Running On Empty

Well I'm sure all of you have been on the edge of your seat dying to know how the soccer tournament went last last Saturday, so I'll start off there. The girls played in the morning and the guys in the afternoon. There were six guys teams, three teams made up of kids from the orphanage and three from the surrounding town called Guaimaca. I played for one of the Emmanuel teams because they were missing a person, and I've gotta say, it was pretty awesome. Probably partially because we had some pretty legit uniforms.

The tournament was a pretty big event here. There was music, they were selling food, and everybody came out to watch the games.

My team tied twice in the first phase, so we made it to the next phase. We played one of the teams from Guaimaca and were losing 2-0, but made an amazing comeback! ..and then we lost in penalty kicks. We ended up coming in third place, and the team that beat us won the whole thing. Unfortunately, that meant that the prized medal wouldn't be spending any time here at Emmanuel.

The Wednesday after that was my birthday. The day started off with a beautiful chorus of small boys singing the Honduran birthday song (which is a lot longer and more creative than the American "happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear insert name here, happy birthday to you." I mean seriously, whoever made up that song could have at least made it a little bit more interesting.) One of the English classes I teach sang the regular happy birthday song to me too. After that we had church, and then me and the other volunteers decided to have a little hot dog cookout at the farm. Scratch that; it wasn't a cookout, it was a FEAST! We had some vegetables, some fried plantains, and some pixie sticks and suckers for dessert. When you're eating pretty much the exact same thing every day (breakfast: oatmeal or granola; lunch: rice and tortilla, dinner: rice and tortilla, occasionally with a pleasant surprise of scrambled eggs type stuff), you have a greater appreciation for all other foods. But hey, the food with the kids tastes good and it's free, so I'm not complaining.

Speaking of food, I learned how to make tortillas the other day! The cocineras (girls that cook for us) taught me how to properly make the dough into a ball, flatten that ball of dough out, and toss it on the oven. My tortillas were pretty pathetic at first, but I got the hang of it by the end. Of course it still took me about three times as much time as them to flatten out the tortillas, but hey, they've had a lot more practice than I have.

The cocineras also got a cake for me on my birthday! However, misbehavior on the part of the little boys and complications in the cake delivery postponed the celebration until Saturday instead of Wednesday. Splitting up a modestly sized cake into enough pieces for 60 or 70 boys means the portion size is pretty tiny, but it was some good cake, and all the boys really enjoyed it. One of the girls had my camera and took some pictures of the boys as we passed out cake and drinks.

All the volunteers sign up for shifts working in the clinic, and I brought my camera to my shift the other day. This is Cristopher:

Gosh, what a baller. This guy is gonna be getting sooo many ladies when he gets older. And not only does he have a ridiculous amount of swag, he's also got a good sense of humor.

A couple of girls named Karen and Yensi were there too, but they were being difficult and wouldn't let me take many pictures of them so this is all I've got:

Aside from all that fun stuff though, I've been having a little bit of a rough time lately. There's not like some major problem or anything, it's just a lot of little stressful things that build up. Serving in ministry for two and a half months is a lot different from a one or two week mission trip, and I think I’m starting to feel the consequences of that. I’ve just felt really exhausted lately. It’s part homesickness/not having anyone I’m comfortable being completely myself around, part constantly being frustrated with not being fluent in Spanish, and part miscellaneous little stressors like students misbehaving in English class and stuff like that. All that stuff adds up and puts me in a pretty miserable mood, and then I get frustrated with myself for being in a bad mood, which doesn’t help at all. The other day when I was feeling especially frustrated with everything, God led me to a few different verses.

“We are hard-pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body” (2 Corinthians 4:8-10).

“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all” (2 Corinthians 4:16-17).

If Paul can consider all the beatings and jail time and persecution he endured as “light and momentary troubles,” then there’s absolutely no reason for me to have a little pity party for myself every time I get stressed out. However, for me to be able to see any unpleasant circumstances I face as light and momentary troubles, I have to truly believe that that eternal glory really is coming.

“Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint” (Isaiah 40:30-31).

God doesn’t ask us to just grind our teeth and endure the trials and stresses in our lives, he offers to renew our strength every day so that we can truly live in the midst of it all. That’s how people are going to see the life of Jesus revealed in our body; God gives us the ability to truly live regardless of our circumstances. The thing is, we have to hope in Him for that to happen. That’s the thing I’m struggling with the most right now. It’s so easy to get bogged down with all the stuff that frustrates me that sometimes I don’t even think about God during the day, let alone put my hope in Him. A lot of times when I do try to put my hope fully in Him, I intellectualize it too much. The fact that I get to spend eternity with the Creator of the universe becomes just a piece of knowledge in my head and not a living hope. That’s why I’ve been so exhausted lately. I’m pouring myself out for these kids but not getting filled back up because my hope in the Lord is too much head knowledge and not enough heart knowledge. So the prayer request for right now is that God would help me to not try to renew my own strength, but instead fully put my hope in Him so that I may run the race he has for me and not grow weary.