Living in Northern Iraq wasn't exactly living in the desert, but at times it felt close. For much of the year (with the exception of about two months during spring) everything is dry and brown. We also would get the occasional, or sometimes frequent, dust storm. I tried to capture what a true "dusting" is like in the above pictures, but it's hard to tell how much dust is actually coming down. When a dust storm would roll in, everything could get coated in just a matter of minutes and no matter how much you dust it will keep getting dusty till all the dust falls. Sometimes this could go on for days (though usually not more than three or four). However, for as deserty as it felt, I loved living there. It had a rugged beauty, and I loved the people and my teams. I was going to say my team, but truly we had three during our three years!
There's a scripture that I love in Hosea 2:14-15. It reads: "Therefore I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her. There I will give her back her vineyards, and will make the Valley of Achor (trouble) a door of hope. There she will sing as in the days of her youth, as in the day she came up out of Egypt." This scripture is of course talking about God and the Israelites, but there have been many times in my life where I have seen this principle to be true. God, out of His great love for us, takes us somewhere we don't really want to go in order to capture our hearts, heal us, refresh us, etc.
Houston is my desert. I have not initially been so thankful, but I am now. I'm thankful that God is more interested in me and my heart than what I can do for Him. We both truly feel like He brought us here to a place that we don't love in order to cement some things in our hearts. For one, His goodness, favor and kindness is the same no matter where I am on this planet. There are other lessons, like thankfulness and contentment in all situations, but I've gotta go now and don't have the time to get into all of it! Just wanted to let you all in on some of the deeper things going on. :)
No comments:
Post a Comment