Costa Rica… a country with beautiful mountains but even more beautiful people. A very relational country, greeting people each day like you haven’t seen them in years. A country where I experienced Christ’s unity, community, and humility.
Month 8 in Costa Rica we worked alongside Transforma-an organization that teaches vocational skills to empower poor women in the community. While they are taught these skills, the women are shown how to have an intimate relationship with God and to uphold important values. Transforma partners with Face of Justice-an organization that works to prevent human trafficking and defend, shelter, empower, and love its survivors. We also came alongside various other groups and organizations who work together for one purpose as different parts of the body of Christ.
Throughout the month in Costa Rica I met Christians, non-Christians, poor women, wealthier women, prostitutes, pimps, drug dealers, American, Germans, Hollanders, you name it and I probably met them. Except maybe not Trump. No I didn’t meet Trump (forgive my awkward humor). In other words, I met a lot of different types of people. What I noticed and have noticed the last 10 months on the race is that we may be very different people; our lives can look the complete opposite. You can live in a mansion, I can live in a 50 square foot room. You can have a warm shower, I can have a bucket of water. You can have a washing machine, I can have a river. You can have a toilet, I can have a hole in the ground. You’re a doctor, I’m a mom of 8 (clearly making this up…some of it anyway). You can believe in Buddha, I believe I’m a daughter of God. It really doesn’t matter because in reality we’re not so different. In reality, we all want and need the same thing. We’re all looking for it. We don’t always realize it, but we do. We all want the Truth. We want to be loved. We want purpose. We want peace. We want joy. Worth. Fulfillment. We want it all. In other words, we want God. We don’t all look for it in the same places though. Some of us find it in sex or drugs. Others find it in money or materialism. Some of us find it in education & career success. A lot of us find it in our superficial lives we post on Facebook. Still others find it in perfectionism-being the most perfect version of whatever societal group we find ourselves in. Are we trying to be the most perfect Christian or the most fun person to be around? I’m not sure what category you fall under. Maybe none. Maybe some. Either way, from both personal experience and knowing people around the world, none of it is truly fulfilling. Yeah, the beer might be cold and taste good on a Friday summer night, but the buzz only lasts a while. It might feel good to find fault in others to make yourself feel better, until the shame creeps up again. It might feel good to make something of yourself and let people know, but you’re still one of 7 billion of us. Who are you when you no longer have the job title or education? I don’t want you to get the wrong idea. I’m guilty of all of these things & it’s not all bad. I like to have a drink every once in a while. If you’re a CEO or graduate student. Great! I’m sure hours upon hours of hard work went into getting there. My point… It’s the heart behind what we’re doing. What are you living for?
One night in Costa Rica we spent all evening in front of Del Rey, the biggest brothel in Costa Rica, handing out coffee and cookies, building relationships, praying with them if they wanted us to, and just loving on them. We were appreciated, shown kindness and gratefulness, but also laughed at and cussed at. A white man walked out and walked past us. He stopped and asked what we were doing with an annoyance in his voice. I mean what are a bunch of non-Tica looking folks doing out at night giving out coffee and cookies anyway? We ended up talking for a while. He believed in God but that was it. He didn’t have the Truth in him, but I could tell he wanted to find it. He said he’s been at the top of the ladder. He worked his way up and couldn’t wait to have it all. He made it. He’s seen it all, but he said there is nothing really special up there. Yet he didn’t believe in following Jesus because he didn’t want to be forced into doing something only to avoid hell.
But I can tell you that’s not the Truth. I used to think that way. I used to think being a Christian was only about when you died to determine if you were going to heaven or hell and going to heaven meant you had to do good things. I was so wrong. I mean it is about eternal life don’t get me wrong—I’mma be dancin’ with Jesus for 10,000 years straight—but God wants us to experience heaven now. On earth. With Him. He wants to fill us up with His love, a love that lasts forever and that loves beyond all our mistakes, that’s deeper than all our hurts. He wants to give us purpose. Peace. Joy. He wants to give us worth. A worth that cannot be priced. A worth that doesn’t come from physical attributes, our job description, our home value. No, he says we are so worthy he gave His one and only perfect son, who is God, to come down to earth to be tortured and crucified for our mistakes, so our mistakes could die. Our shame? Dead. Our hurts? Dead. Our transgressions? Dead. Our old self? Dead. All of it is dead. But just as Jesus rose again, we rose with Him. He came back to life to give us life. New. Clean. Righteous. Sons and daughters. That’s who we are in Jesus. That’s the Truth & the Truth also says life with Jesus will not be easy. No, there’s a cost to being a follower. We lay it all down. We lay down our reputation, our success, our comfort. But it’s worth it. We aren’t forced. Life is a gift. Salvation is a gift. We do it because we love Him because He first loved us & there is freedom on the other side. There is freedom in not finding fulfillment in doing whatever we want, whenever we want, wherever we want. We find freedom in connecting with our Creator by finding the truest version of ourselves by knowing the One who knows us even better.
I say all this to say that we’re all fighting through the nothingness of this life. We’re all here in it together. We are here for One purpose & One purpose only. Let’s come together as His body, his church, and serve in our respective callings continuously learning from one another, speaking life over each other, speaking truth in love, building each other up in the body of Christ, and fighting together for an Eternal purpose that leaves us eternally fulfilled…not fighting one another because of our differences. After all, we’re really not so different. And I don’t want to just leave Christ’s unity, community, and humility I’ve experienced the last 10 months behind where I found it. I want to experience it everywhere alongside all of you.
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So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.
Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.
Ephesians 4:11-16
