A Holy Night

Merry Merry Christmas! 
And joy all around the whole wide world! 

I love you, and I hope the love of a perfect baby boy whose life began to overcome death is consuming your day.

This is the first Christmas in all of my 27 years that I have not been with my family. My original, all-the-time, thick-and-thin, all-the-way-around-the-world, Home people. I miss them with all of me, and I love them more than I can say. I'm posting now as I anxiously wait for everyone to arrive to Aunt Glo's house so we can all skype together!

I want to be with them, sitting right next to my cousin Carli to open presents and egging cousin JoJo on to beat last year's Christmas dance performance. I want to eat No-Bake cookies until I feel like throwing up. I want to watch little Ella and Mia squeal with delight upon every opened treasure, and I want to meet Baby Josiah when he makes his debut next week. I want to squeeze my NaNa and make a scene about her being THE BEST NANA IN THE WORLD! (She really is.) I want to throw a fit until I get my way and my sister agrees to come with me to Galveston Island instead of anywhere that involves fluorescent lighting.


Although I haven't always been the perfect candidate for being perfectly loved, they have filled me up with an undeniable, unending, unconditional love. I'm relishing in Christmas memories and the passion God gave me for family tonight. HE told me to love His Family - the Kingdom of God sized family - and they taught me how. 

Today we celebrate Jesus coming to earth to teach us how. 
And I'm celebrating a family who taught me how. 
And that's how I spent this first ever Christmas Eve in Africa this year.

I am overwhelmed with joy tonight because I got to host a REAL Christmas celebration because HE came and because they taught me how.

Thank you family. And thank you for Family for Christmas.

I picked up Kevin and his family for Christmas, and was brimming with delight at having a cottage full of family. I had the privilege and joy of serving a hot meal to a family who hasn't had enough food this month and sending home enough leftovers for everyone to eat again. I got to lavish them with a kind of love they've never received before - Christmas gifts wrapped under the tree with their names on them!  I bathed every child, rubbed lotions on their dry skin and dressed them in new outfits for a night out. We laughed and held each other the whole night while we watched a play about the Christmas story, starring another family from Ten Thousand Homes participate at a local church.

Happy mamas and sweet little Karabo. Right - Charity, Kevin, Given and Karabo's mama. Left - Nandi and Tommy's mama.

Charity - 4 years old

Right where I want to be for Christmas!

A happy girl!

LOOK! KEVIN'S SMILING!!!!

What's Christmas without a family photo? Absolutely amazed by the smiles that have transformed the countenance of these perfect little angels. 

My new extended family

Time for presents!

I'm not going to get over this smile... it's so perfect.

Or these Christmas toes!

The mamas loved their new scarves!

Our Christmas super-model.

Bathtime for babies! Kevin and Given - 2 years

Excitedly waiting on the Christmas play to start!

What better way to end the night than a balloon drop!?!

Happy little Given!

Language Lessons

Merry Christmas! It’s a week to celebrate! A birthday week!

I kicked off birthday week last Sunday by standing in front of a sweaty church full of SiSwati-speaking South Africans, telling them we were all going to speak the same language that day.

They’ve heard me try to pronounce the name NhlaNhla and have seen me ask repeatedly how to say the same things…  So they didn’t have a lot of confidence in me preaching in fluent SiSwati that morning.

I told them we would start speaking the language of Thanksgiving.

Just like infants practice mirroring faces, gestures and sounds… That’s how we would start speaking Thanksgiving.

We stood up together and read line-by-line a psalm of Thanksgiving in SiSwati. (Psalm 100) We gave thanks through song and dance… and Thank You Jesus for that dancing in Your House. We spoke thanks through talking Truth.

We dwelled on the most commonly recited and most commonly glazed-over Truth that reminds us we have reason to be thankful in all things:

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.” John 3:16

“Nkulunkulu walitsandza live nkanga waze wanikela ngeNdvodzana yakhe lezelwe yodwa, ukuba ngliyohaloya akholwa ngiye angabi nekubhubha kodvwa abe nekuphila lokuphakadze.” Johane 3:16

We gave all our thanks to a God who gives so deeply, so completely, so extravagantly. The author of the language of Thanksgiving. The very reason to speak it.

We didn’t gather to say, “thank you”.  We didn’t gather to open up our pockets and just give. We gathered to speak thanksgiving.

Anyone is capable of just giving.

If anyone is aware of her capacity to give, it’s an American standing in front of a House of orphaned and vulnerable children.

I could give them every material thing I have. And I would love to.

I could kiss them until my lips fell off and pour out every ounce of love within me. And I try to.

But if the source of giving is not love, then we’ll all end up with dry bones.

Dry bank accounts, dry lips and dry bones.

