Dallas vs Hampton Roads: Driving Edition

There are always fun differences as you travel to different places. Here are a few I've noticed from my recent transition back to life in Hampton Roads. So if you're moving from Dallas to Norfolk or vice versa, or if you're just really intrigued by small cultural differences within the States, I present ...

Dallas vs Hampton Roads: Driving Edition

1. Pedestrians vs Drivers
   When I was living in Dallas, I had this fear, an overwhelming fear, that someone would jump out in front of my car and I would kill them. "It's one of my goals in life," I would say, "to not accidentally kill someone." While Jacob could understand why I did not want to commit manslaughter, he did not really understand why this was a concern of mine. Until we arrived in Norfolk. Twice during the first week of our time here, we witnessed very very close calls. Closer than running out into the street like a moron (which we all know is danger) but "Augh! That man narrowly escaped being hit by that vehicle!!" Now Jacob knows the fear. Now the fear is real.
   On the other hand, driving in general is far better in the Hampton Roads area than Dallas. To drive in Dallas is to flirt with death. They are aggressive and feel entitled. If they are about to miss their exit, they have no qualms about shooting in front of you across three lanes of traffic to get there. They are the kind of people who reverse on the interstate to avoid making a U-turn. In Norfolk, driver's don't try to kill one another. It's quite nice.
2. Downtown
   In my first week in Dallas, I went downtown everyday. I had thought that this is what you did in Dallas. I got lost multiple times a day until, Wednesday, I came to accept that getting lost was a feature of driving in Dallas. (I still stand by that.) Most people look at me like I'm crazy. "Why would you do that? Why go downtown with threat of death over you?" Finally, coming home, I remember why that seemed like a good idea at the time.
   In Norfolk, everything is downtown. Does a day pass when we don't find ourselves passing the Scope? Probably not. Jacob at first thought I was manipulating things to force us into Downtown a lot. No. That is just where you go.
3. Smog
   In Dallas, there are smog warnings. Sometimes construction signs declare that you should roll up your car windows and try to stay inside as smog levels have risen to concerning levels. I never really noticed or smelled any difference.
   Norfolk smells like poison. I don't know if their emissions laws are super lax here because they haven't hit the problem that Dallas has. But, as a pregnant lady, Norfolk is rank with the smells of various emissions, burning rubber, construction odors and more. I've been surprised at how many different ways poison can smell, but a short drive down i-264 will give you quite an inventory.
4. Size
   In Dallas, everything is spread really really far apart. Dallas is the pretty much in the middle of nowhere which means they have a lot of room to sprawl. Hampton Roads, on the other hand, is nestled in a bunch of water ways, giving us some distinct building limits. So we crowd together and build up. Everything is about 20 minutes from where I'm staying in Norfolk. In Dallas, everything was at least 10 minutes away and all the cool stuff was 40 minutes away. (Consequently, we had boring lives. Live in North Dallas, trust me.)

Why Pray for the Will of the Lord?

In January, our Bible Study asked: What is something that you can pray for this year that, if it happened, it would totally and 100% be God who did it, no doubt?
I said, to be fully funded by the end of the year.
Jacob said, no, to be fully funded by my birthday. (which is Oct 3rd)
Fast forward a few weeks and we find out we're pregnant and due (drum roll, please) mid-October.
So look at that perfect timing! Our outrageous pray would have us financially set just in time to turn our attention to birthing our child.
Needless to say, we feel pretty good about this. We kinda feel like God placed that outrageous prayer on our lips when God prompted our Bible Study to ask this question, because He knew when we were going to have our family addition.

