Kandahar Spring

Editor’s Note: Heather McColl Morgan, a favorite writer for Excellent or Praiseworthy, wrote this posting when she was deployed. We are grateful that she took some time to reflect and share these thoughts with us before returning home.

Excellent or Praiseworthy is posted on Monday and Thursday nights.

“ . . . because those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by Him we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’ The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in His sufferings in order that we may also share in His glory.” — Romans 8: 14-18

It is getting warm here in the desert and things are very busy.

Last month I heard a few people pose different versions of a question asked by many of us: “Why are we here?” Thoughts on U.S. foreign policy and the meaning of life aside, this question can be expected whenever there is a drastic shift in priorities and mission set, as people go to war with one idea of why they’re going and what they’ll be doing— which inevitably takes new, dramatic twists and turns, especially this late in the war. This question also struck me as having a basic answer for believers in Christ’s death, resurrection, and redemption. If Christ—with God the Father and the Holy Spirit—is indeed a co-creator, co-sustainer, and co-restorer of this broken world . . . and if we are, as St. Paul says, “heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ,” then the following things can be said of us, no matter where we find ourselves and no matter what we may be doing:

WE CREATE: In dark, empty places we speak and make something new and good into being.

WE SUSTAIN: We destroy or remove what is dead or diseased, and help what is alive to grow and function.

WE RESTORE: Where there is willingness and purpose, we help put broken people, things, and situations back together.

This has been especially encouraging to my husband and I during periods of transition and waiting in the military, where we can’t always use our best gifts daily, and are made constantly aware of our weaknesses. While we continue to discern and pursue our vocation as that activity where “our great joy meets the world’s great need,” we realized early on that our military service days were not meant to be our life’s work but a necessary part of our vocational journey.

While we wait, the calling of a Christ-follower is this: within our duties and obligations, we find space to create, to sustain, and to restore because we bear the image of God. This will look different for each of us, and will undoubtedly cause friction (sometimes even with other believers) as we try to discern the void, the destructive, the broken, from what is worth preserving and saving.

I will say that it also makes the day more adventurous to be on the lookout for examples of people doing this!  As quickly the spring in Kandahar has given way to summer, we watch each other transform and mature with our various challenges. The hope is that each day we are more able to recognize brokenness in our world, and more equipped and ready to participate in the creative, restorative ways that God makes all things new, starting with us.

Questions to Share:

1. What brokenness do you see in the world around you?  How can we encourage each other by naming the brokenness we see around us and in ourselves?

2. How can we work alongside others using our different experiences and gifts to co-create, co-sustain and co-restore the world with God?