My house mom Jane knew I wanted to trim my hair. She insisted that the salon down the road would do a great job. I asked her over and over again if they could cut a “muzungu’s” (white person’s) hair and she insisted, “just bring a picture and he will do a great job!”
So that’s what I did. I brought a picture of what my hair looked like a month ago. I showed him the picture at least 4 times, telling him I only want less than an inch off. I told him I didn’t want it too short, I wanted it just like the picture. As I pulled out the picture, just to make sure he understood he said, “I’ve seen the picture… I know, I know.”
Ok. He knows. I convinced myself that it was going to be fine.
He began making conversation with me… and then… it happened A large patch of the right side of my head was shaved. Not like shaved to the skin shaved. But like, there’s less than an inch of hair on my head, shaved.
Crap.
I told him to stop. I showed him the picture again. “See? I wanted this, NOT this,” pointing to my now partly shaved head.
No going back now.
I told Joseph, one of the boys, to run and get Christin and Carly as I held the tears in.
Did he really just shave my head?
Twenty minutes later, Christin and Carly ran in. I somehow forced the laughter with them as we realized how completely ridiculous this is. We immediately fled the scene (after giving my fearless hairdresser a few schillings) and ran home.
As I melted, Carly’s determination to make it look halfway decent encouraged me.
“It’s gonna be fine,” she insisted.
I was convinced that nobody in their right mind could fix this mess.
And well, it could be worse…
…I will just be wearing a lot of headbands and beanies throughout the next month!
After I wallowed in my self-pity of losing my hair, I was reminded that this should be the least of my worries. Here I am, living amongst 18 beautiful children who have lost their birth parents and have experienced the deepest depths of despair. The pain they have felt cuts deeper than I can fathom.
I began thinking of the places I lived this year… among the poorest of the poor in the Tondo slum, with girls who have been rescued from being sold into the sex-trade and amongst the unreached Muslims of Malaysia.
Bringing restoration to these broken places is what matters.
See, a bad haircut, and a really bad one at that, does not matter in light of the grave suffering of billions of people around our globe.
I am so often so focused on myself. I want things to work out for me. I want to serve myself over the needs of the world. I wallow in selfishness as I grieve the loss of my hair when kids are dying of hunger or grieving the death of a mom who just lost a life to AIDS.
Man, I’m lucky enough to even be able to afford a haircut.
I want the blinders off of my eyes so that I can see others more clearly through the eyes of my Savior. As much as I’d love to have a fabulous haircut, that doesn’t matter in light of the needs around our world.
If anything, Jesus is using this to get my eyes off myself. To build my confidence back up in Him. That the little things really don’t matter and that whether I have hair or not, I can stand firmly on His rock knowing that He has called me to a greater purpose than myself.
I can still be His servant.
It’s about the Kingdom.
And the Kingdom is what matters.
I want to be about that Kingdom.
So if Jesus has to shave off my hair for me to realize that it’s about Him and His Kingdom, than so be it.
It hurts and it’s humbling, but I’m His and His alone.
And somehow, He has chosen me to bear His name throughout the world.
I bear a Kingdom responsibility that extends far beyond myself – let THAT be my reality.
