Now, I may have been a straight A student in all academic subjects in high school but, as is the case with most bookworms in high school, gym class was the bane of my existence. I literally dreaded that class, and it is the only class I ever skipped (yes mom, I did skip in high school). I am not athletic – my favourite sport is curling, which I’ll admit is not a super high energy sport. So, needless to say, when I finished my last gym class I was pretty stoked, thinking that I would never, ever, have to be in PE class ever again.
And then I came to Uganda…
Our ministry here is with Celebrate Jesus ministries – working and speaking in the church on Sundays, and helping out at the school through the week. Goshenland school is a Christian primary school. It’s fairly small, with less than 100 students. The students, though, are so precious, and we have fallen in love with them.
Our average weekday is 8-9 hours. In the morning we are doing physical labour, usually making bricks to lay over the dirt floor in the classrooms, or landscaping. In the afternoon we join the PE class. This is a school wide class (although by this time of day, many students have gone home to work, so we are down to between 30-50 students). Gym class lasts anywhere between 2-4 hours, and is pretty much running, running, jumping, and more running. Our role is sometimes to lead a game, or introduce a new activity, but usually we are just participants.
Which means I am back in gym class. Complete with the instructor calling you out in front of the entire group if you are not jumping high enough, running fast enough or stretching far enough. If we thought we got a bit of break because we are adults, or because we are guests, or for any other reason…we were wrong. I’m back in high school.
We are thoroughly exhausted by the end of every day. We get home, eat dinner, have team time, and crash. And sometimes I am lying in bed by 9pm, sunburnt, wondering if I have heat stroke, sore, stiff and absolutely exhausted, and I wonder why I do it. We all realize that we’re not supermen. So why do we go every day to do physical labour, to run around, to play with children? I mean, with days like this, nobody would put up a fuss if I took an extra rest day other than our Mondays we have off. So why do I still get up every morning and give it my all?
Its not only because I can finally work off some of the ugali, rice and potatoes that we eat on a daily basis here. It is because this is where I find God.
I see Jesus in the eyes of the child taking me by the hand to teach me a new game. I learn about my faithful God when I pray in the morning to find joy in the physical labour, and have an absolute blast packing concrete into moulds. I see God in the details when we meet a British woman at a restaurant during lunch, and three days later she shows up at the school with Gideons Bibles for every student in the school. I see the handiwork of the creator in every bird and tree on the property, and in the beauty and the laughter of the children. I am learning that God gives me enough energy to make it around the circle one last time. And that my loving, caring Father is better than any sports massage for sore muscles.
God has put me in a place of physical labour, playing with children, and gym class. If you had told me last month what was ahead of me, I would have told you that this was the worst possible month for me. But, surprisingly, I am loving this month. I am challenged in so many ways – physically and spiritually, and it is so good.
Because, once again, when you leave your comfort zone and put yourself in a place where you NEED God, and cannot finish the day ahead without his help, then that is when you grow the most.
I think I am learning more in gym class now than I ever did in high school.