Do I think that just because God is cool with this timeline, that meeting it is a given?
No. Why? Because God kinda has this thing where He wants everyone to know that He is awesome. It's kinda a theme that permeates the entire Bible and time up to today.
So I expect that God will make me ask for it, beg for it, and scream that I can't do this on my own, before He makes a grand entrance. And in the spirit of beseeching the Lord for our needs, we ask others to come and pray with us, for us.
And on occasion, when I ask, "Can you pray that we'll be fully funded by Oct 3rd?", someone will bow their heads and pray, "and Lord, may your will be done."
...
.....
Now, I desire the will of the Lord in my life. I do, really I do.
But I just don't understand why people refuse to pray for specifics!

I think back to Abraham, who did not pray to God, "Hey, God, you seem pretty peeved right now. So if it's your will to totally obliterate Sodom, may it be done." No. He bargained with God. "Would you destroy the city if there were 50 good people left? Great! ...but what about 45? Ok! Good! How about 10? what if there were just 10?" (Now, it turns out that there weren't 10... But God did spare Lot's family!)

Moses in Exodus 32 talked God down from smiting all the Israelites. Not in the numbers game that Abraham used but by appealing to God's reputation. "God, if you kill off all these people, then the Egyptians you just rescued us from will think that we weren't actually your people. Plus, you promised that the Sons of Abraham would be a great nation. And inherit the world forever. That can't happen if everyone dies." So God relented. (Only to have the Israelites disobey again and punish them with a plague.)

Jesus tells a parable about the persistent widow in Luke 18, who came to an unjust judge repeatedly, asking for the same thing, again and again. Now, the judge didn't actually care about the woman, he just wanted her to stop bothering him. So finally he gave her what she wanted. And Jesus said, "Listen, if a shameless judge would grant her justice, why wouldn't your awesome God answer your prayers?" It seems that Jesus is trying to tell us we "should always pray and not give up" (Luke 18:1)

Now, I know that Jesus, when He demonstrates praying, includes that bit, "your will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven." But I think his prayer is a bit of a vague framework. I think "your will" here is more of a general,  that all the nations would praise you, kind of will. Which is totally what Jacob and I are after. And now we'd like to discuss specifics.
And I know that on the mount, Jesus prays for this cup to be taken from him, but if it's the Lord's will, he'll let himself be crucified. But, again, I think asking God, "must I obey You, because I don't like what You want me to do" is different than "will You in Your great majesty please take care of these needs by this time? Please."

Outside of the Lord's prayer and Jesus' example being the reason for this tendency, I wonder if it comes from praying for healing. Which is hard. You want to pray that people get better, but you're afraid that they won't no matter your prayers. And, in the event they don't, it's easier to say that it was the will of God, which you prayed for, that your prayers not being answered or receiving an answer you didn't like. For some even, these words might be a gentle reminder to the grieving that God has a plan even if we don't like it, which I do think is appropriate.

I just don't think we need to give God permission to do what He wants. He is going to totally do what He wants. Even if we can fathom why He wanted that, God does what He wants. But in prayer, we get to come before Him. To repent. To praise. To thank. And to beseech. We get to ask for things.

And we're asking to be fully funded by Oct 3rd!
And we ask you to join us.
(And you can pray however you want. We appreciate your prayers even if you pray for the will of the Lord! :) )

"Then Jesus told his disciples [this] parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up." Luke 18:1

Using our Kid as a Strategy

Jacob and I have spent our whole lives with the expectation that we would have children and we have been excited by that. So when I say that our kid is a strategy move for our ministry, I don't mean exclusively. We want the child for the reason most parents want a child aaaannd a few extra reasons...

Right before we pack our bags and head off into the jungle for the first time may seem like an absurd time to plan to have a child, but here's why it isn't:

1. Status
When Jacob and I were in the village, married, in 2012, we were put with the teens of marriageable age (whether or not married) who had no children. In the village, you weren't considered an adult unless you had kids. (I believe you could also skip that step and be an old person, but you needed some years to pull that off.) We feel like we can do a better job building relationships with people and doing our jobs if our peers are considered the adults of the village and not their angsty teens. For that to happen, we need a child.

