Assume the Position

Every Friday night, we go to a market in Hout Bay. It’s the highlight of our week! We look forward to seeing the beach, mountains, every type of person you could imagine, stalls filled with artists and their products, a live band, and the most amazing selection of fresh, cheap dinner options. We go early, draw our weekly cash from an ATM, and find a seat before it gets too crowded. I take a break from cooking, and everyone gets to choose what they want for dinner – even dessert!

Bay Harbour Market is the perfect place for us to learn the heartbeat of the city we're learning to love.
Photo credit: www.marketscoop.co.za

Until our own church starts meeting, we worship at a local church weekly. The pastor has graciously welcomed us as church planters into the city. Every Sunday morning as we drive to that church, Chris looks at me and says, “I think we’re supposed to give all of our cash to the church again today.” It’s become the standard to deplete our wallets and pockets for another church’s offering bucket.

This week, Chris had pulled money for both of us, and we ended up giving the church double! He shook his head incredulously. It’s (almost) comical that the more financial need we see in our own lives, the more God asks us to give. Before we pulled into the church parking lot, we had taken our stance and spoken it aloud: “Thank you, God, for asking us to give all we have because it means you’ve given us everything we need.”

Did you read my last post about astronomical lawyer fees?

And did you know that we’ve been called to live and serve one of the very most expensive suburbs on the continent?

And Chris is starting a Master’s program soon?

Thank you, God, for asking us to give all we have because it means you’ve given us everything we need.

Recently, while Chris was out on a run, his mind started racing about overwhelming financial obligations, an exorbitant amount of litigation ahead, early stages of church development, getting equipped with a higher education, moving into our new neighborhood, and on and on… But he stopped. And God spoke.

The King of Kings told him we are perfectly positioned for miracles. He is delighted when we live lives that need Him.

Bring it on, Lord!
Lifa in Hout Bay

God the Father loves lives that die to live, not live to die. He loves emptying our pockets so we can open our hands. He doesn’t need us to make sense of it. He just asks us to be obedient and use wisdom.

We’ve learned a lot about that as a family.

A few months before we got married, Chris apprehensively told me a figure God had given him for our housing budget. A big one. It was absolutely impractical for the rural community we lived in at the time. We couldn’t even find a home to pay that much for, and we weren’t able to yet. From that day, we started organizing our budget accordingly. We moved into a very large home for less than half of the price we were working toward and began slowly building up a collection of used furniture that we adore. Little did we know that, 18 months later, we would be moving all of that charmingly old furniture across the nation to fill a home that is exactly the amount He had told Chris to plan for.

A few weeks ago, we didn’t know if Lifa would be able to go to school because he had no government registration number. God said to position ourselves for His favor, we bought school supplies, uniforms, and everything we needed to start the 4^th grade. The door didn’t open for Lifa to attend the first day of school, but the waters parted with a miracle and he went, fully prepared, on the 2^nd day. (Here’s the story, in case you missed it.)

We’ve got testimonies to stand on, even when one hand is full of lawyer bills and the other is dropping all of our cash into another church’s offering bucket. We are perfectly positioned for God’s provision. For God-filled, God-requiring lives. And that’s exactly where we want to be.

He asked us to sell my car and move to a city where we’d need it more than ever. I'm proud to report that we've learned to be grateful during the daily transportation strategising. It's been a journey, and not every day has been easy-peasy, but we've learned that it's a gift to live a life with larger parameters than you can provide for. The Ladd Family is honoured to have a calling to this densely-populated city, no matter how many vehicles we have to maneuver it with. 

When God trusts you, when He really trusts You with His most beloved, He asks you do do things you can't do on your own. He uses every open hand to make space for more of His miracles.

Photo Credit: https://capetown-airport.co.za

He asked an army to dig ditches while they waited on the rain (2 Kings 3). He asked His Son to die so you could live.

Tomorrow morning, we wake up to a new season. Our sabbatical will be complete. This is the time God has set to begin planting the church. This is when we are moving into the house with the budget he prepared us for, on the street He’s put in my prayers for months. We will joyfully drive our car to get the work done, and spend the rest of our time walking, loving and knowing the neighborhood He's placed us in. 

The table has been prepared.
Tomorrow we are moving to the foothills of Table Mountain to plant a church. 
We can't wait to sit at our dinner table again!

We are perfectly positioned for God’s love to birth miracles and abundance into our family, future, home and into this city. Thank you for praying and participating on this journey with us.

Friday night in Hout Bay

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www.chrisandkacy.com

Payback

The Ladd Family has something to share. It’s big, bold and urgent.

Many of you have followed along on our family’s journey. (Here’s a link to a silly story of us coming together as a family.)

