A Fate Worse Than No Internet

There is something worse than having no internet service at all.  That’s having some internet.  I don’t say this to try and compare access to FaceBook with clean drinking water or a roof over your head.  I can certainly do without it, but I woke up this morning (thanks to jet lag) at 4am.  Some -quick- groggy, early morning math told me that would be 8pm back at home.  This would be a great time to video chat with Tricia and the kids.  My expectations high, my hopes were up.  I opened my laptop and it automatically connected to the local wi-fi, however after 30 minutes of reconnecting, rebooting and growling at my computer, here I am, still offline.  The router won’t connect to the internet.

Sometimes I feel the same way about my family’s adventures in trying to get here to live in Turkey for the past few years.  We go through times of hopeful expectation when we think access to this world is only moments away. At any time we could get a call that would make it all happen.  Then there are other times that we’ve gone through an entire re-boot and entered into a period where we knew we weren’t going anywhere for a year or more.

The common factors in this comparison are expectations and hope.

I always expect baklava to be delicious.

Unmet expectations can be a source of great frustration.  In living cross-culturally how we react to them is crucial.  I’ve had years of living with unmet expectations.  Some I’ve dealt with in healthy ways, others not.  At the moment I’m dealing with unmet expectations in a productive way, by writing this post instead of sulking, getting angry, or trying to break into the office where the wireless router is.  The key to reacting well to unmet expectations is remaining flexible.  We need to be able to set aside our preferences for the sake of self control, peace and joy.

Hope is different than expectation.  Hope puts trust in something.  My hope this morning was putting trust in technology which is never a safe thing to do.  My hope for moving to Turkey, however, is putting trust in God.  Which of these makes more sense?  Obviously a hope in God is much more well-founded.  It is a house built on rock instead of sand.  While I may struggle with it for a while I will eventually give up on the hope of technology working, but I will not give up on my hope in God.  He has given me my dreams, desires and talents for a reason and I will be faithful to pursue those dreams and use those talents wherever He has me no matter what.