2. Language Learning and Relationship Building
If you've ever tried to step out side of your comfort zone while people were looking at you like you were a circus animal and might do a trick or something, you know how valuable it can be to have the focus removed from you. When doing language learning and relationship building, there's a lot of forcing yourself to go outside and talk with people about.... ..... Forcing friends is hard. But when you sit a baby in the dirt, all the attention shifts to the kid and you have an easier time practicing your language and you have something to bond with nationals over. Aren't babies cute?

Furthermore, when our kid gets older, he will have grown up with this language as one of his own. When we come to a place of struggling with words, he might very well be able to step in and save the day. And even more impressively, he could do this with biblical concepts I can't seem to explain well to the nationals and we've found ourselves stuck on. My little translator in training!

3.  Life is More Fun with Kids
You can feel free to disagree with this one, but children are filled with wonder at the littlest things and that's contagious. I think back to some of my least favorite times in the bush and they usually involve me sitting on something I don't want to be sitting on for hours. But having a kid means I get to watch him toddle around and explore his new world. I get to focus in on him and not on - is that ANOTHER bug on my skin?!?!?!? On painfully boring days in the bush, I can pull out some bubbles and watch my kid race after them. Also, Jacob and I have a worthy excuse to bring Legos duplos to the bush.

So as you can see, for the sake of status, skills, and sanity, maybe making a baby right before heading out wasn't as crazy as you had originally been wondering!

Also, be sure to check out our 10 reasons (in more general terms) we're stoked to have a jungle kid.

Look At My Baby!!

Ok, well, you can't look at him right now, but soon that will change!!
And when that does, we're going to send out announcements!!! As is proper.
We're also going to update our prayer cards to include the new member of our team.
(I'm not sure when we'll do this, as I'm pretty sure that babies get cuter once they get a couple months under their belt, so these pictures probably won't come out simultaneously.)

But here's my issue. With baby announcements, I could totally just pick my favorite people and hunt down their addresses and send them announcements. But with prayer cards, the more people who have our pretty faces stuck to their refrigerator and pray for us when they pass by, the better. But I don't know who all has/wants/uses our prayer card. Therefore, I need you to tell me if you'd like an updated one. And while we're at it, go ahead and let me know if you'd like to see my bundle of joy in print before his careful chosen announcement goes on Facebook for all the *other* friends to see.

Now, if you're a monthly supporter:
I'm just going to go ahead and assume you want both.
If, however, you have moved since committing, please send me your new address just in case our records aren't updated.

If you are not a monthly supporter:
Your name is not on my given list. You, then, have two choices. You can either become a monthly supporter! ;) Or you can send me your address and let me know which one (or both) you'd like to receive in the mail and I will hook you up!

You can send your address to elizabeth.smith@pbti.org  or jacob.smith@pbti.org OR you can send us a Facebook message. Jacob will actually be doing all the consolidating of the addresses into a nifty mail merger thingy, because he's the details guy in this marriage, but if you're like, "I don't know him! I don't want to email him!" that's ok. You don't have to email a stranger. I'll just forward it along for you.

Top Ten Reasons I'm Stoked to Raise a Jungle Child

Is there such thing as a stupid question?
The sassy side of me screams YES!
The linguist in me acknowledges that there is probably some kind of miscommunication or an assumption that I have that the questioner does not.
So when someone asks me, "Are you taking your baby with you to the jungle?"
...
There's a sarcastic voice in my head that says, "No. We figured we'd leave him with a colony of Texan armadillos. I've heard they're very nurturing."
Thankfully, there's also a logical side of my brain. It says that, as much as I find any alternative to be absurd, they probably think me taking a helpless infant to the jungle is absurd. While I wonder what other answer they're looking for, they are probably desperate to see another answer that isn't as horrible as the simple "yes."
But, in case you were wondering, I will be taking my child to the jungle with us, and I am super excited about it! Let me tell you why.