You might have been there in Tennessee when Chris gave up his passion for trail running and mountains to move to Africa. He came as a single man, willingly surrendering his desires for a family and the mountains. Or perhaps you remember me finding deep fulfillment in my family counseling career and painstakingly giving my therapy licensure back to God, choosing to stay permanently in South Africa to care for Lifa. He has no birth certificate and the circumstances were messy, so I accepted the likelihood of being a lifelong single mom without any legal way to protect my child.

There have been dangerous and difficult times since we said “yes” to God’s call in our lives, many of them better left unspoken. But we have also learned when it’s important to speak, and today is one of those days.

Today, we can tell you that surrender, the gut-wrenching, wholehearted, painful surrender counts. Every bit of it. And it’s worth it.

This week, we see the secret surrenderings over all those years, even the midnight ones were not hidden from God. They’re worth something to Him, and He’s restores what we lay at His feet in the way only He can do.

Yesterday, we took a risk and shared our story with some family lawyers.

We have decided to pursue legal co-guardianship of Lifa. That means Chris, myself and Lifa’s biological father would all have parental rights over Lifa. He has never been counted and has no legal rights. With guardians, Lifa could be safe, secured and provided for.

He can be a kid. With parents

A human being. With rights. 

We weren’t sure we could even afford the one-hour consultation cost, so we prayed, researched and made phone calls first. We decided that these particular lawyers would be the best stewardship of our family’s resources. As it turns out, the family law advocate we will trust to take our names and future to the South African High Court lives on the same street that we will move into next week. It’s the very street and its residents God has been prompting me to pray over for the past 3 months!

The lawyers soaked in every detail and document and then spelled out the process. They said, “Within a few weeks, you could easily have co-guardianship of Lifa.”

They just said it like it was a normal sentence.

They said it like heaven hadn’t just come down to earth, as though they couldn’t hear the chains falling off over the sound of their pencils scratching facts on legal pads. They said it like breaking off generational curses is their day job. (It basically is.)

They told us the cost and the steps:

First, they will write affidavits for parental rights for myself, Chris and Lifa’s biological father. Next, Chris will have to fly across the country to Lifa’s father, have the affidavit translated and explained to him so he can sign and legalize it. Then, we will bring it back to the lawyers. The advocate (who will be our neighbor by then) will submit them to the High Court. With the favor of the court, LIFA WILL HAVE GUARDIANS WITHIN 48 HOURS OF SUBMISSION.

South African High Court in Cape Town

He’s been invisible for 9 years.

It’s been 7 years of fighting, striving, surrendering, and doubting.

And it’s time for payback.

Since our arrival to Cape Town, God has kept us tucked into His favor. He has restored my husband to the mountains. He has even given me a place to exercise my passions and use my clinical counseling skills. He’s paid back those small surrenders that seemed so big at one time. He’s paid them back with more purpose and abundance than we could have dreamt on our own.

And now… Even now…

He’s paying back what Lifa’s never known he didn’t have.

He’s paying back the prayers of a parent’s raw, rendered heart.

He’s paying back 6 years of sleepless nights.

He’s paying back all those tears and struggles with identity.

He’s giving Lifa a name and a place.

He’s recognizing me as a mom and Chris a dad.

Even Lifa’s father, who’s never had a name or an identity, is becoming a dad. His name will be written down for the first time in history.

He pays back what we didn’t even know we needed.

He deposits more into us than we could ever spend of ourselves.

Pray for a smooth and easy process of establishing legal co-guardianship of Lifa.

Pray for Lifa’s name, his father’s name, our family’s name to be written, sealed, secured.

Pray for our finances to pay for legalities, our communication with Lifa’s father, Chris’ upcoming travel, family relationships, favor with the High Court, wisdom and discernment.

Pray for all the dead dreams being resurrected into something bigger and better than we ever imagined. Pray in faith with us, and remember it.

This same payback is available to you – maybe even more. Whether it’s your midnight or your morning, your prayers and your renderings count. Share your faith with us and share in the bounty of this testimony.

Everything you spend counts for something. Everything you give for God comes back exponentially. Don’t stop in the middle of the night, whether it’s been 7 years or 70. It counts.

If you would like to give toward our upcoming lawyer fees or join our family’s monthly support team, click here.

Joel 2: 12 "Yet even now," declares the Lord, "return to me with all your heart… 25“So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten. The crawling locust, the consuming locust, and the chewing locust, my great army which I sent among you. 26You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied and praise the name of the Lord your God Who has dealt wondrously with you; And My people shall never be put to shame.

It's Like Taking a Walk on the Beach

After my first year in South Africa, I visited my family in Texas. I took a walk… No, a stomp down the beach on Galveston Island, spiritually arrested with the choice God had laid before me. He gave me a “Yes or No only” invitation for a very special kind of life and family.

 

When I ran out of beach to walk, I took a spiritual leap. With sandy feet and a tear-salted heart, I said, “Yes, God. You can write my family story. From this day forward, I will commit to being Lifa’s mom, no matter what happens.”  

