Chiggers: boo!

Normally, this blog is for sharing my deep contemplative thoughts, or sharing a story of cross-cultural significance, to keep friends and family around the world connected with my daily life. It's my way of keeping you involved in the highs and lows of life while living far away from so many of you. So, here's to keeping connected.....

This is something I never thought would be a result of overseas living and ministry: Chiggers.

Now, I grew up in the Northwoods of Minnesota. My summers were spent building forts among the trees. I learned at an early age the proper way to search for and remove ticks after a day in the woods. I know how to bear-proof a campsite and have tried everything known to man to prevent bites from the mosquitoes that are the size of small birds in my back yard. But I've NEVER dealt with chiggers before and I have to say, I hope never to deal with them again.

About a week and a half ago, I spent two days outside doing various activities: A picnic in the grass after church with friends, an outdoor lunch with my church, a BBQ for the Moon Festival with students from my English class near the beach. Somehow over those two days, these little guys found their way onto my skin and burrowed deep.

I initially was afraid all the little red bites that appeared on my skin were bed bugs and I was freaked out. Bed bugs are near impossible to eliminate. I was imagining the discussion with my landlord, buying a new mattress, and figuring out how to clean everything in my room. However, I had no additional little red spots. So then I just assumed they were ant bites from the various outdoor eating adventures and they'd disappear shortly.

Oh, how wrong I was. Now I know that chiggers latch on and after about a week they fall off. THIS is when the itching really happens. And so it did. My arm started to itch like CRAZY and later that night it was near impossible to sleep and the welts on my arm were about 10 times their original size.

Thankfully, with Taiwan national health insurance, I marched into the doctor and for $5 got a diagnosis and some anti-itch cream and antihistamines. But these suckers are gonna itch for a few more days and I'm just gonna whine (a bit...) and shake my head at the crazy things that happen while living overseas. So the moral of the story is....no matter how enticing the grass looks in Taiwan, don't sit in it! And, living for Jesus sometimes requires weird suffering. And, building relationships sometimes costs you physical discomfort! ha ha!

Remembering....

I woke up this morning and went through my morning routine: worked out, showered, made coffee and sat down to read the news while eating breakfast. It was very similar to the same morning exactly 10 years ago when I stood in front of the mirror in the bathroom in my college apartment, getting ready for class and listening to the radio. That morning the plane hit tower one in NYC...and I watched on TV as the second hit tower two.

I watched the video on CNN today and could not hold back the tears. The emotions that day were suddenly upon me and I sat there thinking of all that has unfolded since that day. I watched as those buildings collapsed and the graves of 3,000 people were there, right before my eyes. People who have friends, relatives, children still alive today that watch that with even more pain in their hearts.

And so much has transpired. That day opened a door, unknown to me at that time, to move into the very land of these "enemies" of my country. I looked into their eyes, I passed Talibs on the street. I heard bombs and gunshots go off in their own backyard. I was taken in as family by these people who in the minds of my own nation are the enemies of all that is good: prosperity, education, democracy, the right to freedom and comfort, women's rights and liberalism, secularism, etc.

Now, my post is not intended to be a political rant, nor is it intended to express my opinion on America's war on terror (though I do hold my own opinions!)...but I've really been challenged lately from a lot of different angles. I've just recently finished reading the book "Tea with Hezbollah" in which Ted Dekker and Carl Medearis travel the Middle East and ask people what they think about the teaching of Jesus to love your neighbor and the parable of the good Samaritan. The dialogue is intriguing, some of the answers predictable, but the glimpse into the human heart and it's struggle to get beyond it's own hatred and prejudice, is humbling.

9/11, if we are not careful, may cause a bitterness in our own souls that will cause us to hate Muslims, to hate anyone with dark skin and an accent revealing Arabic as a native language. When we meet those who kneel on prayer rugs and press their head to the ground facing Mecca, those of us who to look to the teachings of Jesus and the way of the cross, we can't afford to hate. This is not the "ministry of reconciliation" Paul speaks of in Corinthians.

This morning I wept over the senseless loss of my own people who were killed for the sake of an ideology. Those who died that day never looked into the eyes of their killers. They never interacted on a personal level. They never had a conversation about what life was really about and what they believed. And I wonder, I wonder if anyone dared to set foot where these men, men who'd we'd label killers, and shared a message of love and reconciliation, of relationship with their creator, and common human condition of sin...I wonder if the result would have been the same. And this causes me to weep over those who haven't had a chance to even consider the message of Jesus. Afghanistan will never be "enemy territory" to me. I weep over that nation as I weep over my own. Oh God, help me to love my neighbor.