Top Ten Reasons I'm Stoked to Raise A Jungle Child

10. No clothing
Small children in Papua New Guinea run around naked. Older children wear a pair of shorts until they are literally falling off of them. Older children still receive a t-shirt and shorts until the same fate befalls them. As I hear parents lamenting about how much the Back-to-School wardrobe is running them, I just smile and think of my little naked village boy, who, one day, might need me to spend a couple of dollars on shorts for.
9. Coconuts
Coconuts grow at the very top of palm trees. I don't know how to climb a palm tree, but little village children are great at it. And my child will be a little village child. So whenever I need my thirst to be quenched, I can send him scrambling up a tree with a machete and have him throw a couple down.
8. Sweet Machete Skills
From the time they can wobble on two feet, village children grab hold of those useful bush knives and start "helping". They learn at an early age that machete's are sharp and to be careful. But they also learn sweet skills. Like how to open that coconut my son just fetched for me with a single, well-placed thwack.
7. No cars
As often as I hear parents shouting to their oblivious child to look both ways before running into the street with reckless abandon, I am so glad that there aren't cars cruising through the village. The fact that their loud and stinky diesel engines aren't fouling the atmosphere is secondary to my child not getting smashed under their tires.
6. No buses
Along the same vein as cars, there are no buses! No waking up at ridiculous hours of the morning to pull grumpy children out of bed and race the clock to see their clothes donned, their teeth brushed, and their shoes put on. No standing outside waiting for that bus to round the corner so we can retreat to our house and find where we left our coffee in the chaos of the morning.
5. Homeschool without qualms
Though even if there were a bus, I suppose we wouldn't have to worry about it as we're homeschooling. But we get to homeschool without the worry of whether or not it's the best choice. We don't have to stress about how much social interaction and how many extracurricular activities they're missing out on. We don't have to agonize over our qualifications to teach various subjects. We just simply don't have another option. We homeschool by necessity. (Though I anticipate enjoying it!)
4. No Screen time issues
In our age of media, issues of screen-time become more and more complicated. In our home, however, the introduction of addicting screen games can be totally avoided and not perpetuated by neighboring children. Our son will believe that the good Lord invented the screen so that he could read books on it and complete his homework. My little oblivious son.
3. No materialism
It's pretty inevitable that when you declare your home to be in a place where children and pigs fight for scraps, and rocks and seeds are used to play Jacks, where eating meat is a treat, and malnutrition runs rampant, my son will not throw a temper tantrum because I didn't buy him a new Tonka truck.
2. It takes a Village
You often hear that it takes a village to raise a kid. We'll get to try this out ourselves! We'll have the entire village watching out for our precious cargo, meaning that we can let him go tromping about with his friends without worry of his safety. He may have a number of pseudo-moms taking a swat at him, but hopefully that will only teach him that he needs to be good all the time and not just around mom. The defiant "you're not my mom" I hear so often will be absurd as our son will know that you don't get to opt out of listening to others but you should always mind the words of someone who is guiding you to the proper course of action.
1. They'll be Missionary Kids
Missionary Kids, more commonly known as MKs, often get a bad rap for being really really weird. And that rap is often justified. But anecdotal evidence has me convinced that if they're raised by social normal parents then they'll be social normal kids. And, I mean, I'm awesome. But the thing that MKs really have going for them is their emphasis on family. When no one their age understands the collision of cultures that they've experienced, they turn to their family unit. MKs are open minded and well rounded kids with a firm grasp on holistic problems and global issues. They're also super great at interacting with adults.

Bonus - They're great ministry tools

There are pros and cons to living anywhere. But we're thrilled about the pros of the jungle.
Kids are born and live happy lives there everyday. While the infant mortality rate is a bit higher than we're used to here in America, most of those deaths are from preventable and curable diseases. We will have access to medications for our son and will hopefully be able to a be a blessing to other children in the village as well.

