Matt W Cook

In trying to improve my Urdu I’ve been reading the Bible more lately. That is, I’ve been reading the Urdu Bible more lately. I find it amazing how fresh it seems to me. Just the different wording and different idioms and emphasis that is given to the text. Yesterday I read 2 Corinthians 4:7-12. Here’s a translation from the Urdu, as I see it.

But we have this treasure placed in clay pots so that it will be obvious that this unlimited mighty, controlling, wonder-working power is from God’s side, not from our side. Pressure comes to us from every side, but we don’t get crushed. We certainly have stress, but we are not hopeless. Persecution comes, but we are not left alone. We are wounded, but we do not perish. We, in our own bodies, carry Jesus’ death around so that Jesus’ life also will be obvious in our bodies. Because while we live, for Jesus’ sake, we stare at death’s face so that Jesus’ life also may be obvious in our perishable bodies.

mighty, controlling, wonder-working power in Urdu is a neat word, Qooderut. It’s very hard to translate and means a lot of things. Mighty, controlling, wonder-working power is about as close as I can get.

I don’t know if it carries the same meaning in English, but when I read it for the first time in Urdu I was gripped. What an amazing fact that we are so cared for. How wonderful that the unlimited Qooderut of God is working on our behalf. That even though I’m pressured and stressed out and persecuted, it is never to the uttermost. The word I translated as stress is also a big word. It could mean anxiety, confusion or even compassion sometimes.

I think it’s hard for me to explain how lovely this has all become to me. I feel refreshed by it, as if I read it for the first time and didn’t know about it before. What a wonderful truth that we carry Jesus’ death around so that his life will be obvious, and even though we stare death in the face, it’s for His sake and his life is made obvious by it.

I’m listening to an instrumental rendition of Ave Maria. Piano only. I close my eyes and I can kinda see the music. I can feel the delicate notes dancing together. Each note, by itself very plain and boring, comes together with its mate to make some sort of beautiful work of art. I don’t know the words to this song and I only have a faint idea as to what it’s about, but it’s very beautiful.

I’ve often sat and wondered at beauty. I might have said before that it is beauty that helped convince me in the beginning that we are much more than animals. A dog doesn’t gaze into the sunset. A dolphin doesn’t build great cathedrals. A monkey can’t appreciate a Rembrandt. But we can. We look over the Grand Canyon and we stop to take a breath.

But I’m really not sure what beauty it. I can’t define it, though I’ve tried. It’s difficult, elusive. What is beautiful and what is ugly? Sometimes that depends on the beholder, but sometimes it’s more objective. I think beauty, like love, is such a high thing that it defies our attempts to define. Things like beauty and love are a part of God’s realm, and while we give words to these things we aren’t totally sure what those words actually mean. I’m sure I could make up a few definitions to love and beauty that would suffice for a dictionary, but I don’t think they would be able to do justice to the great meaning behind the words.

And I think of all the beautiful things in the world. The creative works of God in nature and the cosmos. The image of God working in the creativity of man in words, paintings, music, architecture and everything else. Sometimes I just sit and look or listen at whatever is in front of me and I’m in awe. I wonder… If it’s so beautiful here… If this cursed world has so many things to taste and touch and see, if fallen man can create such lovely expressions, what will glory be like? What will the river flowing from the Throne be like? What sounds would it make? What songs will we sing? I suppose the image of God will still work in us to be creative. Perhaps we’ll write new songs. Maybe we’ll paint and carve things to the glory of God that we could never imagine or appreciate here. And if all that we see around us is the canvas, what must the Painter be like? I would much rather meet Handel than to listen to Messiah. The creator is always more interesting than the creation because in the creator we can learn his motivation and try to understand what he says is beautiful. How wonderful it would be to know the mind of God.

Those of you who get my Emails may be aware that things are a bit tricky over here these days. The biggest problem is the flooding that’s been going on. Hard to imagine that an area with an average annual rainfall of about -2cm is now swimming. It’s rough for the people here. Houses are collapsing, crops and animals are dying. Apparently the city we’re in right now have been hit the worst. Hundreds of families here in Sanghar are homeless now. Pray for Sindh. The rain finally stopped today (we think) and the waters are draining. Here’s a shot of the courtyard after much of the water was drained.

God has been making himself sweeter than before in these last few days. I am terrified that sin will take me out of fellowship again sometime. I’ve been thinking about the absolute transcent worth of knowing God. I read a little peom Jim Elliot wrote about it.

