What does it mean to “come home”? I’ve been asked countless times in the last few months, “So what’s it like being home?” “How does it feel to finally be back home?” “Was is difficult to adjust to being home again?”
How do I answer that?
To be honest, it’s like you’ve been broken into at least 11 different pieces (although I think it must be more than that) and then you romp around the world and leave some of those little piece of yourself behind. And then, at the end of this thing called the World Race, you go home and you’re expected to fit, somewhat, into the space you left vacant while you were gone. The problem though, is that while there definitely is a good amount of YOU left over, your edges are different – and like a puzzle piece that doesn’t quite fit, you don’t either. Things are different. Things have changed. And there isn’t a thing you can do about it but adapt, and pray the ones you love can adapt too.
This is not meant to be sad and depressing, but up front and realistic. Maybe not everyone feels this way. Maybe some have come home, and felt right at home. Or maybe the changes haven’t been all that difficult to adapt to. Either way, we’re all different people with our own set of fingerprints and our own set of emotions. We’re different.
Some days I remember the little babies on that sidewalk in Uganda. Some days I remember the way that the kids live in the slums of Phnom Penh. Some days I remember the hopelessness in the eyes of the people outside that bar in Guatemala. And if I allow myself to think of one of the people who truly made an impact in my life, I am forced to remember all of them, in an effort to NOT forget…
God broke me.
But in the best way possible. Some of my friends and family were deeply concerned about me doing a trip like the Race. They said I get too attached to people, and I’d be a wreck when I got home. Maybe they were right.
I’ve been wrecked. I got attached to a hundred people I may never see again on earth.
I fell in love with the way I saw God in every day little things, like smiles and hugs and songs and dance.
And the things that I saw that broke my heart? Those things that are truly painful to think about but can’t seem to stay too far from my mind? I am thankful for the brokenness, for the pain. Because for me to see these things and not be broken and not hurt still about the injustices around the world? What a tragedy that would be.
I believe God longs for us to feel something. To see things and truly see them, without the boundaries like logic and reason that our human minds hide behind. I believe He LONGS for that for us.
So I’m trying not to be afraid to see those things. I’m going to try to live every day just as I lived while on the Race, with the mentality that I’m not just randomly placed somewhere for no reason. Things are definitely different, and the contrast gets overwhelming – but certain things stay the same, and we must always hold on to the truth that we know.
“12 So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling; 13 for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.14 Do all things without grumbling or disputing; 15 so that you will [i]prove yourselves to be blameless and innocent, children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you [j] appear as [k]lights in the world, 16 holding [l]fast the word of life…” – Philippians 2:12-16 NASB
