I'm in the office today and i'm trying to get some work done. A co-worker forwarded an e-mail from a friend who is in SE Asia helping clean up and serve the victims there. This person met a man from Germany who was vacationing with his wife. While he was jogging and his wife was sun bathing on the beach he looked over and saw something strange in the water. He immediately started running toward his wife, but two minutes before reaching her he looked and the wall was right above him. He has been looking for his wife since. I suddenly feel completely distracted from my work. What can I do, but pray? And there is a part of me that feels that is so trite when there are people on the other side of the world grieving the loss of everything.

Yesterday, a director from World Vision came to speak with the staff. We are talking about partnering in some way and planning a mission trip to Africa. We ended up talking about the AIDS epidemic and how it is changing an entire landscape of people. He shared his concerns of what life will look like in 20 years. There are children in parts of Africa whose parents have died, grandparents are gone, aunts and uncles are dead and teachers have died due to this epidemic. What does the future look like for these children who are raising themselves? It's grim.

And here I am sitting at a comfortable desk... in a comfortable office... with every need taken care of. While on the other side of the map, there are men, women and children suffering beyond my understanding or experience.

As we've been reading Genesis, I've been thinking a lot about Sarai and Abram's promise from God. What a testament of God's provision and grace in their lives! I'm currently reading a commentary and the author points out the re-birth of Sarai and Abram. Their names are changed to Sarah and Abraham, a symbol of their re-birth. As Sarai and Abram they are barren and as Sarah and Abraham they give birth to Isaac. I parrallel this story with the grace and sacrafice of Christ. Before Christ we could not be reconciled before God and through the sacrafice of Christ we are redeemed and brought into relationship with our Father. Paul states, "But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God's wrath through him! For if, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation (Romans 5:8-11)."

Now where am I going with all this? I guess I find comfort and hope in the revelation that God has been weaving his redemption story throughout the course of humanity even from the very beginning. The comparison of Sarah and Abraham's story to the gospel story reminds me that God's plan and promise has been the same all along. He desires to make us pregnant and alive in his grace, love, goodness and faithfulness so that we in turn can give birth to hope for others to embrace.

I still feel burdened. I'm unsure how to help, what to pray, how to give... But I can sit reassured that although I can't understand it or fully comprehend it there is hope, because God remains.

Surprise.

Today my youngest brother dropped off the Christmas gift he'd been planning for me for quite some time. When I told him I'd like him to consider giving to a charity on my behalf as opposed to getting me something he laughed at me. He said he wouldn't do that. That's my youngest brother for you. He truly humbles me.

So today he surprised me at 9:30 am with a big gift in his hands and said, "It's ready"! I said, "I can open it?" So I unwrapped it to find this amazing piece of art that he had picked out for me and had specially framed. It's an abstract piece. I'm not sure who the artist is or what the name of the piece is, but he was inspired by some other pieces I had in our apartment and when he saw this piece in pike street market he got it. It's a big painting with very beautiful, bold colors. I think it is a redemptive piece. Meaning I feel redeemed when I look at it. Or rather I'm reminded that redemption is so near when I look at it.

His gift truly floored me. In and of itself, it is fantastic. But I think the aspect that humbles me the most is that my brother demonstrated that he 'gets me'. Most of my, 20's (and adolescence) I struggled with this whole idea of being known. I would simply ask the question, "Can anyone be known?" "Can anyone even get a glimpse of who anyone is?" And I had theorized that, "yes, maybe we can catch glimpses, but no one person can be fully known by another human." Maybe that came from cynicism... Or maybe that is just the truth and a practical way at looking at relationship and life. I've come to realize that I can only truly and fully be known by my creator. And yet, a bit of me aches to be seen, experienced and known by my husband, my daughter, my parents, my friends, my siblings, my grandfather and my colleagues. And I think that there are ways in which they know me, but never completely. I believe that it is God's divine calling for us to engage the mystery of each other and to expose the frailty of our longing for relationship.

After many years of trying to jump hoops and find a way to make people like me, get me and be proud of me. I feel in a much more hopeful place knowing that God knows my soul, my heart, my every thought and that it is truly magnificent to be caught by another human being. God redeems our disappointments through his biblical truth that he promises life and he heals through the simplicity of being surprised by human hands.

This life is amazing.