simplicity

As an American I have this tendency to try and be busy no matter what. Our culture tends to stimulate our senses however possible and as much as possible. I'd argue that it is pretty successful most of the time. In America busy-ness is easy to encounter in a world of friends, family, work, play, study, movies, cell phones, computers, games, sports, TiVo, music, concerts, shopping, eating, driving, and living.  When I first moved to Mozambique I was struck with the reality of life slowing down in major ways. I no longer had the ability to get in my car and drive over to a friend’s house. No longer the same forms of entertainment whether seeing a movie or going to a concert. Life came down to a simpler level, one of slowing down and sometimes sitting and just enjoying doing nothing.

Something that I have learned about myself is that even if I’m doing nothing I still tend to try to “do” something whether it is to play guitar, read a book, listen to a podcast, or work on lesson plans for school. There is ALWAYS something waiting to be done. Just because I’ve relocated to half a world away hasn’t changed my internal desire to want to be productive and achieve something. American culture is one of doing while African culture is one of being. This was made very real to me this past week as things slowed down and I suddenly had no list of things to do, but had time to spend being. Things felt very simple, extremely simple, for probably one of the first times in my life. 

simplicity

• the quality or condition of being easy to understand or do 
• the quality or condition of being plain or natural 

This past week I had the lovely opportunity to be able to spend a week with a family in the bush. At first I was slightly nervous since I had absolutely no idea what to expect. The house was in the bush and quite a ways outside of the city. (Much like what we refer to as the sticks or boonies in Oklahoma) Not too far away from the main road, but down some bumpy, rutted and almost non-existent dirt roads. Their house is in the process of being completed. Gabriel started building it in 2003. Currently they have two bedrooms and the kitchen finished, which they use as a kitchen and living room combined. 

When one first sees or even hears of a house like this one described you would automatically think it is simple. There is furniture, but not an excessive amount. There is a toilet, but no running water. There is a stove, but no microwave. A mosquito net, but with huge holes in it. These are all very different than the typical standards in America. If we consider the second definition of simplicity it describes something that is plain or natural. Now this house was definitely easy to see and know what it contained, thus being very plain and natural. But life in this house was actually very difficult for me to understand. It is a sort of contradiction. Why is it that sometimes the simplest of things can end up being the most complex?

So I ask that we further consider the first definition of simplicity, as something being easy to understand or do. Living with this family for a week was by no means easy to understand or do. I had to learn how to take a bucket bath and actually wash the shampoo out of my hair. I also learned how to prepare foods like matapa from scratch. And the hardest thing I learned was how to BE instead of DO. Life was no longer on a time sensitive schedule, but instead completely caught up in the people present in the now and here. Not about what is happening later. As an American this was a struggle at first. But I was soon able to relax, chill out, and able to simply enjoy the presence of others and being together. 

I think I was able to walk away from this time with a few useful insights and lessons learned. The first being how to correctly take a bucket bath and actually be clean. Next that it is ok to just be sometimes, and probably more healthy when used wisely. Also how to just sit and wait. Africa is a place where waiting takes up a lot of time and patience is absolutely necessary in order to keep your sanity.

Wait for the LORD;
   be strong, and let your heart take courage;
   wait for the LORD!

Psalm 27.14

The LORD is good to those who wait for him,
   to the soul who seeks him.
It is good that one should wait quietly
   for the salvation of the LORD.

Lamentations 3.25-26

"Be still, and know that I am God.
    I will be exalted among the nations,
   I will be exalted in the earth!"       

Psalm 46.10

The family I stayed with was Gabriel, Nildes (who is seven months pregnant), and their 3 ½ year old son Reuben. Gabriel is an accountant for a couple different companies and Nildes is a student at a local university about to begin her final year. Reuben is full of energy and loves to dance. Their nieces, Ana and Nildes, have been spending the past month with them while they’ve been on holiday from school. They were extremely hospitable and helpful. They are both in high school and live in central Mozambique. The last two nights of my stay we had another visitor, Nildes’ madrinha (or god-mother), Maria and her 1 ½ year old daughter Abi. They have been staying around Maputo visiting various family members and friends and live in Beira (a city several hours north of Maputo).

I'm so thankful for the opportunity I had. These things can not be taught in a classroom. They cannot be simply understood. They must be experienced and lived through. I was able to spend time with and get to know a family with huge hearts. I also was able to learn from them things that would be impossible otherwise. And I'm grateful for their patience with me as I learn portuguese and slowly start to speak. I did make a very large improvement in my portuguese abilities. We had a lot of laughs at my attempts. 