What is this, Lord Jesus, that Thou shouldst make an end
Of all that I possess, and give Thyself to me?
So that there is nothing now to call my own
Save Thee; Thyself alone my treasure.
Taking all, Thou givest full measure of Thyself
With all things else eternal-
Things unlike the mouldy pelf by earth possessed.
But as to Life and Godliness, all things are mine,
And in God’s garments dressed I am;
With Thee, an heir to riches in spheres divine.
Strange, I say, that suffering loss,
I have so gained everything in getting
Me a friend who bore a cross.

I got no comments for that. Just silent prayers that God would take everything away from me and only give me Himself. I love how Christianity doesn’t promise riches, health, luck or stuff like that. It promises God. A reward of billions of dollars or hundreds of years of youthful life is far too little for me, I won’t be satisfied with it. I refuse to be satisfied with it. Give me God. Or I die.

Here are some pictures, for you lovely patient people. I don’t know when new ones will be up, my computer has taken a turn for the dead. Here they are:

Here’s Ruth’s maternal Grandma. I don’t know her name, we all just call her Noni. Lovely lady. Big teeth.

Joe’s practicing to be a bike rider. Go Joe.

Hello. My name is Joe. I work, in, the button factory…

We be jammin’

Joseph wants to be Stevie Wonder when he grows up…

Or maybe he wants to be a Buffalo Rodeo Rider.

Or maybe a miner…

And a nice picture of Sindhu (Paul’s wife), mom and John.

More may come later. For now watch and pray.

Some thoughts on the sovereignty of God

I really enjoy that TV series that was on the air just a few years ago. Lost. It’s about a plane that crashes on a weird island and the survivors have to work together in order to survive. Kinda like castaway, except with more people, and crazy monsters and polar bears that eat people. Anyway, there’s this doctor on the show named Jack. Everyone looks up to this guy and they make him their reluctant leader. Near the end of the first season he has an argument with Kate over a decision he makes. She wants to carry some dynamite or something and he won’t let her. She argues with him and says that it’s not his choice to make. Then Jack said something that stuck in my head ever since I heard it. “Everyone wants me to be a leader until I make a decision that they don’t like.”

You may have heard by now that Ruth’s visa application was rejected. The Canadian government is afraid that Ruth might try to stay in Canada past her allotted six months. I suppose it’s a fair fear to have. We were quite disappointed when we found out, of course. The neat thing is that before the visa came we were praying that God’s will would be done regarding it. Deep down inside we were actually praying something more like “Gimmie gimmie gimmie.” It’s funny; eventually I got to a point where I was totally convinced that the visa would come. I remember one night when I prayed that the visa would come the next day. Sure enough, the next day I called the High Commission and they said the decision had been made, though they weren’t allowed to tell us what it was. I took this as a definite sign and was thoroughly convinced that God had ordained the visa to fall in our hands. Imagine my disappointment when an empty passport arrived at our house. For a second I felt a little misled. I felt like I had put my faith somewhere it didn’t quite belong. I was upset.

That’s how it always seems to go, eh? We all want a god of some kind. Just like we all need good leaders. Well, we say we want good leaders and gods, but what we really want is someone in a high authority who will agree with everything we agree with. God is great, until he makes a choice we don’t like. Of course, if God’s choices were always the same as mine that would mean that either I possessed omniscience and omni-wisdom, or that God had the intellect of a puny human. Neither of those scenarios fit with the God of the Bible, though. God is far above us. God’s wisdom is so great we could never understand it, even if he tried to explain it to us. It’s like Einstein trying to explain his Special and General theories of relativity to my boy, Joseph. It just can’t happen. I think it should be rather obvious to us that God (and good leaders) will make decisions that we don’t understand or like.

But we have wonderful promises, don’t we? God knew that many of his choices would rub against us, so he put some wonderful promises in his Message to us. “I will never leave you or forsake you.” “All things work together for good…” “I know the plans I have for you…” Lovely, lovely words.

So I sit here and I know that it is best for me to be here. Perhaps God wants me to clean up my Urdu before I get back, or plug another year into this school and try to shape the lives of these kids. Or maybe I’ll just get some better sanctification over here than I would in Canada. Or maybe the reasons are numerous and way over my head, so I shouldn’t try to figure everything out. Maybe I should delight myself in the Lord, do what I can to glorify him wherever I am, and all that good stuff I’m supposed to do.

So on we go! Another year, pray for us. Don’t pray for crappy stuff like money, comfort and whatnot. Pray for gold. That spiritual gold of faith, hope and love. Of total love to God and love to man. That’s the sort of stuff we need over here.