 

There was no paperwork to validate the invisible covenant I had made and things only got harder from there. When I returned to South Africa, I spent countless hours advocating for justice for the invisible children around me, with one especially in mind.

 

Lifa is a person – real flesh and blood with a beating heart – but there’s not a piece of paper in the world to prove it. Lifa deserves an education, health care, protection, a hope and a future in his nation.

 

I’ve heard “It’s impossible,” a trajillion times out of every type of social justice officer in South Africa. Everything changed once my feet landed on Yes in the sand that day. Everything became possible. Not easy. Not immediate. But possible.

 

A few years later, I took another fateful walk down a wedding aisle. We made a covenant to be a family that walks in God’s miraculous love. We knew we were better together and committed to live in a way that shows and requires God's miracle-sized love. 

 

Some days, that journey is tough.

South Africa started school yesterday, and Lifa had to stay home.

Lifa has never had the right or access to a proper education. I’ve lived in South Africa for seven full years as of yesterday, and I have spent six of them fighting for his rights. My husband’s YES to stand in the gap with us has been a game-changer. We believe in the power of our united prayers- the impossible doesn’t stand a chance when a Miracle Family brings it to the throne.

 

We brought it. We had an excruciatingly disappointing day while all the other kids went to school, but we know all things are possible with Christ - in Cape Town and to the ends of the earth.

 

AND GUESS WHAT: Impossible started losing this morning.

The God of all things possible started “The Great Cape Town Takeover." 

Mission: All Things Are Possible. 

 

Today is the first day of my 8^th year in Africa

 

Today Lifa started his first day of school. 

Legally. Validated. Visible.

Invisible and impossible is broken off forever.

 

There was just one school in all of Cape Town that did not send us away with an impossible “No.” The principal invited us into his office and said “Yes, if…” If we were able to make the invisible boy visible to the government.

 

The school’s admissions counselor has not eaten breakfast or had coffee in a week because she’s spent all of her mornings on the phone with me and the education department. She's denied herself push for possible, fighting for the "Yes, if" with us.

 

Yesterday, I made my way into the big boss’ office in the Department of Education. I went with folder full of paperwork and a boatload of prayer. I sat in the office and watched everything impossible become possible. She made a phone call, sent an email, and IT WAS DONE.

 

She told me Lifa could go to school the next day. I kept my cool: I burst into tears and asked if I could hug her before I went to cry in the car. I called my husband, and we wept miracle’s tears together. I drove straight to the school to give hugs, flowers and chocolate to the admissions counselor. I went home to hug my guys HARD. And we got to work… there were books to cover, lunches to pack, ties to tie, stuff to do.

EIGHTEEN notebooks covered by the incredible Mr. Ladd.

Getting the tie ready for the first day.
Lifa is also really good at keeping his cool.

This morning, as we headed TO SCHOOL, I looked at Lifa and said, "It's like we're walking through the Red Sea this morning." I asked him if he remembered when everything felt impossible for the slaves who were trying to get to freedom, and then suddenly God made it possible His way - He simply opened up the ocean. Lifa looked at me and said, “I was thinking the same thing, Mom.”

“Lifa, this drive to school is like taking a walk on the beach.”

 

We’ve faced fears, struggles and a lot of impossibilities, but impossible has parted like the ocean and made way for the possible. It took a lot of work and a lot of people, but we know Who made the sandy way.

Lifa was full of questions about what the day would hold, but not about Who held him. We’ve got a lot to learn here, but we’re going to keep our feet sandy and our hearts set on Yes.

It's Not What We Expected.

Three sets of folded legs sat in a shaded circle in Cape Town. Three sets of hands plucked blades of grass and doodled with twigs in the dirt, mirroring our internal fidgeting that day. Our family gathered in Chris and Lifa’s favorite Frisbee field to talk to Lifa about what to expect before we took him to visit his biological father.

As Lifa has learned to thrive in Chris’ loving, engaging fatherhood, it became almost unbearable for him to know anything different. As he thought about visiting his biological father, he created a fantasy, hero-dad that takes him shark-diving in the middle of a dry nation. He developed an entire relationship that never existed. Lifa had amped himself up to the point of exhaustion for visiting his hero-dad, and we had to help him put himself together and develop some realistic perspective before we could drop him off.  

He was sure it was going to be different this time.

We all hoped it would be different.

We expected it to be different because we’d made some major investments into some major changes.

While we were moving to Cape Town, we were also moving Lifa’s dad away from the oppressive household he was living in before. Lifa’s father has always lived in other girlfriends’ homes, full of chaos and people. He has little contact with Lifa during Lifa’s visits, and it’s been an increasingly unpleasant experience for Lifa. With the help of a local pastor, we secured and furnished a home for Lifa’s father in a safe community near people we know. We tried to set him up for success, to be the head of his household and have all the physical elements he needed for a good Christmas with his son. It could be his first experience getting to know Lifa.

