Debrief is suppose to be our ebanezer, a time of complete and total rest. A time to recharge and renew ourselves. To relax and enjoy just being. However, I can say, this debrief wasn’t relaxing for me until the Lord taught me all of this.
Distractions are so real.
Within a 6 hour bus ride, our lives flipped upside down. We previously were living in a building with cold showers, and no power, located in the bush of Swaziland where we could go to two stores once a week. And then we rode to South Africa that has hot showers with good water pressure, TVs, power, WiFi, and a Pool. The hostil was only 10 minutes from two huge malls with bowling, ice skating, countless shops, tons of great restaurants and cute coffee shops. To say that this switch was overwhelming, was an understatement. We went from having almost no say in our outings to having complete freedom of what to do with our time.
Very quickly my team and I decided to go to the mall for three days! We got knew clothes as we have been wearing the same three shirts for the last month. We got good WiFi, posted updates, uploaded vlogs and talked to people back home.
Not that these things are bad, but I didn’t realize till three days in, that going shopping and sitting on WiFi wasn’t refreshing me, it wasn’t relaxing, but instead was instilling stress within me. I would worry about how much money I was spending, but would struggle as I wanted new clothes and I wanted to try different styles while staying true to myself. I noticed that replying to comments and posting things began to stress me out as I feel like there was always more to post about and I would never fully catch up on things at home. I wanted to talk with all my friends and struggled with the reality that it just wasn’t possible.
I began to notice that I had choices. That I needed to choose relaxation over stress. That I needed time to just sit and read my Bible. I needed time to recharge through prayer, I needed to relax by napping. I was literally getting frustrated with myself that I was coming home exhausted very night, but it’s because I was looking for complete rest in earthly things like shopping and WiFi. It is crazy to think about because back home sitting on my phone is chill time for me, but here it creates stress. Hanging out with friends while shopping used to be a casual experience, but now i was psychoanalyzing everything i tired on and if these pants where worth the money.
Back on the compound (where we live in Swazi) there isn’t much to do so my default is always reading my Bible when I want alone time. But on debrief, when there are so many other things I could be doing with my time and energy, I have seen that I have to be actively choosing to pursue my relationship with God. I have to choose to pray, and read my Bible and talk about his word rather than go shopping and talk about all the things we bought with my team.
Distractions are real and we all have a choice each and everyday. Will we use the distractions as excuses or will we choose our Father? It’s all up to you.
We will fail at this however, I already have. But that’s the beauty of God and hiss never needing forgiveness, mercy, and grace.
While being on debrief this verse that Paul wrote really came to mind. “I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, plenty or little.” Philippians 4:12. I certainly can’t say I know everything, but I can say I have lived with very little (In Swazi) and now so much (in South Africa and home in the U.S.) and to be honest, I like living with less so much more. It seems to me that so many people in Swazi that are physically poor, are rich in their relationship with Christ! But it saddens me that so many who are so rich (in comparison to Swazi) in the U.S. and Europe are actually so poor spiritually in their relationship with Christ, or lack there of. Jesus tells us that we must store up our treasure in heaven, and give him all of our hopes and desires. We shouldn’t put value and worth in money and possessions because they will fade away after this life on earth, but our salvation will never fade, it will last forever (like literally FOREVER because of eternal life).
So yeah, this as just been stuff I’ve been thinking about, learning and processing these past couple days on debrief.
Thank you guys so much for the support, love and encouragement! I miss you all and please keep praying for great community in our team and squad. As well as good health! (I’ve been so blessed to not get sick yet, yay God!!)
