Wow I’m still trying to process the fact that we’re already 8 months into this crazy thing. It’s been a super busy month full of so many changes and so many hellos and goodbyes.
Travel from Ethiopia to Costa Rica was LONG, in a matter of a day and a half we had been in 4 countries- Ethiopia, Ireland(maybe we shouldn’t count that 40 minute layover), Canada, and finally to land in Costa Rica.
Something I had not expected was how overwhelming our layover in Toronto would be for me. People talk about culture shock all the time and I had never understood what that really means until I went from 3 months in the village on a mountain in Africa and then in a day found myself walking the streets in the city of Toronto, in the middle of winter and riding in a car for the first time in 6 months. We were on the high way with our Uber driver and all of a sudden I just started feeling sick to my stomach, and it sort of continued everywhere we went. Culture shock, yikes. We ended up going back to the airport earlier than we needed to and I just sort of sat for a while and gathered myself together and talked through it with God and thanked Him that He gave me a little slice of what going home would actually feel like.
Arriving in Costa Rica was a lot of that same feeling. Going straight from living with the same people for 3 months and never seeing anyone else who spoke our language right into being with 3 other squads was pretty intense and eminently a big adjustment. But despite the newness, The Awakening was also super encouraging to have a fresh perspective from new people and to get to worship with over 200 people.
But walking onto the REAP farm in Nicaragua I immediately felt at home amongst the fields and fields of lime and plantain trees. Although still grieving leaving Ethiopia and all the changes, it was easy to find my place in one of the friendliest cultures I’ve ever been in. We jumped right into our new ministry, spending half the day working on the farm(yes they trusted us with machetes and pick axes) and the other half of the day doing prayer walking(a lot of evangelism and house visits and a whole lot of prayer). Probably one of my favorite months of ministry so far, learning how to stretch my physical body and worship God while doing manual labor and conquering so stinking much fear and beginning to walk in the authority that Christ died for me to have while doing house visits. I learned so many things from hearing the stories of the people of Granada each day as we went wherever the Lord brought us. But more than anything I watched the hospitality of these people as they invited us into their little tin houses and offered us chairs, apologizing when they didn’t have enough. I saw how open they were, when with one question they would pour out their stories dripping with their faith in God. I think so often we think of poverty and have this idea of such hopelessness that comes with it but hearing the stories of these people I heard anything but hopelessness, I heard people on fire for the Lord and constantly hungry for more of Him. I was constantly reminded of the verse in James “Listen my beloved brothers, has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, which He has promised to those who love Him.” (James 2:5), and day after day I saw this verse before my eyes. As we went from house to house to encourage and pray for whatever needs we encountered, I always walked away more encouraged than ever.
It was definitely a weird change only being in Nicaragua for one month and with the week of or parents being there it ended up feeling even shorter and before we knew it a whole new round of goodbyes were already happening and we were on the deadly long bus ride from Nicaragua to Costa Rica once more.
THE LAST COUNTRY
Yikes.
This has somehow been the longest and shortest 8 months of my life but here we are, with a little over a month left on the field. It’s crazy how perfectly God has set up our route to back home, easing into it with Cambodia, living completely off the grid with Ethiopia and then slowly gaining more and more freedom and feeling more and more like home from Ethiopia to Nicaragua to the touristy, American looking Costa Rica. God is teaching me so much about what life at home is going to look like and how to live a mission centered life when your everyday looks like riding the bus, talking to Uber drivers, walking through walmart, and writing blogs in Starbucks.
I’m so excited for these last weeks and al that God has in store for this country and for this squad.
See ya later friends!
Alyssa
