Sometimes when I look at my brother I don’t know what to do.
Sometimes I don’t know what to say, and I don’t know what to pray.
Sometimes I feel really helpless and weak, like there’s nothing I can do to make the situation any better.
But when I look into my brother’s eyes I can tell that the same God who is walking me down this road, is carrying him through this storm. I can tell that he can have faith and can trust no matter how dark it becomes, because the same God is giving me faith and helping me trust Him so easily where I can see no end.. I can tell that God is his strength the way He is mine.. and He will never forsake him or leave him, the way he has never forsaken or left me..

It’s been four years since brokenness greeted me on that cold Kingsford street and invited me to dinner.
And though he was a gentleman, I had no choice but to accept.

It’s been four years since my childish heart began to understand how strength could perfect itself in weakness,
and in every passing day laced with uncertainty,
I learned that even if I couldn’t lift myself to live each day,
Someone would carry me.

And though it was four years since that day,
and grace could have made it forty,
it was grace and grace alone that made it four and not three.
Four and not two.
Four and not one.

I guess I thought that in those fours years we’d lived through the peak of the storm, where the wind was at its wildest, and we were at our weakest. Those waves that shook us, I thought they were the biggest we’d see. I remember Jesus getting up so many times and telling the whole ocean to chill out.

I remember waking up some mornings and telling Jesus I didn’t think we could do it anymore, and he’d take me by the hand and say I know, but I can.

365 days ago you took the hand of the love of your life and together you made a home, for awhile.
77 days ago the Love of your life took your hand and welcomed you home, forever.

And in those passing 77 days, I began to know brokenness in a way I hadn’t before.
I learnt what it was to hurt so deeply and entirely, to feel so cold and alone and to be so desperately needy and absolutely vulnerable for Someone to hold me and comfort me and tell me that everything is actually going to be okay.

On some days I still feel alone as I weep into my pillow and ask God why I didn’t come home sooner.
And on some days I feel okay, and brokenness seems far off, on the other side of the road, and we act like we don’t really know each other.

And even though it’s nicer to feel okay,
I feel so much closer to God when I’m broken.

God is close to the brokenhearted.

And it’s because the brokenhearted have tasted the sweet and bitter of the world,
and they know that they are absolutely nothing,
and absolutely nothing and no one,
but Christ himself,
can answer the gaping deep pain in their hearts.

I’ve felt whole.
And I’ve felt broken.
And even though in my brokenness I cry out for God to heal me,
deep inside, I would rather just be closer to him.
I would rather just know that I’m actually always broken and actually can’t do anything without him,
because deep, deep, deep inside, past all the hurt, and even past all the hope,
it just feels right when I’m wrapped up in him,
and nothing,
and no one else.

I had a life plan. A ten year plan. A five year plan. A year plan. A monthly plan. A weekly plan. And a daily plan.
Goals for every sphere of life and plans to hit them. Broken down into endless day-to-day to-do lists.
(I’m not exaggerating at all).

I was proud of it too. I revelled in the fact that I was always extremely fanatically busy and always had too many things to do. Proud that I was taking daily, consistent steps towards ‘success’. It almost made me feel like superwoman.

But it didn’t actually feel so super at all. I just lost a lot of sleep, overloaded my body with too much caffeine, wasted my dollars on cups of coffee, and was often tired and somewhat stressful.

Pa bon (not good).

So, as you might know, I just lived life in Haiti for half a year. Life changed a bit there.
All of a sudden I had almost no responsibilities, except to help prepare dinner every day for every one who lived at the base.

My world was rocked and thrown and swooshed and swivelled around in the three hours every day from 2 to 5pm.

We had to cook dinner for 80 people… but believe me, it didn’t have to take three hours.

In my first few weeks of preparing dinner, I found myself getting agitated often, thinking this could get done quicker. There is a quicker way. The more focused we work, the quicker it gets done. This doesn’t have to take this long. If you work faster, and I work faster, we finish faster, and we have more free time. There is a more efficient way to make this happen. 

