So You Had a Bad Day.

I had a really bad day today.

Everything that could go wrong, did. And even when something went right, I was so overwhelmed that I couldn’t even enjoy my small victory, because I was drowning in the horribleness of the day. I smiled when all I really wanted and felt I could do was cry, and a couple of times, the super-fake everything-is-okay mask that everyone could see through anyways slipped, and I did cry. At breakfast. In the hallway. In the bathroom. On the basketball court. In a couple of other places I don’t want to talk about.

It was a really bad day.

I want to tell you that in the midst of this miserable experience I had some life-changing moment with God, that He lifted me up and I rose from my ashy sorrow like the phoenix of legend. That the transformative power of God redeemed my day and I was able to lead 16 people to Christ and start a church plant. That my tears turned to joy and I gave a small child a puppy.

In all sincerity, I would be lying if I told you that. If you couldn’t tell from the puppy.

Time to make my point: I didn’t have an alleluia-chorus moment where God spoke to me and dragged me out of my bad day and away from the daily demands of my life today. I didn’t even feel particularly spiritual today, because I was so busy trying to survive the awfulness of the day. However, I can tell you what I realized at one point, when I was feeling guilty about even having a bad day:

Sometimes, I think we get so wrapped up in our little Christianity world, we feel like we’re not allowed-or even in some cases, above-bad things. That misery shouldn’t touch us, because we’re Christians. That we shouldn’t hurt, because we have Jesus. Bad things, stay away, I rebuke you in the Name of Jesus!

In some ways, that’s true. You can rebuke bad things. You can pray that they won’t touch you, and maybe God will honor that prayer. I don’t know; I am neither a theologian nor a pastor. I’m just a girl who loves Jesus in Mexico (and anywhere else He sends me; I’m not really picky).

But my answer to that is to look at Jesus in the Bible. Look at where he placed himself. He didn’t really hang out with rich people by choice-he kind of scorned them. Jesus spent his time with poor people. The sick, the old, the dredges of society. He didn’t get out of the way of hurting people; he went to them gladly. He said “It’s not the healthy who need a doctor, it’s the sick.” (Mr. 2:7) The bible prophetically calls Jesus “a man of sorrows” (Is. 53:3) and sometimes I wonder, were they his sorrows, or the sorrows of others weighing on him?

So yeah, today was a rough day. They happen. It wasn’t a fun day, and I wish it was over. However, I can tell you that though my entire horrible, terrible, no-good, very bad day experience Jesus never left me alone. Even in the midst of the bad day-ness of it all, he was with me. And that’s something I can take out of this: that I have a God who holds my hand during bad days.

Figuratively speaking, of course.

 All this may seem anti-climatic, given my blather about proverbial phoenixes raising from their ashes, but in my experience, the anti-climatic stuff seems to be the most important. I say this sadly, what with my personal love for hyperbole and mostly fictional drama. Still, the fact that I managed to dig something good out of this wreck of a day has me pretty proud. And take it from me, people: If you see a bad day looming on the horizon and physically CAN’T do anything to avoid it (such as, rent a boat and sail to Japan, buy a pair of track shoes and start running, or lift a car off a busy suburban street and make a break for the nearest Starbucks) I recommend just tossing your hands up early in the day and saying, “I give up! Jesus, you take this day, because obviously it’s not going to be a good one and I don’t want to be responsible for my own life today!”

Actually, I suggest doing something like that every day. It will revolutionize your life.

For any of you new readers, don’t let the tone of this blog put you off. Read my other stuff and see what an only partially insane person I am. And for my six other readers (or maybe we’ve grown to seven; I dare to dream!) hope you’re enjoying the blog. Send me any questions or comments you may have, and feel free to refer me to new readers. Shout out to my Mom!

The After-Vacation Exhalation.

It was really hard to come back here.

Physically, not so much. After all, how hard is it to go to an airport, wait around, get a on a plane, lather, rinse, repeat and poof: home again. That part was not hard; it was just really boring.

The hard part was leaving my family. I don’t want to disillusion anyone, but I really actually kind of like my family. A lot. If I tried to put into words what I feel about my family, I would completely and totally fail, because it’s not something I can describe with words. Every time I leave them it’s like a little stab-not anywhere fatal, just somewhere that hurts.

Usually when I leave I play the tough guy. You know, I’m-going-but-this-doesn’t-really-affect-me type of attitude. And usually it really doesn’t affect me. Much. I’m here, they’re there, but there’s internet, facebook, facetime-I can lie to myself and say, it’s not really any different. I wouldn’t spend any time with them even if I was home.

And that’s probably true. If I lived in MN, I would probably have my own place to live and my own life, and I just wouldn’t concern myself unduly with the proceedings of my family. It’s sad, but it’s true.

So you people who get to see your families, you people who live near your parents, you unspeakably blessed people who get to spend time with your sisters and nephews and best friends-please do so. For me. Because you’ve never sobbed your heart out as you wonder when the next time you see your father will be. You’ve never watched your parent’s house get smaller and smaller in the distance and known that you don’t really have a home anymore, not right now, anyways. You’ve never left your life behind, and then tortured yourself by going back and visiting it every once and a while.

So, this was about the state of my mind when I was heading home from visiting MN.

Cue: Alisha, sitting on a plane, crying so hard the flight attendant asked me if I wanted an entire box of Kleenex. While I was sobbing, and trying to decide exactly how embarrassed I was, I happened to remember a story that I heard in college while studying the life a Count Ludwig von Zinzendorf:

“Two young Moravians heard of an island in the West Indies where an atheist British owner had 2000 to 3000 slaves. And the owner had said, ‘No preacher, no clergyman, will ever stay on this island. If he’s ship wrecked we’ll keep him in a separate house until he has to leave, but he’s never going to talk to any of us about God. I’m through with all that nonsense.’

