Faithful

Last summer, as I shared about my time in China, two phrases stuck out as a common theme, He is Big and He is faithful. These two things seem to be under the most attack of doubt this year. 

As I welcomed my new freshman and let them chose English names, I was intrigued by the choice of one boy, Faithful. "This is interesting. :)" I thought. Now, 8.5 months later, I should have recognized that it was a sign of where I should be going, but not to expect the same.

Some people are really easy to love, when you see them your heart jumps and is excited, you think what they do is cute and funny, and you talk about them a lot. You genuinely enjoy spending time with them, (even if the language barrier is difficult at times and tiring.) Then there's other people who sometimes you want to jump in another room so you dont have to talk to them. When you see them, everything in you sinks a little because you know the focus and energy it's going to take from you. I know it sound horrible, but it's often true and I dont want it to be. It's been an honest struggle and currently wearing me out. I feel like the Father has put Him there for a reason, but even that took me some time to see. For the longest time, I just wanted to get through the conversations - which are 80% about "the skill of pronunciation" and the other 17% often sounds like an inspirational speech/sales pitch but with high Chinese mentality. The remaining 3% is potentially silence or choppy answers when I ask questions such as "how was your day?," "what do you want to eat?" or "What are you going to do this weekend?" He often waits for me outside of my class which kind of kills the free time or mingling afterwards. You can count on the fact that Friday afternoon after my class, he will be there saying "do you have some plans?" In my selfishness/own mind, I often just want 30 min/hour after all my classes of the week to just sit and think or to go do something fun or to relax - but I found I have to have plans now for that question that awaits me at 3:20 every Friday afternoon. 

After a few months of just trying to get through the conversations, the Father finally showed me there's a reason he's in front of me. He's one of the people I need to be pouring into. By His grace and the HS changing my mind, we had a new perspective on the conversation. He was there for me to share life with. I also learned how so much of the time we accept what's good or bad based upon what others think is cool or not. Most people can't stand him and due to his 3-30 min monologues, lack of questions about you, intense vocabulary and speech like conversations. He's also just socially awkward and very one-track minded. Looking past these things and saying, Ok, how can I love you? The Father has given me the mindset to just think on that level and listen a lot.  He's also taught me how to be more assertive, direct, and blunt in conversations as I often have to cut in and say something that to me seems harsh - but otherwise it's not happening. 

As great as this sounds, it's very tiring on me at times. Sometimes I KNOW the Father is working through me as I'm not tired and I feel like I'm growing a lot and I'm going to be a good dad, husband, and a superBeliever. Other times likes last night, I wanted to just slap that stupid vocabulary out of him and have a real conversation. There's so much Chinese thought of if I try harder, do better, am more persistent then I can do it. I believe in myself. "Every human has unlimited potential to do whatever he wants," he told me many times. "Do you really believe that?" I asked. "If that's true, why isn't everyone successful? Why isn't everyone happy? Why doesn't everyone have their dreams?" He responds with a certain confidence in his answer, "The lack the spirit of perseverance." I drop my head because I know this train of thought that we've went down so many times: try harder, let experiences form you, don't give up, keep trying and one day you'll reach your dreams. If you dont, you haven't tried hard enough. I try calling him out on it. I try telling him I know old people who have spent their life like this but aren't happy. I just straight out tell him, without the One Man, you won't be happy. Yet each comment I make seems to be a hammer bouncing off a boulder being deflected and only sending tiring vibrations back in to my arm as he refers to men like Napoleon or a famous Chinese interpreter. He names 1 out of millions and says "they persisted and tried hard enough."  It wears me out because I know it's not true and I know it's wearing him down too but he has so much pressure from his parents who have just straight up told him "Don't disappoint us. Our futures are riding on you. You have to be successful. You have to work hard or you wont get a job, be successful, or take care of us." With an extremist respect towards parents in this culture, that's hard to combat against. 

Today, I'm going with Faithful's class to a park. Yes, his class. All 29 of them. I ask for patience and joy with them. I also Ask that I can say no when I need to and can get to share what's really important to me when I need to also. I dont want to downplay our relationship but I want to give him value and still be honest that it's because G loves him that I love him.

Tomorrow, part 2 of Faithful - G's side.