I’m always trying to find a way to stabilize. To be as comfortable as possible. I don’t want to be hot. I don’t want to be sweaty. I don’t want to be stinky. I don’t want to be crammed in a house with 100 people who are also hot and sweaty and stinky. Okay, 19 people, but it’s a small place. I don’t want to go play with kids in the hot sun because it’s just going to make me hotter. And more sweaty. And more stinky. I want to lay down in the coolest spot available and camp out. I want the dang rooster next door to stop crowing all hours of the night so I can sleep. And I never want another peanut butter and jelly sandwich again for as long as I live. I want ministry to involve air conditioning, swimming in cool water, and showering.
Sometimes I think everything is about me and how I am feeling. I am much too self-centered to enjoy myself right now. I am focused on how uncomfortable I am. Have I mentioned how incredibly HOT it is here? I hate constantly wearing wet clothes from the insane amount of sweating happening.
My eyes are focused on my circumstances. Even when we are walking the streets here meeting people, I am looking at the ground because the terrain is so rocky and unstable and I’m constantly trying to avoid stepping in poop. It’s just like me to be so focused on the crap and what I’m stepping in, that I don’t see the people around me and the nastiness sticking to their shoes. Everyone here is hot. Everyone is sweaty. For the people who live here, this is their day to day existence. The unemployment rate in Haiti is some ridiculously high number. Even leaving behind the majority of my possessions and life, I have more in my backpack than most of the people we meet. I don’t know how I can complain about my circumstances when I see kids playing in garbage filled rivers with pigs and a city of tin shack houses and hungry, half dressed babies running down the street. Yes, I am uncomfortable, but we have a house, with running water (most of the time), and electricity (a good bit of the time), and I get to sleep outside in my hammock and bug net every night where there is a breeze. We have a kitchen and women who cook dinner for us every evening. I get a bucket bath pretty much every night to scrub the dust and sweat and salt off. I get to do life in a house of beautiful women who can’t get enough of Jesus. I get time to rest and blog and journal and connect with God. There is a lot of garbage here, and heat, and dust, and some bad smells that often include me and my teammates; but there is beauty here too. There is hope here. This city and the people are beautiful because God is here. I see that when I make the effort to take my eyes off my junk and look at Haiti through His eyes.
Sometimes we need to take our eyes off of the poop we are stepping in and look up. There is a whole world outside of me I need to see. But I still pray for a miraculous climate change every day =)