Lifa was STOKED. He felt so loved that his dad got a new house, that he would have his own bed for the first time, and he would never have to go into the scary house with the mean family he’d visited before. Chris and I were excited to know that Lifa would be safer, closer to us, and great pastors were watching out for him. We knew parenting would be a whole new ball game, so Chris shared some basic principles of how to protect your child with Lifa’s father and taught Lifa how to make his own eggs. I filled a suitcase with enough clothes to never have to do laundry and enough activities to keep him busy.

With Lifa’s nail-biting anxiety in full-form, Chris (also a nail-biter) made a deal that if Lifa’s nails were longer than his when we picked him up, we would go straight to Toys R Us. Lifa could choose any toy in the store he wanted. (Chris the super-dad has a super-soft heart… he basically just agreed to spend our life savings on Lego’s so Lifa would have something to look forward to. That’s my man.)

We want his dad to always have a hero’s place in Lifa’s heart, and we’re committed to doing whatever is within our capacity to help with that.

Lifa has been at his dad’s house for 10 days now.

It’s not been what we expected.

The Ladd Family arrived with Lifa and a truckload of home goods. With the pastor’s translation, we told Lifa’s dad stories of Lifa’s strengths, skills, and Lifa made plans to make placemats for new table we had just delivered.

Although we’ve helped change his physical circumstances, Lifa’s dad is recreating the lifestyle he lived before. Most days, Lifa has slept over at the pastor’s house because his dad invited a new girlfriend and her child to live with him. Lifa doesn’t have enough space to sleep and the girlfriend doesn’t treat him well. Lifa told me on the phone the other day that he worries relentlessly because his dad is not home at night, and he’s afraid he will never come back… but he has not touched his nails. “No way, not even once. How’s dad? What’s he doing? Is he biting his nails?”

Chris and I considered abandoning all plans and going to pick Lifa up. I cried on the phone with the pastor, prayed with Lifa, and pressed deeply into God with my husband. Finally, we had nothing left to do but remember the promises and instructions God had given us before because He is the only One who does not disappoint.

Years ago, when I cried by myself on the road to drop Lifa off with his father, God told me to keep making that drive until He told me to stop. I have no authority to take Lifa’s relationship with his father in my own hands. I don’t have to understand God’s plans for them to be fulfilled. I just have to get in the car. The distance is a lot further, but that word still stands true.

The King of Kings spoke to my husband about one little warrior He is raising up with passion and purpose for the nation of South Africa, and that warrior training was not something we should protect him from. He said to Chris, “It is finished.” His Fatherly seal of guardianship and safety is over Lifa and that would not be compromised. God’s protection, training and purpose fulfillment may not look or feel the way we want it to, but it’s good. It’s better. It’s bigger. It’s everlasting.

It’s Christmas week. It’s not exactly the way we would have planned it, and it’s not the kind of Christmas we expected Lifa to have with his dad.

That puts us in the perfect position to celebrate Christmas for what it really is.

If there’s any holiday built on not being what was expected, it is Christmas.

Can you imagine the potential for devastation of unmarried teenagers on a government-mandated, extraordinarily uncomfortable, 9-month-pregnant road trip on a donkey - only to find out that their baby would be born in a stinky stable?

Can you fathom the disappointment of history itself when a dirty, fatherless baby entered the working class world and called himself the Way to the Father?

That first Christmas might have been the greatest unmet expectation of all time for those who thought they knew what salvation and redemption would look like. Expectations can disappoint us, and they almost always do. But hope… Hope does not disappoint.

Just like in Lifa’s life, the words the Father spoke are still true for all of us. We can try to make life look the way we expected, or we can believe for something bigger than we can fathom. We can celebrate that His Family makes room for the illegitimate, the dirty, the downcast, the ones who don’t know how to live any way than they’ve lived before. We can celebrate the Father who will go the extra mile, even when it looks like suffering, to make sure we’re strong enough for what He has planned.

We can celebrate that Christmas is the miracle of a family that lets go of their dreams of the way it should be for the way it could be.

We could go pick up Lifa right now and have a rockin’ family Christmas filled with Lego’s and pumpkin cake. Everyone would be relieved for the moment. We could undo all our unmet expectations with our own hands and hugs.

But there’s more than that.

My man and I are going to have a two-person, awe-filled, sweaty, summer-in-Swaziland Christmas together. We are going to give deep thanks to the God that has more for us and for Lifa than we could ever dream, think or imagine.

His safety is better than ours.

His purposes are eternal.

His preparations are far better than scrambled eggs and clean laundry.

Merry Christmas!

Thanksgiving is important.

