As many of you know, our squad was held at gunpoint during which lots of our stuff was stolen, while in a hostel in Johannesburg, South Africa. After our “event” in Johannesburg right before coming to India I felt rather traumatized. This came as quite a surprise to me, because I really thought that I would be ok. Throughout the event I was fairly calm (although shaking like a leaf on a windy day), but I didn’t really grasp what was happening. I’m not sure if I fully understand it now, or if I ever will. I do know that you will NEVER know how you will respond to a situation until it happens to you. At one point during debrief Michael said something to the effect of “you are pretty strong, I didn’t think something like this would affect you so much” to which I replied “I didn’t think so either, until last week”. It is really surprising what happens to you.
After breaking down the night of the event, followed by not sleeping until I saw the sun rising, and freaking out again the next night I went into survival mode. I told myself that everything would be fine, I just needed to make it to India because Michael and Kathy would be there and they could help me. So I started surviving. I made it to India (after hours of delays at the airport in Abu Dhabi and hours of delays trying to get from the airport in New Delhi to our home here). A couple of days after when Michael and Kathy arrived, we met up with them at a restaurant. There the strangest thinig happened. It was as though the “I’ll be fine until I see them” mentality worked, because as soon as I saw them I started to cry. Right there in the restaurant. I don’t even think the Hindes’s knew (at least until after when I was talking to them for a brief moment and I started to cry AGAIN). Magen was sitting next to me and couldn’t figure out what had happened that had sparked the sudden water works. And so began the week of tears.
I cried in the evenings, I cried talking to Michael and the squad when he asked about the event, I cried during one of my team debriefs. Even throughout, I felt completely ridiculous, because it was not such a huge deal (everyone was safe, it was just a bit of stuff taken, nothing super important). Besides, everyone else seemed just fine, and was talking about how they weren’t scared and it was ok because God is bigger than that. They thought about crying for 30 seconds until they were over it and figured out that God was so awesome and looked after us all. Well, so whenever I heard that it made me feel even worse because I WAS scared, and I DID feel like crying all the time. It got to the point where I just wanted to go home. I didn’t feel like I was ever going to be ok, and although I didn’t blame God for what happened, for some reason our relationship had stopped. I had nothing left to say to Him. I was over it, done with praying. Not forever, I didn’t doubt God, or anything, I still had my faith, but I just had nothing to say. Then it happened.
It was our last night of debrief. We were having worship and Jake (a previous racer) was going to share with us. I was seriously debating whether to go home or not. I figured it was a big enough deal to at least give God some say in the matter. So I prayed. The first sentance in I got this overwhelming, complete peace in me. I was covered by it, surrounded with it, filled up from it, totally soaked in it. I had the peace that passes understanding. Let me tell you, it sure passes my understanding. Literally one minute I felt like crying every 5 minutes, jumping at every noise, and being terrified of every man who looked my direction, had his hand in his pocket or walked in my direction. The next minute I was so peaceful that none of those things scared me anymore, I haven’t jumped at a noise since and I haven’t felt like crying since either. It was so overwhelming, and so desperately needed. I decided to stick it out in India, through the difficulty of it all, and see where God takes me this month. I did hear God calling me to spend some time with Him instead of going out to ministry so that He could help me work through some of what happened. So that was what I decided to do. These next few blogs are going to tell you what happened throughout the few days I spent with God. It was a long hard process, but good things came from it. So keep reading!
After breaking down the night of the event, followed by not sleeping until I saw the sun rising, and freaking out again the next night I went into survival mode. I told myself that everything would be fine, I just needed to make it to India because Michael and Kathy would be there and they could help me. So I started surviving. I made it to India (after hours of delays at the airport in Abu Dhabi and hours of delays trying to get from the airport in New Delhi to our home here). A couple of days after when Michael and Kathy arrived, we met up with them at a restaurant. There the strangest thinig happened. It was as though the “I’ll be fine until I see them” mentality worked, because as soon as I saw them I started to cry. Right there in the restaurant. I don’t even think the Hindes’s knew (at least until after when I was talking to them for a brief moment and I started to cry AGAIN). Magen was sitting next to me and couldn’t figure out what had happened that had sparked the sudden water works. And so began the week of tears.
I cried in the evenings, I cried talking to Michael and the squad when he asked about the event, I cried during one of my team debriefs. Even throughout, I felt completely ridiculous, because it was not such a huge deal (everyone was safe, it was just a bit of stuff taken, nothing super important). Besides, everyone else seemed just fine, and was talking about how they weren’t scared and it was ok because God is bigger than that. They thought about crying for 30 seconds until they were over it and figured out that God was so awesome and looked after us all. Well, so whenever I heard that it made me feel even worse because I WAS scared, and I DID feel like crying all the time. It got to the point where I just wanted to go home. I didn’t feel like I was ever going to be ok, and although I didn’t blame God for what happened, for some reason our relationship had stopped. I had nothing left to say to Him. I was over it, done with praying. Not forever, I didn’t doubt God, or anything, I still had my faith, but I just had nothing to say. Then it happened.
It was our last night of debrief. We were having worship and Jake (a previous racer) was going to share with us. I was seriously debating whether to go home or not. I figured it was a big enough deal to at least give God some say in the matter. So I prayed. The first sentance in I got this overwhelming, complete peace in me. I was covered by it, surrounded with it, filled up from it, totally soaked in it. I had the peace that passes understanding. Let me tell you, it sure passes my understanding. Literally one minute I felt like crying every 5 minutes, jumping at every noise, and being terrified of every man who looked my direction, had his hand in his pocket or walked in my direction. The next minute I was so peaceful that none of those things scared me anymore, I haven’t jumped at a noise since and I haven’t felt like crying since either. It was so overwhelming, and so desperately needed. I decided to stick it out in India, through the difficulty of it all, and see where God takes me this month. I did hear God calling me to spend some time with Him instead of going out to ministry so that He could help me work through some of what happened. So that was what I decided to do. These next few blogs are going to tell you what happened throughout the few days I spent with God. It was a long hard process, but good things came from it. So keep reading!
