Current Location: Sunyani, Ghana
Current Time: 10.07am
Current Mood: Exhausted, struggling, fearful.
It has been a long, sore and frustrating 5 days since I slipped, fell and heard my ankle snap in 3 places. Yes, that’s right, a broken ankle. In Africa. Yep.
I’ll spare you all the details, but what should have been a very simple fall turned into me lying in a dirt road, crying in agony, 2 very skilful nurse squadmates beside me instantly, and my sweet squad leaders praying over my almost certainly broken left ankle. 6 hours and 2 hospitals later, with the break confirmed on an x-ray, I was taken to theatres for a cast and a return appointment for a few days later. I arrived back to the guest house we have been living in this month with one less intact bone, a lot of anxiety and a few exhausted teamies who had been with me all day.
Breaking a bone is a new experience for me, never mind breaking a bone away from the NHS hospitals I am so used to working in. Being a patient is also nearly an entirely new experience for me too, being that I am used to being on the other side of that encounter also. A whole new world in a brand new country.
Initially when I arrived home I was filled with a sense of “its going to be ok, I’m fine, we are fine, it could have been a whole lot worse, I could have needed surgery, no-one panic, its good”, and that lasted for about 48 hours before reality really set in. The fact that I now was facing the next 6 weeks; in a cast, in countries I don’t know, supposed to be doing active ministry work, away from my family, scuppered plans for our time in Cambodia (our next ministry month), 16 hours of flights in the next week, a lot of pain, and having to rely on everyone around me to do anything. It really hit hard and I was overwhelmed with just such fear and overwhelming sadness. How on earth am I going to do this.
To preface this week, I had been absolutely adoring our time in Ghana. As a team we have spent our time working with Elim City Church and being in a local part of the community where we have built beautiful relationships with the people there. We spend time with them around 4 times per week, encouraging them, discipling those who are believers, answering questions for those who are not. Learning how to love people exactly where they are at. I had been spending most early mornings in quiet time with the Lord, reading scripture with a new found hunger for the Word, worshiping my heart out, praying fervently. I was feeling excited, encouraged and I suppose in a way, comfortable. I also was so busy I barely made time to sit down. If we had time off I was at the local hotel using wifi connection for leadership tasks, having one on one conversations with squadmates, going to the markets, running from A to B etc – giving very little time to God apart from my morning quiet time. I could feel Him prompting me to rest, to learn to sit quietly with Him, to listen for what He was really trying to tell me, and yet I pressed on each day thinking I would make time for it tomorrow. I know, I sound like a terrible missionary on paper, but for me being productive is my way of serving, and I couldn’t slow down to see it any differently.
To try and realign my priorities, I started to read a book called ‘Sacred Rhythms’ approximately two weeks ago, and was enjoying what it said, but not really putting a lot of it into action. The book talks about healthy daily tasks that allow you to be productive yet constantly connected with the Father, and resting fully in Him in the midst of that. I had been slowly reading through it up to the day I broke my ankle. Two days after I fell, now suddenly with nothing but time to rest on my hands, I reluctantly picked the book back up to read the next chapter. I want to copy a section of it below, taken from Chapter 8, which is titled ‘Sabbath’;
“Several years ago I was run over by a car while riding my bike… In what could have been a devastating accident, I ended up with only cuts and bruises and a fractured ankle. The first feeling to set in as I got situated back at home was euphoria. If there had been a moments difference in the timing, my whole body could have been run over. But eventually the relief gave way to other levels of awareness… And then there was this sentence from Wayne Muller’s book Sabbath that kept buzzing around my head like a pesky fly buzzing against a windowpane: ‘If we do not allow for a rhythm of rest in our overly busy lives, illness becomes our Sabbath – our pneumonia, our cancer, our heart attack, our accidents create Sabbath for us.’
I did not want to hear this. I did not want to consider the fact that perhaps this accident, while it was not God’s fault, was a way God was trying to tell me something. I did not want to acknowledge the possibility that is was that hard for God to get my attention.”
Ok Jesus, I hear ya.
I read the opening of Chapter 8, as you see above, and just knew the Lord was looking and giggling as I sat wide eyed in amazement reading this flimsy piece of paper with my life story typed on it. He did not break my ankle, but He knew in it He could teach me exactly what He’d been trying to make me see for months. He knew in the midst of this, I would have to rely on Him completely (broken bone, can’t walk, sketchy healthcare, new continent, none of my usual people surrounding me – you get the picture).
You see, a life with Jesus never promises us that bad things won’t happen to us. He didn’t promise me that choosing to be a missionary for a year would be an easy year full of nothing but laughs, rainbows and sunshine. He definitely did not promise me that a life as a Christian would be without judgement, I can guarantee you some people are reading this blog entirely for the purpose of judgement. He promised me salvation, life, joy, hope – but nowhere did He promise me an easy road.
To illustrate this – I often imagine myself in a boat in the middle of a storm; its a small boat, just a few seats, no sides, no roof, and around me the seas are raging and the clouds are dark. It is raining and stormy. I get the choice to be in this boat with or without a life jacket, which do I choose? Do I choose the comfort and hope of something to save me, or just accept my fate in the dark circumstances? Life holds the same question. The world is full of darkness, storms are raging all around us, bad things happen everyday. If I can choose to do this life with a life jacket or without one, which do I choose? If I can choose to do this life with a Saviour, or to do it without one, I would choose HIM every single time. He won’t always change the circumstances, but in the middle of them He comforts, sustains, loves us and gives us the hope that we so desperately need. In this life, do you choose to just accept that we are on our own and nothing is helping us, or do you give those worries to the author of our existence, and let Him hold them for a little while. The world around you may or may not change, but the way you feel in the middle of it absolutely will.
So here is to the next 6 weeks of healing, resting, learning how to truly Sabbath, choosing the hope of Jesus every day, depending on the One who never leaves me, and trusting that He will get me through every step of not just this situation, but of every trial to come.
Love,
C xo