So I can say now that my heart is willing and I’m excited for another year here. All is and will be well. You’re in my prayers, pray for me.

In his grip and grace,
The Cook

Great heart of my own heart
Whatever befall,
Still be Thou my vision
Oh ruler of all.

Some thoughts on the sovereignty of God

I really enjoy that TV series that was on the air just a few years ago. Lost. It’s about a plane that crashes on a weird island and the survivors have to work together in order to survive. Kinda like castaway, except with more people, and crazy monsters and polar bears that eat people. Anyway, there’s this doctor on the show named Jack. Everyone looks up to this guy and they make him their reluctant leader. Near the end of the first season he has an argument with Kate over a decision he makes. She wants to carry some dynamite or something and he won’t let her. She argues with him and says that it’s not his choice to make. Then Jack said something that stuck in my head ever since I heard it. “Everyone wants me to be a leader until I make a decision that they don’t like.”

You may have heard by now that Ruth’s visa application was rejected. The Canadian government is afraid that Ruth might try to stay in Canada past her allotted six months. I suppose it’s a fair fear to have. We were quite disappointed when we found out, of course. The neat thing is that before the visa came we were praying that God’s will would be done regarding it. Deep down inside we were actually praying something more like “Gimmie gimmie gimmie.” It’s funny; eventually I got to a point where I was totally convinced that the visa would come. I remember one night when I prayed that the visa would come the next day. Sure enough, the next day I called the High Commission and they said the decision had been made, though they weren’t allowed to tell us what it was. I took this as a definite sign and was thoroughly convinced that God had ordained the visa to fall in our hands. Imagine my disappointment when an empty passport arrived at our house. For a second I felt a little misled. I felt like I had put my faith somewhere it didn’t quite belong. I was upset.

That’s how it always seems to go, eh? We all want a god of some kind. Just like we all need good leaders. Well, we say we want good leaders and gods, but what we really want is someone in a high authority who will agree with everything we agree with. God is great, until he makes a choice we don’t like. Of course, if God’s choices were always the same as mine that would mean that either I possessed omniscience and omni-wisdom, or that God had the intellect of a puny human. Neither of those scenarios fit with the God of the Bible, though. God is far above us. God’s wisdom is so great we could never understand it, even if he tried to explain it to us. It’s like Einstein trying to explain his Special and General theories of relativity to my boy, Joseph. It just can’t happen. I think it should be rather obvious to us that God (and good leaders) will make decisions that we don’t understand or like.

But we have wonderful promises, don’t we? God knew that many of his choices would rub against us, so he put some wonderful promises in his Message to us. “I will never leave you or forsake you.” “All things work together for good…” “I know the plans I have for you…” Lovely, lovely words.

So I sit here and I know that it is best for me to be here. Perhaps God wants me to clean up my Urdu before I get back, or plug another year into this school and try to shape the lives of these kids. Or maybe I’ll just get some better sanctification over here than I would in Canada. Or maybe the reasons are numerous and way over my head, so I shouldn’t try to figure everything out. Maybe I should delight myself in the Lord, do what I can to glorify him wherever I am, and all that good stuff I’m supposed to do.

So on we go! Another year, pray for us. Don’t pray for crappy stuff like money, comfort and whatnot. Pray for gold. That spiritual gold of faith, hope and love. Of total love to God and love to man. That’s the sort of stuff we need over here.

So I can say now that my heart is willing and I’m excited for another year here. All is and will be well. You’re in my prayers, pray for me.

In his grip and grace,
The Cook

Great heart of my own heart
Whatever befall,
Still be Thou my vision
Oh ruler of all.

Hear ye, hear ye!

Just a quick post to let you know that I called the High Commission today about Ruth’s visa. The lady who answered the phone checked her computer and said that an officer was checking out Ruth’s application at that very moment. It takes a few days to check it out so please be praying! I’m calling back on Friday to see what the answer is.

Pray pray.

Hear ye, hear ye!

Just a quick post to let you know that I called the High Commission today about Ruth’s visa. The lady who answered the phone checked her computer and said that an officer was checking out Ruth’s application at that very moment. It takes a few days to check it out so please be praying! I’m calling back on Friday to see what the answer is.

Pray pray.