And then it hit me.  

I wasn’t in Australia. And I wasn’t in control.

I was in a culture where the most important value in life wasn’t getting things done and smashing tasks as fast as you can so you have more time to do other things. In this culture, it was important to live life with the people you were living life with.

What a foreign concept.

So I sat my pride and my super-efficient-hyper-productive values behind me and stopped thinking of the million faster ways we could work and started talking to the people I was working with.

And dude, those three hours became alive.

To live fully in a moment is to love.
To love fully. And to actually love the OTHER – not what they can do, give or produce.
To love them.

I’ve been back in Australia for two months now.
Today I drank tea with my mum and I mopped the whole house and sang to Jesus.
And I don’t actually have much of an idea about what I’ll do tomorrow, but my sister is coming home so maybe we will bake.
I still make goal lists and plans on how to get there. But I’ve learnt how to chill. And oh my joy is it fun.

If you are one of those people that I once was, scared of wasting a minute, mapping out how to do everything in the best, fastest, most efficient way possible and feeling like a failure when a day passes without executing everything in the highest degree of productivity… then please, realise this.

YOU ARE NOT WHAT YOU DO. 

And you never will be.

Stop. Chill. Throw away the list for a day. And love.

It’s so much fun… to do nothing, but just be present.

I’ve learnt a much better way to do life.

It’s simple. Seek Jesus first. All will be added unto you.

My goal is not success anymore, but I know that in seeking Jesus, success will come. (Its just a side effect of a crazy in love relationship with Jesus Christ.)
A true relationship with Jesus Christ touches and transforms every aspect of your life.

And just doing life with him and falling in love with him, is so much funner and better and more fulfilling than freaking out and trying to make all the good things happen.

excerpt from journal entry of 2nd october 2011 // written on outreach, working at mision rescate, port-au-prince.

“i love living in community. whether that’s 80 people in a pink and white house with lots of food and anpil white tiles or 15 people in a tent that breaks in the middle of the night, with rats jumping over your feet as you cook breakfast and mosquitoes manje-ing you down to the pits of your veins. i’ve realised, as i love living here so much, that it’s not at all, and never was, about how much you have.

because in actual fact it means nothing at all.

nothing, nothing, nothing at all.

it doesn’t add to your peace or your joy or your love. and that’s all the freakin heck that matters.

to live selflessly, to live for another is not only so fulfilling but just so FUN.”

photos: jasen chung

when dust spreads over the sympathy cards, it still hurts. when all the flowers curl and dry, it still hurts.
i still miss you.
i still wake up and you’re still not here.

love, it solves the hardest of problems. and makes light shine out of the darkest of places.
but it also plunges your heart in so deep that the slightest movement, the faintest breath of the other is a knife through your body.
love is the electricity that lifts your soul out of the grave and throws you towards the horizon. and love is what hits you and leaves you in tears on the floor, curling, inhaling pain and exhaling nothing you understand.
love gives you life, and love kills you.

love killed Him.

but only so love could make us live.

love is so violent.

god, your pain must be so deep.

this is like a sting, deep in your heart. and you go on, and the hurt goes on with you,
clinging to wishful thinking of relived yesterdays.
but life only spurs you onto tomorrows.

you, my brother, are my first and my last thoughts each day, before i slip into a painless slumber.
and i awake again, realising that those hours of numbness had to end.

you, my god, are the only one i can run to now.
and your presence is the only place i can still find hope, even as this hurt tries to eat it away.

her name is dani (different to the last dani). and she is a writer, photographer, traveller, explorer, surfer, jesus loving, people loving, fun, fantastic soul.

she wrote this about god, and it comforts me, thinking about the days and nights i would float in the caribbean ocean, staring up the colours stretched across the sky or the fireballs pounding through space, feeling so small but as though the eyes of the creator of the universe were only on me.

