Itsara

On this trip, there were a handful of questions that we got asked repeatedly. I figured it’d be a good idea to address them here, in no particular order.

What are your kids ages/names/genders/how many kids do you have?
Because our family is large and often-changing, we keep a list here and try to update it whenever necessary.

What’s your typical day look like?
On a typical day (meaning a weekday in which all the kids are at school - this happens less often than you’d think), we get Pan and Lutiya to their schools really early (6 and 7, respectively). Matt gets himself to school around 7:30, and then we homeschool Sandra and take care of Isaac until the afternoon when the other kids start coming back. During the day we also take care of the house, shop, blog, go to worship practice (Cindy), teach dance (Cindy), and write (Adam).

How do you get kids?
We’ve never sought them out. Cindy’s cousin called us about Matt and Sandra. Pan, Alaypa, and Lutiya came through a friend of a friend. In both cases, it was only because people knew what we were here to do. We’re fully convinced that God brought them to us. We are not actively seeking out children at the moment either.

How are you doing financially? Where does your support come from?
In general, we’re okay. God has always provided and we have no doubt he will continue to do so. About half of our support comes from friends and family through Coast Vineyard. The other half currently comes from Matt and Sandra’s mom. If at any time you feel led to help out, see this page for how. We are also working on things during the day that help bring in a little income, but we cannot do anything fulltime at the moment so this income is minor.

Where do you go to church?
We go to an international church called House of Praise. It’s perfect for our family as it has both an international and Thai service, and an international and Thai youth group. Sunday evenings our two families meet with another one and do a sort of home group thing too.

How’s your Thai?
We’re not fluent, but we’re good. We can communicate most things we need to and can understand basic conversations. Watching TV or listening to sermons is difficult (maybe 60-80% comprehension). We can read and write enough to help the kids with their homework or read letters from their schools, but we’re not fast. Reading Thai subtitles, we can only catch about 2 or 3 words before it changes.

(For Adam) How’s the book coming?
The story most people know about (Travelers) is finished, and I’m querying agents to see if they’re interested. The querying is not going so well, but I’m learning a lot and writing another story in the meantime. You can find out a lot more at my other blog.

So what other questions do you have? What have we been neglecting to make clear on this blog? It doesn’t have to be frequently asked for us to answer.

We’re slowly getting things back in order. We’re catching up on Sandra’s homeschooling, unpacking, cleaning, and trying to get back to life. Jet lag is mostly gone (weird how traveling west is a lot easier in that way). It’s hard coming back to our house and family after it’s been run under different management, but for the most part things are the way we expected them to be. So I guess overall I’m proud of our kids.

This trip was the first time I’d been back to the States in 2 years (though Cindy and Isaac went last year). More than that, it was the first time we’ve spoken in front of Coast since before we left 3.5 years ago.

In doing so, I was reminded why we need to talk to Coast every time we go back. (more…)

We’re back and trying to put our house in order. It’s really good to see everyone here (though we have yet to see 3 of our kids - they’re still in school), but of course we haven’t been home for over 3 weeks so there are things to do in addition to unpacking. Fortunately Sean and Prang are helping out a lot and Isaac is having a great time with Abby again.

Turns out after all the cold places we visited (you know, like LA, San Diego, and Mexico for example), I’ve de-acclimatized, which sucks. It’s totally hot here. I’ve got to get my internal regulators set back to Thailand right quick.

I’m also about to pass out, but I can’t. Two kids come home any time now, and we have to pick up a third in like an hour. And then we have to reassert our parenthood a little, which means staying conscious and being parents. We also need to eat, apparently (did you know this?). And though I think she’s delirious, Cindy keeps saying something about going out for my birthday. Right now, the only thing I want for my birthday is the sweet, black embrace of unconsciousness. That and a plasma screen.

I’ll be back later with more useful information and some debriefing thoughts. I have a lot of such thoughts. I have no idea which of them will end up here. Pictures too, maybe.

Just two more days until my sister’s wedding, then on Sunday we start our long journey back home. I know each of us feels differently about it, but for me Thailand really does feel home. I like the US, and I really miss my friends, but for the last few weeks I’ve felt like my life has been on hold and I’m anxious to get back to it.

Cindy and I were talking about our trip the other night, and I realized something. The thing that I really want from this visit is something I can’t have. In seeing all the people I miss, what I really want is to share life with them again. I want to work with them, live with them, worship with them, but I can’t have that without changing our life again (and in some cases, changing the lives of some of my friends).

The best I can do is share about the parts of our lives that we’ve missed, a hope to see each other again, and maybe some small, fun experiences together (e.g. play games, see movies, etc.). It’s not enough, but it has to be for now.

We’re in San Diego now. Yesterday was the crazy day of talking to Coast Vineyard (twice) and two separate hang-outs with people. I think Isaac’s all partied out, but fortunately for him the rest of our time is hanging out with friends in small doses, which I think he can handle.

We’ve been plagued by all kinds of random, tiny, annoying health problems. Our friend’s daughter, Ava, threw up on the way down here. Isaac got a fever the other day. Cindy’s wrist has been hurting again. I cut my thumb and finger and this swelling in my ear came back after I thought it’d gone. Oh yeah, and I got all stomach-sick on the day we drove down from Napa. So good times. We’re much better now overall, and we don’t have the presentation at Coast hanging over our heads, so we’re good.