We didn’t have a bustling, people-filled Thanksgiving celebration this year.

We don’t know many people in this city yet, and South Africa doesn’t know Thanksgiving. We are our pinching pennies (or rands), and the table is tiny in our current rental house. And all of my placemats and tablecloths are in a storage unit in Johannesburg until February.  This is not the proper recipe for a Hallmark Thanksgiving special.

I couldn’t contain my cry-voice for a solid three days as I walked around the rental house muttering, “Thanksgiving is important.” It’s an entirely delicious holiday centered on gathering at a table around family, feasting and gratitude. That’s my dream world. Thanksgiving is important.

We came to Cape Town with a plan and a purpose. For me, it seems like all of Cape Town should be at our Thanksgiving dinner table, laughing, loving and learning that pies are sweet and not savory. But we just aren’t there yet, guys.

We moved less than a month ago, and to say we are still learning our way is the understatement of the year. Chris and I entered a foreign mission field one time before and remember the adjustments – driving the wrong way down one-way streets, not understanding anything someone just said even though they were actually speaking English that time, and the enormous amount of extra energy it takes to understand your surroundings and to live, really live there. We are still in the same country but feel like we are doing it all over again.

And then there’s Lifa, who had never even seen a big city before we moved here. We all learned he has a fear of heights after his first experience on a 3-story escalator. He can’t figure out why there are squirrels instead of monkeys in the yard, and he’s been taking 3-hour naps daily because the thinking, feeling, observing and trying to process his new world has exhausted him.

We’ve got a lot going on over here, y’all.

God told us to go to Table Mountain, and that He has prepared that table for us. Yesterday, as we congratulated ourselves for successfully running one errand and meeting with a local pastor, I realized we might not be ready for all of Cape Town to sit down at our dinner table just yet.

I love feeding people and preparing tables. But there is a better feast and a bigger table than what I can imagine, and that’s the one I want to gather at.

Let’s be real, there is no better table presentation than this:

Table Mountain. My man takes beautiful photos.

So what did we do for Thanksgiving? We prepared a beautiful table as a thanksgiving offering to God, proclaiming we are going give our everything no matter how meager.

We made a budget and began preparing the most cost-effective, wonderful Thanksgiving meal in the history of South African Thanksgiving meals. Lifa found security in sitting at a table with me to help trim green beans, tear bread, and sing worship songs. He found a little more of himself when I put him in charge of card-making and table-setting.

I secretly assembled and cooked the dishes during his naps so he could operate within his capacity and still feel like an accomplished Thanksgiving ninja. We picked rosemary and lemons out of the yard to dress the turkey, cut flowers and vines to decorate, and set beautiful tiny tables with borrowed tablecloths.

We gathered our little family at the base of Table Mountain.

God prepared the table. We brought everything we had to it, and we sat down to eat. It was the sweetest, most important kind of Thanksgiving there ever was.

It reminded me of another similar Thanksgiving feast that had a tight budget, tired people and limited capacities. It was a long time ago, and it wasn’t a family of 3 or the city of Cape Town. It was a crowd of 50,000 families sitting hungry on a hill listening to Jesus. They probably came to that hill like we came to Cape Town, with awe, expectation and promise. There was so much to hear, see and learn, they eventually got tired, hungry, and possibly had cry-voices. Jesus’ disciples muttered that there was not food, just like I muttered that there were no people or tablecloths.

And then there was that one kid.

I like to think that kid wore a superhero t-shirt and had a slightly squished packed lunch from his mom. He probably woke up with extra shiny eyes set on adventure that morning. When tired and cranky hit like a hurricane, he took what he had – one little lunch that probably had a note written on the napkin – and he ran with it. He ran it to the front of the mob like it was the most practical, logical thing in the world. If someone’s hungry, you share your lunch.

There’s something powerful about gathering up the meager portion that’s yours and putting it in holy hands.

We’re not sure how to maneuver through Cape Town, find refreshment on sabbatical, or even where we are going to live in December and January while we are in-between rental house leases. But we are sure of one thing: We’re going to run with what we have to the front of the hungry crowd, and put it all in holy hands.

We have a healthy 8-year old, leftovers in the fridge, and a lot to be thankful for. Lifa has been set apart with a special calling for his nation, but right now he just needs extra naps and to practice subtraction and multiplication. So that’s what we’re doing today. While he takes naps, we are also starting a process for his advocacy, justice and future.

Tomorrow we will release a newsletter with a more illuminating account of the realities of education and dire need in South Africa. We can’t stand on top of the mountain and solve all the world's problems on a Tuesday, but we can invite you to gather on the hill and be a part of the miracle with us.

Giving Tuesday is an international campaign for starting the giving season with the kind of giving that leaves a legacy. We will be sharing through a newsletter and social media how you can join us this Giving Tuesday by starting with one little shiny-eyed kid, one future, and one need that just might be a catalyst for a lot of shiny eyes, bright futures and miracles.

