prestigious online blog (ha!). I am refusing to keep up-to-date on global news via online networks and websites.

To put it bluntly, I am fasting from the internet for 90 days.

The majority of the world won’t know and certainly won’t care that I am going “offline” until April 1^st (no fooling), but for the tiny minority that will care and will notice, I thought it best to offer a little advanced warning and a sort of explanation. No, I haven’t un-friended you on Facebook. No, I haven’t been eaten by an African lion. The world will go on without me. I'm pretty certain of that.

Outside of my co-workers, fellow Botswana residents, and the tourists/passengers on my flights, the only contact I plan to have with “the outside world” will be old fashioned snail mail sent to my company address in Gaborone. If you want that address, feel free to contact my family or to look it up on the World Wide Web. Plan on 2-4 weeks of transit time for any letters you may mail. The donkey carts that deliver mail over here are pretty slow. Not really, but the time it takes for me to get mail will depend on the flight schedule of our air ambulance planes, so it is unpredictable.

In case of emergency, contact my company or my family. Or you could just call 911.

Enjoy the internet for the next 90 days! It should be faster without me clogging up the bandwidth. If you would continue to pray for me during this time of internet silence, I would most definitely appreciate it. As for me, I’ll be enjoying life as it used to be with no internet to distract, to communicate, or to enlighten. I am actually hoping it will be the best of times, the age of wisdom, the epoch of belief, the season of light, and the spring of hope for me rather than the opposite. And just perhaps, during the sabbatical I will be able to say with my own personal meaning, “It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest I [have] than I have ever known.” Oh yes, and I do plan to read some Charles Dickens with my additional free time. It will be great. 

Family

Christmas is about Jesus Christ. Christmas is about the gift of God's Son as a savior to the world. Christmas is about remembering and celebrating the virgin birth of baby Jesus. Christmas is about family.

The birth of Jesus was so important because of who He was, and especially who His Father was. Millions of babies have been born on this earth, but none of them besides Jesus were the son of God Almighty. Jesus was important because of His family. 

As Jesus walked the earth and ministered to its inhabitants, He was building the foundation for a spiritual family. Being fully man and yet resisting every temptation to sin that you and I as humans must face, Jesus conquered sin. Dying on the cross while completely innocent, Jesus conquered sin. Rising from the grave after three days of being dead, Jesus conquered sin. He was the perfect sacrifice that has torn the curtain between humanity and God the Father to allow us all to become children of The Most High. Because of God the Father and God the Son, we can now be adopted into the family of God. 

We celebrate Christmas every year with our biological families or families by marriage or by adoption on this earth, but we also get to celebrate it with our spiritual family around the world. All of us who have been saved by the blood of Christ are brothers and sisters to one another. We are all related. In a way, it is because of the first Christmas that we are all part of the same family.

Here in Botswana, thousands of miles away from my biological family in Texas and my adopted family members in Virginia, North and South Carolina, Florida, and Puerto Rico, I am thankful that I have spiritual family members with whom I can celebrate the birth of Christ. At the same time, I will most definitely miss being with my brothers and sisters by birth, my parents, and my aunts, uncles, and cousins that I have been with for every Christmas up until now. So let me encourage those of you who have the blessing of spending this Christmas season under the same roof as your loved ones and family members to make the most of it. Remember that the presents and food and traditions are only as good as they are because of the people you are with as you enjoy them. Remember that not one of us is guaranteed another Christmas with those that we love and that each moment, each smile, each memory made is precious. Enjoy Christmas with your family! Whether you spend this holiday season with biological, adopted, or spiritual family members, remember that you and I are blessed. 

In the midst of our Christmas joys let's not forget those people who don't have a family, whether physical or spiritual, to be with on Christmas morning. The world is full of orphans, widows, and lost souls who will be sad and have an aching heart this December 25th. Perhaps besides simply counting our own blessings this Christmas, we can somehow manage to also be blessings to those who need it most. This is one of my favorite Christmas songs and says it even better than I can: http://youtu.be/XvDBGVoGKD0

Christmas is all about family! 

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"Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father..." - James 1:17

Praise Ye The Lord!

The Bible, especially Psalms, is full of commands and reminders to praise God for all of His wonderful works. Honestly, though, I forget to do that as much as I should. It certainly isn't because He hasn't blessed me or exhibited His power and greatness in and around my life every single day, because He has done that. My lack of sufficient praise unto God is due to my failure to recognize and appreciate all of His blessings in the midst of everyday life and its busy schedule. What a lame reason.

