Home

So last night Mark and I were talking about the trip we are leaving on today. I was still packing and cleaning after midnight last night when he jokingly told me he wished I was excited about this trip. Of course, I am always bouncing off the walls excited when we get to go home, and it's been over two years since we've gone as a family. He said, "But we're not going home." In a sense, I guess that's true. The two places we are going this time are places where we have never lived. First we are going to the Cities where our best friends from college live. We are staying with them and going to our InterVarsity Christian Fellowship reunion with lots more college friends. After that we are headed to my parent's home in northern Wisconsin where they moved after Mark and I were already in Tennessee.

It doesn't matter to me, though. To me, we are going home. Home is not about the place to me, it is about the people and the feeling of welcome and belonging. I am most excited about being able to just sit with people who love me for who I am and don't constantly focus on the ways I am different. It's nice to have people excited that we are going to be there, who want us around, just because we are us. That's Home. I wish that I had taken more advantage of those relationships while we lived there. If I had been as emotionally healthy than as I am now, I would have enjoyed them much more. I can't go back and change that, but I can take advantage of every moment that I have been given this week, and that's exactly what I am going to do.

I Miss Albania

Well, I stand corrected. Thanks for reading :) Actually, I wasn't trying to be negative. This is just weird for me to type out all these thoughts and wonder if they are just floating around in cyberspace somewhere. It's like giving everyone the key to your diary. We never would have dreamed of doing that as teenagers, but now it somehow seems ok.

I had an interesting conversation today about someone who seems to not see the plank in his own eye, yet sees the speck in everyone elses. While sometimes this individual drives me nuts, today I felt the Lord gave me an insight into his heart. Sometimes when we are very aware of the plank in our eye, we make a point of looking for the speck in everyone elses. That way we can somehow try to justify our own. We also then diminish the right or ability of anyone else to speak truth about our plank, because we are so very conscious of their shortfalls. We may not like our plank, but we have gotten so used to looking around it that we are somehow afraid to get rid of it and see clearly again. And it is not just this person who does this, but I can point that finger at myself as well.

On another note, we had our Albania team reunion tonight. What a blessing! The Wright's are here for three months, and we were able to catch up with them and life in Albania, as well as share pictures, video and memories. You know, that place and those people are never far from my mind. I so long to go back there again. I'd love to wrap my arms around the women in the prisons, as well as in the village of Ibe, and tell them we loved them enough to come back and share our Jesus with them again. I am always so overwhelmed when I think of how the Lord could impact the world from that one little country on the Adriatic Sea.