A Clear and Present Danger

Books are great things. I have found that I really love reading. I like many different types of books. KLBC gave me a love for those theological tomes that are hard to find. High school gave me an interest for general knowledge books. And I think my mother gave me a love for novels. All kinds of novels. Old classics, new stories, action, drama, science-fiction, fantasy, whatever. I love reading a good story. When I read an old Puritan book it takes me weeks to get through, and that’s a good thing with the good ol’ Puritans (gotta take your time). But when I read a novel I can get through the whole thing in a matter of days. I actually finished The Da Vinci Code in one day. I found a really neat bazaar in Karachi called Itvar Bazaar. Literally means Sunday Market. There is a massive table in the deep depths of this bazaar filled with the most wonderful books imaginable. From Dickens to Clancy and Grisham and everyone else you could imagine. I bought almost ten books there; most of them are Clancy. I had never read Clancy much growing up, just Rainbow Six. And that I read just because I liked the video game. After reading a whole lot more of his books I gotta say, I’m impressed. He writes very realistic stories and the plethora of characters he puts in every book have their own stories, ambitions and dreams, even if they die five minutes after meeting them.

In half the Clancy books I’ve read part of the plot involves some sort of secret, covert mission. I was very interested in how the characters in his books are recruited for these missions. It usually goes something like this:

A secret recruiter guy comes to an army base and meets up with a specially selected soldier.
Recruiter: Hey there son. We’ve got a mission for you. We’d like you to come and get ready for it.
Army dude: What’s the mission?
Recruiter: I can’t say (and I don’t really know myself), but if you’re in we leave for special training in an hour. Are you in?
Army dude: You can’t tell me anything about the mission?
Recruiter: Only that it might be dangerous, and it might not be. It’s for a good cause, and you’ll get special training for it. Might take about half a year. Maybe more. Maybe less.
Army dude: Okay, let’s go.
Off they go to a secret training camp where they meet all the other new recruits. None of the other soldiers know what the mission is all about. Even the people in charge of training the soldiers are left in the dark. As time goes on some of the bright ones are able to figure a few things out based on what the training is, but only a handful of people in the upper rings of command actually know what’s going on. In fact, the soldiers don’t learn what the real mission is until the night before they leave for it.

I like drawing spiritual parallels where none seem to exist. I think there’s one here. We have been recruited. We have a general idea about what our mission is. We have ‘standing orders’. Orders that apply all the time and for all soldiers. Orders like Be holy, or Delight yourself in the Lord, or Preach the Gospel or all creation and other such things that are standing orders for everyone in God’s host. But each of us has our own special orders too. Trick is, we don’t know them all yet. God’s got a special plan for everyone in his crew, but he won’t tell us it right now. You may think that you know what he’s preparing you to do, and you may be right. But you may be wrong. We don’t know what we’re training for, but we certainly are in training. Maybe you’re training for some covert op across the sea. Maybe you’re training to bring the message of light to those at work. Maybe you’re training to lead your own troop of forces. Maybe you’re training to follow your general orders in a beautiful way. Whatever is going on in your life, you are in training. Even when you’re on a mission, that mission is training. So train hard and love your Drill Sergeant. He’ll give you a tough ride, but it’ll be better in the end because of it.

Don’t worry…be happy!

Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life…
Matthew 6:25

So here’s the deal. Ruth’s visa application is somewhere between Karachi and Islamabad, there is no way I can know if it arrived safely until the middle of next week. Also, in order to get a good deal on plane tickets I paid for our flight last week, though I cannot take possession of the tickets until Ruth’s passport with its visa returns. Imagine what would happen if our ‘reliable’ Pakistani courier service lost the application with her passport. She’d need a new passport, and that takes a while to get, we’d miss our flight. On top of it all when I try to talk to our dear friends at the High Commission they, more often than not, decide to not pick up the phone. The possibility of stress is pretty high these days.

Then I read the Sermon on the Mount. Don’t worry. Don’t worry about your life or your food or your clothes. There’s more to life than all that! The others worry about that stuff, not you! You’re different, you’re set apart, and you’re part of a holy nation whose ruler is God. So don’t worry.
But what if Ruth doesn’t get her visa?
Don’t worry about it.
But what if we’re stuck in Pakistan?
I’m in charge of the limitless cosmos. If you’re stuck here, I put you here.
But what do we do if we have to stay?
Don’t worry. I’ll take care of it.
But what if…
The situation doesn’t matter. I am in control. Nothing escapes my power or my grasp or my sight. Whatever happens to you is part of the wonderful story I’m writing with your life. Seek me first; I’ll take care of the rest.

