“Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing” (James 1:2-4, ESV).

 

These last few months have squeezed our family like a grape. We have six kids aged eight and under—including infant twins, Ford and Eleanor, who joined our family in summer 2022. We are also about to move the whole Morris clan to Papua New Guinea in 2023 to serve as healthcare missionaries. I am sure you can imagine that our lives are as calm as a clam.

 

In August 2022, as the summer sunshine waned, my wife embarked on another year of homeschooling kids in three different grades, all while endlessly nursing newborn twins and corralling our 2-year-old, Milo. Have you ever tried to teach three levels of language arts, and prepare for a science experiment on the water cycle, while holding two voraciously hungry babies, and cleaning up after a toddler who scatters Goldfish around the house with greater alacrity than Hansel and Gretel? Or what about trying to prepare lunch, teach long division, do laundry for eight people, perhaps take a shower and help a 5-year-old find a Chaco sandal he lost somewhere outside for the thirteenth time?

 

Meanwhile, while you search for said Chaco, you are carrying twins in each arm, your 2-year-old wants more Goldfish and your 8-year-old is more interested in hot gluing together a bottle rocket projectile than finishing his lesson on spelling rules. Also, is there something burning in the house? Yes…someone took the turtle’s heat lamp out of the cage, placed it face down on a dresser, and there is smoke and an acrid burnt paint smell billowing through the bedroom! That could have been bad! It is still two hours until the twins’ nap time, and it’s only Monday. Welcome to an average day in the Morris home.

 

Have you ever felt like life feels out of control? I am truly amazed by the infinite tasks my wife Genae orchestrates in the storm of our lives. She is incredible and resilient. Trust me, working in the emergency department feels like an all-inclusive Cancun resort compared to our home. She has the difficult job. I often joke that the emergency room is where I go to relax. Our life may sound humorous, and it often is, but I have left out describing the incessant noise that makes a Boeing 747 aircraft sound like a purring cat. I haven’t described Genae waking up at 2 a.m. with a panic attack for the second night of the week—so desperately in need of the sleep that her very stress and exhaustion steals away. I haven’t described the doctors’ visits. I haven’t described the painful arguments Genae and I have had with each other because we are both frayed. I haven’t described how we have snapped at the kids over trivial things because we are so overwhelmed that every additional mess, fight and act of disobedience feels like the catastrophic straw that shatters the slumping and dejected camel’s back. Welcome to an average day in the Morris home.

 

Life is filled with contrast and paradox—with seemingly contradictory emotions and qualities in every situation. We are blessed with six kids aged eight and under, but we are reduced and refined under the weight of that blessing. We follow God’s leading to serve Him overseas as healthcare missionaries, but we struggle with the pain of preparation, transition and disconnectedness that results from that decision. Nothing is easy. Every vibrant blossom is seemingly upheld by a stem of thorns. Nothing is perfect. Every joy is followed with pain. Every pain is lined with grace, and we rejoice in all of it.

 

These contrasts have been blazingly apparent to us in this past season. Reckoning with these discrepant qualities—stress and joy—involves practical wisdom: Do we send our kids to public school? How do we find margin when we feel like we are drowning? How much can we bear with God’s grace, and what would be wise to let go? These are not easy questions. We prayed. We cried. We argued. We tried not to make decisions at peak moments of fear or stress. I thought of a wise piece of advice I once read, “When you don’t know what to do, just take the next logical step by faith.”[1] So, we trudged forward in faith, instead of standing still in fear.

 

We decided to transition our older three kids, Walter, Evie and Harvey, from homeschool to public school one month into the school year. It was a painful decision. The afternoon before their first day, we filled a Target shopping cart full of dinosaur pencil boxes, spiral notebooks and yellow folders. Both Genae’s heart and my heart were heavy. The twins cried the whole trip. As we stood in the line to checkout, an older woman sidled to wait behind us and our loquacious kids began to chat her up. She was kind and smiled. She saw us try to stack our multitude of supplies on the conveyor belt like it was a Jenga tower, and then she wisely disappeared into an adjacent line. A few minutes later, as I went to pay for our $250 trip, a Target employee walked up with a credit card and said, “Another customer wants to pay for all your groceries, she insists.” As I looked up in confusion, the employee slid the credit card and walked off, bringing the card back to the woman who had previously been in line behind us. I went over and gave her a hug. She said, “God bless, you have a beautiful family.” That is grace. A whisper from God that He is there even in the storm.

