At the end of month three in Peru, I posted a blog about how it felt like our month of ministry there had been useless and wasted. A couple days later, my blog post from the end of month two in Bolivia, in which I talked about all the amazing ways God was introducing J Squad to the spiritual realm and my confidence that this incredible work would continue, was shared on Facebook by the World Race.
There was such a striking juxtaposition between the two posts that I just had to laugh.
I came on the Race expecting great things from God. I wanted to see miracles: the sick healed, the dead raised, demons cast out, God’s power visibly on display in new and incredible ways. So while the first couple of months challenged me, I was expecting and excited to experience new aspects of God that I didn’t understand.
In some ways, Peru felt like a letdown. Here I was, yearning for more of
God, and I got stuck in timeout in a seemingly pointless ministry. Rather than preaching the gospel, praying over the sick, and witnessing miracles, I was tearing lettuce into teeny-tiny pieces, being chastised for producing lettuce shreds that were still too large, and calling in broken Spanish for crazy four-year-olds to SIT DOWN NOW or they weren’t getting any juice.
Of course, it wasn’t pointless. Looking back, I’m sure that Team Kenosis had a greater impact on Vista Hermosa than we could see or realize. And God used the month to help me understand that it’s not my place to know what He’s doing. He calls me to obedience and trust, and He doesn’t always choose to show me what’s going on.
So ultimately, by the time we left Peru I was satisfied that I’d grown in my relationship with God and that He had made the month valuable, whether I could see it or not.
I was also happy to consider that particular lesson learned and move on to more exciting things in Ecuador.
Unfortunately, God wasn’t.
Most of J Squad spent December in Quito, Ecuador, working with an organization called Inca Link that is involved in numerous programs and connected with several churches around the city. Kenosis was split up among several ministries. A rotating pair of us babysat at Casa Elizabeth, a home for teenage girls who have gotten pregnant and come from unhealthy or dangerous home situations. Some days the others helped with jewelry making and babysat at Casa Adalia, a home for young women who have been victims of human trafficking. Some days we hung out with and planned activities for the youth group at a local Nazarene church. Some days we taught free English classes at the church. And some days we painted walls at the Nazarene seminary down the road.
We had our fingers in numerous pies, and ministry was always engaging and interesting because it was new and different every day. We certainly had more direction and purpose than we’d ever been given in Peru.
And yet I couldn’t see that I was any more effective than I’d been in November. I didn’t fee like I was really building relationships with the girls at Casa Elizabeth, and I only met the girls at Casa Adalia once. The English classes were sometimes successful and sometimes overwhelming and stressful. As I don’t speak Spanish, I didn’t feel like I really got to know the youth group kids or the congregation at the church. And painting was all well and good, and the pastor we were working with truly appreciated our help, but it wasn’t a relational ministry.
Three weeks in, I was frustrated. I’d just spent a month learning that God doesn’t always show me what He’s doing, but asks me to trust Him and follow Him regardless. I’d learned that lesson, it was fine, and I was done with it. Couldn’t we move on? Couldn’t He teach me something more interesting, more exciting, at the very least new?
Well, no and yes.
No, in that our ministry didn’t change; we continued to participate in our normal, fairly unremarkable activities. But the lesson changed, or rather, progressed. Yes, ministry often seemed mundane, quotidian, ordinary. But God was present.
Sometimes I want my faith to feel exciting. Flip through the book of Acts, and you’ll find some pretty ridiculous and amazing stories of a truly awesome God. That same God is the One who invited me to join Him on this journey to experience His work around the world. The World Race looks from afar like a pretty crazy adventure, and it is. But ministry on the Race doesn’t always involve doing door-to-door evangelism or befriending prostitutes or praying and witnessing miraculous healings. And so this month, God taught me to seek His beauty in the mundane.
No, ministry didn’t always feel meaningful. But following Jesus isn’t about feelings. Just because something feels meaningful doesn’t mean it is–and just because something doesn’t feel meaningful doesn’t mean it isn’t. God was with us as we babysat, as we spent time with the youth, as we scraped together lesson plans and did our best to teach English, as we sat uncomprehendingly in the Spanish church services. He was with us even as we made cookies back at our home for the month and hung out with the Inca Link interns and staff. His work wasn’t always visible, but He was there. And if we’d doubted it, we were able to see it at the end of the month. People we never would have expected, like the Casa Elizabeth girls and women in the congregation we’d barely spent time with, told us they’d miss us when we left, that we had had an impact on them during our time there and they were glad to have met us.
Yes, God is powerfully present in the middle of miracles, when people are coming to Jesus and being healed left and right.
But God is also powerfully present as I faithfully and obediently walk alongside Him in the mundane, quotidian, ordinary activities, the things that build the Kingdom day by day without pomp or fanfare or a strong sense of meaning. He’s there in the babysitting, in the painting, in the cookie baking, in the card games with teenagers. He’s at work even when there’s a communication barrier as vast as another language blocking conversation. He’s still working when I’m bored or impatient, aching for excitement. And while the exciting stuff is still to come, He invites me to seek His beauty here, now, promising me, Seek, and you will find. His presence and His work in the mundane are worthy of being sought out. And when the exciting experiences do happen, that work and presence in the mundane are still equally valuable, not to be written off or forgotten.
So, even though the last couple of months have sometimes felt like an exercise in purposelessness, God has been doing a great thing. He spent Peru teaching me to be content in Him even when I couldn’t see the fruit of my ministry, and then He challenged me to apply that lesson in Ecuador. And yet, even though it often felt like retaking a class, still God was doing a new thing, building on what He’d already done and growing me in new ways, showing me that even as I do ordinary things on ordinary days, following Him in unremarkable tasks and serving Him in seemingly small ways, still His work is glorious and His presence is near.
Funnily enough, I find that this is what life normally looks like–on the Race, back home, abroad or in the good old US of A. Sometimes we get our minds blown by God’s greatness, sometimes we’re overwhelmed by His power as He displays it in new and incredible ways. But more often, we’re walking in the mundane, perhaps content, perhaps not.
It’s easy to glorify the World Race as a time to do great things for God and experience Him in awesome ways. But walking with Jesus and doing His work isn’t something that happens only for eleven months in eleven countries. God is in the incredible and in the mundane, in the amazing and in the ordinary, in the once-in-a-lifetime and in the day-to-day routine. He is all around us, at work all the time. And He invites us to join Him and see His beauty, promising, Seek, and you will find.
I’m now in Blantyre, Malawi for month five of the Race. J Squad had team changes at the beginning of the month, and I’m now serving with the lovely ladies of Team HULK–blog post to come soon! Internet is scarce, so I’m having difficulty keeping friends, family and supporters up-to-date. But know that we’re enjoying an awesome month of ministry and that we’re quite safe from the flooding across Malawi.
I still need a little less than $2,000 to stay on the Race for the next six months. If you feel led to contribute, click the Support Me! link on the left.