What if we become a part of something much greater than lunch on a Tuesday? 

What if we bring what we've got, and end up with a lifetime of leftover miracles?

Eat some leftovers today, and think about it.

15 Sleeps. 262 Steps.

We have slept in Cape Town for 15 sleeps. We have explored the mountain, picnicked on the beach, and perused local markets.

We are doing all the other things you do when you move to a new city as well. I joined a gym, and Chris is mastering the Table Mountain trail system for running. I walk down every aisle of every grocery store, trying to find “the one”, my grocery store soul mate.

We are learning how to get around and how not to. The lady on my phone’s GPS tells me what to do, but was markedly unhelpful yesterday when I got stuck in a parking garage after not accomplishing any of the things on my list.

Days are full of touring schools and filling out paperwork. We are thrilled at the high quality of education here and equally bewildered by the fact that we can’t find a single (affordable) school with an open seat for Lifa – not even in government schools! True story: Two ladies told me this week that they start applying for their kids to get in school while they are still pregnant, and one school told me to fill out an application immediately so Lifa might have a chance of getting in for 8^th grade. That’s 5 years from now!

We found a charming house to rent next year and are very excited to settle in with our own furniture and our puppies! We’ve found paths for afternoon walks, have become regulars at Mr. Arthur’s shop, and Lifa and Chris know the perfect park to work on their Frisbee trick shots.

I haven’t written anything since we moved to Cape Town because there’s nothing extraordinarily noteworthy about moving. People move all the time. They find their favorite grocery store, learn parking garage etiquette, and find the nearby shop to buy milk. (We also found out that Mr. Arthur has some jammin’ good croissants to go with that milk on a Saturday morning. Lifa actually had to pause and emotionally pull himself together after the first buttery bite.)

We are enjoying the adventures and misadventures that come with a new city. Everything is a super-exciting first for Lifa. He has become a full-fledged beach lover with a heart set on being able to run in the mountains with Chris one day. We’re timing 5k runs through the neighborhood, and he’s ready to sign up for surf lessons as soon as he overcomes that pesky fear of water.

My husband takes the best pictures.

I think I’m just as awestruck as Lifa by the enormous potential and the waves to overcome. He wants to take on the ocean and the mountains, and I want to sit at every table with every type of person and taste every type of food in this city.

The rest of the neighborhood is waking up for work and school right now, and I’m thinking about how there’s a there’s a lot more waking up still to happen in me, Lifa, our family, and in this city. I’m sipping (possibly chugging) coffee in a picturesque setting. Currently, the clouds are spreading themselves over Table Mountain, tucking it away like a secret. I have re-named my favorite nearby street “Fairy Road” and call the guys’ Frisbee park “Magical Fairyland”. (Super-manly, I know.) But, for real, it is so lovely that it practically sparkles.

Part of my fairy life. This is just a typical afternoon 5k in the neighborhood.

Cape Town: It’s enchanting; it’s amazing; it’s a bucket list city.  We didn’t move for the views, the adventure or the charm. We moved to Cape Town to live in Cape Town because we see something more beautiful here than sparkles and fairydust. Before we tackle the day’s life stuff, all three of us sit down with Life Himself, and we pray for this city. We know that Jesus has a big, abundant plan for this bucket list city.

We hang on to that Truth, and then we take on all that other stuff. Trust me, we are a work in progress over here… Our little future surfer, Frisbee champ, and mountain runner in the making has been bug-eyed with overstimulation for 15 days now. Lifa needs extra naps and can easily get lost in his own thoughts on the afternoons when the backyard starts to feel small and he’s missing school days and soccer practice. I had a mild, internal meltdown when I realized I didn’t have a single name in this city to write as an emergency contact on Lifa’s school applications and when Chris gently and lovingly asked me how I would like to celebrate Thanksgiving.

When life-stuff starts to overwhelm, my pumpkin pie spices are packed too far away, and Lifa’s eyes have turn Texas-sized, we scale life back to what makes us alive. I dig through this rental house's cookware, make one of our favorite meals, and we squeeze into a tiny table in the sunroom for dinner. We hold hands, Lifa prays, and we talk about our highs and lows for the day. Afterward, we clear the table together and laugh at Lifa’s sideways walking and talking because he just can’t handle his new Cape Town late-night hours. (He's been staying up until almost 8pm. He can't even believe how ridiculous his life is.)

Last week, Lifa got stir-crazy and drove me crazy in the process. We decided to take our at-home learning to the streets. We walked outside with a 3-item grocery list for Lifa to predict costs and pay for. And then we counted steps, by ones and then by two’s, to get to Mr. Arthur’s shop and the Magical Fairyland Frisbee park. It’s 103 steps to the park, and 262 steps to Mr. Arthur’s.