Anyone is capable of giving. But giving without love dries you out.

Anyone who loves can’t help but give.

If you love, you give. Love compels us to give.

Take that and rewind it back to your favorite memory verse…

For God SO LOVED the world THAT HE GAVE His one and only Son…

When we started speaking Thanksgiving together on Sunday, I believe it opened us up to give and receive that “so loved” kind of love.

It opened me up. Dry parts turned into fountains.

And there’s room for that dried out part of you to open up and flow freely too.

God can’t help but give because He loves you so much.

He is desperate for you to have eternal life.

No one has to have an eternity of dry lips, dry bones, or dry anything.

He so loved us that He gave us access to Living Water… and chap stick!

The more I started speaking out about His love, the more I wanted to give it to my church. And to His favorites.

And then a handful of you, who love so big, were compelled to give too. And, together, we made books that tell the most perfect story of giving. The story where the “Once upon a time” and the “Happily ever after” are bound up and sealed with True Love’s kiss in John 3:16.

On Sunday, I got a little wound up talking about the birth day that changed humanity and that flooded our eternity with Living Water.

Many people in the culture don’t know when their birthdays are. And there aren’t birthday parties. Or birthday cakes. Or birthday anythings.

They started in shock. They don’t speak birthday. So I started demanding  “Hallelujah’s”. I started begging for the “Amens” for the eternal life, the best birthday gift ever.

And then I threw a birthday party. Right then and there.  A party that didn’t require speaking birthday. It required speaking Thanksgiving. It required speaking the praises of the One who so loved the world that He gave eternal life.

Can I get an AMEN!?!

I asked them to stand up and sing “Happy Birthday Jesus” together. I couldn’t help but giggle at how awkward it was for this white America to lead a birthday song for Jesus with people who have never heard the birthday song with their name in it.

And then, they sang it again on their own.

And again.

I finally had to interrupt them to move on to the next practice round of speaking Thanksgiving.

What’s a birthday party without a paper chain? We called it our banner of Thanksgiving. Everyone added a link with a prayer of thanks written on it. We sang worship songs of thanks while we created the combination party décor and banner of thanks.

I could see the thankfulness starting to flood them. Smiles started to replace sorrows of daily life here as our common language rose to the heavens.

Construction paper and crayons crashed through the typical formality of a Sunday morning to create a tangible and festive proclamation that we can speak Thanksgiving together and in every circumstance.

 

And then I told them there was cake.

For that, they freely offered up their “Hallelujah’s” and “Amen’s”!

And then I told them there were gifts – Christmas stories and crayons for every child. And for every family who didn’t have a child.

I wanted to lavish free celebration on these people that I love, to give them a tiny, chocolate-covered taste of God’s love – with sprinkles!

Every family in my church now has a book written in English and SiSwati. They’ve all been to a birthday party now. And now they all have the story to know why it’s worth celebrating. I asked them to read the story aloud every night this week as a family. The gospel is penetrating homes and hearts throughout Mbonisweni as we speak.

He is so good.

He loves so much.

So much that He gives eternal life.

Together, me, you and the orphaned and vulnerable children in South Africa are trading in our dry bones, our dry hearts, and our dry lips for Living Water, eternal life and True Love’s kiss.

Celebrate THAT on Christmas Day.

  

Check out the birthday party I had with Lifa! 

The Right Kind of Upside Down. Let's Make the Countdowns Count!

Whether it’s paper chains, advent calendars, shopping frenzies or sugar-charged children doing the counting, I’m guessing Christmas countdowns are full throttle in most of the world!

This is my first Christmas in South Africa, and I have to admit, I’ve had a little trouble getting into the holly-jolly holiday spirit, much less the holiness of the big day we're counting down to.

Everything feels upside down… the summer weather, the distance between my family and I, the potential that Lifa will leave on December 23^rd.  I bought us a Christmas tree because I kept forgetting Christmas is coming!

The whole idea of Christmas is pretty upside down anyway… A Savior brought into the world through the womb of an ordinary, young and single lady. A Messiah who still needed a mama to raise him. The Son of Man spending his first night in a barn.

So I guess upside down isn’t so bad.

But I want it to be the RIGHT kind of upside down.

There is a very different kind of upside down happening in South Africa today. I believe God is saying we have an opportunity to be His hands –and even pass out the crayons- for a fantastic project to turn the wrong kind of  upside down, upside down and make it right. Did you get that?

Christmas in South Africa is not a sanctified celebration of the birth of Jesus. In the people group I work amongst and call family, pastors are excited Christmas falls on a Sunday this year. On other years, no churches meet on Christmas and there are no Christmas Eve services... because no one comes.

Christmas in South Africa is simply the time of year for children to receive clothes for the next school year and to spend Christmas bonuses on alcohol.

