moving the rock

"In Him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in His holy name." -Psalm 33:21

I lay in my bed with Misachi after a particularly rough day. I want home, and the people of home, and familiars of home. But as I snuggle what may be the world's cutest child ever, I realize how deeply it's going to hurt to leave these children I've come to know and love. He looks up at me with those eyes of his and that grin of his and my voice breaks as I whisper, "Misach, I don't know how I'm going to leave you." 

I come home late, children are in beds and lights are turned dim. And I do what may be my most favorite thing to do at Ekisa- peek in and see sleeping children. But she's still awake, sitting in her bed. "Auntie come!" Rachel says, holding her hand out. Bag still around my shoulder and shoes on my feet, I sit on her bed and hug her hard. "Oh," she says, "Auntie Anna, you are leaving for America?" I pull back and look into eyes so brown and sad, realizing they must reflect my own. "Not yet, Rach.. not yet."  But I know that day will be here in the blink of an eye, so I hug her tighter.

We're on Skype, with Auntie Gracie and Auntie Michelle. We bring kids into the room, one at a time, to say hi to the aunties on the computer. And it hits me like a blow to the chest. In not too long, I'll be that auntie who gets skyped in to say hey every once in a while. I'll be the auntie Jason asks about at bedtime, the auntie Walter gets shy on the computer around, the auntie Mama Nam cries about when the car pulls out of the Ekisa driveway. 

I can count on one hand the amount of weeks I have left here in Uganda. And while it fills me with such excitement at the thought of seeing you all so soon, I know it means saying goodbye to some of the most precious children who have wrapped their little fingers around my heart. I'm afraid, because I know the heartbreak that awaits. I find myself -sitting on the porch at nighttime, feeding babies, chasing children in the yard, going on walks to Kimaka- soaking in the moments, knowing 3.5 weeks are going to fly fast and these moments don't last for forever. It feels like last summer felt all over again- excited for a new season of life, heartbroken to say goodbye to the one I'm living now.

When I watched Mama Nam say goodbye, I didn't understand it. I sat on the couch, rubbing her back as the tears fell, wanting to ask her, "You know aunties aren't here for forever, why do you let your heart get so attached?" But in my mind, I replay the moments… her and I hand washing laundry in the yard, staying up all throughout the night laughing, making cassava fries, saying good morning [one of the few things we can communicate, since neither of us knows each other language fluently], sitting on the porch ledge on Sunday afternoons. Moments filled with such laughter and such joy. This young woman is the most joy-filled person I have met. She doesn't guard her heart or her emotions or attachments. And every time an auntie leaves, she hurts like none other.

I've told myself to not get too attached, because goodbye is coming. And the more attached you get, the more it's going to hurt later. But then I think of Nam. I think of the deep joy she knows. She lives with her heart on her sleeve; and I know that's how I want to live too. Because I want to know joy like she knows. And that kind of joy, you can't know it unless you're willing to feel the sadness too. But seeing Nam's joy helps me see how it is so worth it.

There's a future of unknowns that starts the morning of March 8th when I wake up in my own bed and planning a Uganda-trip isn't in my near future. I think of two months from now, and two years from now, and 20 years from now. What will I be doing? I shake at the fear of not knowing so many things… how life will have changed, how my heart is going to be so happy to be home, how much I'm going to miss my life here in Uganda, what this new season of life holds. 

I'm standing with my hand on the rock, and He asks me, "Do you trust Me?" It's like when Lazarus is raised from the dead. Jesus standing outside the tomb and Mary whispers, "But Lord, the smell, it will be great." And I know her fear… not of the smell, but of not knowing what Jesus is going to do with the inside of the tomb. I don't know what lays inside the tomb. I want to put off the moving of the rock and knowing the future, because I don't know what He's going to do with what lays beyond that. 

Whatever lays ahead, the joy and the heartbreak, the known and the unknown, the many more seasons and people and hellos and goodbye's that will come… do I trust Him? Do I believe -truly, sincerely believe- He knows what He's doing? I'm hesitant to say that I do and that I always will. Because do I really mean that? Will I mean that in 10 years? I'm afraid to answer, because I'm afraid of what happens if the answer is not "Yes, I trust You." 

But I have known life with Him and what that's like. And I have experienced it- a life lived with Him is the only life worth living. And I know that there's no going back to any other kind of life that isn't centered around Him. So together we will walk to places of indescribable joy, and also to places of great sorrow. And there's no other One I'd trust enough to walk those places with.