It’s crazy to think about how It has already been a little over two months living in Albania. When we first arrived I thought that everything here was going to be so much more different than America. I had all of these expectations of what life would be like that ended up being something a little less then what I thought. My previous conceptions about ministry looked along the lines of us being filled with the holy spirit on a consistent basis, praying over people and healing them left and right and constantly hearing the voice of God, prophesying over people daily and following where the holy spirit was leading us. I had these huge expectations that weren’t necessarily a bad thing, but a little more than what has been happening on a day to day basis. When I compare my expectations to a normal day of doing ministry, I would say they are quite different. This isn’t to imply that I’m filled with grief and sorrow because my reality is not quite on par with what I imagined, I’m just saying that real life isn’t always this fast paced adventure constantly filled with climaxes and explosions. Real life is like driving on an unknown road. Sometimes you’re going fast feeling the warm breeze, other times you’re going uphill at a slow pace that feels like forever.
I’m going to be honest, life hasn’t gotten instantly more crazy and wild just because I’m living in another country. I’ve realized that no matter where you go, you will always find a routine. Routine in and of itself isn’t a bad thing; often times we need routine to ground us with where we are, but with routine there can come discontentment. If I chose to, I could totally be discontent with where I’m at right now, I could dwell on how sometimes I get bored or how I feel like I’m not doing that much. Routine can make one focus on the mundane and simultaneously make one forget to be thankful and happy with where they are. I’ve learned to be content with where I am always. If I wasn’t content than I’d always be focusing on my expectations of how things were supposed to be in my mind. I’d be constantly searching for some new routine to change my life when in actuality, there will always be the monotonous that arrives in life. No matter how many times you shake a snow globe, the sparkles will make their way to the bottom once again. Like wise no matter how many times you change your routine and shake things up, the routine will always come back in place. This isn’t saying that everyday is boring here and I’m constantly pushing through the mundane because trust me Albania is awesome, I’m just not going to act like every single day is some crazy new experience and over glorify what I’m doing.
With all that being said, I would like to describe our normal ministry day.
We always start the day off by waking up around 8:25 a.m. for our 8:30 prayer meeting. There is my team of 7 world racers plus 8 or more staff/members of the church who attend each morning. If anyone has any prayer requests, they present them to the group and we will spend the next 5 or 10 minutes praying over these different requests. When we’re done we go back to our apartment and eat breakfast for a half hour or so. Each day is different but often we will work with the preschoolers and play with them up stairs. Some days we go to clean the church and do various things that they want us to do. The other week I sanded wood for 3 hours instead of working with the kids. Other days we have worked food drives, organizing a certain amount of food to give out to each person. There are days where we go to the port with the seafarers ministry, offering services for sailors who are often at sea for 6 months at a time never seeing anyone else but their crew.
After doing any of these things, we get to lead bible studies and devotionals for the church at 2:30 p.m. everyday. One of us from the team shares a message everyday. At times this can be stressful presenting on different topics of our own choosing but it helps with stepping out of my comfort zone. That usually goes for a half hour or so. Depending on the day, we will have a youth group with the teens who attend the church, other days we will go on hospital visits or go and teach english at a class.
This is what a normal day is like. Yes it is routine. Yes it’s not how I expected things were going to be, but that doesn’t mean I’m discontent or unhappy. Things are great here but there are always those days that are less great than others. It doesn’t mean that what I’m doing here doesn’t have purpose. This is where God placed me and I’m so thankful to be serving here however I can.