The country is plagued with abuse, human trafficking and crime during this drunken, no-rules-apply month. But you and I have an opportunity to turn things the right kind of upside down and make an eternal impact.

Together, we can turn a meaningless month of chaos into a time to know and to celebrate the most intentional gift from our Creator.

I am putting together 125 coloring books that tell the Christmas story in English and the local language, SiSwati. We will celebrate the gift of that perfect Messiah baby by giving a gift of Truth written simply, and in a language that families can read together. There’s still a lot of work to do, but I’m already passing them out as soon as I can make them.

You are reading this because you have invested in some way into my life and my story. I would like to invite you now to invest in the lives of the orphaned or vulnerable children in South Africa and the way their story will change when they know the real story. 

Each book costs approximately $2 to make including paper, printing, assembling and crayons. Would you consider buying a book for a child in Africa this Christmas?

I believe with all of me that God is asking me to do this, and I believe the blessings will multiply throughout our lives and the nations if we do it together.

If you are interested, check the right-hand column of this blog and click on my PayPal link. For more information or to receive a .pdf copy of the document, email me at kacychaffin@gmail.com!

Party People

Humility... sweet and holy and to the tune of my favorite worship song. That's how I like it.

Yesterday it came in the tune of house music, SiSwati speeches and culture shock.

I've lived here almost two years, and I find myself continuously surprised. I count it as an honor that I don't stand out as the only white person present anymore and that special allowances aren't made for me. I feel my way through language barriers, unspoken and unexplained norms, and things that sometimes make me grit my teeth and stomp my feet.

Yesterday I experienced a gamut of feelings and reminders that I'm created for heaven, as I live and love completely out of place-  from right where I belong. 

I had flurries of feeling angry that no one had translated or helped me understand... that I had shown up not knowing I was supposed to bring a gift for Lifa.
I laughed to myself as I hung up my cheesy construction paper decorations, with the kids and moms oogling over the sparkly glitter, only to watch them come behind me and hang up everything they could get their hands on with the help of my stapler and tape.
I felt even more out of place when I started following the herds of parents, hand-in-hand with their children, only to realize they were going to change their kids into their traditional clothing for Swazi culture dancing. I didn't even know that stuff existed in such small sizes, much less have anything for Lifa.
I celebrated that, for at least two months, Lifa was going to a school where he was learning his culture traditions, dance and beliefs since he comes home to an English-speaking mama from an American culture.
I was proud to be living with him and attending his school parties amongst his own culture, rather than heading straight for the red, white and blue.
I felt sad and a little embarrassed that, between his dad's house and mine, Lifa had only been to this school for a patchy 2 months of the year, so he didn't know all the songs and routines the other kids did. And he wasn't given an award.
I was thrilled to hear his laugh and watch his resilient joy as he sang and danced with his friends, oblivious to any differences between their houses and his.
I was shocked and mortified to see a bunch of 4-year old girls put on bathing suits for a beauty competition - and to be asked to be the DJ for it because I was the one with the car that had a radio.
I felt used and thrilled to wait in my car, away from the beauty competition, with all the other kids who didn't have a seat as I waited for the teacher to come scream, "MUSIC!" or "VOLUME!" as my cue.
I was relieved and frustrated when I couldn't understand more than a hand full of words during the entire 6 hour party. I resorted to reading my Bible, taking photos and kissing kids.
I felt completely like I belonged as part of the family and community, and completely embarrassed and out of place at the same time.

(Click slideshow to see bigger pics in new window)

At the end of the day, exhausted, thankful and about 4,800 other adjectives, it got me thinking about the real Jesus-style humility.

On days when I am just reading or praying or listening to music, humility is sweet baby Jesus wrapped up in swaddling clothes in a manger, sleeping to the lullaby melodies of donkeys and sheep. It's not so much the part about a teenage virgin carrying the Messiah, being rejected at every inn and forced to give birth without her midwife in a dirty, flea-infested barn with little protection from the weather.

When I'm praying and giving praise, humility is like the sinless King of Kings taking on my sins and yours to pay off debts we could never repay for our forgiveness and to usher in grace so that we could be adopted eternally into the Family of God... and live happily ever after. It's not so much that part about him being publicly mocked, stripped, beaten and murdered with people casting lots for his clothes standing below him and a sign with the last insult, "King of the Jews" hanging above him.

There is now something even stronger and deeper between Lifa and I as a cross-cultural family who chooses to stick together, even though there's no comfortable balance between cultures. One day of overwhelming partying was just a morsel of a reminder that humility is a posture of holiness... but is still humiliation. That those swaddling clothes were itchy, infested and uncomfortable. And there was nothing flashy or bedazzled about that crown of thorns Jesus wore that Friday afternoon.

