Life Down the Rutted Red Road

1. I am not God.

If you had asked me if I thought I was God, I would have been shocked at the question, “Of course not!”. But then I would go home in an internal mess (only on the inside – of course, I couldn’t let it show on the outside) because I hadn’t been able to save the life of a child, that I hadn’t been able to make my teammate happy, that I hadn’t been able to bring peace to my town, that the week had not turned out like I had planned. In short, that I hadn’t been able to be God.

It took a few years to realise that, though I would never say it, functionally I had been thinking that I was.  And yes, I still beat myself up internally if I think there is something I missed and a child dies, but I am better at releasing the outcome into his hands. Yes, I still want everyone to like me, but I am slowly coming to own that I am not responsible for others’ emotions. I still plan out in my head the week ahead – but am better at holding those plans loosely (or more realistically I have just got better at making 50 different plans aware that maybe one of them will work). And just in case I am tempted to start picking up those heavy burdens that aren’t mine to carry I wrote it down, decorated it with some pretty pink craft flowers and stuck it on my desk, “I am called to follow Jesus, living in dependence on him, remembering that he is God and I am not….”

2. God has a strange sense of humour.

When I was in high school, if you had written a list of everyone in our class of those most likely to 1) live in a war zone, 2) stow away in an old Russian Antanov (well, it is not really stowing away if the pilots know you are there, but sitting in the back on piles of goods feels like you are stowing away) 3) enjoy riding on the back of a motorbike, it would not have been me. In fact, I would have been one of the very last names on the list. I am a quiet homebody by nature. My hobbies are doing puzzles and cross-stitch (even when I was a teenager). I don’t sit wondering what adventurous thing I should do next. And yet I have done all the above. I have been given the privilege of being an ordinary person in some not-quite ordinary circumstances. And I sometimes wonder if God is sitting up there with a little grin on his face (metaphorically speaking) saying “what shall we make happen today….”.

3. I like wearing a head covering and clapping and dancing in church.

I grew up in white, conservative-enough church circles that I did come across occasional women who wore a ‘head covering’ in church (though I was never convinced enough or willing enough to be that weird to do so myself) and we didn’t (unless we were being very brave or it was a special occasion) clap to music in church. We definitely didn’t dance.

Here, I wear a head covering and I clap and dance in church. And I enjoy it.

In this area women nearly always wear a covering over their heads outside their homes, whether a loose scarf or the full body wrap-around toob. To show respect, I generally wear one too. And, instead of finding it repressive (as had been my view), I find it freeing. It is a shade for my head from the burning sun, a shield from the guys eyeing my up as I walk past, and as I sit in church with its pressure resting on my shoulders, I am reminded of the Father who covers me with his wing of protection.

In church there are no hymn books, no bulletins, no powerpoint displays. Some random person starts singing a random song, and then others join in. The words are often incomprehensible. So, I am often reduced to making vowel sounds and the occasional Yesu at the right times. But, I can join in the movement and posture of the worship around me, the hands clapping and the feet moving.

And so that is what I do (now, if you looked at me from the back with my toob on I might even pass as a local). Pleasing everyone (or no one) in the church cultural divides – but choosing to worship with the people he has placed me with.

4. I am not as good at relationships as I thought I was.

Prior to moving overseas, I never had relational problems with people (ok, maybe excepting my sister during our teenage years, but isn’t that what is meant to happen). I knew I was an introvert, and I didn’t have a huge number of friends, but I didn’t have any bad relationships. I thought I could do relationships.

And then, I realised being nice to people who you see occasionally, or even getting on well with your family members (who are all conflict-adverse people to begin with) does not make you good at relationships. It does not prepare you for living day-in day-out in a stressful environment with people from different cultures and backgrounds, people who had to be rather driven, focused and passionate to go against the tide of ‘normal life’ to reach this place. And who are all now trying to work together. Sometimes it is not pretty. Often it is not. And I soon found out how far short I fell in relationship skills and loving people well.

I still fall short (though I have learnt a heap about myself along the way and picked up some skills on the side).  But at least it gives this goody-too-shoes girl something to confess.