“I am learning that when He is silent, He is listening and not abandoning; and that His timing is actually perfect; and that I am very, very, very, very impatient and demanding. He is like the ocean to me, I am a little bit afraid of it, couldnt live without it, love to be near it or just hear it or smell it, but I cannot even try to control the tides or the waves. Each morning it looks different, but it is still the same. It never changes, it never goes away, but it looks different in different places and times and lights of day or night. It will completely consume you if you desire, or you can just stay on the beach and admire its beauty. I have always loved the ocean but the older I grew, and realized the dangers of it, it made me scared a bit more. But being away from it makes me claustrophobic and makes me feel like something is missing. I can breath and my shoulders relax after a hard day when I wander there and sit. All problems seem smaller when I’m at the sea. And thats how Christ feels to me.”

Life, or who we become, is made up of seasons- different chapters of all different colours, shapes, and textures, pieces that all eventually mesh to create one final beautiful mosaic. And then in the end, I imagine, the Artist takes his chisel, and chips away the parts he never intended, and polishes the pieces he loved the most. He makes it perfect.
And even though the mosaic is finally perfected, all the pieces and parts and seasons that made it didn’t always feel so perfect.

Six months ago I stepped off a plane in a land I knew I loved and began a season that I never wanted to end. I found the most perfect family of 80 in a pink and white house in Belvil, Port-au-Prince, and, as though I was a canvas, God washed away any marks left on me and furiously began painting the most exquisite masterpiece.
I learnt a lot.
I learnt how to treat cholera patients and how to build a water tank with one week and a giant pile of cement. I learnt how to travel around Port-au-Prince for free, using nothing but charming foreign smiles and faith that we wouldn’t get kidnapped. I learnt how to shower with one gallon of cold water and be truly grateful in simplicity. How to be thankful in knowing nothing I own is actually mine, and how to find deeper joy in giving than receiving. How to hear God’s voice, romancing and directing me every day. How to speak Creole and live like a Haitian, but how to find my identity nowhere else but in His word. How to dream and dream and dream bigger, how to take great, ridiculous leaps of faith on nothing but His word. How to love people relentlessly. How to truly see beauty and potential within every individual. How to walk in forgiveness daily. How to know His heart, and walk out in its heartbeat. How to be grateful for every drop of water, every spoonful of food. How to improvise, initiate and be flexible in every kind of situation. How to not get ripped off despite being a blanc, but turn it around and score freebies instead. How to count plagues of mosquitoes all joy because through the testing of my faith perseverance is developed.

And all these lessons shaped me – lessons that I know God had so much fun painting, ones I know moved His heart and made him smile, and probably even sing sometimes. But at the heart of every single lesson, was one lesson. One lesson that I started learning a few years ago, and one that God never tires of teaching me.

Love.

It’s always been love, and it will always be love.
No matter where I go, and no matter what I do, I have one call.
To be loved by the Creator of the Universe.
To be romanced, ravished, enchanted by his unending, unfailing, overwhelming, ridiculous love for me. Every moment of every day.
Honestly, I can’t think of a more exciting life.
When you know you’re loved, you can’t help but love.
When you know you’re loved, you can’t help but give. You can’t help but risk everything and run out on adventure. You can’t help but leave everything that seems safe and normal and okay and live to see justice done, to see righteousness shine out of every place darkness once was. You can’t help but give up everything to love the One who loved you first, with everything you are.

I can’t thank God enough for this incredible season he blessed me with. Time and time again I think, wow. I can’t believe God let me be a part of this.
He changed me deeply through the most beautiful, fun, adventurous and joy filled season – a season which changed me, 80 others, and changed Haiti. A season that changed other nations, and will continue to go on to change the world. It was perfect.

But God doesn’t only use perfect chapters, to write perfect stories.