Today I am thankful to remember that I am being folded into a family, just as I have been folded into the Family. That I am chosen, predestined out of His perfect love... Just because He wanted to. (Ephesians 1)


So I hope you enjoy the pictures of the most beautiful children, the most enchanting culture and the sweetest reminder that we are citizens of heaven.
We get to enjoy the glimpses of heaven on earth in every tribe and every tongue on the way Home.

Click here to see the videos! 


There's always a party in reveling in the creativity of our Family and our Creator.
Let's alway be party people.

I have an extra child tonight...

I have an extra child tonight.

I'm writing you from South Africa tonight with the perfect view from my couch: an almost-4-year old in a big-boy bed with "L I F A" hanging on the wall above him, and a long-legged little lady sprawled out in borrowed pj's across my red sheets.

Nandi's spending the night with us tonight.

There are so many versions of so many stories about Nandi. And about her mom.
None of them start with "Once upon a time..." and none of them are worth repeating.

Nandi's been showing up at TTH feedings since before I even got here. She's one of those kids that everybody notices, knows her name, and knows there's a story behind.

I don't know how old she is. But I know better than to measure her age by the way she carries herself. Or by the way she's learned how to use those long legs. Or by all the hard-knock life lessons that flicker through her eyes. It's only her childlike, ear-to-ear grin that betrays her when she gets shot by a water gun, surprised by a new pair of shoes, helped into a warm bubbly bath, or takes her first ride in the front seat of a car that show she's younger than her life experiences say she should be.

Nandi carries a lot of labels with her. She's a "runaway". She's been found sleeping in graveyards and in the doorways of strangers. Her mother's been an elusive figure in a Lifetime movie kind of story. I always notice the weeks when Nandi doesn't come to the Dwaleni feeding.

I've started building a relationship, slowly but surely, with Nandi's family.
(Background for those who know how much I love little Kevin and his family: Kevin's mother is Nandi's mother's sister. They live in the same plot of land.)

I found Nandi's mother and auntie waiting for me at the feeding program when I pulled up this week. Through a translator and deep burden, they explained Nandi had been gone for a week. Some of the children at the feeding knew where she was. It was too far to walk and they needed my help.

Absolutely.

A 10-person car ride later, we had our girl back. She climbed into my car looking like she was made of stone. Her mom wept all the way back to the feeding. This was a mess. And, by the icy emotions chilling the summer day, I knew it would only get worse in their house tonight. And we'd probably be looking for Nandi again tomorrow.

So, I asked if Nandi could come to my house tonight.

I explained that we were family, and we would take care of our kids together. And maybe tonight, Mama Nandi needed to rest with an extra helping of peace knowing her girl was safe. I wrapped my arms all the way around Nandi's slender frame and cracked a joke about how tight I would hold her all night long.

Instant relief.

And somehow, within moments, we were worshipping together at a neighbor's house, sharing snacks, and I had a lap full of sleeping babies. All was well. We became family.

There was a birthday party on base for 5-year old Caleb tonight. Our yard was filled with children, laughter, good food and swimming. For one night, Nandi was not a "runaway". She was a giggling, beaming, delighted little girl who was only running from the splash of a water gun as she passed off her new shoes to me so she go faster. 

I've been running away from God all week.

He used the f-word to me.
Rosa - don't freak out.

He called me to be a foster parent for his Kingdom. For the "least of these".
Foster parent... that's the f-word.

He asked me to love them with full-throttle Mama Love... all the way, every single day. To make their families stronger because of it. And to trust Him in all the moments - even when they go back home.

I've been running away from Him all week because it gets a lot more personal when they have a bed with their name on the wall. And when you've said ni-night prayers over them. And when they've bathed in your bath bucket. And when they call you Mama. It felt like all this love was backfiring.

I said "God the Father... I'm mad at YOU." I let that Abba-God have it.
And He whispered right back that He gets it.

Christmas is coming. What sometimes seems like a commercial holiday is really a sparkly hoopla over the beginning of the most personal and painful parenting experience in the story of Creation. And that He said it was worth it.

It's worth it to be a foster parent  and let my kids go home, so His kids can come Home. So me and the mamas and babas and gogo's and babies can all go Home together- fully adopted, fully sons and daughters of the King of Kings! 

We are learning together what His Family looks like. Our Family.

Today Mama Nandi learned that, no back-story required, she's not alone. And she's worth being taken care of. Today Nandi probably had her first-ever real bedtime routine. After fearful uncertainty and wiggling, she's sleeping hard and peacefully. Today Lifa learned that there's still room for more and that he'll always matter. Today I felt the most satisfying kind of exhaustion I've ever felt and decided that getting to feel this kind of love and be a part of this kind of family really is worth it.