Leaving home felt a lot like a breakup… a messy, gross, heart wrenching breakup. The kind where your heart feels like it’s been shattered and ice cream and your mom are the glue keeping you together. Yeah, that kind.
Since being back in America, I’ve been fighting with this feeling of loss. This feeling like my heart is broken and the only thing that will fix it is to be back in Nicaragua. I’ve fought with God many nights over the subject. Why couldn’t I just stay and fundraise? Why can I never stay somewhere longer than 6 months? Why am I always moving? Why am I always missing things? When will you ever just let me be home?
And ya know what His response has been? Nothing.
In these moments when God is silent and I’m left feeling like a crazy ex girlfriend leaving 100 voicemails, there’s a sort of comfort in the frustration. I know… that doesn’t make sense does it? But the thing is,I know that when he’s silent, it’s because he’s already given me the answer and I’m just to stubborn to accept it. The answer you ask? Because I need to learn to fall in love again.
From a young age I have chased the feeling of falling in love. I have sought after the stomach flip feeling when Prince Charming slides the glass slipper on Cinderellas foot, or the breathtaking butterflies when sleeping beauty is awoken by her true loves kiss. And as much as I am a “strong, independent woman who don’t need no man”, I am also a helpless romantic, and I believe that as humans, we were created to seek after that butterfly, stomach flipping feeling. Society will try and sell you an artificial version of the feeling, but like all knock offs, it’s all only temporary. From early child hood I have chased it though. I have chased the butterflies into every short lived relationship and false love. I have chased it in success and travel and yes, even church. I have chased it, and held it in my hands, only to watch it fluttery away.
God created us with an innate desire to love and be loved by Him. And so, we seek to fulfill that desire. Nicaragua, for a long time, helped to heal and fill a gaping wound in my heart, and it was and is the sweetest gift from Jesus. But I fell in love with Nicaragua. I fell in love with the people and the food and the culture and role it played in my healing process. I fell in love with the creation and lost sight of the Creator.
And I know that someone, somewhere probably thinks I’m a horrible missionary for saying that, but it’s true. And it wasn’t a conscious thing that happened, but slowly and surely, like any good affair story, it happened. So, God took me away for a while, and he’s asked me to fall back in love with him. He’s asked me to follow the butterflies right into his arms. To let him romance me and show me all of the things he’s done just for me. He wants to sweep me off my feet and take my breath away and fill my heart for all the best reasons. And, unlike the fleeting things, he wants that butterfly feeling to stay. He aches to satisfy and to love us. And when we cut off all the other things that we think will fulfill us, He shows us that he’s the only one who can. And when we let ourselves fall, wholly and completely, all the previous heartache doesn’t seem so painful anymore. In fact, you come to a place where you’re grateful that He loved you enough to share his creation, and every precious moment in it with you.
The being away is hard, and I look forward to being back in Nicaragua in the near future to serve how I feel the Lord has called me. But in the mean time, I’m going to let Him love me and teach me how to fall in love again.