A week before I was scheduled to leave Haiti I received a phone call from Australia and was told that my brother Bona had suddenly passed away. He had been diagnosed with leukaemia four years ago and as a family we’d walked out in faith – in the knowledge of God’s love and goodness, and seen Him heal and bring Bona through so many difficult situations. On December 3 2011 he was taken to the most beautiful place to be with Jesus.

As much hope and peace I have in knowing that Bona is no longer in pain, and is completely at peace in the presence of God, it hurts, unbearably at times. There is pain without resolve.
It’s a reality I wish with all my heart wasn’t real, but a reality I know one day, probably soon, I will have to finally accept.

I’m in that season – that piece, that colour, that texture of the mosaic, that doesn’t feel so perfect. It’s the part I don’t understand, the piece that I can’t see how it makes it all more beautiful.

I don’t know how long or how difficult this next piece of the story will be, but I know God. And I know that He writes the most beautiful stories.
As dark and difficult as this valley may be, I walk with Christ, and he is truly all I need.

Thank you so much for all your prayers and the support you’ve shown my family and I now, and also throughout the past four years. We are so incredibly blessed with such loving and thoughtful family and friends.

Thank you for being a part of my story, and also being a part of Haiti’s story. I am honoured that God called me there, and honoured that you would partner with me through this season with love, prayers and support. Haiti is changing radically, person by person.

If you would like to know more specifically about Haiti, I’d be more than happy to share. Feel free to drop me a line to this email address (emilydiana at gmail.com).

Tribute to my brother Bona: http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150427168255233

now i live in sydney, australia and she lives in the united states of texas. we lived together for the past six months in haiti & the dominican republic – the most amazing season of my life – which ended with a phone call that changed… everything.

she never knew my brother, but she became my sister.

and she wrote me a beautiful poem because she loves me. and knows my heart is hurting.

i love you dani. thank you.

he stood there once right over you, but you never minded.
he was big, you were small, and the world would never shatter.
together, all three, you roamed the hallways of childhood,
finding new adventure in every shoe print and finger smear
left on your mother’s finest china smiles.

your father always said there’d be hard days, but he never meant this.
the day three went to two, went to all the shards of hearts
you left with him when suddenly he wasn’t standing
when you were lying, sobbing until the sky was tearing
there you were on an island far from him, from them, from the sound

of all those china smiles shattering down, the questions soaking into your newly stretched out heart, they linked hands with the ones you’ve been carrying about injustice and things that sound like hell until you came back to the place where you once daydreamed, to find a fresh coat of death all on your favourite things.

take your eyes, glue them to the dawn.
look up, sit up, get up, see the sparkle in the air
he stands there right over you, in the place you’re seeking after
a place one day we’ll all call home, a place you will dance forever
and now, and now, you’re heart beats out all the memories to
the record player of the way your dad cries in the mornings.

did you ever think all the things that sound like hell would come to dwell, wrapped up in your sister’s hair,
and the plans you’d made for summer
and here, here it is again, the silent sparkle of the going on
the never dying of that soul you loved so dearly, though yours is empty just for now, there are streams, red streams, giving you breath again

because he still has his, all tangled up in the stars.

my love is over, it’s underneath, it’s inside, it’s in between.
the times you doubt me, when you can’t feel,
the times that you question is this for real.
the times you’re broken, the times that you mend.
the times that you hate me, and the times that you bend.
my love is over, it’s underneath, it’s inside, it’s in between.
the times you’re healing, and when your heart breaks.
the times you feel like you’ve fallen from grace.
the times you’re hurting, the times that you heal,
the times you go hungry and are tempted to steal.

in times of confusion and chaos and pain,
i’m there in your sorrow under the weight of your shame.
i’m there through your heartache,
i’m there in the storm.

my love i will keep you by my power alone.

i don’t care where you’ve fallen
or where you have been.
i’ll never forsake you, my love never ends.

it never ends.

times by tenth avenue north

To my brother, Bona.

I never knew this was coming

I never knew I would stand before men

and speak of how you left this earth.

