Thursday, October 7, 2010

dirty ragamuffin in love

I haven't written much in comparison to all that has happened in the last three weeks. I have met so many people, seen and learned more than I can really remember to explain. Every moment is an opportunity to learn, to experience life from a new vantage point. And everything seems to have deeper meaning than can be expressed on paper. It's not just a freezing cold shower; it is a connection with a lifetime of cold showers that my family has gotten used to. It's my little host sister breathing hard and fast; crying from the shock of the water. It not just trash everywhere. It is people living with heaps of trash to the left and the right, in mounds and scattered from one side of the neighborhood to the other while other areas are completed cleaned of debry. It is my family and friends and everyone I've ever known who are here in Peru, because I am here in Peru. It is God's hand getting ready to move because I am ready to move. It is Jesus and Tucson and Lubbock, Texas reaching out to others.

What I am experiencing seems so much bigger than the little help I can give. I'm learning how to be aware of the mighty power of our God who has been changing the world with the hands and feet of humanity all along. Knowing that this movement is so much more than my small efforts and failures (failures that feel so big at the time). The grandness of good news of forgiveness helps me to feel the arms of the Creator hold me tight, to care for me throughout the day. The moments when I fall become opportunities for me to be grateful for the way that God loves this ragamuffin. How awesome is it to know, as Shane Claiborne puts it, the God who didn't want to change the world without us.

"You won't relent until you have it all. My heart is yours."

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