Last week was an incredible testimony to the greatness of God and yielded many more reasons to praise Him. To set the stage, let me explain how things work here in Botswana when foreign nationals initially enter the country. When citizens of another country cross the border or pass through customs at the airport they are given a stamp in their passport that basically serves as a tourist visa and allows them to stay in the country for a maximum period of 90 days. People like me who are trying to move here for a job must apply for a residence permit and a work permit through the immigration office or else they will be required to leave the country after their 90 day pass expires. The past few months have been a difficult time for international applicants to obtain approval to stay or work in the country. Some of FMS's new employees have had to leave the country and are going through an appeal process to attempt to be able to come back and work. Lots of other organizations and individuals we have talked to are having the same problems. That being said, last Friday was my final day to be able to stay in the country on my 90 day passport stamp. The clock was ticking and my days were disappearing rapidly last week when I was called into the immigration office on Wednesday. Four and a half hours of waiting in line later, an immigration officer handed me a residence permit and a work permit over the counter and I walked out of that office with a miracle in my hand. With only two days to spare, God showed Himself strong on my behalf and has allowed me to stay and to work in Botswana!

God deserves praise for more than just opening doors and providing for His children. Look around. His creation is awesome! Over the weekend I went camping at the Khama Rhino Sanctuary with some FMS friends. The pans (large, flat open areas of ground) were covered with rhino, wildebeest, kudu, ostrich, impala, springbok, zebra, giraffe, eland, warthog, gemsbok, water buck, and a variety of neat birds (watch the video from the trip here). Watching all of these animals frolicking around as the sunset lit up the Botswana sky was amazing. Not to be outdone, the night sky was filled by a crescent moon and a plethora of dazzling stars and constellations. The flickering flames of our fire, the distinct smell of African wood smoke, and the varying tastes of delicious foods were all small and often unappreciated examples of the creativity, power, and greatness of our God that we experienced that night.

I have always loved this quote from Robert Louis Stevenson: 

"The best things are nearest: breath in your nostrils, light in your eyes, flowers at your feet, duties at your hand, the path of God just before you."

Life is full of wonderful things that we should praise The Lord for every single day. He has done great things and will continue to do great things. Just praise Him!

 

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"Let everything that has breath praise the Lord!
Praise the Lord!" - Psalms 150:6

Chronicles

I've started a few different blog posts over the past week, but haven't finished them yet. So much has been churning in my mind for a brief while but then disappears like a mist blown away by the breeze as soon as I try to solidify it into words on a page, or on a computer screen actually. What I've decided to do in this post to somewhat bypass my typer's cramp (did I just invent a new term?) is just chronicle some of what has happened since I arrived in Botswana. It will be more facts and less thoughts than usual. Please forgive any repetitions that may slip in from previous posts. 

Cessna A2-FME

Nine and a half weeks ago, I arrived in the beautiful country of Botswana. My contract with Flying Mission Services was as a pilot, and I was slated to fly Cessnas into the Okavango Delta region around the city of Maun. Since arriving, I have submitted applications for both a work permit and residence permit to allow me to begin working and living legally in the country for the next two or more years. Neither one has been granted yet. In fact, many applications like mine have been denied in the past few months, so I'm very grateful that I can trust God to take care of mine and teach me more about Him through the whole process! In the meantime, I've technically been volunteering at the FMS offices here in Gaborone. The first few days and weeks here I was scrambling to get through ground school, testing, and applications as quickly as possible. It's a waiting game for my permits right now, but I still have one more step each to complete for the validation of my pilot's license and my mechanic's license. Monday and Tuesday of this week I will be taking a check ride in a Cessna 206 up in Maun with a Botswana pilot examiner. After that, it will just be a matter of time, hopefully. Taking one more written test is all that I need to accomplish for my mechanic validation. Lord willing, the end of the waiting is in sight! 

The beauty of a sunset in the bush

The office work I've been doing has included writing some new in-house tests for incoming company pilots, researching aircraft maintenance compliance for various planes being worked on in the hangar, counting airplane parts to verify the amount of inventory in stock, and helping cook for the monthly company braii (cookout). There are definitely some days where I feel useless and impatiently want my authorization to start flying to come through. Remembering that God has a plan for His ultimate good in all of this always perks me back up though!

