As I look out of my living room window and see the bustling city of Santiago, Chile, I marvel that my husband and I have been asked to lead the church here. That by itself is amazing but on top of that we don’t speak the language, yet! Learning Spanish at this point in my life is one of the hardest things I have ever done. By nature when a task is this hard I often give up: like doing a painting or running a marathon (neither of which I have ever done). I think God has been training me for this for a VERY long time. You see, I am 59 years old. There are a lot of reasons why people stop trying to do hard things at this stage in life. Our bodies don’t cooperate in many ways, to say nothing of our minds. Now is the time that people start making jokes about forgetting things….not a very convenient problem when you are trying to learn a new language.
You may be much younger and think, “I don’t need to read this, I’m still young and it doesn’t apply to me”. I suggest you read on and open your mind. It is possible you could use some of these ideas in the future, or that my thoughts might affect some current decisions that will impact your life in later years.
I, too, was once 18 years old and a freshman at the University of Florida. There, I met people from the church and I learned so much about what it meant to follow the Bible. From the time I first read the New Testament I knew there was nowhere else where I would find a genuine standard for my life and find friends that would help me get to Heaven. On top of that, the church was where I needed to find a spouse who would have these same convictions. These decisions have made a profound difference in the direction of my life. Did I wake up one morning and decide I was going to move to India, Afghanistan, the Middle East, or Chile? No. As a matter of fact, I was raised in the only one city (Miami) until I left for college, and most of those years were in the same house. But because the Bible became my standard, I learned to view the world through new eyes. I focus on doing what God wants me to do and allow Him to direct my steps (Prv 16:9). I strive to keep firm on what the Bible makes clear about life and doctrine (I Tim 4:16) but, not “dig in my heels” and draw lines in the sand about what I will or won’t do or where I would be willing to live. But it is God who has taken us to so many different places, not me.
You might wonder if I knew before we married that one day I would travel to and live in many exotic places. The answer is a very clear “No”. Change can be scary. Many of us shy away from it all together. So, I learned to like it and even look for opportunities to change. I like cleaning out my closet, giving things away, imagining new places and new activities. I have learned to like moving to new cities or countries, making new friends and finding new ways to do things. But this didn’t come easily. I was so scared when we landed in India with the church planting in 1986. I felt like I was drowning for a while. Only my relationships and prayer kept my head above water. Each decision along the way had to be met with prayer, advice and more prayer.
Actually, prayer has always been difficult for me. I just finished Mark Templer’s book: “Prayer of the Righteous”. Yes, I read it in Spanish. Reading it this way took longer but that made me think more about what I was reading instead of simply flying through it. It was inspiring and challenging. Prayer is an area of my life in constant need of challenge and renovation. I pray that those of you who are strong in this area would write about your prayer life to help those of us who are weak in this area. I do know that prayer works because our Father in heaven listens and answers and I have seen so many of those responses!
In staying strong with God, I have come to realize that Bible Study is crucial. Sometimes for months I will listen to the Word while exercising. I focus on a particular book and write notes on what I am learning. I read a book and then read it again after a few months. I am particularly encouraged when I find parallel passages to whatever I am reading. I don’t claim to be any kind of scholar – I am just trying to learn as much as I can when I read. I gain so much from the work of others. I listen to messages and distill them and send the notes to my children sometimes. All of this said, I am in a constant quest to do more. I love it every time I learn something new so I try to make it daily.
I suppose one of the biggest lessons in my life has been my understanding of helping the poor. When it comes to this, perhaps I began to gain a greater understanding one Saturday in Gainesville, Florida. Several of us were asked to go clean a very poor woman’s house. It took hours. We put her rat-infested mattress was put out on the curb for the trash collectors to take away. I remember leaving with the others and wondering what would she sleep on that night. As we left, we saw her pulling it back into the house we had just cleaned. We did what we could to help, but in the end all we could do was pray.
I also remember the time that several of us in South Florida went to the home of a woman who was a “pack-rat”. I imagine that her need to hoard things had become a mental illness for her. She couldn’t even throw away a tea bag. They were everywhere. Her needs were overwhelming but we did what we could to help. Though we helped, in the end all we could do was pray for her.
When we were in India the beggars seemed to be everywhere. Sadly, because it is so overwhelming, it is possible lose your sensitivity to their struggles and you can end up walking by and trying not to make eye contact or even trying to escape their clutches. Some are forced into their life of poverty and others brought to it by life’s circumstances. Regardless, the needs were overwhelming. All I could do was pray and try to help one at a time: with a meal, a hand-shake, an invitation or a specific gift that would help. When we lived in Afghanistan, the winters were brutal for many. We often raised and donated money to buy wood for the heaters some families had in their homes. We would find clothes that we could give out, food that we could distribute, and even offer vocational training that would help people fend for themselves. I could recount the many things done with the money donated, but there was certainly never enough for all needs that were before us.
Here in Santiago we go to “La Vega”. It is the largest vegetable, fruit, meat, spice, beans market I have ever seen. It runs 365 days a year. There are
homeless that live there. You can imagine why. We have a church service for them every Saturday. We do communion, a message, Bible learning games and a small breakfast that includes hot tea, coffee, and sandwiches. Truly, it is a highlight of my week. We dream of having a place for them to have AA or CR meetings, take a shower, get different clothes, do studies etc. It’s a long term plan. I know that I can’t “fix” all the problems they have. All I can do is pray and use the life God has given me to do something.
It’s important to me that I don’t get so safe and comfortable in my life that I forget that the majority of the world doesn’t live that way. Being careful not to love my surroundings or things too much just keeps me ready to move.
The church has always been my safe place. Each year I grow deeper in my understanding of why Jesus referred to us a sheep. It’s an amazing and profound analogy for us. I recommend you look into the characteristics of sheep: how they treat each other, how weak and simple they are. When we bump into each other, bite each other, walk on each other, trample each other and get confused, we need to remember that it is better to be a simple sheep than a stubborn goat. However, in most passages about sheep, perhaps Jesus is more talking about Himself as the shepherd and how dependent and in need of His protection we are. So, when we as sheep get into trouble, we need Him (through the church) to rescue us. And we will need this again and again. I am so thankful for the many churches I have been a part of in our group of churches. Wherever I go around the world, I am loved and cared for by God’s people.
I need my husband too. You can only imagine how much work it has taken to continue to grow together and love each other after 37 years of marriage (June 6, 1976). This would be another whole article. But without him I would be more stubborn than I am. I would be angrier than I am. I would be more impatient and more prideful. He is truly my other half. We argue and hurt each other’s feelings. But we laugh and love and share, too. We married young (22 and 23 years old) and have literally grown up together. I love my children (and now my grandchildren) more than I could possibly say. God has taught me amazing lessons through them I wouldn’t say I was a great mom, but as the Bible says, “Love covers over a multitude of sins” (I Peter 4:8). They can write their own articles.
Perhaps I have just scratched the surface of many things. I pray for you to have rich of a life in Christ as I have had – learning, repenting, changing and being challenged.
