Great Expectations

Through my time at GPC and college I participated in a lot of short-term mission projects. As I think I’ve mentioned before, one of these trips was to Ecuador. I fell in love with the country and knew I needed to go back. Therefore, coming into this trip I had high hopes for what I would experience and feel. I looked forward to the warm, family-oriented culture, the focus on practical, daily things, and escape from the highly skeptical, intellectual world that I live in at home.
I also looked forward to practicing a more disciplined lifestyle. In the month before coming to Ecuador I was a nomad; staying at different friends houses in Baltimore during the week, working full time at my internship, traveling home and to Boston on weekends, and trying to sort out my plans for the next stages of my life. I was going full tilt, racing through each day with piles of to-do lists and spending each night saying goodbye to friends. Needless to say, I didn’t make a lot of time for quiet time with God, or quiet time in general. I kept on running the rat race thinking that soon I’d be in Ecuador, where my only task would be to love others and be open to new things and I could rest. It would be the perfect reset button to my hectic life, before beginning my new life in Boston.

The first thing that happened to me here in this lovely country was nightmares—Nightmares that woke me in the middle of the night with every muscle in my body tense and my heart rate elevated. Staring into the pitch dark, it would take several long minutes to realize they weren’t real. I had them for five nights. Each one hit close to home, bringing up some insecurity or unresolved problem that I had successfully (I thought) hidden away. Apparently I had way more on my mind that I knew, and I hadn’t had the time to actually sit, be still and deal with that until I got here. And when I did they just flooded out, all at once.
The next thing I experienced in Ecuador was boredom. I know that sounds horrible- we’re here to serve and do God’s work in a new and exciting culture… but we spend a lot of time just around the house. I was really disappointed with all the down time and found myself getting frustrated and short-tempered. To compound this, we were asked to help out with cleaning and chores. Normally this wouldn’t be a problem, but I was so focused on wanting to do something big and exciting for God that spending time vacuuming just didn’t seem as important.

Hence came God’s big message, while I was killing time swinging in a hammock one afternoon. It came booming through the mundane things that were driving me crazy: SLOW DOWN.
How can I lead a disciplined life, let alone perform huge acts of love and service, when my spirit is twisted up in knots? I was keeping myself busy to avoid dealing with the things that were heavy upon my heart. And how can I faithfully serve in big ways, when I don’t have the patience to serve in small ways? It took the first week of my time in Ecuador to realize that, and the second week to actually accept that.
I’m not saying that I now joyfully take to the dusting or that I don’t get antsy to get out and be active, but I realize the importance of taking time to slow down and spend quiet time with God. My prayer as this trip continues is that I will grow in patience and come to enjoy the stillness that permeates our Ecuadorian way of life.

Oh, and I’m happy to report that once that message got pounded into my head big ways to show God’s love and exciting things did happen, but I’ll let the others tell you about those :o)

Thanks for letting me share,
Lisa