 

The next morning, we woke the kids up for their first day of public school. The paradoxes were not over. Though we all had some sense of anxiety, we nonetheless started the day with laughter. Milo’s older brothers had played the midnight van Gogh and painted their helpless sleeping sibling with a beard and mustache. Thankfully, the markings were ephemeral, and when Genae dropped the kids off at school, much of the damage had been washed off. He still had a six o’clock shadow.

 

Later that week, after school, our evening turned into spontaneous family worship. I got out the acoustic guitar, Genae strummed the ukulele and sang, Walter kept rhythm by hitting the couch and Evie brought the djembe up from the basement to dance and drum like we were in a Kenyan village. Everything was going swimmingly for about 20 minutes, until Harvey decided it was a good idea to insert his foot into the djembe. When he told me it was stuck, I laughed and kept playing guitar. I thought, “What a cute, silly kid.” Then I realized it really was stuck. Worship stopped. Harvey began to cry. Pain followed joy.

 

Ten minutes later, we still had not extracted his leg from the djembe. Sharp, rough, wood fibers on the neck of the djembe cut his skin any time we tried to pull. He cried that he was going to lose his foot. He then said, through his tears, “Wait! I have a good idea! Call a drum maker and have them come take off all the drum strings! A drum maker will know what to do!”

 

I, unfortunately, do not have any drum makers on speed-dial. So, after some puzzling, some frustration (mine) and lots of tears (Harvey’s), I retrieved a knife from the garage, cut off the drum skin (not his foot), slid the smooth drum skin between Harvey’s now visible ankle and the neck of the djembe, and we were able to extract his imperiled appendage.

 

Life is a mess. Joy and pain. Paradox. Beauty in the collision. This last season has squeezed our family like a grape—but we are still here. We don’t want the stress, the panic attacks and the tears, but God shows up in the midst of brokenness. He stretches us, broadens our shoulders, helps our roots of faith grow tough in the darkness and teaches us to count it joy when we face trials of many kinds. Even though we have felt like an over-filled bag ready to burst, we wouldn’t trade these light and momentary afflictions for lives of passivity and ease. We are overwhelmingly grateful for our lives, for our family and for Jesus.

 

Challenges and pain are not a symptom of dysfunction in following Jesus; instead, they are a feature. Jesus is no stranger to paradox. More than 2,000 years ago, He came to earth as a man, lived a spotless life and died on a cross to bear the punishment for sins He did not commit.

 

Author G.K. Chesterton once said, “The cross has at its heart a collision and a contradiction. It can extend its four arms forever without altering its shape. Because it has a paradox in its center, it can grow without changing. The cross opens its arms to the four winds; it is a signpost for free travelers.”

 

Our lives collide at the crossroads of pain and blessing. But, for those who trust in Jesus, at that intersection stands the One who bore the sharpest pain and granted the most superlative blessing. In Him, the pain and the blessing find meaning. Jesus is the greatest guide for our lives of paradox.

 

In your wearied life of pain and blessing, do you see the cross, with its arms spread wide as a signpost for free travelers? Have you found Jesus in the intersection? Do you see His strong hand, scarred with understanding, reaching out to hold you—and everything else—together? Be encouraged that in your life of stress and joy, peace and chaos, pain and grace, you are not alone.

 

“Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand” (Isaiah 41:10, ESV).

 

The Morris Family departed for Papua New Guinea on April 5th, 2023. They may have forgotten a few belongings, but all of the children were accounted for. They are grateful for your prayers as they serve Jesus in the mountains of Papua New Guinea. You can follow their blog at www.morrisfamilymissions.org.

 

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About the Author

Jake Morris, MD, is an emergency physician who previously practiced in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. He completed his medical school at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and his chief residency in emergency medicine at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He has been actively involved in CMDA since 2012. He was a Resident Trustee on the CMDA Board of Trustees from 2018 to 2019. He previously served as the Wisconsin Assistant State Director for the American Academy of Medical Ethics. The Morris family moved to Papua New Guinea in early 2023 to serve as healthcare missionaries.

 

The Morris Family: Jake, Genae, Walter (8), Evie (6), Harvey (5), Milo (2) and the twins, Ford and Eleanor.

 

 

[1] Robert J. Morgan, The Red Sea Rules: 10 God-Given Strategies for Difficult Times (Nashville: T. Nelson, 2001).