Why Our Blog is a Pack of Lies, Or: Don't Believe Everything You See

As I glanced over our blog recently, I thought to myself: wow, these people have amazing lives, galavanting off to foreign places, light-heartedly leisuring, ne'er a day of trouble to furrow the brow. Unfortunately this impression is one that a blog virtually begs to give off: who feels like chronicling the day in, day out struggle ("Day 183: five detentions, cursed at by another kid, teachers gossiped behind my back, yet another anti-American joke, etc." or "Day 92: woke up, tried to read a language I can't understand; wanted to pull my eyes out; instead, drank another cup of coffee and back to work")? That's not to say that we don't feel ourselves extremely blessed and overjoyed at the opportunities we've been given. It's just to say that most of the time our normal lives are, well, extremely normal. The romance of living overseas generally wears off after about a month of living in a new place, and then you realize that you've still got to go grocery shopping, pay the electric bill, figure out the daily commute, etc. But it's in and through these things that we find ourselves, from time to time, graced with the realization that we are living the extravagant life - not because we're in England or Germany or whatever, but because we are in Christ and experiencing all that comes from union with him (including, of course, his sufferings). These moments of realization - far too rare for us - help us to recognize all the other moments of our lives for what they are: echoes and whispers and rumors of glory, even when it is the particular glory that stinks like death on a roman cross.