Being back in America has been harder than I had imagined. It has also been easier. I struggled with feeling worthless and unimportant as I went back to my daily life. I wasn’t seeing life-transforming acts of God every day. The constant change and excitement went back to routine and normalcy. I felt a struggle to identify with anyone around me. There were few who I could talk to who really understood how vast our hurting world really is, and how our God is greater than all of it still.
I longed for the days when I didn’t know what was happening next. When I could go out into the streets and be immediately surrounded my curious faces or when I could just sit on the floor and three orphans would crawl into my lap. The days when I didn’t know the name of the city I was living in or what the yellow stuff I ate for breakfast was. On the Race I felt that my life had meaning and a purpose. When I came home everything seemed to deflate rather quickly.
Then life just happened. I said yes to every activity and opportunity that came along hoping that I would find fulfillment again, that my life would have importance and a purpose again. I exhausted myself and demanded answers from God when opportunity after opportunity fell through. I wanted to get back out there into the action I wanted to get out of America! That was the problem.
Until one day, Jesus told me ever so gently that it wasn’t the problem. I was the problem. I believed that I only had value if I was in Africa loving orphans, or preaching in the streets of India or buying prostitutes lunch in Asia. My identity had been so wrapped up in what I was doing for God, that I failed to see that it was what my Creator did for me, not what I did for Him that gives me real worth and value.
These last few months have been a time for me rest in the presence of God and stop trying to earn his approval with all of the things I do. God’s ability to surround me with his love is not based on what I bring to him. It’s like dumping a cup of water into the ocean just to make sure there is enough for you to swim. It has been hard on me sometimes to feel like I am on the sidelines, but I know that no matter where I am or what I am doing who God is and His presence in my life will never change.
