You know that moment in movies when the character says, “what could possibly go wrong?” and everyone in the audience smacks their face because now all hell’s about to break lose? That’s what this month felt like. For the past two months, all of us over here in Wild Fires have suffered, endured, and thrived in a whole new kind of crazy.
Our host this month has never had a Race team before, so there’s a lot of pressure to do our absolute best, to bring him and his ministry lift. He may be an Indian pastor struggling to reach his country men living in Panama, but he stays busy. It’s all we can do to keep up with him and we’ve legitimately asked him at what particular hours of the day he reserves for sleep. But it’s not easy to reach people very defensive of their faith, so ingrained in their culture that it’s hard to differentiate between the two.
So this month has been filled with house visits, prayer meetings, children’s programs, a Christmas program (twice), and of course the weekly Sunday church meeting. Most of these require prep time for a message, a testimony, and multiple songs as a minimum, some also need a skit or two and several games. Our prep time can be anywhere from a week to a couple of hours beforehand, no matter how big the event. We’ve gotten to serve and work alongside Indians, Panamanians, and even an indigenous community in this country. And between personal struggles and fighting to stay on the same page as a team, somehow we’ve found time to make friends, see various kinds of wildlife, and check the box on our bucket list marked, “Panama Canal.”
But seriously, I’ve spent some time recently contemplating the English language and how many words we have in it. I looked it up and the English language has nearly twice the words that Spanish does. If you’re curious about my sources, you can type the question into Google and find the same answer. But I’ve been thinking about words not only because for the past three months I’ve been very limited in conversation with strangers, but also because for all the words we have, they don’t seem like enough. I can use, “difficult” and “painful” and “hard” as much as I want, but that doesn’t let you feel my emotions. I can play down what happened and let you try to read between the lines, but that still isn’t enough to accurately ensnare and reproduce the events and emotions involved; what was said and done and what was left unsaid and undone.
So it’s been a month. I don’t know how to say much more than that. I’ve stretched myself, been stretched without wanting to be, I’ve cried (a lot), been stressed, and I know I’m not the only one.
But even when we were practicing our Christmas program for the first time only hours before presenting it, even when we had no idea why we’re fine one day and at each other’s throats the next for no apparent reason, there’s one thing that I’ve been able to see through all of this. God is good.
Jesus says in Luke that, “the Holy Spirit will teach you at the time the words you should say.” Even as I’m writing this, I’m shaking my head, this has been all too real this month.
When we don’t have the time to prepare the way we’d like for a big event two days away because we haven’t had time to prep for the one tonight. God is good.
When there’s no reason why, but everything your teammates say is rubbing you the wrong way. God is good.
When you’re figuring out the day of, what message you should be giving in church. God is good.
It’s been hard. It’s been uncomfortable. And yeah, a lot of the time I’ve been tempted to ask, “why me, God?” Trust in God is what it comes down to and while most of the time I have not done that gracefully, right now I’m just grateful that I’ve done it.
In other news, during this time we have met some amazing people; Mr. and Mrs. Johnson and their daughters Aneeta and Aleena, Joshua and his wife with their daughter Bambi and so many others. Building relationships with these people and getting invited into their lives, their stories, has been such a blessing and honor.
The Johnsons are from south India, the same region as Shibu, our host. So though Hindi and twenty one other languages are considered national in India, there are hundreds more throughout the country. But the Johnsons are an answer to prayer because they actually speak the same dialect as Shibu, so we’ve been learning songs in Malayalam.
Joshua often comes to the Sunday fellowship and his daughter Bambi was one of the kind souls who drove us to our hostel when we arrived in Panama City three weeks ago at 3 a. m. Wow, that was a long time ago. We also seem to have a thing with 3 a. m. going on. Bambi is a boxer and has probably participated in every sport on the planet, but a couple of weeks ago she got a serious knee injury and is laid up in bed. So it’s been really cool to have the opportunity to visit her and just hang as we got to do last night for New Year’s with her whole family. More on that later.
We’ve had a few adventure days (look for pictures in a blog coming soon to devices near you). Seeing God’s creation around us is always so refreshing, so beautiful, whether it’s plants, animals, or people.
So for all of these things, good and bad, we give thanks.
Love y’all and happy new year.
TL
