Bolivia was the country that I overlooked. It was the one that I thought, “Okay, I guess I’ll go there.” I viewed it as a necessary evil to arrive in Asia. A speed bump on our World Race route. My selfishness and vain perception of what “my race” was supposed to look like almost robbed me of my favorite month on the World Race so far.
I would never have expected to be captivated by it’s landscape and to fall in love with its people. I would never have expected to be assigned my DREAM ministry for the month.
I would never have expected to be humbled in the ways that I was.
I would never have expected to be able to love a new, merged team as much as I did.
I would never have expected to learn the meaning of finding rest in the LORD, and nothing else.
I would never have expected just about anything that happened this month.
When we departed the Adventure Brew hostel in La Paz, I was bummed to be leaving my friends on other teams, but eagerly anticipating the adventures ahead with the newly formed Team Duken (Dunamis + Awaken ladies) and our ministry assignment in the quaint rural town of Rurrenabaque. We picked up our translator, Sarita, and piled in 2 taxis en route to the “bus station”…which in reality was just the side of the road where the buses happened to load and unload their passengers.
After an incredible yet sometimes horrifying 18-hour bus ride through some of the most beautiful, yet dangerous roads in the entire world, we had arrived at the bus station/airport in Rurrenabaque just after sunrise. Bleary-eyed and exhausted from the bus ride, we loaded up our belongings and our bodies into the back of 2 motorcycle-driven taxis with covered truck beds and took another 20-minute ride to our host home for the month.
After a warm welcome from our hosts, Frans and Deysi, we quickly settled in and acquainted ourselves with our host family and the place we would call home for the month of March. Case de los Ninos is a daycare center in Rurre, which serves newborns up to children about 5 or 6 years old.
And the next day, we jumped right in and started our interactive painting projects. The teacher’s main needs for us were to re-paint the outside wall of the courtyard, the sidewalk entryway, the staircase heading to the upstairs classroom, and the courtyard floor. She wanted us to liven it up, and to paint designs that the children could be interactive with and learn from.
This was my DREAM ministry assignment!
We divided up design assignments and got straight to work. And over the course of the next three weeks, Casa de los Ninos was transformed. Everyday we scraped old paint off of the wall with pocket knives, sanded fenceposts, scrubbed cement stairs, and mixed paint. We designed an educational mural, and interactive layouts for the courtyard, entryway, and stairs. Some days we cleaned out old storage closets, and other days we pulled trees down and hacked them up with machetes. We worked hard. We sweat a lot.
On our first off day, some friends and I decided to rent mopeds and go explore the surrounding areas of the town. And most of you have already heard this story, but let’s just say it ends with me crashing the moped, the bike landing on my left leg, my friend landing on my upper body and careening past me…leaving us both pretty beat up. After a trip to the hospital, a few x-rays, lots of ibuprofen, and a few days rest, we had come to the conclusion that Christina, my passenger, needed to go home to get more testing done on her knee, and that I would be fine with just rest.
So I rested…sort of. And my team pressed in and continued working on the projects assigned to us.
After a couple days of rest, my pain level had decreased, and I was sick of watching my teammates work while I laid in my hammock, feeling like a bump on a log. So once I felt capable, I decided to play through the pain and get back to work. This proved to be a major mistake. To make a long story short, thanks to my stubbornness, I exacerbated the injury in my shoulder. We’re still unsure what is going on inside my shoulder/back…and after re-injuring it on the plane from Miami to JFK, I’ve found myself in quite a bit of pain.
So now I’ve landed myself with a set of very strict two-week rest instructions, and a squad full of incredible humble family who selflessly serve me to assure that I can stay on the field with them. They carry my bags everywhere, even though they have their own belongings to worry about. While my arm is in a sling during travel, they help me do just about anything I need. They even exchange seats on the airplane with me to make sure I’m as comfortable as possible.
All this to say, the Lord has not been far from me during this process, even when I choose to blow Him off in my frustration. As a business-owner, self-sufficiency and independence is of the utmost importance to me. I’m entirely accustomed to pulling my own weight, because in my “normal life” back home, if I don’t pull it, the weight doesn’t get pulled. (As if my life is on hold while I’m gone or something…and when I get back to the States all I have to do is flip a switch and everything will go back the way it was before I left for the race)
Watching one squad-mate carry my bag across the terminal so I could check it, then hustle back to get his own belongings…and then another drag both bags through the international check-in lines at Air India, while my squad leader lifts both of our daypacks every time that the line moves, then my best friend indicates for me to go infront of her and carries my bag up to the counter so it can be weighed…it drove me crazy. I felt like I was fighting tears all morning.
But the Lord has shown me that this is what true community looks like. Family. People who are willing to do whatever is necessary to assure my well-being and security are safe and sound. The kind of people who serve you without blinking an eye…the ones who you know will walk through the fire with you, because they love you. And you both love Jesus.
So my challenge to you, whomever is reading this: if you find yourself in a circumstance where you need to rely on your community around you, the people the Lord has placed in your life…just do it. Don’t fight it. Don’t be that annoying whiny person who complains when someone helps you. (I’m preaching to the choir here, believe me) And just watch what the Lord will teach you about His provision and careful care for your life. It’s so sweet and so good!
