God vs Frozen Hamburger Buns

I set a timer on my phone for five minutes. The same five minutes I always do at the beginning of TAG (Time Alone with God—what most people call devotions). Clear my head, meditate on the Lord, try to quiet my thoughts enough to hear from him if he has something to tell me. Prepare myself for the rest of the hour of prayer, Bible reading, and journaling. 

Setting my phone down on the floor next to me, I glance up at the skylight. It is nine in the evening and still light, which feels like a miracle after being in Uganda, where it grows dark at seven in the evening without fail, year round. Clouds blanket this Dutch city, holding in the chill, which is why I am wearing my fleece onesie as I sit. 

Meditate. 

Be still and know that I am God.

Inhale… exhale… Father.

Inhale… exhale… Jesus.

Inhale… exhale… Spirit.

You. Are. God.

Inhale… exhale… Father.

Inhale… exhale… Jesus.

Inhale… exhale… Patricia is still awake, I can hear it. I put her in bed half an hour ago, late for her, but we were running late with everything this evening. She is reading. Well, “reading.” This afternoon she fell asleep with a book draped across her stomach, a position with which I am very familiar and proud to have seen on my two-year-old. Her voice is so sweet. What is she saying? When I told her I was going to read my Bible she also asked for her Bible, so I know she has her little cardboard Bible-counting book. 

But wait, I am still meditating. 

Inhale… exhale… Spirit. 

You. Are. God.

Inhale.. exhale… Father.

Inhale… What other stories about Thomas should I include in my half-written blog post? There are so many about him, but how many can I remember well enough to vividly recount? I wish I had had time to finish it already. What I wouldn’t give for an hour or two of silence—during the day, when I am not worn out at night—to just write. Without interruption. Without background noise. How I miss being able to concentrate. My writing has really gone downhill since having children. Something about only being able to write two consecutive sentences at a time—

Oh wait. These five minutes are for God. Get those other things out of my head. 

Inhale… exhale… Jesus.

Inhale… exhale… Spirit. It was really fun to talk with the other mom at the playground this morning. Christian said he was proud of me for striking up a conversation in Dutch with someone I didn’t know, and keeping it going without her suspecting (at least to my knowledge) that I am not from around here. Well okay, I did mention I live in Uganda so she knows I don’t live around here, but it’s still possible she thinks I am from somewhere else in the Netherlands. Funny, when most people hear that I live in Uganda they start to ask questions and be interested, but she didn’t pry into that. We just talked about our kids. Why didn’t she want to know more? 

Ugh, that is one hundred percent not the point of this time. 

You. Are. God.

Inhale… It was really fun to see Ineke and Claudia today. How refreshing to spend hours talking to people who are familiar with Noah’s Ark and Uganda and not needing to explain the basics of what we do and what the organization is. I’m so happy they could come. 

Oh, come on, Katie… 

Inhale… exhale… Father. 

Inhale… exhale… Jesus. 

Inhale… exhale… Spirit.

You. Are. God. 

Shoot, I wanted to prepare a lot of tomorrow’s cooking tonight. I could have made the potato salad tonight, even the bean burgers to put in the fridge so that tomorrow while the kids are awake I don’t need to spend my time cooking. But I also want to go to bed in time so I can wake up early to do TAG and go for a run in the morning, and I know from experience that if I don’t go to bed early enough it dashes my chances of being able to start my day in a very positive way. Then I won’t stay up late cooking tonight, but I can at least get the frozen hamburger buns out of the freezer before I go to bed. 

Oh wow. God, are you frustrated with me yet? If I were you, I would leave me alone and go listen to the prayers of all your children in Afghanistan who are running for their lives—for you. Am I really getting distracted from you by frozen hamburger buns and cookies I didn’t remember to bake? How can I let myself do that? What does that say about the place I give you? What kind of Christianity do I have compared to those in Afghanistan? 

Inhale… exhale… Father.

Inhale… exhale… Jesus. 

Inhale… exhale… Spirit.

You. Are. God.

Inhale… exhale… Father. My hands feel really dry. 

Inhale… exhale… Jesus. 

Inhale… exhale… Spirit. Patricia stopped talking. I am willing to bet she fell asleep. It makes me so happy that most nights she falls asleep without a fight. 

Agh—

You. Are. God.

Why do we need to sort the trash in the Netherlands? It is so complicated, what goes in each bin and what counts as plastic and what doesn’t, that I know they need to sort it again at the plant (or wherever it is the trash goes). Wouldn’t it be even easier to throw everything together and they can sort it all—

Timer. 