I never knew that it would come this soon.

I never knew it would happen this way.

But God knew.

He knew it the day he formed you, the day he thought of making me.

He knew it the moment he decided he’d write our stories so closely together,

the day he planned to make our days entwine.

He knew that six months ago I would be so close,

but that six days ago I would be so far.

He knew that I would be oceans away, asleep on that island

Heart broken by the dark skinned girls who sell their bodies to clothe them,

the children who want to dream but don’t understand what that means.

He knew that my heart was hurting.

And He knew that it would break again,

but that this time it would bleed.

My father called me that night.

He told me the words they say about every man,

the words I never thought I’d hear.

He told me that the breath stopped in your chest,

the wind of your lungs ceased.

I felt it tear from mine.

I wept on the bed that night,

wondering how I never knew.

But God knew.

He knew that I would lie for hours in the dark,

crying from the cores of my bones,

knowing no pain greater than this.

He knew I would ache and hurt and question

because it was that reality that would never happen to us.

A reality so far, because we chose to walk in faith.

Faith causes you to run.

And you ran.

Faith moves you to love.

And you loved.

Faith inspires you to hope.

And you hoped.

Your last months were your most beautiful.

And so were mine.

And maybe the desire of my heart was that we shared them.

Maybe it is senseless to my earthly eyes that we didn’t,

Maybe I dreamed and hoped for so much more.

Maybe I thought you’d never leave

because in my eyes

there were so many unfinished parts to the story,

so many chapters that hadn’t yet concluded.

Like why you loved, and she loved, but it couldn’t last.

Why you didn’t grow old together.

Why you didn’t see your children,

your children’s children.

Why we didn’t chase dreams together,

Why our children didn’t grow up together,

grow old together,

chase dreams together.

I said, my God, I thought you made him for this.

But God said.

I made him for me.

I made him for love.

I made him to walk with me,

And he did.

I didn’t make him for the world,

I made him for me.

No, it’s not this, and it’s not that.

It’s not what you do,

Or where you go,

Or how much you build, or gather, or acquire,

No my darling, it’s not even how much you do for me.

It’s me.

It’s him.

It’s me, loving him.

It’s him, loving me.

And it’s us, walking hand in hand.

And Bona, even if you didn’t live long together, grow old together, build your lives together, and see your children grow old together,

You lived the life he called you to.

You walked in the way He chose for you,

Long before He laid the foundations of the earth.

And that, my brother, is enough.

You, Bona, are truly courageous.

It takes courage, to love violently, relentlessly, in the face of adversity.

It takes courage, to run ahead in nothing but faith with thousands falling at your side.

It takes courage, to not know how many tomorrows are coming,

but to hold onto hope that they are coming.

And this is how you lived.

You lived with your eyes fixed on eternity.

Letting nothing of this temporal life weigh you down.

You cast off every hindrance, and you ran.

You were never an autumn leaf falling,

But you were running the race.

And you ran it well.

And because of this my brother

I, too, will choose to run.

I, too, will fix my eyes on eternity.

I, too, will cast off every hindrance

everything that distracts me from the goal.

And right now it hurts to not hear your voice in our conversation.

It aches to feel your absence,

the emptiness in the place where you used to be.

With all of my heart I miss you,

And my heart longs to see you again,

but I know this moment is fleeting, this life is but a vapour.

We come, and we go.

And we are but strangers and foreigners on this earth.

I’ll see you one day in that city,

We’ll dance one day in that city.

The city that shimmers like a precious gem,

Filled with pulsing light.

Angels guarding the gates,

streets and gardens paved with gold.

The most beautiful city,

one my heart can’t even fathom.

The one we were created for,

the one our hearts were formed for.

I love you.

I love you so much.

But I know he loves you more.

His love for you doesn’t compare

To the height of the heavens.

To the depths of the sea.

To the orbit of the earth.

To the span of the universe.

