Five random women prepared to spend two weeks in south Asia teaching other women. One of the five, I asked God beforehand what he wanted to tell me about the trip. The two words that popped into my mind raised many questions and answered none. Yet they remained, like a subtitle for the trip: “stealth mission.”
Do not read political intrigue into that phrase. The five of us have no government connections. We represent no business or media interests. Before the trip, we didn’t even know each other, much less have a cohesive plan for accomplishing anything.
Going out, we intended only good for the countries we would visit and the peoples living there. God intended only good for them, too. We were like emissaries sent by an anonymous donor intent on giving a significant gift so surprising that even the emissaries didn’t know what gift they carried or who would receive it.
Stuffing clothes and toiletries into my suitcase the night before the trip, I asked God, “I guess you’ll give the details on a need-to-know basis?”
Stealth missions, even benevolent stealth missions, require a secret identity. In the movies, for example, Superman reappears regularly to do good deeds. The folks he helps don’t know that, in everyday life, he’s “disguised as Clark Kent, mild-mannered reporter.”
From the outset, I had a secret identity. I did not falsify my passport. But when I arrived at the airport in Oklahoma City to board the series of flights that would take me halfway around the world, the airline agent said, “I have no record that you’re scheduled for this flight.”
A few minutes later, we found me, listed under the newly created last name of PRICEBRUNT. Since correcting this error required an act of Congress, I remained, for the duration of this venture, Pricebrunt. Deborah Pricebrunt.
While trying to sleep on the long overseas flight, I hung my glasses on the seat pocket in front of me. Subsequently, my glasses fell to the floor and someone stepped on them. I had chosen not to take my contact lenses on the trip. Thus, my secret identity included wearing lopsided glasses for two weeks.
In our tropical location, my hair regularly succumbed to the heat and humidity. The clothes we wore announced us as women caught between two cultures – not successfully looking like either.
Most frustrating of all, my team members – whom I had not known before the trip, but with whom I lived for two weeks – could not see me. They saw a person, but not me. Because I’m detail-oriented, they labeled me an administrator.
Administrators are wonderful. We need them. I need them. I am not one of them. Just ask the people who’ve worked as my assistants.
A week-and-a-half into our two-week trip, I stood before the mirror in our hotel bathroom. My clothes looked odd; my hair, forlorn. A clip hiding in my hair held my glasses semi-straight.
“It’s mild-mannered administrator, Deborah Pricebrunt,” I said to the glass, “going out to fight another battle for truth, justice and to call people to know God’s ways.”
Regardless who did or didn’t see, I had a supernatural assignment to deliver God’s messages with courage, to speak into nations for their good. Ephesians 4:11-12 announces that Christ “is the one who gave these gifts . . . to equip God's people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ.”
Having now returned home, I’m happy to report: Stealth mission accomplished. Name corrected. Clothes changed. Glasses fixed. Anonymous donor anonymous no more.
© 2007, Deborah P. Brunt. All rights reserved.
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Thursday, September 20, 2007
The cat in the glass
We in the Western world like our stories in chronological order. This fits well with our linear thought patterns. It satisfies us. Having a beginning, middle and end, we feel we know what we need to know about a certain snippet of life.
But hearing a story in chronological order – or even experiencing it as it unfolds – assures us of nothing. We can miss what’s right in front of our eyes. We can misinterpret the details the storyteller includes. We can hear and see without knowing what we’re hearing and seeing.
Thus, my tale of lengthy travels in south Asia (15 days, to be exact) begins with my arrival home. After my 45-hour homeward journey that involved five flights and a 9-and-a-half hour layover in Atlanta, my family members still recognized me and welcomed me with hugs. Hurray!
Our cats recognized me too. Tessa, the 10-year-old, gave her usual noncommittal nod in my direction. Pewter, soon to be one year old, showed more enthusiasm.
She alternately followed me around the house and sniffed my luggage with interest. When I picked her up, she didn’t try to escape, but rather sniffed my clothes with interest. When I put her outside, she returned to the door, meowing for me to come out and play. When I reclined to read a book, she nestled in my lap.
Happily, Pewter still recognizes me. Strangely, she does not recognize herself.
During my travels, says my husband, Pewter discovered a cat peering back at her from each of the following places: the floor-length windows, the French doors, the glass stereo case, the glass fireplace insert, the glass-and-brass shower door and even the glass oven door.
