"There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy place where the Most High dwells." Ps. 46:4

One of our translators said, "I want to teach you a song." And he sang to me: "Joy like a river, joy like a river, joy like a river in my soul. Joy like a river..." I laughed at him and said, "that's not a song, that's just a sentence." But it has been echoing over and over in my head, sounding very much like a song.

The poet Rumi writes,

"Birdsong brings relief to my longing.

I am just as ecstatic as they are

But with nothing to say!"

That little sentence of a song -for me it is as close as I can get to birdsong. Why this joy? I hardly know, I haven't the words, but still I would like to sing. There is "joy in my soul" just as "there is a river whose streams make glad the city of God." The city of God -someday it will be a real place - but for now the Most High dwells inside of us. We are the city, make glad by his presence, made holy because he is willing to flow through us like a river.

Isaiah 55 says:

"As the rain and snow come down from heaven to water the earth and do not return to it without watering the earth to make it bud and flourish so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth. It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it."

This is part of that river of joy. Even when we don't see the budding or flourishing or we can't imagine the miracle of what a seed will become, we can believe in God's promise that his purposes and the things he desires will be accomplished. His promises, his words, are like rain and snow that fall on the land and flow down to the sea, only to be taken up again into the clouds to once again fall like blessings. His promises are good, and they are endless, persistent, like rivers carving out deep canyons, slowly changing landscapes. They are rivers of joy, streams that gladden.

Even when what we see doesn't look joyful, we are still called to rejoice. Paul says, "Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: rejoice!" (Philippians 4:4). It is a strange command, and, incidentally, no more eloquent than my one sentence song.

Rejoice! Even when you do not have words, sing this little birdsong with me: "Joy like a river in my soul." It's a river; you don't have to understand where it comes from to let it make you glad. Rejoice! if only because the Most High longs to dwell within you.

"So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal." II Corinthians 4:18

I tried to memorize this passage once:

"Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For everything in the world -the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does - comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and it's desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever." I John 2:15

And my thoughts at the time were of how easy it is to fall in love with the things of this world. This earth is so full of good and beautiful things, and it is so easy to go about our business doing and seeking and satisfying our endless desires and forgetting that everything is spiritual. Even though it is that part -the spiritual part -of ourselves and this world that will outlast the rest.

I read this passage again recently though, and my thoughts were very different.. more along the lines of, "Thank God that this is not the end, that he has better things planned, that here and now is not all these people have to hope for." I cringe to speak of the poverty and injustice of this place in general terms. We know these things; I would rather point out the good and beautiful. But it seems that maybe now after the thrill of the new and different has faded I can more easily see the ugly things -and it is easy not to love them.

Some examples: There was an election recently, and the family that has been in power for forty years "won" again, thanks to military backing. They say girls can now go to school without having to pay the fees, but when I mentioned it to a local father he said it is what the government tells the Europeans, when the true story is that unless you can pay for a private school your child will be crammed into a classroom of 100 with one teacher who is paid $50, maybe $60 dollars a month... well, hopefully the teacher will be paid. Lately they have been going on strike because they haven't been paid.

It is true that you can live cheaper here - you can buy an arm-load of bananas for $1, and really, it's too hot for clothes (although all the Africans with $2 dollars to their name dress better than me), and you don't need a car because if you're African you can carry 50 pounds on your head (of anything, including chickens -live or dead) and a baby on your back and walk all day through the 98 degree heat.

But it is hard to find any way at all to make money. Our day worker volunteers get $6 a day in "travel expenses," based on our agreement to not officially employ locals. And some work with us because they love what we do, but for most it is also because they can find no other work. Six dollars for travel is a stretch, but gas is expensive and it is not ridiculous to allow that much. The sad part is that it is also not something these people can turn away -and they are the educated English-speaking locals. They tell me $6 a day is not much, but $8 a day, that would be a good job.

I saw a poster recently. It said, "with God all things are possible," and had a picture of a shiny car and a big house. My first thought was, "oh, that's so wrong, so materialistic." But I have always had a house. I thought of one of our workers; he is 31 and has been living with his brother, then his aunt, now his nephew, but his nephew just got married and now he sleeps on the couch 4 feet away from their bedroom. He wants to get married and have children. I saw him rubbing the cheek of a baby and he said, "I wish I could have a baby, but I am getting old and I can't get a wife." Wives only come to those who can afford to at least rent a house. He doesn't want a big house, or a shiny car; his heart's desire is for a small room in the corner of a dusty courtyard to call his own so he can have a wife and a child. I know it doesn't only take money to have a family -but it breaks my heart that America is full of young people who have so much and who are too engrossed in it all to want something as good and simple as a family, while here there are so many young men longing for this good thing -to be a husband and a father, and they are unable because they don't have enough money to rent a room.

Living here beside these people I'm discovering a different meaning when God tells me not to love the things of this world because they are passing away. It is not so much a challenge, but a reason to continue to live in hope, a reason to rejoice despite circumstances. It is true that with God all things are possible... a big house, a shiny car; it's possible. But more miraculously, it is possible to live on little but faith and hope. I am challenged to look again at that awful, materialistic picture and think of how it is an eternal promise of riches and blessing in a realm I have yet to see clearly. May God continue to focus my eyes. And I pray he would pour out his blessings, his eternal blessings of peace, hope, joy and comfort on these people who have so little now.