Here is what we’re workin’ with:
A Motley Crew of six random individuals, who are collaboratively quite a spectacle.
We discovered that almost instantly upon setting foot in our first location in China. At first it was a little uncomfortable feeling the eyes of dozens of people follow our every move as we passed them on the street. Personally, I haven’t spent much time being a minority seeing as the majority of my life has been spent in suburban Michigan. Fortunately, I was given that opportunity in China.
We discovered that everywhere we went a band of curious folks would gravitate toward us. Children would come running up yelling “Hello!” and run away laughing with their friends. Adults of all ages would surround us the moment we stopped to ask one person for directions or assistance. Shop owners would come outside to invite us in. People would stop whatever they were doing to watch us wander by. Police officers would pull over to get out of their vehicles just to talk to us. Whether out of curiosity, obligation, or the desire to make another sale, it was evident that just by our looks we had gained some level of popularity among locals.
Eventually we figured out how to use “being a spectacle” to our advantage. We made a few hacky sacks and hit the streets. As we would play people would slowly gather around until we had a healthy crowd of anywhere between 20-150 people! That’s crazy!!! It was truly amazing to invite children to play with us, practice English with them, and talk to the adults. At one point children were even asking for our “autographs” which ultimately led to us signing “Jesus loves you” on dozens of their notebooks.
By the end of the month we had learned to embrace our standing out for our looks in hopes of standing out for our faith. Abandoning all personal comforts to allow God to use us proved to be so valuable as expressed through the people we interacted with. Maybe this is why God has blessed me with such lovely blonde locks!
