Some of my squad mates are having trouble keeping up with the blogging requirement for the World Race because they don’t know what to write about. I am having the opposite problem; I want to write about everything, but I get half way through the blog and forget to finish because I’m so excited about writing something else. Since I’m finally getting some restful time at debrief, these blogs will all be coming at you at once, ambush style. I pray that you’ll still be able to get a lot out of them, and get a small glimpse of what I am experiencing here.
If you are someone who has decided to pray for me this year (or someone who offered and intended to pray for me, that’s usually what I end up doing…) and you asked for requests, I likely told you to pray for team cohesion. When I thought about the hard parts of the race, I imagined all the hardships I would face, all the pain I would see, and how exhausted I would likely be by it all. When I thought about how I could overcome those things, I imagined a team to come home to each day, a group of people to process with, and people to call my family for the year. I knew that this could be a make-or-break factor of my race. I would need a group of people who were so unified in the Lord that the circumstances were well handled, I was well loved, and those who saw us saw a great example of community. If I’m being honest, that is the way I feel about my team (Daughters of Peace). We’re very blessed. I want to dig into why that is. I listened to a sermon by Francis Chan one morning (in a thatch shack next to a pond where they perform baptisms on a Christian compound in North East India… WHAT HOW IS THIS MY LIFE?!) about this sort of unity being an expectation of the church. He quoted John 17:20-21, Jesus’s prayer for believers. “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, JUST AS YOU ARE IN ME AND I AM IN YOU.”
I was afraid to hope for this kind of unity. I’m a generally agreeable person, and feel strongly that I could be on a team with anyone. I could do ministry with them and live with them and probably even love them, but to have unity with them the way the trinity has unity? That’s next level stuff. I felt excited and convicted and overwhelmed by the possibility of this kind of community, but thought of all the things that could get in the way. What if we had different interests, passions or hobbies? What if we didn’t speak the same language? What if our cultures were different? That day, Mawi Pudaite, the wife of the late Rochunga Pudaite stood before us and spoke on behalf of her husband on the anniversary of his death. Instead of sadness, the most beautiful joy was etched all over her face. She told stories of Dr. Ro, and finally said “I certainly miss him, but our closeness came from our love of the Lord. Now that he has passed on to be with the Father, we can be more intimate than ever through communion with Christ.” I was so encouraged by this idea. Their unity was so rooted in God that they couldn’t even be separated by death. Then I read the rest of that prayer in John 17.
“May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one—I in them and you in me, so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”
There is only one way to be unified with my team, with my ministry hosts, or with the people we are serving. For that matter, there is only one way to be truly and deeply unified with anyone. To be in Christ is to be brought to complete unity. Not only does it have the power to strengthen our community internally, but to show God to those looking in. I’m thankful to get a taste of this kind of oneness with my team, and I pray that by pursuing my personal relationship with Jesus and encouraging others to do the same, I’ll be able to continue to experience it with my entire squad, and the countless people I will meet this year.
