It’s 3:30 am and there are car horns honking. It’s 5:30 am and there are car horn honking. It’s 7:30 am and the car horns are still freaking honking. All day. All night. They honk for no reason at all. I think at times they do it just cause they like the sound of their own horns.
This is Reason 1 of 5,467 that it’s hard to hear God’s voice in a city of 10 million. I am an extrovert with some huge introvert tendencies like the fact that I connect to God best through quiet time in nature. I get giddy when I see a sad wilting tree or the two or three faint stars that show up through a polluted sky. I almost cried when I saw a gorgeous white tiger at a Siberian Tiger Preserve (I must add that a Siberian tiger lunged at my face with only a rusty wire fence between him and me getting facial reconstruction…nature is awesome). It was my first brush with nature in 11 days and in that moment I saw God clearer than I’d seen Him here yet. I need and crave God’s beautiful outdoor creation. At first when I got here I was excited to see God in a big city setting and I thought it would be super easy to do. It isn’t. I looked for His creation on the streets but instead saw trash blowing down the road. I looked for it in people we passed and was met with them hocking up phlegm and spitting it anywhere they pleased (everyone seems to do this). I looked for it in a quiet concrete courtyard but was met with 6 or so Chinese people stopping and just staring at me and taking pictures as if I was an animal in a zoo. But then in my annoyance and frustration God spoke to me and reminded me that the very thing I was trying to escape from is His creation too.
God is trying to work in me hardcore right now to find Him in the moments I wouldn’t expect. He showed up in the eyes of college students at an English speaking club who literally had their years made by getting to speak to actual Americans. I find Him in children’s joy as we play with them. I find him in the architecture. I find him in music when I close my eyes to all the stimulents around me. I’ll admit it, it is still beyond hard on me. God has some major work to do in me. The key is going to be that no matter what I do or where I am to be able to see God. He is everywhere it’s just so hard to remember that at times.
Please pray that God will continue what He is doing in my life and to push me way out of my comfort zone and be able to find Him amid the loud, bright, polluted, dirty, yet beautiful city of 10 million.
For a quick prayer request I’d like you to meet Berry. I spent 2 hours talking to him one night and his story broke my heart. His major of crazy long name engineering was picked for him by his parents. He loves literature and history and his dream is to come to America and teach ancient Chinese history. He wants to travel the world and experience new cultures but he’s never left China. He wants to learn guitar but never has had time in his entire life because of school. They value education so much here that personal interests and passions are completely swept under the rug until all there are are a bunch of unhappy people doing jobs they are told to do. Hence why China has the highest suicide rate in the world. He also doesn’t know Jesus. Please pray that this young man’s passions aren’t quenched by his society and that God will give me an opportunity to share the gospel and that he would have an open heart to receive it. Berry is the one standing on Adam’s left.
Also, tonight God brought two of our Chinese friends into His kingdom! We now have two new brothers! Some of my team and I got to share the Gospel tonight and they both accepted. My heart is overjoyed and has made all the hardships I’ve experienced here beyond worth it. If nothing else comes of the next 10 months I would be completely satisfied, but i know that God is going to do some crazy things. One of the brothers who accepted is named Eric and he is the one crouching in front of the picture. Praise God too that he is the head of the English Club and will be able to touch so many lives. The other’s name is Thomas. Please pray that God will work and move in their lives to touch many other lives.
Also, I love my team because they love ice cream.
