Soft Heart Thick Skin

Our River at Sunset

I have a favorite quote written in the back of one of my Bibles. "Maturity is moving from a thin skin and a hard heart, to a thick skin and a soft heart." I remember who said it -- Vince Burke, in a message at CCF back when the church still met at the Valle Verde Country Club, I think. Fifteen years ago. I was 40. This quote so expresses who I want to be, it became a prayer of mine.

I could be called "mature" now. I hit 55 this year. I qualify for the Senior Discounts at Denny's, if indeed, I ever get to a Denny's. I can join the AARP. According to Psalms 90:10, I've got another 15 years left on this earth to age 70, or maybe 25 years, up to age 80, the verse says, "if we have the strength." On the other hand, two classmates from my high school graduating class died in the past few months -- one of cancer, one of a heart attack. Only God knows how much longer any of us will really be here. Our lives are truly in His hands.

As long as I am here, though, I want to live purposefully. I have a horror of becoming old without being mature. You know people like that, grumpy old ladies and grumpy old men. Always complaining, always carping, never content, forever offended by someone or something. Those people have thin skin. I am asking the Lord to help me grow up, to make me more like Christ, to give me a soft heart and thick skin. I want to be tough, when the situation demands toughness. I want to be not easily offended. I want to speak up when I need to speak up. But, then again, I don't ever want to be known as a Tough Old Broad. That would be a person with thick skin, but a hard heart.

A soft heart and thick skin is what Christ had. He was moved by the needs of the people around Him. He cried for his friends. He cried for the multitude who were "like sheep without a shepherd." He touched. He loved. He healed. Yet He boldly stood up to people when the situation demanded it. He took a whip and chased the money changers out of the temple. He knew when to speak up and when to remain silent. He toughly bore all the abuse hurled at him -- He was whipped, He was spat upon, He was insulted. He silently bore it all. He lived a powerful life.

Every so often I sense my heart growing hard. And so I'll ask the Lord to soften my heart. I want Him to speak to me. I want to hear His voice. One of the ways He speaks to me is by touching my heart. So if my heart is hardened, I have difficulty sensing His work in my life. Recently I've been in a couple of situations where I needed to be tough, to speak up, to confront. It wasn't "fun" for me. One way I know my heart isn't hard, is that I don't enjoy those kinds of confrontations. But because God gave me the strength to go ahead and do it, I realized God is answering my prayer to give me a thick skin.

As I continue to mature in years, Lord, please allow me to mature in spirit. Lord, grow my heart softer and my skin thicker.

More Goats, But In Manila

Manila

Posted a blog not too long ago about having to slow down in my driveway, so as not to hit the neighbor's goats. Something about living in a provincial city where the rural and urban sides of life intertwine.

So fast-forward a week. Bill and I are in Manila for a series of meetings. Manila is the 8th largest agglomerate city, with 19,200,000 people. It comes between New York at number 6, and LA at number 9. To give you an idea, my hometown of San Diego is number 134. Manila is also one of the most densely populated cities in the world, with all those people packed into a relatively small land-space. But there are still bits of undeveloped land tucked here and there, within the city limits. After all our meetings were over, Bill and I zoomed around the city picking up a few items we can't buy down in Puerto Princesa. IMPORTANT items, like pinto beans and La Victoria salsa, in case you wanted to know. As our taxi cut through to one of the ubiquitous shopping centers, the driver had to slow down for -- you guessed it -- goats in the road! We were passing by one of those bits of still-undeveloped land, where an enterprising soul grazed a small herd of goats in the weeds. One got loose from his tether and wandered out into the street. As we veered around Mr. Urban Billygoat, I scanned the horizon. I could see high-rises in every direction.

Had to chuckle at the irony of that. Are goats becoming a thematic item in my writing? I think not. But perhaps incongruence is.

A Question for Mr. Darwin

A big event in our lives right now is that we are going to be grandparents in January! Elisa and Chris are expecting. The due date is January 22, and we are planning to go to San Diego for that joyful event, Lord willing, of course. This is our first grandbaby and we are super excited about it. We don't know yet if it is a him or her, but we do know that this little one, the size of a plum, already had a unique set of fingerprints. In fact, this little baby has had his or her unique fingerprints for a couple of weeks already, as they appear at Week 13, and tomorrow starts Week 15 for Elisa.

I need you to explain this to me, Mr. Darwin. What is the
evolutionary purpose of unique fingerprints? Maybe millions of years
ago, those human-like creatures who all had fingerprints the same got
confused going through the bio-metric readers to get into their
skyscrapers, so people with unique fingerprints had a better chance
of keeping their jobs, and so continuing to pass on their genes? And
what gene is it that spins out a new set of fingerprints for each of
the (what is it now?) 6 billion or is it 8 billion people on the
planet? Or maybe it was that our human-like ancestors that got booked
for their crimes and fingerprinted, and didn't have unique
fingerprints all got mixed up with each other, so languished in their
jail cells, while those with unique fingerprints were able to be
properly identified and catalogued and so could properly serve out
their sentences or be released on time? I need some help here. I'm
just not getting how unique fingerprints contribute to the
propagation of the species through natural selection.