Since my return, Pewter continues to see these feline intruders – all gray, short-haired and green-eyed; indeed, looking remarkably like her. With each sighting, she crouches low, ears back, and slinks toward the trespasser, uttering a low warning growl. Simultaneously, the cat facing her inches closer. Pewter begins to hiss, then suddenly emits a loud cry. Both cat and reflection lunge forward.
As her claws clink against glass, Pewter jumps back, still growling and/or hissing at the rude fellow that stares back at her. How frustrating that this untouchable one neither runs away nor engages in rough-and-tumble cat games with her.
In all fairness to Pewter, we do have a neighbor cat named Walter that looks remarkably like her. Gray, short-haired, green-eyed and male, he is slightly larger than she and boasts a red collar, instead of her purple-and-white one. Walter does climb the fence and come visiting from time to time.
Still, my husband and I are laughing a lot these days because Pewter doesn’t see what she’s seeing. As I laugh, I ponder my own adventures.
When you’re suddenly dumped into a radically different culture, you experience such sensory overload it’s easy to short-circuit and miss what you’re seeing. Yet, because you’re stripped of all that’s familiar, when something familiar does raise its head, you may see it more clearly than ever before.
In south Asia, where I least expected to find it, I saw a remarkable reflection of Western church culture. Watching people who do not think as we do imitating our methods, and particularly, our failed methods, I saw us more clearly than ever before.
Proverbs 27:19 says, “It is your own face that you see reflected in the water and it is your own self that you see in your heart.”
It’s one thing to think: “That’s another cat. I feel threatened.” It’s another thing entirely to realize: “That’s me. I look like that.”
© 2007, Deborah P. Brunt. All rights reserved.
But hearing a story in chronological order – or even experiencing it as it unfolds – assures us of nothing. We can miss what’s right in front of our eyes. We can misinterpret the details the storyteller includes. We can hear and see without knowing what we’re hearing and seeing.
Thus, my tale of lengthy travels in south Asia (15 days, to be exact) begins with my arrival home. After my 45-hour homeward journey that involved five flights and a 9-and-a-half hour layover in Atlanta, my family members still recognized me and welcomed me with hugs. Hurray!
Our cats recognized me too. Tessa, the 10-year-old, gave her usual noncommittal nod in my direction. Pewter, soon to be one year old, showed more enthusiasm.
She alternately followed me around the house and sniffed my luggage with interest. When I picked her up, she didn’t try to escape, but rather sniffed my clothes with interest. When I put her outside, she returned to the door, meowing for me to come out and play. When I reclined to read a book, she nestled in my lap.
Happily, Pewter still recognizes me. Strangely, she does not recognize herself.
During my travels, says my husband, Pewter discovered a cat peering back at her from each of the following places: the floor-length windows, the French doors, the glass stereo case, the glass fireplace insert, the glass-and-brass shower door and even the glass oven door.
Since my return, Pewter continues to see these feline intruders – all gray, short-haired and green-eyed; indeed, looking remarkably like her. With each sighting, she crouches low, ears back, and slinks toward the trespasser, uttering a low warning growl. Simultaneously, the cat facing her inches closer. Pewter begins to hiss, then suddenly emits a loud cry. Both cat and reflection lunge forward.
As her claws clink against glass, Pewter jumps back, still growling and/or hissing at the rude fellow that stares back at her. How frustrating that this untouchable one neither runs away nor engages in rough-and-tumble cat games with her.
In all fairness to Pewter, we do have a neighbor cat named Walter that looks remarkably like her. Gray, short-haired, green-eyed and male, he is slightly larger than she and boasts a red collar, instead of her purple-and-white one. Walter does climb the fence and come visiting from time to time.
Still, my husband and I are laughing a lot these days because Pewter doesn’t see what she’s seeing. As I laugh, I ponder my own adventures.
When you’re suddenly dumped into a radically different culture, you experience such sensory overload it’s easy to short-circuit and miss what you’re seeing. Yet, because you’re stripped of all that’s familiar, when something familiar does raise its head, you may see it more clearly than ever before.
In south Asia, where I least expected to find it, I saw a remarkable reflection of Western church culture. Watching people who do not think as we do imitating our methods, and particularly, our failed methods, I saw us more clearly than ever before.
Proverbs 27:19 says, “It is your own face that you see reflected in the water and it is your own self that you see in your heart.”
It’s one thing to think: “That’s another cat. I feel threatened.” It’s another thing entirely to realize: “That’s me. I look like that.”
© 2007, Deborah P. Brunt. All rights reserved.
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