Quite a Difference

Ummm.... I'm all alone in the Hong Kong airport! and let me tell you, after being with my five wonderful teammates constantly (not to mention the many other amazing people we've had the privilege of getting to know and work alongside with this last month), it is quite a difference. I know God is with me; I know the Comforter is my guide even in this small cafe in the corner by the check-in counters. I watch people and wonder what they have been doing the last month...or maybe what they did last night. Did they cry, because they felt alone too? Did they stay up all night after listening to live music in a small venue 'till the wee hours of the morning (like we did ;)? Did they see their families and are now sadly leaving? or have they been missing their homes as we have and are now so excited that the journey home is finally here? Maybe it's for business... maybe it's for vacation. Or maybe it's for something a little more heart-wrenching: a tough decision to change homes, a need to flee, a funeral, a wandering spirit that won't rest until it finds where it belongs (too bad this world is no one's home)...

But I am here because our team is done with our short time of service in Cambodia. I am here, because I came early to see them off at the security gate and then wait for my dad's and my flight to Bangkok at noon. I am here... because I am blessed enough to have a way to visit my dad and Thailand again--and I am blessed "enough" because how could I even ask for more right now? I am here... but I am about a million different places in my mind. I am back at the center, waking up to bless the morning and put on some water to boil. I am back in that yucky bathroom, with the cold shower-water hitting EVERYTHING else in that yucky bathroom... because there is a bathroom and there is running water and there are things, like toilet paper, for the water to hit--I may not like what that does to the toilet paper ;), but the water rinses and refreshes me, so even there, there is a blessing "enough." I am also in the adoring embrace of a girl who might not feel refreshed or rinsed quite as often as I do. I am looking at her without words that she could even begin to understand--I am looking at her, my hands on her shoulders, and I give her a head-nod--because I don't even know how to say, "I know... and HE knows." I am seeing her, but I cannot tell her she is seen. I am also enjoying her company... I am enjoying all the center-girls' company...maybe it's because they so enjoy mine?

So I am here, but I am also back there. I am here, but I am also back home. I am home with my parents and sisters and niece, I am home with my friends and my family of Christ, I am home with my peers and mentors, my confidantes and acquaintances... with my stories of where I've been, my heartache of what I've seen, my hope of who I would like to be now and how I would like to live, and even my struggle of who I've been and how many I obstacles I see in the way of these changes (myself still being the biggest one...). I am also home with "my" coffee shops, my cell phone, and my free wireless (more or less)... I am home in my comfortable environment and easy-access washing machine... and my bed. I don't feel "guilty" here, because I don't think that's exactly what God has in mind. But I do feel restless. I do feel the need to act out (even a little) and speak out (probably a lot) about what my eyes have become more open to during this trip. And I do feel sad. "Sad" because, even in those places, I am not at home.

But where I am right now--in reality--here in the Hong Kong airport, I am missing my team like crazy and trying to decide if this girl pacing behind me is waiting for her muffin or to use this computer? oh, wait a sec... yeah, it was the muffin. But I guess I should get going anyway. My dad will be here with me any minute now, and so then I will be here thinking about Thailand and how very grateful I will be to set foot on that land again--that beautiful land to which I compare all others and still far exceeds whatever they have to offer. I have missed Thailand... so even as I deeply miss my team on that plane leaving Hong Kong, those girls at Daughters in Cambodia, my family and friends in Oakhurst, my peers and "family" and mentors in Redding, and even as I miss my true home (strange as that sounds... as if I have been there before...), I will be grateful for yet another blessing that God has given me on this 22-year (so far) journey.

Wherever I am, I am truly blessed enough. But He does not seem to just stop at enough sometimes...for whatever reason... so maybe neither should I...? Maybe the difference between "enough" and "more than enough," can also be quite a difference.


Anyway... that's probably more than enough for now ;). Thanks for listening to this lonely girl in the airport.
Thanks for many many other things too! (like support, prayer, and belief).


But if I could just ask a few things more...

Please keep praying for safe travels...
please keep praying for my team...
please keep praying for God's work and their continued "debriefing" with Him.

And please, please, please... keep praying for Cambodia...


Much love,
Jenna