Five minutes. 

For God. 

Only maybe not.

The Thing the Devil Does Right

Now you, man of God, run from these things; but pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, and gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith… (1 Timothy 6:11-12)

God places a huge premium on living, breathing faith. In fact, the more you search the Scriptures, the more you discover that nothing is more important to God than our faith. 

But God is not the only one who puts a high priority on this issue of our faith. Satan also has no greater focus in a single area of our lives. Though he is no match for God, he is a powerful and dangerous foe of believing man and woman. 

Not coincidentally, then—because the stakes are so high—both God and the devil are targeting our faith. They know faith works. We need to know it too. 

(Beth Moore, “Believing God”)

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We really tried with the teachers. The secondary school library staff, which included myself, Farouk (my full-time librarian) and five student librarians, had come up with a plan to convince the teachers that we are on their side and that the library can actually supplement what they are teaching in class, not distract students from it. We searched the library and pulled out hundreds of books from all the different sections, putting them in separate boxes for science, history, English, and the other subjects. We found books with experiments for when students are learning about electricity, a historical fiction novel about a blind girl in Europe during World War II for when they study that war in history, biographies of Nelson Mandela for those learning about apartheid, and so many more. We had evidence to back up our claims of the library’s helpfulness and we were ready to argue our points. 

Only they didn’t come. 

Out of the more than twenty teachers we invited to meet with us, we saw three. Out of those three, two sat quietly and ate their lunches while we talked. The third spent half the meeting arguing with us, trying to convince us that it is actually a bad thing for students to have access to information. (Nope, I am not making this up.) If students have access to information, then they will start to question the teachers, or worse, learn things the teachers were not yet ready to teach them. Absolute worst case scenario, they will make the teachers look like fools if they learn something the teachers don’t know. 

All in all, our plan was a bust. None of the teachers were convinced that the library could possibly be a good thing for their students. 

As those three teachers walked away, I turned to Farouk and said, “Well, at least he cared enough to argue.” 

Honestly, out of all the teachers who either sat there and didn’t say a word, or all the teachers who didn’t come at all, I preferred the one who argued. I preferred the one who snapped back. At least he listened to enough of what we were saying to decide he disagreed with it. He was the only one who found our argument worth arguing with. That was a hundred times better than indifference. 

My husband is the physicist in our relationship, but there are a few things I took away from my excruciating (sorry Mrs. Pattison, you are a great teacher—I just really, really disliked the subject) high school physics class. One of them is that it takes less energy to keep an object in motion that it does to get an object into motion.

Let me illustrate this for you. 

In the Netherlands, everybody rides a bicycle. It is by no means the only mode of transportation, but it is a popular one. It is actually one of the things Christian misses most when we are in Uganda. We love biking here, whether it be winter or summer, near or far, an intentionally long distance or because we got lost. I was pleasantly surprised how easy it was to bike while pregnant, and also how quickly after delivery I was able to get on the bike comfortably again. 

Now that we are in the Netherlands with kids, it is a bit different. Christian has a seat for Elliot on the front of his bike, and I have one for Patricia that sits above my back wheel. In principle, biking itself is exactly the same… only Patricia is heavy. I notice her weight a little bit while we are moving, but I notice it a lot when I need to get moving. The first few times when a stop light turned green, Christian with his long legs and smaller baby shot out ahead of us, and I tripped and stumbled to keep the bike upright long enough to get my feet on the pedals and get moving before we annoyed the people behind us. It takes so much energy to get both of us into motion. 

Do you know who is already in motion? 

Satan is moving, and moving fast. That guy cares enough to get moving. He is not indifferent about God. He is not stagnant. He is invested. He is on the move. He has devoted one hundred percent of his time, energy, and resources to opposing God. He knows God is that important. 

Do we? 

How many people devote one hundred percent of their time, energy, and resources to God? How many put him in a position of such importance in their lives? I have to say, sadly and honestly, that my priorities are too divided. I do not pursue God like I should. I do not pursue God like I want to. I am one hundred percent certain Satan knows the scriptures better than I do.

Who would have thought we could learn from the devil’s example something to do right? 

At least he cares. He knows the power of God. Do we? Do we really want to? 

What would the world look like if we lived with the same intensity as Satan? What would happen if we pursued God with the same passion and zeal as the devil uses to oppose him? We cannot afford to be indifferent. We cannot afford to be stagnant. Or motionless. Or lazy. We cannot fight the good fight of the faith without moving. 

It takes energy. It takes courage. It takes risk. It takes faith. 

Is God worth the energy it takes to get moving?