I’ve been listening to a lot of Five Iron Frenzy these days. I miss the old days when I was a ska kid. One of my favorite songs is called The Greatest Story Ever Told. It reminds me why I don’t need to worry. I’m part of a wonderful story. The greatest story. Jesus is making a wonderful story and I’m in it. Everything will work out for my good. So everything may screw up and blow up in my face, no matter, the end will be better because of it. My only job right now is to seek and pray and wait on God. He’ll take care of the rest. The author of my hope is writing the greatest story ever told.

World Without an End

For all the deepest thoughts complied,
Philosophy to laws of physics,
No-one’s ever heard or seen
A more beautiful thing than this love that saved us.

In the soundless awe and wonder
Words fall short to hope again.
How beautiful, how vast your love is!
New forever, world without an end.

The very spark that burns the stars
Drew near to me today.
The God of everything that is
Whispered in my ear that this love is boundless.

In the soundless awe and wonder
Words fall short to hope again.
How beautiful how vast your love is!
New forever, world without an end.

Cook out

PS – Since this blog was first posted the visa application has been returned to us because I needed an extra form that the Consulate in Karachi didn’t give me. I sent the whole deal back to Islamabad two days ago. Looks like we’re cutting it a little close here, eh?

Rain, rain on my face…
We were in Karachi for a little while this past week. We decided to head back to Sanghar a day earlier than expected. It was a very interesting trip home.

I booked our seats for the 3:30 bus. At 3:15 Ruth and I were sitting patiently at the grungy bus-stop waiting for our bus. Oddly enough, it was late. At about 3:50 it finally arrived. Whatever frustrations we may have been feeling were banished as soon as we boarded the bus. I have never seen a Pakistani coach so lovely! Chilling A/C, tons of leg-room, and wonderfully comfortable seats with cup-holders made this look like the most wonderful ride we’d ever had. We settled down for a nice ride home.

The bus traveled much slower than usual. Usually these coach drivers rule the road and drive any obstacles into the ditch, but this guy was courteous and rather slow. While I went through the entire trip without fearing for my life once, I wished it went a bit faster. Eventually we left the National Highway and got onto the rural roads that would eventually lead us home. This is where the interesting things began to happen. We suddenly pulled off the road into a gas station and met up with another coach. Before I knew what was happening all the men were scrambling to get off the bus. For some reason we were switching buses. So off the bus I went, trying hard to keep up with the crowd and not lose my seat. I almost lost all of my luggage but eventually Ruth and I were settled nicely in a less-comfortable but much faster bus. Wonderful, eh?

Maybe not. About five minutes into the ride I noticed something that I had not seen for almost a year. There were flashes of light in the sky and droplets of water striking the windows. Rain? In Pakistan it never rains, but it pours! Within ten minutes of the rain starting we found ourselves in the middle of what I might call a monsoon. Even though I don’t really know what a monsoon is, I figure it can’t be much worse than that rain storm. The windows were leaking water all over us and we couldn’t see two feet out the windows. Funny thing is that our dear, semi-crazy driver never seemed to slow down. So on we went, up and down bumpy roads in the middle of a flooding nowhere, hoping and praying that we would reach Sanghar without drowning. At about 10:00 (two hours past the original ETA) we arrived in the lake that used to be Sanghar. I hopped off the bus to grab our luggage. As I stepped onto the street I silently cursed the driver for parking right beside a foot-deep puddle. I stopped cursing him when I walked away from the bus into the rest of town which was a two-foot puddle. I greatly regretted wearing my nice leather sandals that day.

Eventually we found a rickshaw that was willing to take us home. We were given a neat surprise when we got there. First, it was incredibly difficult to walk, the entire courtyard having been turned into a muddy swamp. Secondly I noticed that a rather large tree had fallen down. As I walked inside the house I saw the strangest sight of the day. The entire western wall of the compound had collapsed, leaving the family exposed to the outside of the city. As I type this now the men of the family are collecting thorny trees and branches to put up in place of the brick. Here’s a picture of the wall:

And here are a few other shots you haven’t seen:

Leader of the pack. Vroom, vroom.

Our cute little family at the Qaid-e-Azam tomb. Nice tourist destination.

Joe, cuter than ever.

Hanging at the Arabian sea.

He’s gonna be a soccer player. He iiiiis!

Swinging like a champ.

Yeah, you teach that goat a lesson!

I hope you enjoy those pics. Pray for us these days, some big things are near in the future. I could use some of that Spiritual Wisdom stuff.

Cook out.