WARNING: these are some of my raw, unedited thoughts that I am sharing to show the ways my heart and perspective has changed. Please honor these stories and the perspective I’ve gained.
*names changed for privacy purposes*
“Forgive yourself for not knowing better until you knew better.” A quote my college roommate frequently shared with people and always stuck with me.
It has been about a month since I’ve been back in the states after 11 months of traveling, learning, discovering, adventuring, but most importantly spending a year fully dependent on God. I’ve been processing some of the things that have changed in my perspective since being gone. Things that used to feel normal and are very normal to a lot of our culture. God has had to remind me time and time again to be gracious as He is to me. He reminds me of my mindset before leaving the states, the things I didn’t know. After experiencing what I experienced this past year, I have unexplainable emotions that arise in situations and moments I was numb to before.
As I clean and find boxes of donuts in trash bags,
As I sat in an airport watching people gamble their money away,
As I watch people sit around idolizing sports on the TV, escaping, no longer recognizing or being aware of anything else going on around them.
As I witness these things I wince as my mind goes back to the places I was this past year…the homes I sat in, the people I met and the lack of needs being met for many. I can’t help but wonder, in the moments I’m witnessing all the things I stated above, how that loving and hospitable Haitian family is doing in the Dominican Republic…was Amede able to find some construction work to provide for his family? Did his wife, Esther deliver her baby yet? Are all the kids healthy? Are they safe?
I think of the indigenous community in Panama, still believing they need to offer human sacrifice…will they soon comprehend Jesus’ blood was shed for them?
Are all those people in Lesotho who lit up hearing the gospel and accepted Christ still standing strong? Have they found a community to walk alongside them in the hope they now have?
I stare at all the food in the trash thinking there HAS to be something we can do with this…
As I saw people sitting at slot machines all day I think of all the kids that walk 3 hours to a care point daily in order to get one meal in which they selflessly take 3 hours back home to feed their entire family.
How can I complain about a silly wrong coffee order, in fact how can I complain at ALL knowing that right now there is a young girl in an indigenous community between Costa Rica and Panama being raped by her father as her tribe believes this is just a part of their culture…
I reflect on these things as just tears fall to the floor…a righteous frustration and sadness for Gods people that He allows me to feel, yet reminds me of His beautiful grace, in which I continue to extend and pray for our nation to desire opening our eyes to the cultures, realities, hardships, and beauty of the world around us.
I want to be clear that I’m not casting judgement, rather sharing the things my eyes have been open to. But if you feel unease while reading this, I pray that it drives you to your knees in prayer, to a God that is so much bigger than all of this.
Something I recently learned is in the verse Acts 1:8 “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” He doesn’t say “in Jerusalem and THEN all Judea and THEN…” He’s saying all at the same time. Because we can’t be in multiple places at once, he means through PRAYER.
Some things I miss most are singing in church with the only music being clapping our hands and using our voices. Feeling the Holy Spirits presence fall without a stage, pretty lights and expensive instruments. I miss the excitement of finding out I’d get to sleep in a bed the next month, a comfort that was never expected, but a luxury we would soak up while we had it. All the tiny things there are to be excited about when you’re free from being a slave to materialism.
As I came home, I wondered to myself a few times, how do I re-enter a place I’m expected to be the same when I’m no longer the same? The answer is- I don’t. I carry that life change into the lives of others.
God let us recognize our privileges and be grateful, but let us not become so complacent that we gloat in the things we have. Let us not become so complacent that we forget your Great Commission and keep the gospel all to ourselves.
Lord let those who are suffering know that there is something worth suffering for. Amen
