“It is my pleasure to tell you about the miraculous signs and wonders that the Most High God has performed for me.” Daniel 4:2
I was doing my regular bemoaning about the public speaking part of my job as a missionary a while back when a friend sent me this verse-literally during the exact moment of my complaining. This friend is an incredible prayer warrior, and the Lord regularly uses her to remind me of His truth. This day was no exception.
When I first came home a few months ago, I was petrified to be speaking in front of people. I still don’t thrive on it, but have come to accept it and recognize I’m not even terrible at it. What shocked me was the word choice in this verse: A pleasure- it is A PLEASURE to share! As I’ve been mulling this over, I’ve been enjoying seeing how the truth of this statement has rung true.
I came home around Easter exhausted from my time overseas. Teaching is hard, but I hadn’t even finished a full school year, and couldn’t quite wrap my mind around where that exhaustion really came from. It became a little clearer to myself as I walked through what my sister calls “The Summer Slump.” Essentially, she describes it as the time after school gets out but before summer really starts going when you’re in a detox from the fast pace of school, entering the slow pace of summer. As I sat in my living room in my new apartment I was staying at in Southfield, I found myself on the couch staring at the door, wondering when someone would come to knock-an indicator to my heart that even in my home at RVA, I don’t always fully “turn off” as I anticipate the joyous visits of students, neighbors or even kiddos coming to pet my dog.
It’s this full “off” mode that I am so thankful my home assignment was filled with. If you’re wondering what a home assignment looks like, for me, it meant finding rest, rhythms, rejuvenation, and reconnection.
Rest: Extra time spent in God’s word. Extra time to go for long bike rides by myself on FLAT trails through the woods, or through the city to pick up a coffee! Rest meant watching a season or two of a fun TV show for no other reason than that, it’s fun! Rest meant a few chunks of time with very little scheduled, a trip to the beach with a friend or a retreat to the mountains with people from my missions organization.
Rhythms: Drive to Grand Rapids, drive to Detroit. Back to Grand Rapids back to Detroit. There was a lot of back and forth to see churches, friends, but most importantly family. When driving, sometimes I’d listen to a book, sometimes a podcast, sometimes the radio, and sometimes I just enjoyed silence, wind whipping through my hair with the windows rolled down. When back in Southfield, I’d go to the gym, go for a run and generally work to keep my body moving! I loved having the back and forth pattern, engaging with family, engaging with friends, then returning to “my community” and “my apartment” for some space and a familiar normalcy resembling the life I loved before moving to RVA.
Rejuvenation: When I’m at RVA, one of the things I miss the most is church. I enjoy our Sunday morning services, but they don’t carry through the breaks and remind me a little bit of college chapel time as our “congregation” is primarily high school students. I have LOVED getting to actually go to church. I had the privilege of joining a women’s prayer group my first couple of months here and let me tell you, it filled my soul. Spending two hours in prayer with these women each week was an incredible reminder of God’s character and love. These women were rich in faith and I felt the presence of God, just sitting in their presence listening to them talk to Him.
Reconnection: This one feels a little self explanatory, but it’s the joy of spending time with friends. I have LOVED walking with friends, eating with friends, staying with friends, chatting with friends, canoeing with friends, kayaking with friends, laughing with friends, and doing anything else you can imagine someone would do with friends, with friends. Oh- and family! Seeing my sisters, parents, aunts, uncles, cousins and grandma. The joy of reconnection has made the hellos so sweet on this side of the world.
With each of these people, each of these aspects, I’ve found myself in conversations about my life at RVA, sharing stories of God’s goodness and faithfulness in His work in the lives of the students and their families.
Having left RVA exhausted, it is so cool to see how in conjunction with rest, rhythms, rejuvenation, and reconnection, I can see recounting added to the list as recounting God’s faithfulness in His work has filled my heart and shown me, it truly is my pleasure to share of the wonderous works of my Most High God.
Prayer Points:
-My prayer requests haven’t changed from my last post, this one really was just more for me as I’m continuing to process my transition. So as a recap: please keep praying for my transition, grace for when my new roommate and I settle in together come a couple weeks, and training my dog!
Faithful Footsteps 