And as long as we are talking about unique, what about each snowflake
being unique? What is the purpose of that?

I propose that those unique fingerprints are the signature of God. In
my humble opinion God goes out of His way to extravagantly proclaim
His glory through Creation. As Bill says, "I personally go with the
Fearfully and Wonderfully Made explanation." That I can understand.

Barnyard Animals in our Neighborhood

Driving home the other day I had to slow down to not hit the two

little goats in the lane. They were tied to our neighbor's fence, but
had wandered out into the dirt road that leads to our house.

Every morning I wake up to the sound of roosters crowing. Lots of
roosters. Crowing really loud. In every direction. Our neighbors on
all sides of us keep chickens. Cock fighting is popular here in the
Philippines, and many Filipino men raise roosters. Several of the neighborhood chickens have figured out how to fly over the fence into our yard, so we often have
chickens pecking around our house as well. Unlike the
city where I grew up, no zoning laws prohibit farm
animals in the city.

And live in the city we do! Our house is one block back from a busy
street called The National Highway. The National Highway runs up and
down the eastern coast of Palawan. It is a two-lane road, paved for
the most part, well, at least it wants to be paved. But by the time it approaches the city of Puerto Princesa, it doesn't look much like a highway. More like a crowded
Third World street. The establishments closest to us include a
vulcanizing shop, some hardware and building supply stores, and an
elementary school. Motorcycles, trisikels (the local motorcycle plus
sidecar taxi), jeeps, trucks, cars and pedestrians weave among each
other. Little stalls selling after-school snacks, load for cell
phones, and daily necessities dot the side of the road. Dogs
occasionally venture out to cross the street, on the way to visit
their latest love interest. School kids wearing their cotton uniform navy skirts or
pants and white shirts, laden with heavy backpacks, run along
both sides of the street, excuse me, I mean The Highway.

Individual Packets of Shampoo and Toothpaste for Sale

I'm always amazed at the juxtaposition of rural and urban here in Puerto Princesa. Pinecrest Avenue, Serra Mesa, San Diego this isn't.
But I love it.

Fun Fotos

Searching through my IPhoto pics, trying to find one of Pidi, who was our neighbor in the tribe, and walked by our house several times every day, and who I always saw whenever I visited Aming, because he always spent all his spare time hanging out with Abil and Aming, but do you
think I can find one single picture of him anywhere? No, of course not. But here's one of me at Jollibee, the Philippine's answer to Mc Donalds. And here are some sticky rice goodies from our last church potluck in the tribe.
How many ways can you make a dessert out of sticky rice?

Praying for Pidi

Pidi arrived at our house barefoot, wearing ratty old shorts and a dirty tee-shirt. I had the doctor's appointment already lined up, so I had to take him in to see the doctor just like that. I don't know what the receptionist, or the other patients in the waiting room thought about the little barefoot man, with the big American woman.

I can only imagine. The doctor is a friend of ours, he attends the church we attend in town, and the Friday night Bible study we attend. He is new in town, like us. And I think he is new to having tribal people as patients, too. But he is a believer, and compassionate. He treated Pidi with respect and care. Pidi is mostly deaf, too, so communicating with him is complicated. His traveling companion, Karding, is used to "talking" to him using a combination of sign and lip-reading. I would speak to Karding in Palawano, Karding would sign to Pidi. The doctor used both Tagalog to talk to Karding, and English with me. It is hard to know how much Pidi understood of all that was going on around him and happening to him.

Before our next appointment, to get a biopsy of the growth on Pidi's foot, and x-rays taken at the local hospital, I was able to get Pidi some clothes. Most of the Palawanos have some "town clothes" -- nicer, newer clothes that they keep hidden away for trips to civilization. But Pidi never goes out of the tribe. Palawanos are small people, and Pidi is extra small for a Palawano, so we found shorts and a shirt to fit him in the children's department. And we bought him a pair of flips. The Palawanos all told us, "Pidi doesn't wear shoes." And on his bad foot, he couldn't. But, in town, it just isn't acceptable to go around barefoot. Pidi liked his new shorts and tee shirt. He was a good sport and gamely put on the one flip, carrying the other one around with him, as he went to get his xrays and biopsy done. The doctor is afraid that the growth is melanoma, and may have already spread to his lymph nodes. If that is the case, Pidi's foot will have to be amputated, something he really doesn't want to happen.

We are praying for Pidi, as we await the results of the biopsy. The results won't be back for one week, or maybe two weeks, so we sent Pidi and his traveling companion back home to the tribe to wait there. I had to smile, as my last view of Pidi was of him walking up the steps of the bus, barefoot, carrying both of his new flips.

(I can't find a picture of Pidi, so here is one of Karding, his traveling companion.)

