It has been a while. You are receiving this because, at some point about a year and a half ago, you had indicated that you were following my Mexican adventures while I completed my Discipleship Training School (DTS) with Youth With A Mission out of Ensenada, CA. This ended last May, and I believe that the general impression that I left with my emails was that it couldn’t possibly end soon enough. That being the case, it may come as a bit of a shock to those that I have not been in close touch with (and even most of those that I have been in close touch with) that I am now back in Mexico, volunteering with YWAM’s Mission Adventures program until August 8. A few people had indicated that they would be interested in receiving update emails, and I certainly found them helpful last time around, so I just decided to start with the same basic list that I had before (plus a few additions); if you would prefer not to have your inbox spammed, I completely understand and will not be at all offended; just respond back and I’ll take you of the contact list.
Before starting, the obvious question that comes out with this strange transpiration is…why? That’s a very good question. In our last week in Mexico, my friend Nolan and I were joking (sort of) that if God really wanted us to come back to YWAM in general or Ensenada specifically, He would have to send a whale to swallow us and spit us out on the shore across the street from the base. Yet, a year later, here I am again, and he’s getting ready to go to France to work with YWAM there.
I guess, to make sense of this (at least, from my point of view), I have to continue the story where I left off. I arrived back home in June exhausted, with virtually no money, and still no idea of what to do with my life. That summer was a good time of relaxation and recovery, but also a very frustrating time of trying to make sense of what I had just experienced and where I was now going. I spent that summer looking for jobs, house sitting periodically, and continuing to journal furiously as I tried to figure things out. One day in August, as I was doing this, God spoke to me. I say this with caution, because I know that Evangelicals (and particularly charismatic Evangelicals) are prone to receive frequent prophecies of dubious veracity; nonetheless, in the middle of a sentence, I “heard” this: “Stop your worrying. Quit your journaling for a season. And I Myself will remind you of My goodness to you.” So, I put down my pencil, closed my journal, and left it. Whether or not this “word” was really divine revelation, wish fulfillment, misfiring synapse, or whatever; what I do know is that, after that, things started happening.
A week or so later, I got an interview for a part-time bilingual position at Kennedy Elementary; it evidently went well, because they offered me both that position and another to bring it up to full-time. For really the first time in my life, I had a job that I actually enjoyed and had the chance to do something worthwhile. Over the course of a year living with my parents, I grew closer to them, my youngest brother Matthew, and all the rest of my family as well. I slept better over the past year than…ever, really. I got the chance to reconnect with old friends from high school, to stay in touch with close friends in college, and to make new friends in Salem. I got the chance to teach a class at church and participate in the music team. Basically, this year, I rediscovered what “home” was; I was reminded of many powerful yet simple blessings that I’d been distracted from. Certainly, the year was not without its frustrations, but on the whole, it has been an amazing year.
Which brings me back to Mexico. The more that I have seen these things happen–the more that I have seen that God actually cares, actually provides, and actually blesses “beyond all that you can hope or imagine”–the more I was reminded of Mexico. These same things could have happened before, but it wouldn’t have been the same, because I am different. It took being completely broken and helpless in order for me to be able to understand what grace really was.
There’s a line from St. John of the Cross’ poem, “Dark Night of the Soul,” which loosely translated reads,
Looking back, I was nostalgic for this “dark night,” because it was here that I really knew what Love is.
Oh sweet night, which gently guided!
Night, more lovely than the morn!
Night, which loved and Love united,
beloved being in Love transformed!
So, here I am, back again. I don’t know what to expect. But strange as it is, it kind of feels like home.