Three thousand slaves from the jungles of Africa brought to an island in the Atlantic, there to live and die without hearing of Christ.

Two young Moravians heard about it. They sold themselves to the British planter and used the money they received from their sale, for he paid no more than he would for any slave, to pay their passage out to his island for he wouldn’t even transport them.

As the ship left its pier in the river at Hamburg and was going out into the North Sea carried with the tide, the Moravians had come from Herrenhut to see these two lads, in their early twenties, off. Never to return again, for this wasn’t a four year term, they sold themselves into lifetime slavery.

The families were there weeping, for they knew they would never see them again. And they wondered why they were going and questioned the wisdom of it. As the gap widened and the housings had been cast off and were being curled up there on the pier, and the young boys saw the widening gap, one lad with his arm linked through the arm of his fellow, raised his hand and shouted across the gap the last words that were heard from them, they were these,

‘MAY THE LAMB THAT WAS SLAIN RECEIVE THE REWARD OF HIS SUFFERING!’”

-Paris Reidhead

Let’s face it, missions work is a tough job. Working with these kids is even harder. I’m really far away from home and I miss my family. I get tested every day in ways that I never imagined. But these two men-they sold themselves into slavery. Forever. They were never heard from again. No one ever heard what happened to them. They were gone, cut off from their families forever.

I’m not belittling my own suffering; I’m pretty sure I’ve cried myself to sleep every night this week. However, if those men could make that kind of sacrifice, and launch an entire missions movement, one of which the effect can still be felt today, then how can I compare? (Not to mention, I actually really love what I do-I just wish I didn't have to be so far away from my family. Like, they should move here). So, really, what is my suffering compared to what theirs must have been? And I’m not even going to bring up Paul, or I’m going to be here writing for the next three hours.

However, it was the apostle Paul who said it best:

What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ.

Phil. 3:8

So, my family, here you have it: I really do miss you.

I would love to hear from you! If you have any questions or comments, or would like to get a hold of me, please email me at alishatomsen@lovehopemercy.org. If you would like to support me monthly or give a one-time donation, please contact accounting@lovehopemercy.org to get started today! 

Starting the Story

I’m just going to tell you up front: this is not a success story. Yet.

It’s not even really a story yet. To call it what it is, it’s a beginning. There’s no middle, no ending yet; just the potential for something wonderful to happen. But read it, see what God’s doing, and judge for yourselves what part of her story this is.

Dani came to us in October. Newly turned 7, she had the mentality of a toddler. I’m not talking about her intelligence; Dani is very smart. But, because of the trauma she had endured, abuse and neglect had rendered Dani into a fragment of what she had the capacity to be. This skinny, long-limbed, loud little child wandered into our care, and I will be the first to tell you we had no idea what to do with her.

She yelled, she screamed, she swore, she bit. She had nightmares, she had day terrors. She was terrified of any and all new people in her life, and reacted in a predictable, if unpleasant fashion: by screaming, hitting, and biting the stranger. But beneath that traumatized little girl there were pieces of a wonderful little person, waiting for it to be safe enough to come out.

I will tell you something that breaks my heart: I will tell you one of the first things she ever said to me. When she arrived, and we were left to our own devices for the first time, she spent a long time looking at me suspiciously. Dani has this wonderfully expressive face, and she does suspicious really well. She screws up her face and looks at you like you just shoved a chocolate-covered cockroach or something equally pleasant under her nose. And then she opened her mouth and asked me, “When are you going to start hitting me?”

Not, “Are you going to hit me?” Not, “Do they hit here?” No, just the expectant “When are you going to start hitting me?”

You see, in Dani’s experience, adults always hit. Everyone hit. So asking me when I was going to start hitting her wasn’t a sad thing, it was a normal question,  and when I told her I would never hit her, she had no response aside from obvious disbelief-it was not believable to her that she wouldn’t be hit.

I told you that this was the beginning of a story, and now I’ll explain why. You see, we can’t make Dani better in four months. Seven years of neglect, abuse and trauma is a big hurdle to jump. Every day is still a struggle with her. She still hasn’t learned that hitting is not a viable option for problem solving. She has yet to learn that swearing is unacceptable from small children, or that stealing is wrong. She has nightmares, and is only now starting to get past her fear of strangers.

However, the changes we have seen are remarkable. Dani is like a little flower opening up to the sun for the first time. Finally in an environment where she can grow and thrive, Dani is excelling in school. For the first time in her life, she has friends. She has supervisors to love and take care of her, and while we’re not as good as parents, I like to think we do an okay job. She’s learning about Jesus, and loves to sing the worship songs she learns at church, or make up her own songs about Jesus and fish (although I couldn’t tell you why).

But best of all, Dani has finally stopped waiting for someone to hit her.  When I asked her yesterday if she thought anyone here would hit her, this is what she had to say:

“No, you wouldn’t hit me, or Ofe or Esmi or Ana (other supervisors in the dorm), and nobody would hit me even if I was bad I would get a punishment because when you’re bad you get a punishment like having to watch everyone else play and but when you obey you don’t get a punishment you get to eat candy. Can I have some candy?”

I gave the kid some candy. It was a great answer.

If you have any questions or comments, I would love to hear from you! Please email me at alishatomsen@lovehopemercy.org. If you are wondering how to you help me, please be praying for me-I have eight children, I need it! If you would like to support me financially, either through a one-time donation or monthly, please contact Mary Madsen at accounting@lovehopemercy.org or email me for more information. 

And thank you for reading my blog! I hope you enjoy it, and feel free to leave comments and feedback!

Alisha