I don’t know what or where we’re going to eat Thanksgiving Dinner, and Lifa doesn’t know how to surf – or even swim yet. But we know we are only 103 steps from a Magical Frisbee-throwing Fairyland and 262 steps from heaven-baked croissants. And that’s not a bad start.

People move all the time. People go to work and school and buy milk and do life stuff all the time. But not a lot of people live. Not a lot of people come to the tiny table they have, take an inventory of their blessings, and count their steps. We want to be those people and make life count in Cape Town.

If you and I chose to reel in the unraveled places and gather around the good, whether it’s a tiny dinner table or a phone call with a friend, we could be alive instead of just busy with life stuff. Instead of thinking about not knowing where or how to celebrate Thanksgiving, I can celebrate knowing it only takes 262 steps (counted in giggly-two’s by Lifa) to have a friendly conversation about church with Mr. Arthur and buy milk… or croissants for the guys and dark chocolate for me… whichever.

Let’s make this life count.

Take 262 steps, and be alive today.

The First Day of Sabbatical: PJ Edition

Today I don’t “live” anywhere. Today looks like an Air BnB rental, monkeys on the roof, the Indian Ocean, pajama time, two cups of coffee, and my family.

We just ended our term with the ministry, and we haven’t made it to the city where we will plant the new church yet. We slept as late as we could. (6:30am… learning to rest takes time). We let it sink in that we are here - just us, just here. We poured cups of coffee and opened our Bibles.

This is Day 1 of sabbatical, the 3-month commitment to God, where we intentionally exchange the “what we do’s” for the “who He is and what He will do”. We start with no address and nothing to do except for family (the verb family) and drink coffee. (Lifa drinks milk.) 

This morning I started my sabbatical by looking back and giving thanks. I remembered fifteen years ago, when a college scholarship and great expectation carried me out of Alvin, Texas - the only town I’d ever known. Since then, I’ve had 10 different addresses and have said goodnight in more places than I can count. 

For the past seven years, I have lived in White River, Mpumalanga. (Mpumalanga is pronounced just like it’s spelled and is a province in South Africa.) I was heavy with emotion as we pulled out of that green gate for the last time. I haven’t lived in any town as long as I’ve lived in White River since I was 17-years old. White River is the place where we became a family. 

This morning, God showed me there was a lot more to my heart for family than seven years could hold. While Lifa watched The Jungle Book (the original…it’s a bare necessity) and my husband read the book of Daniel, I thanked God for a family I didn’t deserve. A family that is so for family. For familying together. I asked God how I deserved a family so extraordinary, burgeoning with such a deep love for family that we are begin entrusted with expanding His Family through a church. (Totally don’t deserve it BTW.) He took me on a journey of memories from way back then to right here in my jammies.

I remembered White River, where my heart switched from caring for the orphan, to strengthening the family. If we have families, then we don’t have orphans. 

I thought about how God called me to not think, speak or live in the poverty and sickness around me, but to thrive, live and give away my inheritance and health. I bear within me wealth and health that do not run out. I can give it away without cost. I thought about all the stories that didn’t make sense according to the world, unchartable highs and lows, and something even better than that...

There is unchartable joy in being a family that makes room for people, instead of dwelling on the plight of the orphan. If we are a family, then we do not have orphans after all. 

The God who wrote this story started WAY longer than 7 years ago, way longer than 32 years ago. Today He reminded me of all the ways He held me in his hand and taught me about family, even when I didn’t know I needed to learn it. When my goal was independence, He let me need people and gave me the people I needed. When my mindset was for survival, He personally packed my survival kit with secrets of abundant life tucked inside. When the walls burned down and I didn’t have a place to belong, He brought home after home to give me the place I needed. When I didn’t know I was starving for substance, He placed me at countless family dinner tables. When I tried to take things into my own hands to save the orphaned, He was holding me in His hands, patiently waiting, writing, knowing. When I could not see or understand family the way it was designed, I was surrounded by it like the mountains surround Jerusalem. I was hemmed in when I didn’t know I was fraying. 

So, before I even take off my pajamas on this first day of sabbatical, (it may or may not be noon right now…), I have to say thank you. Before beginning something new, before parking at a new address or opening the next chapter of family, I have to give thanks to the people who held me so I could behold.

I have an incredible family: Rosa lived with limitless sacrifice and Sister Jo gives perfect, sparkly love. And NaNa is perfect. Actual perfect. I have a family that made family fun, always jumped in the river,  and never questioned any of my moves or starting a family on the other side of the world. Thank you, thank you, thank you. 

I can’t list you all, but here’s a good start. 

