Obstructions of Love

I am now in Hungary for the next six weeks as I finish up my student teaching.

Hungary and Budapest are familiar places for me... they are where I've spent nearly every summer of my childhood... they are where my brother and I became friends. When I inhale the smell of my grandma's house I smell the freedom of summer, laughter, ice cream, growth, and family.

But now my brother is an ocean away. All of the experiences I have so loved have been closely tied to him. While I enjoy spending time with my grandma in a new country, a new school, with new experiences, with my childhood memories... it's weird without my brother here. In some ways, when I hit a lonely spot, it's intensified because he isn't here. Everything I have ever experienced here has been with him.

Before I left, my roommates challenged me to reflect on the blessings and joys in the incredible opportunity it is to teach here. They know my tendencies to get stressed, overwhelmed, and lonely.
Since leaving, I have been actively counting my blessings. In fact, if you have followed this blog at all, you have probably seen significantly more blessing-counting here than perhaps actually happens in my day-to-day life. But this has been a habit I have tried to create for myself since last year, and I do it in joyful spurts, here and there, until I get too busy and push my blessing-counting to the side.

But I'm thankful that even when I get distracted from blessing-counting, I have moments where my routine is obstructed. Where I (figuratively) hit the floor in awe knowing I am not alone in this. I am starting to call these moments "obstructions of love." I do not have to pursue them. I do not have to find ways to make complaints into positives. Rather, they are points where I am stopped in my normal routine because I am overwhelmed by the little things that whisper  I have gone before you. I am with you. I love you.

They are things that settle my fears... strange coincidences that I know are more than that... they give me joy, help me keep going, knowing that I'm here for a reason!
The short list:
-After constructing a unit on The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe for sixth graders at a Christian school as one of my projects at Grace, I expected to never have the opportunity to use it. False. My supervising teacher here emailed me to tell me that's the book she was starting with the students...
-The first person I walked in with on Monday morning happened to be in the same graduate program as one of my professors at Grace... and knew her!
-While at Grace I had the opportunity to tutor English Language Learners in the Writing Lab. I now have the opportunity to work one-on-one with ELL students once more, this time 8th grade Chinese students. I love this time so much.
-Direct answers to prayer in my conversations with my grandma
-The Hungarian language floating off my tongue smoothly, especially when having a spiritual conversation. I stop, smile and continue because I know this isn't my normal level of Hungarian, and yet it pours out, fluidly.

These are the bigger things. But sometimes it's as simple as the rainy day clearing up for my long first commute home, fresh coffee already made when I can't handle my jetlag in the middle of school, or a British boy writing a snarky poem about Chinese-made Legos. 

Actively looking for blessings turns my complaining tongue into one of joyful thanksgiving. My thoughts, my heart, my mood, my attitude.
But sometimes I'm just too tired to search for blessings. Sometimes they literally have to hit me in the face.

So when I board the 6:30 bus in the morning, my heart races at the excitement of discovery: what obstruction of love will I find today?
Because my God pursues me. When I get tired of counting blessings, he sends me obstructions. So that they cannot go unnoticed. So that I stand in awe of His love and faithfulness.... in all the familiarnew this season holds.