Mice and Men

Well, I anticipated that the first installment of this series of blog entries would read differently than this. I'm not normally one who forms strong expectations and bases his responses to situations on whether or not those expectations are met, but no one is entirely without presupposition. It occurs to me that I probably ought not to have anticipated anything at all. The Lord does have a nasty habit of confounding our best-laid plans, yet strangely, my previous trip really was quite a lot like I had expected it to be. So perhaps I was set-up for a surprise from the beginning.

"Surprise" isn't quite the word that I would choose to describe the... mishap... that befell me three days ago, but it was unexpected. After months of planning, preparing, and fundraising, Kenya was a lock. I'm not sure exactly when it occurred to me that I might not be able to go, but it was sometime between when I landed on the side of my ankle, and when I was carried to the car half an hour later. Yes, I sprained it. Quite severely. It was during a volleyball game at the July 3rd picnic. I landed in a ditch in the grass. It sounds simple enough, but I have never felt pain so severe. I'm sure I'll upset a few women here, but there is no possible way childbirth is that painful. My eyes were open, and I couldn't see (insert spiritual metaphor here). When I finally could see, I looked down at it, and it was easily the size of a grapefruit. Then I was told that it had been twice that size at the peak of the swelling. Until the x-ray came back several hours later, I couldn't be sure whether or not it was broken, and therefore, I couldn't be sure if I'd be seeing the fruits of my planning and the resolution of my expectations regarding Kenya.

Yet here I am, moments from leaving on the trip I had planned for. The last few days have been chaotic and painful, and I have discovered that chaos and pain are mutually compounding. Packing and errand-running are made much more difficult when attempting to heal an ankle that was once twice the size of a grapefruit (so... a small cantaloupe?), and healing an ankle that was once the size of a large pumpkin is made much more difficult when attempting to pack and run errands. In spite of this (or more accurately, because of this), the power of prayer has been on full display. I was told that it would be many days before I could put weight on my ankle, and months for it to fully heal. There really is no reason I should be able even to hobble, to go anywhere without crutches, except by the power of prayer. To those of you who have been praying, thank you. It turns out that even our best-laid plans can't succeed apart from His power, so it can't hurt to ask Him to just take care of them in the first place.