1 Year on the Field
Three homes, hundreds of hours of Arabic, many pounds of bread, and more than a few meltdowns. It has taken far longer than I planned to write this update, but here is my best attempt to sum it all up. Seeing my Worth The clearest place I can see God’s work over the past year is in my identity. I have struggled a lot in a job without clear daily tasks or measures of success, working with people whose openness to the gospel is frequently compared to hard, rocky soil. Who am I on days when all I accomplish is getting groceries, because that task alone took hours and left me completely… Read more >>Spiritual Darkness and Counting the Cost
For the last 3 months, I’ve been learning Arabic with an MBB (Muslim Background Believer) teacher. I’ve gotten to hear her testimony and share a simple version of mine in Arabic. She asks lots of questions about what Christians in America think about different topics. One conversation that comes up a lot is her desire to leave her country. She lives with her parents, and none of her family or non-believing friends knows she is a believer. She was reading the word with a foreigner friend and going to gatherings sometimes, but quit out of fear that someone would report her when her parents… Read more >>
Parties and Thobes
Early in the month, I got invited to a friend’s graduation party from law school. She wanted full-arab dress so us Americans went all-out with makeup and our flashiest thobes (full-length Arab dresses). My cousin also happened to be visiting and got to come experience a girls party + barbecue. Many people have not wanted to have big celebrations in solidarity and respect for the war in Gaza, so this was the first true “girls party” I’ve been too! A few weeks earlier, I got to go visit a friend I met in the fall in her hometown for the first time! My roommate and I drove up for Arab brunch… Read more >>
Running out of Water
Recently, I had an experience that reminded me just how dry this country is. In fact, we're one of the most water-poor countries in the world with less than a fifth of the renewable water needed to meet UNICEF’s threshold for severe water scarcity. Neighboring countries provide some water, as they control the river, but aquifers are being depleted and there is still a water deficit every year. Water is brought to buildings weekly and stored usually on the roof in a large white drum. If you run out of water for the week, you might just be out of luck until the next water day. After… Read more >>