5. I cannot avoid conversations about my singleness.

Talking about relationships, my lack of marital relationship, of not even being “booked” (the local phrase for engaged) is an anomaly in this culture. And, they are not shy about pointing that out and discussing it. Often. In fact, after my name and various medical conditions it is probably the most common conversation I have.  While these conversations are sometimes funny, other times excruciatingly awkward (thankfully, I don’t blush quite as easily as I used to), or on a day when I am already struggling with the issue simply painful, I have found it is the easiest way to bring up the God issue. For really, what other reason in their eyes is there for me to be 35 and still single. In fact, sometimes I now even show a picture of one of my nieces or nephews (other than because they are very cute), because I know it will lead to that conversation, which can lead to talking about a lot of deeper things.

6. Lament is an important art.

But that doesn’t mean that I don’t grieve some aspects of my singleness, of the tragic situations I see every day at the hospital, of the wars that have plagued this region (not that I am putting all these things on the same footing of grief).  And as I have grieved, as I have seen injustice and deep loss, I have learned to value the gift of lament. That I don’t have to pretend, to myself or God, that this doesn’t suck, that it doesn’t hurt, that it isn’t wrong. And, I can tell God so.

And now, occasionally a tear can even squeeze past my stoic control.

7. God does not waste my time and experiences.

There definitely have been occasions for tears. I am in my fourth location since moving overseas, the first two I had to leave because of security issues, the third one I was reluctantly at while we were initially denied moving to location four. None of them were moves or changes I would have chosen. And yet, I could not be doing what I am doing now, if not for all of them. There is now such a web of experiences and relationships and connections that have been built because of those different moves, that I can flourish here in a way that I wouldn’t have been able to without them. That is not to mention all the “oh I was just reading about that” or “I did have one patient with that” or “I met this person last week” that just seem to happen.

8. I am always going to be an outsider.

I think I came with romanticised ideals of who I would become: I would learn the language, dress locally, make friends, become one of them. None of this living behind concrete fences in a nice separate western bubble.

Yet, ten years in, although I may live in a house made from mud bricks and have an outside latrine (though we do have water and lights which significantly lifts us above most of the local population), there is still so much I don’t understand. My language is still halting. I still make cultural faux-paus (or just sit in a gathering with no clue what is going on). I still get led to a seat of honour (even though as an unmarried female I should be at the bottom of the hierarchy). I have developed a couple of ‘local’ relationships – but there is still this massive gap between “my world” and “theirs”. I will never belong fully. I will never become one of them.

But God didn’t ask me to. He didn’t make me with their beautiful ebony skin. I’m patchy white, with brown moles and hair on my arms. He has brought me to this place because I am different, because of what my difference can contribute. Though I may not belong, I can choose to be present (even if I am confused).

9. I am not changing the world, but I am being changed.

I did not come simply aiming to be present. In fact, I am very bad at just being present with people (hence why I became a nurse or you will often find me doing the dishes at a large social event). I had absorbed the motivational challenges of my youth and I wanted to do something significant with my life. To make a difference. To change the world (well, my aspirations were never that grandiose but heading in that direction). I remember thinking in the first location that I lived in that this wasn’t enough: I lived in too nice a house, too many of the people were already Christians. I needed to do something more radical. God sent a civil war to that location, so I suppose he answered that one.

But the reality is, most of my life is not glamorous. It is lighting the charcoal stove in the morning. It is reviewing spreadsheets and walking the wards of the hospital. It is buying tomatoes at the market. It is reading a piece of fiction in the evenings. Sometimes, I look back over a previous year and think, have I accomplished anything, other than a lot of chasing after the leaves tossed around by the wind? Yes, there are particular people that my being here made a change for them.  

But, I think the main thing that has changed, has been me.

10. God is faithful.

In all this God has been faithful, even when I have not been, even when I have not seen how what is happening could be him being faithful.

I have laughed and I have grieved. I have met some remarkable people. I have got to do some amazing things. I have been scared and filled with wonder. I have come to hunger a little more for heaven and to hate evil more. Sometimes I have been able to actively cling to promises, other times I have just been an exhausted heap in his arms.

I am still alive and still able to laugh (which should not be taken for granted).

And though I still have many questions, and there are definitely times where protest, “God, do I really have to go through this lesson, again”, I now have story after story I can look back on and say, “You were faithful”.