Look behind you…

I was off again on an airplane recently.  I wrote this after taking off from a hard week while on an airplane to another tough spot. Its words still ring true for me, and I hope they’re helpful for you.

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I’m up in the sky again on a plane. I can’t quite tell you where I’m headed.  It’s not because I’m trying to be fancy or weirdly vague. I’m heading to work with an anti-trafficking organization and they’ve asked us not to share much about our location while we’re with them.  Since their lives would be far more in peril from a security breach than mine, I’m honoring that.  I’ll fill you in when I can.

It’s arguably one of the darkest places on earth for vulnerable children.  Even as I say that, I suppose that wherever a child is vulnerable is the darkest place for him/her…but there’s something about the tangled web of mess we’ve been asked to help with that leaves me feeling like this place is darker somehow.  Like it’s far more likely to be harmed than to not.  And yet I’m also expecting beauty.  It’s always there.  I’ve been to some dark places and haven’t ever been without some breathtaking moment of beauty. Every time.  (By the way, I am entirely just as safe as you are reading this from your couch.  I’m in Christ, and we’re good.  No one’s life is more secure than mine. I know this for sure). 

I delightfully have the window seat on our early flight out of Austin.  I will never get over watching the takeoff.  I can’t help myself.  I peer out the window trying to catch the last glimpse of discernible movement on the ground before it all becomes large shapes and shadows.   As the daughter of a retired airline pilot, I’ve literally been on thousands of airplanes and it hasn’t lost an ounce of wonder (though you can ask me again in 15 hours how I feel about planes and I might be less cheerful). 

A few minutes ago, I look at one of my teammates and say, “look, it’s going to be a beautiful sunrise, I can tell.” 

And I was right.  It was (still is) stunning. 

But I had to crane my neck and look behind me to see it. 

And something about that caught my attention this morning.

How often do we need to look behind us to find the thing we’re looking for?  Isn’t it true that sometimes the thing you’re looking for can’t quite be found by trying to see it directly? 

This week has already felt heavy and hard.  I’ve found myself fighting back a fair amount of despair.  We have a tough situation with some folks we’re trying to support.  It’s the kind of situation that seems maddeningly simple.  Of all the work I do, this one is easy.  There are some kids who can and ought to be reunited with their families.  And yet the human heart is stubborn.  So, there is an obstacle where there ought to be a red carpet.  Tears of frustration instead of the tears of joy we long for. 

I struggle with ruminating on things I can’t solve.  The hamster wheel in my head has been over and over again on this situation.  Could we have said or done anything different to inspire a change somehow?   Are we ever going to be able to actually have this work?  Will kids ever really be helped by any of what we are reaching to do?   

At times this rotation is interrupted by another equally non-helpful loop.  This one is entitled: someone else would be far better at this.  Someone else would know what to do.  Someone else wouldn’t be so emotionally affected and thus more effective and wiser.   

Naturally, none of this brought about any peace or any resolution.  And I’d love to tell you I bounced back out of it.  Still haven’t. 

But then there’s the quiet whisper across the clouds this morning…maybe look behind you for the light as it emerges.  Maybe what you’re hoping to catch a glimpse of is coming from the opposite direction from where you’re looking…

Perhaps you could quit focusing on the thing that won’t budge and look instead at beauty.  Look up at the One who formed mountains and thought of clouds.  The One who is faithful enough to break the dawn every single day.  Maybe just wait a little bit longer in the darkness of not understanding.  Maybe just give Him a little more time.   

Tish Harrison Warren writes this, “in the end, darkness will not be explained, only defeated.” 

I find such comfort in those words.  There is an end coming to the night.  The night of abandonment and abuse for children.  An end is coming to the terror we are able to inflict upon one another, both knowingly and ignorantly. 

The dawn will break.  

It might even be today.