This month my newly formed team RovELE (a combination of the girls from team rover and the girls from ELE) journeyed out into the Ugandan bush to work with an organization called Child Voice International. The goal of CVI as an organization is to restore the voices of women and children silenced by war. The site where we were living and working was their vocational school near Gulu in Northern Uganda. When I say we were out in the bush, I mean that the closest city was about an hour drive away with some small towns in between. We only left the 40 acre compound as a team once in our 2.5 week stay. No electricity (except for 3 hours in the evening when they would turn the generator on), no running water, and certainly no wifi.
Honestly, it was awesome. Being in the bush was way more what I anticipated the race looking like than being in the busy city of San Salvador. Living in a hut and taking bucket showers was exactly what I expected from this year so it wasn’t that difficult of an adjustment. When people described the race to me, the picture in mind that I had was rural villages, not metropolitan cities.
For me, being disconnected gave me the chance to have space to process. There was plenty of time and no distractions so my mind had all the churning time to go through my life on the race thus far, things back home, and the greater issues in the universe.
One thing I spent a great deal of time pondering was my relationship with God. Right before entering Uganda we were at our mini debrief called LDW or leadership development weekend. One of the talks that my squad leaders gave was about how God really is the point of everything. The first, last, beginning, end, and everything in between. Another talk was about how we often over complicate our relationship with God and it really is just about spending time with Him. These two points were churning through my mind the whole month in Uganda. Knowing that God is the point of everything and that it is necessary to build that relationship.
When people talk about building relationship with God they either give you a 12 step program or a series of obscure statements. At least that is what it feels like to me. It’s either:
“Read your Bible for 4 hours, read this list of books, pray for 6 hours, memorize this list of principles”.
Or
“It’s about being. And inviting the Lord in. He will meet you where you’re at.”
Either of these things or both these things, if you do them will somehow spontaneously enter you into relationship with God.
The first, for me, is way to much structure and ends up feeling dry and monotonous. The second is so obscure I don’t feel like it gives me anything to grasp onto.
Back in Guatemala I was talking with one of my leaders about my struggle to trust God (specifically for fundraising). Something she said to me that made all the structure and the obscurity click was “you can’t trust someone you don’t know”. For some reason that statement made all the other statements make sense. Of course. I wouldn’t trust someone that I don’t know, so how can I trust God if I don’t know Him.
Thus begs the question, how do I know Him?
Well getting back to that talk from LDW about how sometimes we way overcomplicate things: how else do you know someone except to spend time with them? I wouldn’t claim to know someone that I don’t spend time with. And the more time is spent, the better you know someone.
For me spending time with God and getting to know Him looks like talking to Him like I would talk to anyone else. Dropping the formal language that people often get caught up in when talking to the Lord of the Universe, and talking to Him like I would talk to my closest friends. Except for the glorious perk that God already knows every thought in my head and every emotion that I’m feeling even before I feel it. There is no pretense. I can’t pretend to think something that I don’t because God already knows. And since He already knows I might as well be honest and go ahead and tell Him what’s really on my mind.
But more than that for me it’s about inviting Him into everything I’m doing.
“Hey God, so I’m carrying bricks right now. What do you think about that?”
“Sup God, they seem upset. What should I do or say to them?”
“So God, I’m hungry. What’s for lunch?”
It sounds silly, and it is in the beginning. But the more I invite God into my space every moment of every day, the more I find myself seeking Him first in “more important” situations. The more I talk to Him about my love of potatoes, the more I feel drawn to His word for counsel and wisdom.
I can survive without a lot of things: hot showers, electricity, ice cream. But I can’t survive without God. For me “doing without” has come to mean not spending time with God, not the lack of sugary treats or running water. Don’t get me wrong, I’d love some candy right now but I spending time with God is much sweeter.
