Hey Everyone, guess what! I climbed to the top of a pyramid last week! Yes, there is actually a pyramid in the middle of Tirana, Albania!
However, once I got to the top I realized that I literally burned the soles of my feet off in the process… Yes, you read that right… oops…
Don’t worry, now my feet are doing much better and healing fantastically; so, as I mentioned in my last blog I wanted to tell you guys more so about the grace and compassion that I was shown after I injured myself.
So let me tell you. My team handled it amazingly, thankfully, and showed me so much grace and compassion. You see, we had plans for dinner that night with two of the local girls that we met; however, due to my injury Brittany and Marissa graciously skipped dinner with me and took me home to tend to the injuries. Additionally, we not only missed dinner, but we missed hanging out and getting to know the five people that we met that day—two at the coffee shop and then three people they had met the day before that happened to be going to the pyramid as well.
These people were awesome, even while being on vacation themselves they were willing to drop any plans they had that day in order to show us where the pyramid was because we only knew it was in ‘downtown Tirana,’ which really didn’t give us much to go off of. So George, the man we met at the coffee shop, led us to his favorite food place to get lunch since we were hungry and then continued to show us to the pyramid.
Fast forwarding, Brittany, Marissa, and I decided to climb to the top of the pyramid and so we did; however, my sandals did not give me enough traction so I decided to climb up it barefoot—my thought process was that I do virtually everything back home barefoot, so I really didn’t think too much of the fact that it was 3:00pm in the afternoon and the cement structure (at least I think it was cement) of the pyramid had been baking in the sun all day just waiting for some poor unfortunate soul to climb up it barefoot in order to collect its fare—the bottom eight(ish) layers of the skin off of their feet! Well, that poor unfortunate soul that the pyramid managed to collect its dues from was me. -_-
Thankfully, it was truly a God send that George was walking over to the side of the pyramid that we climbed up from in order to take a picture of us at the top, as I had begun sliding down (mind you, at that point, I knew my feet were burnt and blistered off and I was in a lot of pain). However, the pitch of pyramid was so steep that I kept gaining momentum and was unable to brake myself in order to be able to safely stop once I reached the bottom, so I began to scream ‘Help me, help me!’ over and over and George ran over and thankfully was able to catch me under my armpits and swing me to a safe and complete stop. By this time, I was hysterically crying out of relief because I truly thought that I was going to end up braking an ankle as I was approaching ground as quickly as I was while still gaining momentum—to the point where Melissa had thought I genuinely broke my ankle.
George then gave me a piggy-back-ride over to where the rest of the group was sitting and getting to know the others and I finally managed to calm down and show my feet to the rest of the team so they knew what was up—this is where they instantly began to show grace and compassion towards me and my injured feet. You see, not once did they talk down about what a dumb idea it was to climb up the hot cement barefoot, but rather they were all concerned for my wellbeing. Additionally, my team was amazing and graciously allowed me to change up my ministry for this last week in order to accommodate the fact that walking in any way, shape, or form, was painful as the healing process was happening to my feet, through letting me opt out of going to the central park in the mornings to play basketball and volleyball with some of the teenagers that we met and have been ministering to over the course of this month. (My next blog will be over how our ministry went here in Tirana this month.)
Plus, to be very honest with you all, being able to opt out of going to sports ministry in the mornings was such a huge blessing for me. You see, I have been struggling with sports ministry this month because I did not allow myself to participate in the sports due to knowing that I need to take care of my body and that at times sacrifices need to happen in order to ensure your own well-being—and that was exactly what I knew I had to do when sports ministry began this month. Sitting on the sidelines/benches each day and being the ‘cheerleader’ was extremely tough for me; yet, it was a necessity due to medical circumstances are out of my control, although I have accepted them, sometimes it still sucks. I love sports, and I love playing sports, but this month I knew it would have been more detrimental for my body if I had played than if I didn’t so I ‘bit the bullet’ and sat down. For those of you who know me, you know how hard that was for me to do—I have played sports for going on 22 years now; going from playing, to reffing, to coaching, I love it all (although my sport of choice is soccer, I will play anything)—and I was truly struggling over not picking up the basketball and playing.
So not only did my team show me grace and compassion by changing around not only my ministry schedule, but also theirs by volunteering to take my place during the rotations on the days I was supposed to be there, they also unknowingly put my heart to ease through those acts as well.
So, what did I find at the top of the pyramid? Grace, compassion, and peace of heart through the actions that my team, and George, showed me after I burnt off the soles of my feet.