Braiing some chicken and sausage 

Outside of the office I have been able to connect with some of the local community through sports like ultimate frisbee, running, volleyball, and tennis; get to know other FMS personnel on camping trips, at pool parties, and lots of cookouts; and spend time with some IMB missionaries, the founder of FMS, and the young men's group from a local Baptist Church. Some of the new foods I have been able to try so far include zebra, impala, and goat head as well as Ethiopian, Indian, and Lebanese cuisine. It has all been delicious! I've always been a sucker for delicious foods, and there are plenty of them here. One thing that has been a little shocking for this small town, tee totaling, country boy who has lived in the homeschooling and Christian college bubbles his whole life is the amount of alcohol that gets consumed over here. Apparently a social event here isn't complete without beer, wine, rum, whisky, or homemade moonshine (ok, I haven't actually seen anything home made yet). The country as a whole has an alcohol problem that the government has attempted to curb by continually raising taxes on alcoholic beverages. But, in the words of Clarence from It's a Wonderful Life, "No, I didn't have a drink!" 

Giraffes beneath a cloudy sky

I have had a few minor challenges in the past nine weeks, but overall it has been a great time of learning and growing. My car had to go into the shop for repairs on two different occasions, but God showed his goodness by allowing it break on the day before my warranty from the dealer expired. It's hard to call it a trial or hard time when my car gets fixed for free. The first time I tried to turn in my application for my pilot's license here, it was rejected and I became a bit dejected. But again, The Lord has been faithful, and I should be able to successfully resubmit the application within the next week to 10 days. On the electronic front, my laptop crashed and the batteries ran out in both of my wrist watches last month. A quick shopping trip should remedy those issues, though. I have to remind myself that these "problems" are so insignificant in the greater scheme of things. Most of them can be classified as learning experiences and faith builders more easily than as trials or tribulations. I am very blessed.

Camping in South Africa for a weekend

I always request your prayers for my time here in Africa, for FMS, and for the nation of Botswana. It may not appear that dark or lost from the outside looking in, but there is great need for Jesus in this country. 

Inventory

Over the past week or two, the parts department at FMS has been preparing for an audit. One aspect of the preparations is counting and verifying inventory. The parts room is lined with shelves that are stacked with boxes that are filled with parts, and each of those many thousands of parts has to be counted.

The boxes were all dusty and some even had dead bugs and spiderwebs in them - evidence that no one had needed that exact part in many months, or maybe even years. The tiny star-shaped lock washers that were almost too small to be able to pinch between your fingers and the bags and bags full of rivets were probably the hardest items to count accurately. It was simple to count fuel sending units and seatbelts because of their size, but the nuts, screws, and washers were an entirely different matter. 

One screw, two screw, there screw, four.... My mind began wondering what analogy could be drawn between counting airplane parts and our lives as followers of Jesus Christ. I suppose we need to be sure to audit ourselves from time to time and see what inventory we have in our lives. Have we counted our blessings today? That's usually a cheerful way to start out - by looking at the good things God has blessed us with and being thankful. How many of the nine fruits of the spirit that Galatians 5 talks about do we have evident in our daily walk with The Lord? Try counting those for yourself. If we count the numbers if sins we committed, the number of mistakes we made, or the number of times we failed today, that may be a depressing part of our spiritual inventory, but it is still important. Counting sins isn't important because the number itself matters. It's important to identify different forms of sin in our lives and hearts so that we can fight against them and try to clean them out of our parts room completely. 

One of the difficult things about taking inventory during the middle of a busy workday was all of the noise and commotion going on all around you. Eighty-six, eighty-seven, eighty-eight... Then someone would bust through the door and call your name. Like a flash, that last number you had counted vanished from your mind, and you had to start all over. Life is full of distractions too, and these tend to pull us away from the duties and responsibilities we need to concentrate on as Christians. In the middle of going through your prayer list, someone suddenly calls you and needs your help, pronto! After a few steady weeks of daily Bible reading you contract a bad illness, and in a matter of days, the good habit gets broken and thrown out the window. It happens. Sometimes  we just have to start again and not lose heart. 

Look at the bright side, at least we don't have to count the hairs on our head or the stars in the sky - God has those numbered already! 

Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test! (2 Corinthians 13:5 ESV)

Bare Feet

For as long as I can remember I have hated wearing shoes. Not just leather dress shoes or heavy work boots, but any kind of shoe or boot. They stifle and oppress my free-spirited feet to no end. I have been known to fight grass fires, cut down trees with a chainsaw, fly an airplane, and many other random things while being barefoot. It sounds crazy (and probably is crazy), but I just like being barefoot. 

The Bible talks about feet in a number of passages. Romans 10:15 says "How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!" Psalms 119:105 says "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path." In John 12 Mary anoints the feet of Jesus and then in chapter 13 Jesus gets down on the floor and washes His disciples' feet. The feet of Jesus were pierced by nails at Calvary, but in the end, the Bible says that all things will be put into subjection under those same feet.

