I lay spread eagle on my bed, 3 fans blowing hot air on me,
dripping slowly into my warm African foam bed. Even the “cold” shower water was
hot from the sizzling Ghanaian sun. I had nothing to do in the heat of the day
but try to rest and stay hydrated. So I lay there, as if in a trance thinking
about my life, and what the heck I’m doing with it.
I thought about this last year of my life since I returned
from Ethiopia last March to a hospitalized asthmatic son and one simple mandate
from the Holy Spirit: stay put.
I did stay and I worked hard on a lot of personal issues
that make staying put so hard for me. But I’ll admit I was never peaceful about
it. I felt every day that the thing that gave me so much purpose (my work in
Africa) had been pulled out from under me and nothing could ever replace it.
I tried. Oh I tried to find something else to fill that void,
to renew a sense of purpose and vision in my life. I tried to start and do so
many things that year. But everything I tried hoping to scratch that itch fizzled
almost immediately. I just had to stay put and feel the discomfort, just as I
now lay on my bed embracing 106 degrees of discomfort. And somewhere in that
squirming, purposeless discomfort, I grew up a little.
I thought about the fact that now I’m BACK in Africa and I’m
getting hit with a realization: I’m no actually very good at this. I mean, I’m
pretty good at traversing new cultures and eating exotic food in beautiful
temperate mountains with English speakers who love me and share my faith in
Jesus. But this?? Sweating in a flat scrubby bush-land eating food I really
don’t like (sorry Ghana), sharing God’s love with Muslims (NOT my gift) whose
language I can’t speak and who have a reputation for kidnapping outsiders? It’s
risky. But more so, I often feel uncertain, sometimes bored, and OFTEN lonely.
It got me thinking... maybe this whole thing is simply
rooted in my need to be liked and validated. Maybe I only like Africa when
Africa likes me. Am I only in this
for the exotic adventures in beautiful places with friendly people?
But then I thought about my 13-year-old self sitting at my
friend Steve’s kitchen table tracing lines across the 5 or 6 West African
countries where then felt strangely called to, and I now work ... I was certain
then (for no obvious reason) that God was calling me to this part of the world
and up until today that certainty has never left me.
Laying there, I took a rough inventory of all the
commitments, involvements, dreams, passions, and ideas I have. It’s a LONG
list. With every one of them, I said, “Boy it would be great to ____________!
....Until it wasn’t great anymore. Then I’d probably quit.” Boy it would be
great to have a music career. Until it wasn’t great anymore. Then I’d be out of
there. Boy it’d be great to own a hobby farm. Until it wasn’t great anymore.
Boy it’d be great to start a coffee shop, be in an intentional community, plant
a church... until, until, until.
But when I thought of my involvement in this sweaty scrubby
bushland among Ghana’s nomadic cattle folk, my self-absorbed caveats
evaporated. I thought to myself, “wow I’m so not cut of for this. And it might
get a lot worse in years to come. And in spite of that, and even if it gets
harder, I know I’ll keep coming back for more.” Not because I’m the faithful
steady type (I’m not). And not because it’s all I know how to do (it’s not).
And not because it makes the most objective sense for me (it doesn’t).
I’ll keep coming back because this is where I’m supposed to
be. I just know it is deep down. Because more than any other area of my life,
God has been most obviously involved in leading me in this area, in roundabout
ways to this strange place and this foreign people. This is where I’m supposed
to be. Not because it’s fulfilling, but just because its where I’m supposed to
be.
It’s been very clarifying for me to think about the things
I’m essentially committed to not because it feels good or because I’ll feel
guilt if I don’t do it but because I know deep down it’s what I’m supposed to
do. I may not always get to do those things in the ways I imagine, but it’s
very centering to have them at the front of my mind when I’m chasing down
passions and making major life decisions.
Do you have anything like that in your life? Try making a
list of all the things you LOVE and are passionate about and dream of doing
some day. Then try to imagine yourself getting to do those things and it being
far more painful and far less fulfilling than you ever imagined. Would you
stick with it? Why or why not? And for how long? Is there anything in your life
that maybe doesn’t make as much “sense” that you would wake up and do every day
no matter what just because? Is there something beyond your fulfillment and
enjoyment and gratification that drives you forward each day? Where did those
things come from? Are they from childhood vows or childhood wounds (maybe not
so healthy)? Or are they driven by a deeper hunger, a strange certainty, an
“I’ve-just-gotta”, a mysterious calling?
Maybe it’s a relationship, a task, or an inner commitment.
I have that “just do it” feeling about my marriage, my
parenting, one or two friendships, and my commitment to seeing the
extraordinary presence of Jesus break into my ordinary life. I’m not saying they are unshakeable,
just that they are pretty core to what makes me “tick” even when I’m all “ticked
out”. They are a few of the most anchoring things within me that make me trudge
along even when doing so defies reason.
So what about you? What makes you tick for no apparent
reason?