 

reflections on 2009

Things that have happened over the past year...

• started and completed student teaching
• graduated from college
• made friends with people in similar situations as myself serving in every continent (except Antarctica)
• raised enough support to move to Africa for a year
• moved halfway across the world alone (knowing less than a handful of people here)
• attempted to begin learning a new language
• moved into a house with my very first own kitchen
• learned how to cook and bake several things from scratch (including popping popcorn on the stove)
• became a real teacher with my very own classroom
• rode a chappa
• cracked open a coconut
• tried a variety of new things including mango, goat, lichee, mozambican sweet potatoes, shema, and cow liver
• successfully survived my first parent/teacher conferences
• took my first bucket bath
• travelled alone between countries and across borders

As I think of these things I'm reminded of how far I've come in just the past year. The places and things, people and experiences God's given to me. All of these things new. All of these things exciting. All opportunities I'm so grateful I've had. A year ago I had the goal of living in Africa anxiously in my mind, but the reality of it was still hard to grasp. Now I am sitting here, in Mozambique, on a Saturday afternoon writing about it. I'm excited for what is to come. What will happen in 2010 and what is God waiting to teach me? Where will He take me? How can He use this small life for His sake? I think I'm ready for that journey to continue!

un-christmas

This Christmas was different for me than it has ever been before. I know that may seem apparent on the surface, but I say that for several reasons. The obvious ones being that the seasons are opposite here (it is summer right now in the southern hemisphere), it's my first one away from family and friends, and in a new culture.

candy canes

snow

christmas trees

scarves

hot cocoa

carols

christmas lights

presents

A Christmas Movie

shopping

ornaments

ham

snowmen

stockings

nativity scenes

gingerbread

fireplaces

tinsel

sledding

parades

Very few of these things are actually present here.

Somehow over the years these things have become what defines or at least make Christmas feel like Christmas for me. It's the warm, fuzzy feeling of walking/driving through Christmas lights, the rush of finishing up your last minute shopping before it's too late, those smells that are only smelled once a year and bring you back to when you were a young child, the excitement of getting a gift for someone that you know they are really going to enjoy, the fun of building gingerbread houses together, and the numbness of your hands as you pack together snow for a jolly snowman.

Every year I say and think the same thing, that I really want to get to the root of the true meaning of Christmas. Isn't that a typical characteristic of American culture, to want to celebrate the real meaning and not to get caught up in everything else? Yet it is so difficult to do in the hustle and bustle of the season. I feel as if I was forced into the depths of that this year. Honestly, it hasn't been easy being far away from loved ones during the holiday season.

As things got difficult over the past couple of weeks, I was able to spend time thinking on the purpose of it all and the cross. Why did Jesus come? He came to die. The only reason we celebrate His birth is because His death gave us life. That is what the real celebration is about. His death, the fact that He was born to die. And that in His death we can have life. Apart from Him we are left to our sin and the destruction that it brings. But because of His great love He came to this earth, miraculously born of a virgin, to make a way for His people. This is the gospel. What our lives are to be centered on. What my life is to be centered on!

So whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

1 Corinthians 10.31

I then got to thinking this is the reason for everything in my life and why I do what I do, think what I think, work where I work, eat what I eat, and live where I live. This is the reason I am here, in Mozambique. To bring the good news of salvation and hope to those without it. I've been called and sent here with a purpose. That purpose being to bring glory to God and spread the gospel. Christmas is about the gospel, our lives are a portrait of the gospel, and I am here with only one goal in mind. To know Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith— that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings,becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead. Philippians 3.8-11

So even though I wasn't able to celebrate Christmas in the comfortable way that I might have liked, I was sweetly reminded of the meaning of Christmas, which overflows into the purpose of living here and my life. In our field only four out of eleven of us were actually healthy on Christmas day. So we postponed our festivities and spent a couple hours in the hospital, finishing the day off by eating Indian food at a muslim-owned restaurant. It was just a normal day. No different than any other. Throughout the day I was sent little reminders on the true meaning of Christmas and what that looks like in my life. Needless to say I often find myself falling short of the calling I've been given. But God is gracious and faithful to continue the work He has started in those He has called. So this Christmas I'm grateful to have been reminded of the purpose of it all.

"All of life comes down to just one thing, that's to know you, O Jesus, and to make you known."

--One Thing by Charlie Hall

One thing have I asked of the LORD,

that will I seek after:

that I may dwell in the house of the LORD

all the days of my life,

to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD

and to meditate in his temple.

Psalm 27.4