Road Food

As far as Donna is concerned, the best part of any road trip is the snacks. Munching makes miles move. Especially on Palawan buses, if my taste buds and tummy are happy, my twisted spine doesn't complain so much from sitting crammed sideways on too-close-together seats. Discovery is the fun part. What can I get to eat here, at this stop? Well, if you were traveling with us on the road heading down the eastern coast of our island, one of our stops would be the tiny town of Abo-Abo. This is where the bus turns from the main north-south highway, and starts heading across the island to the other coast. And the people are waiting for you. This guy has a whole tub of goodies. We like the garlic peanuts. They contain all the best ingredients - peanuts (that's protein, right?), garlic (lots), salt (lots) and grease (again lots). Yum. He also has some boiled peanuts, cashews, banana chips and hardboiled eggs.

And what road trip wouldn't be complete without fresh crabs? Pick some up here, and carry them the rest of the way home. Just caught this morning, and still wiggling. Your seatmate on the bus won't mind. Go ahead, get a few.

I passed up the crabs.

When it was time for our return trip, the bus was scheduled to leave at 5 am, so the afternoon before, I headed out to scout for some kind of bread product to pack for our breakfast. I went from little store to little store in the little town of Sikud. I have to tell you, Sikud is not the Consumer Capital of the World. In other words, they ain't got much there. But then I finally found it. How could I pass it up? This bread was machine sliced.

But I think my favorite spot on this particular road trip was the gas station in the town of Narra. And I didn't even buy food there. I just made a run to their CR, or Comfort Room, the nice Philippine euphemism for bathroom. And I saw a cat or two. Then I saw another one. When I stopped to pet them, the proprietors of the gas station saw me enjoying their cats, so they gave a call, and a whole bunch more cats came running. They told me they had thirteen cats! By the food and water dishes in evidence, they were obviously loved and cared for. And the cats were tame and friendly, which is unusual in this country where a lot of people have cats for their utility (catching mice and rats) but don't really like them, or treat them as pets, the way Westerners do. This gas station wins the Cat Lovers Award for Palawan.

Puerto Ponderings

I am way overdue on updating my blog. Life would be simpler for me if I had a different personality. But as it is I am a mess of conflicting emotions much of the time. I so admire my friends who are straight-forward. They just make a decision, implement it, and don't look back. Not me. I get tangled up. And that is what has happened to my blog site. Previously, it focused on the Palawanos and my life with them down in the tribe. But now we've moved to the city of Puerto Princesa, 'Puerto' for short. So, why don't I just start writing now about my life in Puerto? Because:

Part of my heart is still down in our little house in the jungle

Part of me feels sad about leaving the people

Part of me feels bad about leaving our partners alone in the tribe

So, if I write about how much I am enjoying life here in the city, and all that we see God doing in this new location, those parts of me feel like I am being disloyal to the Palawanos and our partners.

BUT I think the time has come to just get over it, plunge in and start writing about life here nonetheless. And it has been an amazing ride.

Back in September of last year when the cauldron of the insurgency on Mindanao got stirred up and boiled over to Palawan, Bill and I had to evacuate our station in the tribe. And almost immediately we both became convinced that we weren't supposed to return to live in the tribe. At the time we thought it was because of the instability of the political situation. But as the weeks went by and the cauldron of insurgency went back to a simmer, with all the activity based on Mindanao, Southern Palawan became a safe place again. Our co-workers began to return to their stations. But Bill and I still didn't feel we were supposed to return to the tribe. We each had a strong check in our heart against returning home.

Now, we have to admit we aren't the most mystical people. We do believe in God. We do believe that He is active in our lives and is active in the whole world. But we aren't prone to hearing Him speak to us the way He did this time. Yes, He speaks to us through scripture. Yes, He speaks to us through our pastors' sermons. Yes, He speaks to us through the lives and the words of our brothers and sisters in the Lord. But this was one of those rare times when His voice just came us a word to our hearts, 'You aren't supposed to go back. You are supposed to move to Puerto.'

During our time in the U.S., we visited our dear friends Jeff and Helen Jackson. Jeff has a great library. In our guestroom was a book by Dallas Willard, Hearing God. The whole book is on the subject of hearing God's voice. Willard had some timely words for us. He says many things, but I'll just share one thing. . . one of the ways we can recognize God's voice is by the 'weight of authority' that comes with those promptings we receive from Him. Willard says, "The quality of God's voice is more a matter of the weight or impact an impression makes on our consciousness. A certain steady and calm force with which communications from God impact our soul, our innermost being, incline us toward assent and even toward active compliance. The assent or compliance is frequently given before the content of the communication is fully grasped. At least I find it so and others do as well." Bill and I both experienced that calm weight of authority. It wasn't like our minds wondered, 'Maybe we should stay out of the tribe and move up to Puerto now.' No, it was more like, 'It's time to move to Puerto now.' Bill has expressed it as, 'The decision was already made for us. We weren't the ones trying to make the decision.'

As I ponder this move, I wonder IF God was the one behind moving us to Puerto, and IF we weren't being relocated for negative reasons -- to avoid the insurgency-- then might there be positive reasons for us to be in Puerto? Maybe the Lord wasn't causing us to flee a bad situation, but instead was forcing us to move toward some good He had for us.