I have the awesome opportunity to partner with New Generation this month in Guatemala. Going into this month I felt it was going to be jammed packed with amazing opportunities to minister. I was so excited about all that was going to be in store for us. However this all changed with I got sick.
I missed out on the lessons for Leadership Development Weekend.
I didn’t feel on fire because I wasn’t poured into with session after awesome session.
I felt like I wasn’t a part of my team or squad locked alone in my room trying to feel better.
Let’s get real traveling while sick is a nightmare.
Being sick in general is not fun, but being sick on the race can be miserable.
If I was being honest I was over the race month 4 week 1.
The comforts of home were all I wanted.
Stuck in a tent in 40 degree weather, freezing cold, with an air pad I can’t find the dang hole in that deflates within an hour, coughing up a lung (literally), with body aches, shivering, headaches, 99.5-102 fever on the regular, not being able to fully breathe will make you want to go home and have the comforts of home.
The thoughts in my head sounded something like this:
“I feel gross, I haven’t showered.” “The water is too cold and it is freezing outside so it is going to only increase my infection in my lungs. We only have running water at night and it is ice cold. I can’t go to ministry because I will get everyone sick. I am stuck here alone with no one else. All my team is out having fun. I am sweating and freezing all at the same time because of this fever. I have to sleep on the ground because my air pad has a hole in it. I am not even able to sleep because of coughing so much. I have literally slept over half my month’s money on doctors, medication, Gatorade, and cough drops. For the past few days I haven’t even felt like eating because of my lack of appetite, which is making me even weaker. My legs and armpits are hairy. My sleeping bag isn’t warm enough. My team feels like they have forgot about me. I am of no use being sick. I have to go to the hospital. I had to not breathe the cold air or any of the dust, fumes, or smoke. Basically I can’t breathe. I have to go into town to get internet to tell my parents but don’t have the strength to go out. I can’t walk to get lunch without ducking through many laundry lines. I get out of breathe just going up and down the stairs because of the infection. My antibiotics make me sick to my stomach. I am so over the race, all I want to do is be at home warm in my bed, with chicken noodle soup, and a hot shower.”
Funny side note: The next day we got homemade chicken noodle soup. Lord’s favor.
Of course God wasn’t offended by any of this because he knew it was coming. Like I learned in Seth Barnes book Kingdom Journeys we all come to a breaking point. It will be unavoidable if we are pressing into pain and discomfort along our journey. It is a sign of doing it right because it is bound to happen. Because we either choose to press in or opt out.
“The truth is you were always a mess, always broken. Just like the rest of us, Getting to brokenness involves coming to a greater awareness of what other can plainly see.”
I mean in all honestly I could have sat down prayed a nice sweet prayer of, “God thank you for the blessing you have given me in this time of abandonment, You are such a good God,” all the while fuming inside of all the things that I believed were going wrong and were of a challenge. “However God always prefers our honest doubts, fears, and frustrations to hypocritical piety.”
All I wanted was comfort. I didn’t want to abandon the things of home that I felt I needed while I was sick, while I was freezing, while I was laying on the ground feeling miserable at best. I was willing to complain and think over how much better my situation would be if I wasn’t here on the race. However God has been really teaching me and transforming my life from being addicted to comfort to someone who could be content without it.
I had to get to the end of myself and be completely exhausted and this is what others need to do as well. However I wouldn’t have been able to get here without being authentic and realizing how I was truly feeling and what my flesh was wanting.
The comfort in all of this is we don’t have to keep it all together we are a mess. That’s great because that is where God finds us resting at his feet because we cannot do it any longer by ourselves. So I think you God for my breakdown. I thank you for my discomforts. I thank you for bringing me through brokenness. I thank you for finding me at the end of myself.