I know that I'm a part of the body of Christ, and sometimes I wonder if I am the feet. It seems appropriate. Feet do the traveling to get the body from one place to another. Feet are down in the dirt and the ditches getting the soldier across the battlefield. Feet help support and hold up the body. Feet are used to kick Satan in the face or a stubborn brother in the pants. Feet are under a lot of weight and pressure. Feet sometimes get stepped on by others or poked with thorns. Feet seem disgusting and unsightly to some people. Feet can be broken or twisted. Feet need washing and care and protection. Feet are just one of the many parts of the body with a job to do - and that job is not to be propped up on the couch all the time doing nothing. 

At first glance, it seems almost conceited to think that I might be likened to the feet of the body of Christ, His church. Feet are important, and they might even be considered one of the more important parts of the body. I must be full of myself! That's the wrong viewpoint though. 1 Corinthians 12 tells us that all parts of the body are important and rely on one another to function as a whole.

If I'm the feet, then I have the responsibility to keep moving so the hands can reach out and touch the needy and the ears can listen to the cries of the hurting and the eyes can see where The Lord is leading. We all have to work together as the church in our different but equally important roles. So let's get up off the couch and get walking! 

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But now God has placed the members, each one of them, in the body, just as He desired. If they were all one member, where would the body be? But now there are many members, but one body. And the eye cannot say to the hand, "I have no need of you"; or again the head to the feet, "I have no need of you." (1 Corinthians 12:18-21 NASB)

Wrestling

"For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places." (Ephesians 6:12 ESV)

Once upon a time not so very long ago, when I was a young boy, I used to be quite a prolific wrestler. I wouldn't go so far as to say that I was a good wrestler, just that I did it a fair amount. After so many wrestling matches with my brothers and my friends growing up, I probably should have tried out for the college wrestling team! Most of our bouts were all in good fun, with an occasional one spurred on by an argument gone sour, but what I liked about them was that I could actually grab hold of my opponent and use my appendages and body weight to pin him down into submission. It was a purely physical struggle. Since then, I have grown up. No longer do I wrestle against fellow humans using physical strength and size. No longer does the match end with a tap out or a cry of "uncle!" No longer are the stakes simply boasting rights or an elevated ego. The fighting I have to do now is much more serious, difficult, and real than any boyhood struggles. 

I was reminded by a longtime Botswana missionary the other day of the spiritual dimension to our current struggle to obtain permits and approval to stay in the country. It's easy to get annoyed or impatient when the speed of progress seems slower than dripping molasses on a freezing winter day. It's even easier to direct that impatience or frustration towards the government workers and blame them for all of your troubles. In general though, they are just doing their jobs. I'm sure it isn't easy to sort through forms all day and decide how to handle different applications. They are human beings too with their own difficulties to face at work and at home in their personal lives. The real enemy here is the same enemy that all Christians fight against. Perhaps the fights and struggles take on different forms for different people, but I believe we are all fighting against sin, the flesh, and the devil on a daily basis. Our flesh makes us impatient and prone to grumble at delays and setbacks. The devil works against our efforts to enter the country and bring the good news of the Gospel to its people. Sin surrounds us. And so we wrestle. Not with our hands as much as our prayers and not with our physical strength as much as our spiritual weapons. Botswana is full of darkness that we have to struggle against in order to be lights for Christ. There is much evil that needs to be countered with righteousness here, and I believe Satan is fighting to keep Christians out in every way possible - by legal, financial, and medical means to name a few. 

The most important concept to remember is that we have to fight back. The biggest assumption in Ephesians 6:12 is that we are actually wrestling against those "spiritual forces of evil." It doesn't say "For God does not wrestle against flesh and blood." Nope. It says that we are the ones wrestling. We have to take temptations and throw them over the ropes. We have to pin sin down in our lives and force it to tap out and leave the ring in defeat. This is war, folks. Everyday and everywhere we are engaged in the ultimate struggle between good and evil. Let us fight the good fight by taking up the full armor of God and standing in the ranks of His army! 

Please, pray for me and for the members of the body of Christ who are in Botswana. Pray that Satan will not be successful at keeping us out or keeping us from fulfilling the work that God has allotted for us here. Pray that we would stand strong, shine bright, and strive for righteousness. The book of James reminds us that the prayer of the righteousness man availeth much. It is one of our mightiest (but often underused) weapons! Let's use it in the fight!