Because maybe the evidence of things hoped for really is the evidence of things unseen. But unseen doesn't mean un-felt.

   I was walking around feeling like a depressed good-for-nothing and with that attitude - yeah, that would make anyone depressed. And not very nice to be around either. I dug my journal out from my time in Haiti and looked at the photos I brought back. Tears fell. Grace abounds. 

   In Haiti, moments mattered. It was NOT about me - it was about showing love to people. Initiating. Reaching outside of me. Acknowledging  that there is someone else on this earth who needs a smile. Funny thing is this - a smile? A facial expression? That's my language. I love when I meet someone who "speaks" it too. That kind of talking? It crosses borders of all kinds and you can communicate it ways often missed. Because sometimes it is in moments and you have to be paying attention to the other person so can get what they have to 'say'. So I smiled. A lot. It became a habit. You pass a group of women with jugs and baskets on their heads and you say "hello", and their faces change from hardened and worn to happy. You pass the old man sitting among the trash on the side of the street and you give him a smile, and he returns one so sweetly.You tease a group of sassy school girls in their matching uniforms and get sassy replies and sassy grins back. And me?  I smiled all the more. There weren't many times when I wasn't smiling. Wasn't joyful.

   And this was something I wanted to bring back with me to the States. A countenance of JOY and I had finally learned the secrete. It comes from giving your time away to the Lord every day. It comes from giving your smile away. To everyone. It comes from praising Jesus in all circumstances. Literally. All circumstances. And being okay with slow learning. Because stuff like this doesn't happen overnight. It's a process.

   Somewhere somehow I forgot. This was no longer a priority in my life. Making time in the day became one. But when you aren't daily practicing another language - it's easy to loose. And I nearly lost the fluency I gained in Haiti. Bummer. At this point I could beat myself up because the world is falling apart and I forgot to smile and I got all caught up in myself and were is Jesus in all this?

   But that's where you find it again. In Jesus. Because Jesus is in all this. He is in the moments. The very broken very messiness of now. Right where I am and all He want's is the language of Thankfulness. Right now. And especially in the hard and uncomfortable and difficult moments. And when our eyes finally open
- optimism rises to the surface. And all things really do become possible. And the mask of discouragement is thrown away for the true face of joy. Of pure happiness. I don't know about you but I sure want to live like that.