5 Registry Items I'm Most Excited about for Jungle Living

Last year, I wrote an article entitled 5 Things I Couldn't Live Without In the Jungle. Along that same line of thinking, this article is built. Of course, could I live in the jungle without them? I don't know. Obviously, I have no child and am not in the jungle. But nonetheless, I'm super stoked about these registry items:

1. Fresh Starts Food Mill (received) - While I would really love to have the Baby Bullet for use in town, this hand cranked food musher is going to be fan.tas.tic for our third dinner mate. Sure you have to overcook a portion of food for nibbler, but when no fridge and little electricity is available... I'm thrilled for this!

2. Brica Fold 'N Go Travel Booster (received) - Speaking of supper time, this is a booster chair... that folds flat! Think of the portability!!! (Portability is a big factor for the nomadic missionary.) Unlike some turn-a-chair-into-a-high-chair, this offers a little vertical aid. AND IT FOLDS FLAT!

3. KidCo Go Pod Portable Activity Seat (received) -  As much fun as those saucers looks, the ones the little kid stands (or works on standing) in, with all the toys around it to hit enthusiastically play with, they're so big! (Read: not very portable) So instead we found this!! It folds up like a camping chair! And has little velcro straps to wrap around toys, making it (almost) as stimulating as it's bulky friend. Bonus: While it doesn't wobble on that curved saucer base, it can be scooted by children savvy enough to take assisted steps, which means, the kid can move around the house (with an 8in buffer between him and the wall!) to his heart's desire!

4. Poco - Plus Child Carrier Pack (Youth) - With mobility on the mind, check out this awesome kid carrier! Structured like a hiking backpack, any jungle treks will be way more pleasant for everyone involved. It's a shame we have to wait until he's 6 months to go to PNG, as everyone knows 3 month olds are way lighter...

5. Safety 1st Complete Air 65 Convertible Car Seat - Bentley  - Since we plan on living at a road allocation and subsequently needing to purchase a Hilux, it will probably be important to also have a carseat. This one here has a cup holder! It also will hold the child well through the age where we care about him being held down, and will hopefully help protect his cranium from the aggressive roads we'll be bouncing along.

So there it is! And so far I have 3 out of 5 of these items!! Now I just need the child....

Our Sunday at Liberty Baptist

We're unaccustomed to having trees towering over us. But either side of the dirt road was lined with their 5 story majesty. After my sister skid on the gravel into the church parking lot, my feet found a great amount of pleasure finding purchase on something that didn't jerk, jostle, or bounce. Those country roads are notorious for jerking, jostling, and bouncing. My sister's inability to brush her teeth while I was putting on make-up in the mirror delayed us enough to miss the grand tour of the new infant and toddler facility at Liberty Baptist. Instead, we were ushered into the sanctuary moments before the service began. And, as all good small southern churches do, we began with announcements. Announcements about how amazing the previous week's Vacation Bible School had been, about the generosity of the children in their giving during that week, and of the decision that was made to give those funds to the missionaries of the week: us! So we got to work our way to the front of the church (in 5 inch heels, since my flats looked bad with my outfit and I didn't have any heels in between, on slippery carpet...) and, after successfully arriving, were handed a generous gift. After navigating to the back, this time uphill, the service proceeded without further surprise. Immediately following service, we headed over to the fellowship hall, across a gravel parking lot and a grassy field (the things one does to look adorable...). Upon entering, we were presented with the most adorable baby shower. A nautical theme with emphasis on the octopus. Cupcakes were assembled and decorated to form the massive cephalopod.

Little pigs and a blanket were strategically wrapped and cut to form octopus snacks. A row of tables, centerpieced by a plush octopus, was scattered with burp clothes, fabric markers, and stencils, which resulted in our plethora of adorable burp clothes. The lovely baby shower had so much work put into it and was so thoughtful for them to do for us. Afterwards, we took our gift-cards to do some serious shopping for baby, and presently we're feeling pretty good about our level of preparedness. Now we just need to decide on a state to have the baby in...