A Malawi Wowie Christmas.
Anyone who knows me back home knows how much I LOVE Christmas. I am one of those people who start listening to Christmas music consistently in October (or sometimes July). I love decorating the tree and wrapping presents- I wrap almost every present that goes under the tree at home. it’s the one time of year that I will tolerate, maybe even enjoy the snow. And I just love a good Christmas movie. By the time the holidays are over I have watched pretty much every major Christmas movie out there, often more then once. I love attending Christmas parties because I can wear red and green plaid headbands. I love baking and frosting my mom’s Christmas cookies. I love driving around and seeing houses all decorated with brightly colored lights. I love giving and receiving gifts. I just love Christmas.
Please read that paragraph again and count how many times I mentioned Jesus…….the answer would be zero. Woah.
This past Christmas, December 25, 2009, was unlike any other Christmas I have ever experienced. For starters I was in Africa, Malawi to be precise Likuchi to be even more precise. I was dripping sweat from my entire body, eating a “feast” of beans and rice, our Christmas tree was a drawing we taped to the wall, and we were all living out of our tents. Besides that team S’more was by ourselves with one squad leader, Tiffany, hours away from all other members of I-Squad. Not the typical American style celebration I had anticipated happening back in June when I started on this World Race thing. Yet, it was the most amazing Christmas.
God amazes me; He really does. About 5 days to 1 week before Christmas God convicted almost everyone on our team about Christmas. All of us realized that we had never had a Christmas that was truly all about Jesus. The typical American Christmas always managed to over shadow Jesus and His birth. My first paragraph about how much I love Christmas was my mindset for so long. And I never realized that was the case until I was in a place where I had NOTHING from home or my normal Christmas to distract me. It was such a humbling experience. We decided to celebrate by listening to a sermon on Christmas Eve, followed by worship. The sermon we listened to was called “The Cost of Christmas” by Louie Giglio; if you want a new perspective on Christmas and what we have turned it into in America, find this sermon. We didn’t bake cookies, decorate a tree, unwrap presents, watch a Christmas movie or attend any party, and we certainly didn’t have any snow (unless you count a few paper snowflakes we hung up). But I wouldn’t exchange that time for 1,000 presents.
We spent Christmas morning at church, where the pastor made Kimi, Tiffany, and myself have a dance-off. I lost the first round but in the end we all tied. After service we had a delightful meal of beans, rice and eggs (or chicken, I can’t remember), and then proceeded to have a 3 hour question and answer session with the local church pastors and leaders. At a quarter to midnight my family called and I was able to chat with them- it was the little taste of home God allowed me.
As I stated earlier, Christmas this past year was unlike any other I have ever experienced and I hope that from this point on I will continue to see Christmas as what it truly is- a day all about Jesus. I pray that America will no longer dictate what Christmas means to me, but that God does.
