On a Saturday

I love watching the clouds build up here, impressive reminders of one of my favorite Bible stories, found in the midst of I Kings. 

After the astounding situation at Mount Carmel, Ahab heads home in his chariot. Elijah, meanwhile, starts praying, and sends his servant to run. "Tell me what you see," he said. The servant sees nothing until his seventh trip back, after which he says to his master, "I see a cloud the size of a man's hand rising from the sea." Elijah's response is what echoes through my head when these thunder clouds loom:

"Go tell Ahab to hurry, lest the rain stops him."  

I woke up early this morning because I always do.

I had to make myself presentable a little earlier than usual in order to head down to the campus pavilion and help the church ladies set up for a conference.

I attend IBF, a church not directly affiliated with one denomination, here in Lilongwe, and have been blessed by a number of dear friends within the church family. This week, a team from one of IBF's American supporting churches visited Malawi and ran a number of projects, including this conference.

You know how you may know people, within or outside of your church, who go on short-term mission trips? They do things like run VBS for a week, build or knock down buildings, hand out donations, go out on evangelism trips, or, well, host conferences for Christians in developing countries? I knew plenty of people like that. It's a little odd being on the other side of things, the side of being the one for whom the short-term mission team was sent.

I spent a delightfully long bit of the time holding sweet little Kumbu, a chubby four-month old who loved wrapping his fingers around mine. 

These days have been full, and I've felt drained of stamina at the end of each day, until I open again the book full of stories of mercy and grace, or storm clouds over the sea. I may be exhausted, but there is always strength offered. There's always more grace.