It’s all barely a speck

Next to His love.

Bona, we lived like we’d have forever,

like our tomorrows would never stop.

And I don’t think we were fools.

Because one day our tomorrows will never end.

There is death, but there is no more death.

There is sorrow, but there is no more sorrow.

There is pain, but there is no more pain.

There are tears, but there are no more tears.

The day you left I realised who I was

A princess of the King,

But a foreigner on this earth.

An alien in every land.

So I will live like you lived,

Staring into the eyes of Jesus Christ,

The one,

The only one I am called to,

The one who you dwell with now.

—

I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.

2 Timothy 4:7

I considered studying a Masters in International Development early this year. I wanted to know the most effective way of reducing poverty, rebuilding healthy communities, reducing crime, improving education and healthcare systems… fixing all the problems in the world.
Instead I came to Haiti and prayed, God, you teach me. Teach me how you heal a broken land, how you rise a nation out of ashes.

It was the answer it had always been. Love.

But what does that look like? How does that practically fix things? How can I see real love change the world?

A few days ago I realised something I hadn’t realised before.

I’ve seen how love in action changes everything.
I saw the change begin, right here. And now, I have ridiculous hope for Haiti. It’s so real. It’s so tangible.

And it’s not hope in efficient tent city management. It’s not hope in the millions of dollars invested in reconstruction.
It’s not in feeding programs for the children. It’s not in the two water tanks we just built that will mean a lifetime of clean drinking water for 300 people.

I have hope in a Jesus who is so real, whose eyes are like fire and whose heart burns to see Haiti fall in love with him.
I have hope in a Jesus who so desires to betroth this nation to him forever.
A Jesus who desires to betroth Haiti to himself in righteousness, in justice, in steadfast love, in mercy and in faithfulness.
I have hope in a Jesus who longs to get inside the heart of every Haitian and awaken them to the way he sees and loves them, the way he sees and loves their nation.

This Jesus isn’t afraid to get dirty.

He’s the Jesus who stands with open arms to the naked, wretched and broken. He doesn’t turn away from the man sitting by the sewer, diseases brewing in his open wounds. He holds the hands and loves the children who beg of him, who pull at his clothes and ask for things. He looks with love at the lady who demands that he buy her fruit, 200 gourdes for the whole basket. He is patient with the happy man, patient with the angry man. He takes the prideful university student in one hand and the prideful street kid in the other. Together he leads them into humility, and there he teaches them.

I have real hope for Haiti.

I’ve seen the transformation begin. I saw it start with 42 Haitians and 34 foreigners in a pink and white house tucked away in Belvil, Port-au-Prince.
Now that I’ve seen this, I have hope for the world.

Jesus is more concerned about the broken heart, than the broken body, yet he heals them both.
He cares more about the empty soul than the empty stomach, yet he fills them both.
He is more concerned about the transformation of one heart than two coats of shiny, new paint on a new built school for children.
Because changed people will change the world.

I wanted to be changed, and changed, and changed, and changed again by His Love.
I believe God’s favourite development model for the world can be summarised in five words: Let my love change you.

He’ll do it.
And he’s started it.

I now personally know 42 incredible, passionate Haitians (amongst thousands of others) who have been radically changed by the love of God. That’s 42 lives sold out to Jesus, 42 people who will stand up for righteousness, love with compassion, give in generosity, and live for a cause so much greater than themselves. 42 hearts that will seek the heart of the Father, 42 voices that will speak the truth. 42 men and women with dreams to change their nation, and dreams to change the world.

Jesus changed the world with 12. I can’t wait to see what he does with 42… and counting.

I’m excited to see Haiti changed. But I want to see Australia changed too. I want to see Indonesia changed. France. Rwanda. India. Cuba. The United States. Germany. Afghanistan. China. The list is long, but love is sufficient.

Love. It is always the only answer.

Because in reality – we are all poor, naked and in desperate need of God.