Taking Issue With Myself

I have to object to, or at least clarify, something from my last blog. My life didn't change the moment I got home from Japan in 1999, not instantly anyway. That moment was a moment of change, one country to another, and it signified change to come, all the implications of being in a different culture and starting a new job and making new friends, etc. etc. But my life didn't take a dramatic twist, it morphed in steps and stages, and the change in me came gradually as I moved with the flow.

So maybe you're reading this and you're thinking "duh! Why bother taking issue with such an obvious point?" Well, because I think for lots of people it's not so obvious, and I want anyone reading this to understand. The most profound, significant, life changing things are not usually the fast, dramatic things, at least they haven't been for me. Not that fast/dramatic and profound/significant are mutually exclusive. They can fit together. But life is made up of a sequence of choices that shape our futures, and often we don't understand the significance of the choices until we have the power of hindsight.

For example, before I left Japan I decided I was not going to choose a house group based on how many people my age were in it. I'd done that before, and had a less than satisfying fellowship experience. This time, I was going to look for God, go where he led. And I did. And he hooked me up with the best fellowship group I've ever been a part of, in that it was a bunch of people with enough similarities that we "got" each other, enough differences that I learned a lot of good stuff from each of them, and everyone was focussed on God, not anything else. Amusingly, they all happened to be people about my age. Then I entered a training program called the School of Justice where people from our church tried to open our eyes to the realities of those living in poverty. They managed that while God radically changed my way of thinking and looking at the world.

These two choices, the ones that led me to the house group and the school, have had major effects on who I am right now. When I look back, I am amazed at how far people who entered my life and experiences I've had in these two contexts have taken me from who I was. And I'm glad, because I'm better now. It has been a trial-by-fire experience at times, but I'm better now than I was, and have hope that God will continue to work on my bad parts.

So I'm looking forward to fall 2006, because I think it will be good. I probably won't understand how good until I have hindsight working with me. But I'm willing to wait for the insight as I enjoy the moment.

And before that, I'm partying in Japan. [In fact I'll even be arriving there during hanami season, a major party event across the country]