Africa is one series of unknowns after another. We climb on a bus and have no idea if it is a 4 hour ride or a 14 hour ride. Africans really don’t seem too concerned either way, so we just look like fools when we jump up and down demanding to know if it is a short trip or a long trip. Better to just get on the bus and settle in for a long, bumpy ride. Unexpected joy when it is only a 6 hour trip.
I laid my head down last night believing that I would be up for 8AM prayer this morning. Instead they woke me at 6AM to harvest corn. I can grumble the whole 45 min walk to the field, or have unexpected joy when we are done by 10AM.
We arrive in a new city and have no idea where we will be staying, who is meeting us there, or what kind of ministry we will do. Find joy in the unknown.
Are we eating goat, cow, or pig? Who knows and it doesn’t really matter as long as we are not going hungry.
God knows that I like to be “in the know.” I am much more relaxed when I know where we are going, how long it will take to get there, and if we will have running water when we arrive. I think he finds it funny that I have spent almost the last two years of my life with absolutely no clue about any of those things. He has been teaching me so much about trust and resting in Him and only worrying about the things truly worth worrying about. He is teaching me to find joy in not knowing.
I have at least one conversation a day with someone anxious to know my plans after the race. The options are plentiful, but I have absolutely no idea. It is hard to sit here in the bush and worry about what the next few months will look like. I just want to enjoy the day put before me. I just want to be fully present with the HIV widow sitting right in front of me, or laugh when the babies pee all over me.
Jesus says in Matthew 6:34 “Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”
If I am trying to control my circumstances or plan too far ahead I miss the daily, unexpected blessings and joys. One thing the Lord is really teaching me this month is to be present. I would think that by this point in my race career it is a lesson I would have mastered, but he continues to bring me back to it.
I have found myself in a season of counting down. I count down how many weeks until I fly to the States, how many more days in the bush, how many days until I can shower again, and so on. It is easy to slip into a sort of “survival mode” and just make it until the next day and the next and the next after that.
I recognize that my days in this race with these people are numbered and I could be missing so much by focusing on the countdown. I miss the joy of African church when I stare at my watch wondering when it will be over, I miss the laughs of teammates when I wonder if it is time to go to sleep yet, and so on. I wonder if Jesus struggled with this as he knew his time on earth was limited. Did He count down every conversation with the disciples, did he worry knowing Good Friday was coming? Did he lay in bed at night and ponder what was coming next?
From what I read in the Gospels I don’t see any indication that Jesus worried about such things. He was always fully present and ready to receive whatever his Father had for him that day.
My prayer for you and for myself is that each one of us learns to enjoy exactly where the Lord has placed us and enjoy exactly what He has us doing in this season of our lives.
