The Albanian flag is hard to miss. It easily catches the eye with a striking red background and a black double-headed eagle emblazoned in the middle. The red symbolises bravery, strength and valour, while the eagle represents Albania’s sovereignty. The double-headed eagle was also the coat of arms of Skanderbeg, the nation’s hero, who fought off the Ottoman Empire for 25 years.
The double-headed eagle symbol originates from ancient Albanian folk tales when eagles were highly valued and protected. No one was to harm any eagles, allowing the birds to fly freely across the skies. However, one day a youth intrigued by an eagle decided to capture it. He drew his arrow and pierced the bird’s wing in mid-flight. Wounded, the eagle plummeted to the ground.
Alarmed by the impending death of it’s bleeding brother, a second eagle dived alongside it and placed one of its wings over the bloodied wing of the first eagle. The eagles quickly began to work together, flapping their opposite wings in simultaneous motions, learning how to move and shift directions as one. The blood from the first eagle’s wounded wing sealed the two birds together forever and thus the two became one – a double-headed eagle.
During our month in Albania, the Lord taught me so many things about the importance of unity in our team. Living life in community on the Race is real life. There are no breaks, no rests, nowhere to hide if you’re having a bad day. Just real, raw community. I love the women on my team, they have come alongside me in ways I could have never dreamed of.
Every day I have a decision to make, to choose into the people that I have in my life right here, right now. All the good, the bad and the ugly of your life is on display when you live in such close community. We have grown in unity over so much laughter, we love and serve one another, we strive to get to know one another, we have late night pillow talk and cry together.
But it’s not always pretty. We come from different walks of life, with different opinions, political views, theological backgrounds, life experiences. When you’re in community 24/7 sometimes we can be just like the Albanian youth in the folk tale, wielding our bows and shooting arrows that wound the precious people in our lives. It gets messy and bloody and can feel like everything around us is plummeting downwards. The easy option is to isolate ourselves and give up on unity. The more difficult option is to press in when everything inside us is telling us to run away.
And yet, there is still joy in the middle of the mess. We grow closer because of it. When we fight, when we disagree, when we hurt one another and have to ask for forgiveness – that’s when some of the most important work happens to build authentic community. It’s not always easy but it’s always worth it to choose unity. Everyday is another lesson in communication, conflict resolution, vulnerability and love.
For any team to function well, they must be unified. God is teaching me that unity can be found even in the bloodied and broken messes of our lives, that as sisters in Christ we can come together and help each other fly again. That we learn to live and move and breathe as one. Through the blood of Jesus, we are all unified and sealed together in one body. A unified team becomes a dangerous weapon in the kingdom to change the world.
Team Girasol
