I Love the Word Impossible. Ann Kiemel. Читать онлайн. Newlib. NEWLIB.NET

Автор: Ann Kiemel
Издательство: Ingram
Серия:
Жанр произведения: Личностный рост
Год издания: 0
isbn: 9781940242002
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talented personality who had made quite a

      mark in his church. one afternoon, i took an older,

      much-trusted Christian man with me, and after

      several hours of prayer in that tiny room, we saw a

      wasted body and spirit touched by God.

      and for awhile, literally changed.

      it was awesome and beautiful.

      i was caught up with a sense of mission and a

      miracle

      God.

      i so wanted this man to make it, to see God

      develop “something beautiful” for his

      tomorrows. he began

      telling me that this would only be possible if i

      became his wife and helped him. i was totally

      caught up in the cause of his survival.

      well, time revealed that i was off-course. my

      marrying him would certainly not have been the

      secret to his survival. only God was. i had some

      moments of poor judgment, i acted without good

      sense, but God knew that never was i more genuine

      in wanting a person to be His than i was then, and

      never was i any more sincere in seeking God’s

      direction.

      i’m grateful that God cared for both of us.

      we went our separate ways.

      some people in my church will always tag me “a

      poor risk” because of that incident where i almost

      did the wrong thing. and i must confess i’ve been

      just as guilty in tagging others.

      i hope i’m learning not to.

      as a child, my parents talked often about the secret

      to life: letting Jesus be Lord. today i have little

      assurance about MY ability to cope successfully

      with all that shall face me in life. i am more

      convinced than ever that if Jesus Christ controls

      me totally, and i faithfully seek Him, He will move

      quietly and constantly and protectively through

      the valleys

      agonies

      decisions

      incredibly stifling places.

      as we experience life, truth will grow

      in us if God is in us.

      i will always, i guess, “see through a glass darkly”

      on some things… but i can’t wait to ask God for

      just ten minutes of His time so He can sit down

      with me and answer some questions i have,

      and clear the confusions.

      someday i can.

      today, He expects me to be a

      woman—to fill the unknown, the uncertainties,

      and the empty places with Himself.

      to find the poise a living Lord can give.

       prejudice

      i grew up in hawaii.

      i was caucasian.

      but there was something

      about the oriental-island culture

      that absorbed under my skin.

      i found myself feeling japanese-hawaiian.

      or maybe i was wanting to feel that, because i

      wasn’t.

      i was the minority.

      i went through school being one in a handful of

      “haoles”… or foreigners.

      a minority isn’t fun. you stick out.

      everything good and bad that you do

      shows.

      some natural instinct makes us want to be at home

      in and a part of our setting. an acceptable part.

      my twin sister and i hung close.

      we cried a lot.

      we wanted dark skin.

      that was beautiful.

      we were blue-eyed and very fair.

      orientals are generally short and petite.

      we were tall and long-legged. most students

      were buddhists and hindus. we were Christian.

      on our friends’ coffee tables were shrines. on ours,

      the Bible. it seemed in every way,

      we were oddities

      in our setting.

      the sun brought us as close to dark skin as we could

      get. we spent hours on saturdays baking on waikiki

      shore lines, hoping to blend in with the others.

      today, jan and i are still sun lovers. we still feel

      more secure with a tan. feelings one learns in

      childhood are so hard to unlearn.

      i find myself still working at keeping my back very

      straight. as a child, i almost wished to be stooped

      rather than peer over everyone.

      anything to keep me from being too

      noticed in what i thought was a negative way.

      one kid who attended high school with my sister

      and me was also caucasian, and Christian.

      he was struggling for acceptance, too. he

      struggled so hard that he ignored us. i think i

      understand.

      if he could remove himself from the minority

      he was a part of, then maybe the majority would

      naturally scoop him in as one of them. it left us

      more alone, more insecure about our personhood,

      more rejecting of it.

      my sister recalls my mother or father coming to

      pick us up after school.

      she’d always go stand close to a group of kids so

      my parents wouldn’t know she had no friends. we

      knew that the prejudice existed.

      our minority position stared hard at us. but we

      hoped others weren’t so aware. there’s some

      comfort in not being pitied or openly rejected.

      we feel prejudice about a lot of things,

      but it’s subtle.

      that’s the way most prejudice is.

      we