So where IS the loneliest place on earth? It's wherever you are and you don't know if you're supposed to be there--or whoever you're with and don't know if you are supposed to be with them. You want to be some place else, doing something else, being with someone else. Any place else. It's the place of unbelief in God's goodness with what He's given you right where you are. Disappointments abound. Fulfillment seems elusive.
So here we were in the place of Father's kind appointment, Mexico City and all I could thing about was Nepal and the people we left behind. In an effort to move on, we spent the first three months getting to know the Wycliffe people there, having them in our home for meals, seeking to find friends, but it seemed like no one wanted us in their home, or lives. We felt invisible. Remember, Bill grew up among the Wycliffe folks in Mexico so he knew most everyone. It was puzzling and distressing. We were LONELY.
Then Dow and Lois Robinson came down to continue their work with the Aztecs. During this time together we recognized the call to walk together in life. We then and there chose to let them speak into our lives and help us walk through our loneliest place on earth. It was after this decision that suddenly things changed and the Wycliffe people around us began to relate to us. God's "no" to relationships when we first arrived later became deeper, life-long ones. And Lois helped me in my unbelief--the bottom line--not really believing the Lord had brought us to Mexico, letting my heart still long for Nepal. I was trying to absorb moisture from the leaves instead of nourishment from the Root.
In the next few months, even though we each experienced more illness, especially the kids, we began to make some other life-long friends. We also began our intensive study of advanced Spanish in downtown Mexico City, and we began to make plans for another tribal allocation. We hoped to begin work among another Aztec dialect, the Orizaba dialect.While pondering a future tribal assignment, the director asked Bill to continue working on the computer project for Nepal. developing the software necessary to handle the Devnagri writing system used in Nepal so that translations in Nepal could be typeset. The writing example to the right, pronounced "topi," is the Nepali word for "hat" or "cap." So in a very real way, we continued as part of the Nepal team, without being there.
Bill also turned 30 that October and Jenny turned 7 in November. How young we were. How much we'd already experienced. Yet it was during this time I began to see the Lord speak to Bill. I wrote in my journal: "It's like being in on a very special creation--like Narnia. I'm full of awe watching authority develop in him as he finds real friendship with Dow, and God begins to change him and work in our family."
We ended 1977 sharing Christmas with several other families at the SIL center in Mexico City. My journal says, "Lovely Christmas, delicious turkey and kids were so pleased and excited. Jenny couldn't sleep Christmas eve and just kept smiling and giggling." Oh, that we could all have the heart of such a 5 year old!
Here are some pictures of who and what we missed: Dearly loved Kunti with the kids; Jonathan and village friend Birendra; our kids playing with village kids (helping sort oil nuts!); riding bikes through the tori tel (mustard) fields (Himalayas in the background), Jenny's front porch swing.
Written in September, 1977, while living in the loneliest place on earth:
O, Water of Life, How dry I am.
Limp.... lifeless....colorless....deformed.
Soon
I will die....unless You,
O Water of Life,
Pour forth, from your abundance
Precious liquid that revives and heals.
Pour forth, Lord,
And make this body of dust to be
true moldable clay:
The type of consistency that
Moves with the Potter's wheel
And forms an Image pleasing to the Image of its Creator.
Altogether Lovely
A perfect example of a useful life.
Complete in every detail, as a well-cut diamond:
Reflecting-pouring forth the colors of all God's Goodness.
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