And we’re hearing things from back home too. Most of our kids are doing well. Sean and his family took Pan and Lu to Prang’s village for the weekend. He’s got a post and a bunch of pictures. It’s good to see our kids enjoying themselves (and taken care of) while we’re gone. It also sounds like Chiang Mai has gotten tons of rain, which should be real good for our new lawn.

That’s all for now. We’re in San Diego for a few more days, then we drive up to Orange County to visit Cindy’s family, and in a week we fly down to Mexico to see my family and watch my sister get married. Should be awesome.

Cindy, Isaac, and I have been here in Napa for four days now, I think. It’s been a good time of catching up with friends and practicing explanations of what we do and what’s been going on. That last bit’s important because we have to talk about what we’re doing at Coast this Sunday.

We’re still a bit jet-lagged, and tomorrow all of us (Heines and Wyatts) are driving down to San Diego. Otherwise, we’ve been playing new games, eating good food, and watching Isaac and the Wyatts’ girl, Ava, play together. I wish I had time to write more details, but writing is something I haven’t done much of out here. It’s not a writing month.

Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve been tilling bad dirt, spreading, grading, cleaning, and breaking up good dirt, and today we finally laid down 223 square meters of sod (that’s about 2,500 square feet, for the metrically challenged). It cost us only about 7,400 Baht ($212 USD) and hundreds of man-hours, but we’re pretty happy with it.

It is only just now hitting me that we’ll be in the States in a few days. Will Isaac be able to withstand sitting in an airplane for 16 hours? Will we be able to afford one of the most expensive countries in the world? Will our kids be okay while we’re gone?

Who cares! I’m eating carne asada in a week. Woo-hoo!

Last time, I mentioned Mike Guglielmucci’s big lie. Our pastor made a great point about it this week, though. It’s so easy for us to condemn those who sin in big ways like this, especially when we ourselves never have. The thing is, it is not our place to condemn. It is certainly our job to point out sin and call for repentance, and as a church I think we’re really good at that. What we’re not any good at is accepting those who repent after something like this. We don’t know how forgive someone we can no longer trust, but Jesus didn’t give us any options to not forgive.

Lest we think there might be exceptions for extreme cases, look at King David - a supreme pillar of faith, mentioned as such throughout the Bible, beginning to end. Yet the man lusted after another man’s wife, abused his position as king to sleep with her, lied to her husband, and then killed him when he was too upright to accept the lie. That’s not the only thing he did, but it’s easily among the worst - not to mention worse than what most of us, or our modern fallen priests and pastors, have ever done.

God punished him for it, yet he also used it for good. He didn’t kill David or Bathsheba. He didn’t remove David from kingship or the blessing of the Messiah via his lineage. He even allowed Bathsheba’s second son to become, not just the next king, but the richest and wisest king who ever lived. If that doesn’t say that God still loves the guy, then I don’t know what does.

And that’s the problem - we don’t love. We’re really good at rules and rewards and punishments and marketing and manipulating and judging and condemning, but we suck at forgiveness. In order to forgive someone, you have to love them. In my own struggles with this, I’ve learned that it is possible to love someone you don’t completely trust. In this job, I have to punish-yet-love every single day. If I don’t love, then the punishments only serve to drive my kids further away - they do more harm than good. At the same time I know better than to leave money lying around, you know?

So with Mike G, and other pastors like him who have made big mistakes, we need to give them room for repentance and, when they do, forgive and love as if nothing happened to breach the relationship.

Though I would ask for a second opinion if he says he’s dying again.

At the church we go to, I learned this great song about faith in the midst of terrible struggles. It’s called “Healer”, and it’s a fairly major Hillsong hit. Here’s an excerpt:

I believe you’re my healer.
I believe you are all I need.
I believe you’re my portion.
I believe you’re more than enough for me.
Jesus, you’re all I need.

Nothing is impossible for you.
You hold my world in your hands.

I was even more blown away when I found out that the song was written by a guy who had terminal cancer. Now that’s some amazing faith!

Then I found out he made the whole thing up.

Why would someone do this? Money? Fame? And why would a worship leader do this? I wonder if he thought people would forget about the song, or maybe he could say “I’m healed!” after a while and throw a big party. I bet he didn’t think it would get as big as it did, but who knows?

I don’t understand people like this. People who live a lie. I can understand lying to hide sins, though it takes a bold (or cowardly) man to do it for a long time, but an intentional lie? In my mind it falls into the same category as atheist theologians, or students who go to seminary because it’s a good career path. It’s like they’re missing the point. Our pastor likes to tell the story of the conference he spoke at where over 300 pastors gave their lives to Christ for the first time. That’s just sad.

And it’s a good song. Can we still worship with it? Does the heart of the writer taint the song? I don’t think so. Some of my greatest worship experiences have been with “Bring Me to Life“, despite what Evanescence says about the song’s meaning. What matters is the heart of the worshiper, not the songmaker. Unfortunately, the Lie is all I can think of now when I hear the song. Maybe one day I’ll forget about it, but for the now the song is tainted in my own heart.

What’s worse, I can’t get it out of my head.