Things you don’t write home about
So here’s the REAL deal! The stuff you probably shouldn’t tell your mom while on the world race! As I am sure most of you DON’T know, I struggle with kidney stones. And early on in San Juan I began to see/feel signs of another stone. But it wasn’t until our 17 hour bus ride the agony really hit me. All I could do was pray, as I sat in the smoldering hot stairwell where no one could see me cringing and crying, I prayed for healing.
because this year I plan to see miraculous healing, and why not let it start with me?
A few days later in Haiti, as we carried the pieces of a relief house up the mountain I knew it was time! The pain had hit the point on nausea and I couldn’t take another step in the 102 degree sun.
And thus the adventure began…
I sprinted off towards a red cross out house that lay just beyond the hill! I ran into the door doubled over, but alas it was locked. I should have known better. The red cross has built outhouses all over Haiti, not for the Haitian people, but so that their relief workers have a place to use when they are working. Too bad most the Haitian people they are serving don’t even have these luxuries, but have to look at the tempting structures locked out of the aid that should be theirs. (sorry for the side rant)
I scurried around to the back of the outhouse and collapsed, until the kids on the hill began to yell “Blanc” (white) and throw pebbles at me to get my attention. The sun beat down on my back and I couldn’t see straight…I thought this must be rock bottom. I began to pray for one thing…to get me home to the compound so I didn’t have to do this in the woods.
Two seconds later one of my teammates and the man we were building the house for were ushering me to another open outhouse next to someone’s home. But I knew I had to get out of the tent city before this happened.
So with out pause I started to walk towards our home a few miles away. My teammates sprang into action. Sarah caught up next to me and began to chatter away to keep my mind off the pain and Daniel sprinted ahead to get us a motorcycle taxi.
As I limped in pain talking with Sarah about her attraction to avatar men watching Daniel sprinting ahead I felt so protected, and loved.
I had tried so hard to cover up the agony I had been feeling but now I could safely let them know how bad it was…
However, the low was yet to come.
It wasn’t until I was stratling the sweaty motorcycle plastered to the Haitian driver with Sarah and Daniel squished behind me bouncing through the scorching streets of Petit Guava, I knew I could never feel more pain in my life. I jumped, or well stumbled quickly, off the motorcycle and ran for the bathroom. THANK YOU LORD.
I had gotten home to the compound surrounded by my team family. I then sat on the cement for hours feeling as though my whole body had been steam rolled. My family lay around me rejoicing in my new stone free state and not caring that I was using their water bottles for ice, and sweating puddles on the floor.
In John 8:7 “If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone…” So many times in my life, I have cast stones at myself. I ha
GOD IS GOOD! He taught me soooo much through this, but mostly that the cliche “I can do all things through Christ who strenghtens me,” is one of the truest sentiments I know. I can climb a mountain 4 times, carrying hudreds of pounds of wood in over a 100 degree weather, and pass a stone BECAUSE GOD IS THE AUTHOR OF SUPERNATURAL STRENGTH!