• Thank you South Park Baptist Church for being a steady, safe house to go to as a child, for Mr. Newton and the others who showed me that loving Jesus makes you look different, and for the man with the moustache that always opened the car door for me.
• Thank you Mrs. Cavallo and all the other teachers that saw me, shaped me, encouraged me, celebrated me, and stuck with me - even that time I peed my pants in P.E.
• Thank you Alvin First United Methodist Church for being the place and especially for being the people that showed me how to have a relationship with God, a real relationship with God. For Carla’s mentorship and Cindy’s leadership. For the bus ride to Schlitterbahn that taught me church people are fun and for opening my eyes to missions and a world beyond myself. 
• Thank you, thank you, thank you to the Dam Fam for making me yours. This whole letter is inspired by the revelation God gave me about His love for me through you and the place you gave me, for a true look at the joyfulness that marks families centered on Christ, and for what it looks like to do church. To be church. There are not enough thank you’s. 
• Thank you to the Ramirez family and the countless other families, friends and leaders who always had a couch I could fall into and be home. 
• Thank you Phi Lamb sisters for showing me what it’s like to have Christ-centered, real, deep friendships. For all the prayers, dance parties, and letting me be all the way me.
• Thank you Sky Ranch Camp for showing me how to give all you’ve got, no matter what it takes, to make sure every kid has a chance to meet Jesus. And for the ginormous tubs of peanut butter we raided from the kitchen. (Sorry about that.)
• Thank you to my Fuller Seminary professors and Kenichi for accepting me with no credentials and with no idea what I was doing. For patience when I melted down when I got my first “B” because I couldn’t understand any of the -ology words and for Kenichi’s constant encouragement and Truth. Most importantly, for exposing me to the Kingdom of God, making me think, and forcing me to grip onto my faith in a way I never had.
• Thank you to the ladies of Chang Commons for changing my life with the most profound friendship and community I’ve ever encountered. No words can communicate what the red couch can. 
• Thank you Christian Assembly Church and Kathy for walking me further into missions and worshiping in community. 
• Thank you Eve and Lily for letting me be family and for giving so much to come see me when I was far away - in Texas and South Africa.
• Thank you Dr. Glen Roberts, Lisa, Shakeh and the others who shared wisdom, brought perspective, let me use inflatable microphones and finger paint at work, and  helped me wrestle through advocating for hope and healing when “life” and mental health does what it can do to children, families and people. 
• Thank you Mona, Galveston, Bolivar Peninsula and all of the people I encountered during my time of working as a Hurricane Ike crisis counselor for showing me what its like to love where you live, and live where you live, no matter what life brings. 
• Thank you Ten Thousand Homes for welcoming Lifa in with me and being a learning, strengthening and stretching environment for me.
• Thank you ERC Mbonisweni for calling me a daughter, even when I looked different and spoke a different language than everyone else. You translated for me, taught me, and even let me teach you. You let me break all the norms to do art and throw parties from the pulpit. You showed me the word of God changes people. You showed me that Church works, and that changed the whole direction of my life. 
• Thank you Citymark Church and Pastor Steven Yoes for your outlandish, ridiculously committed love. For taking me in, trusting I hear God, and helping me do what He says. For being consistent family to me- no matter what you were going through, for coming, and for sticking with me. Thank you for believing in God’s excellence and creating it in worship and for your city. You’re real family, and you look like the Kingdom of God.  
• Thank you to those who gave to Glory House, for believing in your investment as it became a family and a church more than a building. 
• Thank you to our support team who sacrifices and gives for something beyond yourself. Every month and every dollar reminds me to believe bigger and to give of myself like you do. It’s mind-blowing. 
• Thank you Ladd Family for loving me and bejewelling me as your own treasure, even when you hadn’t met me and when I put on turquoise boots for our wedding. 
• Thank you to my husband for choosing me daily, seeing me for who I am and what I am, and still loving me more today than you did yesterday. Thank you for believing in me and in Christ in me, lovingly leading me, and wanting a lifetime of adventures with me. You’re of a caliber I could never deserve on my own, a daily reminder of God’s perfect and continuous grace. And you are sa-mokin’ hott.

When I didn’t know I was right in the palm of God’s hand, you were the fingers and the thumb that held me right there in place. Today I’m gathering up all of these strengths and truths that were planted in me through you, and I’m cultivating them with gratitude. I’m nurturing and harvesting them with great expectation in my own family and for our church. If we reach even one person in Cape Town, or anywhere to the ends of the earth, you have to know that you are in that touch. You are part of the hand that reaches, and that you matter more than you know. 

Thank you for being part of the hand that holds the whole world. Whether your name was in this list or not, know that you are part of something for someone. That someone at your dinner table, riding next to you in the car, or sitting in your classroom is going to look back and remember one day. They are going to become who they are because of the secrets you plant in them and the words you spoke over them. Know that today you can be a part of changing the future by the way you live and you love.

You have changed my life with your touch, and we’re gonna spread it all around. 

But, right now, we’re going to go to the beach.