the uses of sorrow

Good morning friends!

It is a beautiful day to be alive in Guatemala, and I really mean that. We have been running at a sprint since the beginning of the year, and realized over the past few weeks that the burnout is really creeping in. Ironically, the way I noticed is that I could not write a newsletter. Writer’s block always comes from somewhere, and I felt caught between the need to be upbeat and the inability to write authentically. The problem is NOT the work— it’s our pace, our theology of work, the way we keep saying yes to things that feel important when we’re probably too depleted.

I’ve thought a lot about our historical pattern of overworking, what that says about where we find our identity, and how God made us in his image, not just for work, but for rest.  I spent a fair amount of time in the biology classroom last year discussing what animals are, and if humans are animals.  What is it that sets us apart?  

A few months back, the girls and I picked up a puppy that had been abandoned by our friends’ house.  We named her Harriet. She was covered in fleas and obviously sick, needed attention.  We made a vet appointment for her on Monday morning, but by dinnertime on Sunday it was clear that she wouldn’t make it through the night… her breathing was labored, her belly was distended and tender, and she couldn’t figure out how to lay down.  I called the emergency vet and he agreed to meet us at the office that night.  After a quick exam, he agreed that she needed IV fluids and medicines, and as he put the IV in her forearm, she squealed and stopped breathing, shuddered and died.  Right in front of the kids.  

The weeping was intense, and I felt terrible for the vet, who kept trying to reassure them over and over (in Spanish) that there was probably nothing we could have done to save her.  It was a heartrending experience, particularly for our tenderhearted middle child who had already endured the death of her 4th grade teacher this year and the loss of so many friends.  We talked through what death is, why sometimes we lose things we love so so much.  Why God allows innocent things to suffer, where brokenness and evil come from, and whether hope is a mirage or something we can actually hang onto.  

It gave me days of thinking on the topic of compassion: what a tender and beautiful thing it was to see our kids love and weep for this small animal as she died, for all the ways that humans go to extraordinary lengths to prevent death and suffering in God’s creation.  The last few years have been so hard, watching with dismay as the world has seemingly devolved into crass displays of individualism, selfishness, protection of personal liberty and identity, xenophobia, and now the news from Ukraine… it’s been dark and confusing to navigate.

But compassion! This is a bright glimmer of the other, a flame we need to fan.  I think about so many people who have courageously sacrificed in small and large ways to love their neighbor, people who gave generously toward our food relief fund, Guatemalans who have bent over backwards to care for and protect the people (and animals!) around them, the scores of organizations that have scrambled and heroically fundraised to prevent death and suffering in the under-resourced world.  It’s beautiful, and it is our fervent prayer that those sparks will turn into a wildfire of God’s goodness and redemption.  

The effects of the Covid-19 pandemic are finally receding in Guatemala, but what is left in its wake are unrecoverable losses in child nutrition and education, skyrocketing violence (especially and as ever, towards women), and deepening poverty.   Pray for mercy, and for endurance for all the Guatemalans bearing that burden day after day.  Pray for the Guatemalan church, to faithfully preach the word and live out the gospel. Pray for Jeff and I and our team to model well what thoughtful, balanced and faithful work looks like in a ministry setting where workaholism is expected and reinforced.  Pray for our girls, who are learning how to lean into Jesus.  Pray for Guatemala: our government is hopelessly corrupt, the people are hopelessly poor and the situation just feels so bleak most days.  

Thank you for loving us so well, for keeping in touch, for praying and giving and sharing this burden with us.  

Huge hugs,

Abbie and Jeff 

ps. if you need supplemental reading this Sunday morning, we’d like to share Psalm 107.