So today a handful of the youth, our Pastor and us leaders went to a single Mom's home of 5 children. They just moved here from Dallas Texas. The yard and house needed some fixing up and prep work for their soon arrival in a couple of days. So our Pastor gathered the troops. For this community this was typical. But for me I couldn't help but be rocked to the core in a simple way. The fact that our Pastor, a father of soon to be 6 children, a man who is too often torn in several directions at the same time by the needs of those he has been honored to sheperd, took the time to help this single mom feel more at home, welcomed and cared for upon arrival with all her little one's. I have really grown to love and respect this community, though from the outside looking in it often looks or feels like that the congregation is sleeping, the fact of the matter is they love, serve and honor their Creator and each other in a very quiet simple way.
One of the richest treasures I have found here is within the home of a dear friend by the name of Yona. She is the mother of three little boys. Her nature is complete selflessness. I have been going to her home almost every Wednesday since I arrived to help, and to give her a brake once in awhile. She says I will never understand how much I have helped and blessed her until I am married and have children. Maybe this is so, but from my current perspective all I can see is how much she has added to my life and time here. You see they have very little, but she has never failed, not once to care for my needs and feelings. She knows I love coffee, she has always made sure to have coffee, and when they didn't have milk, she'd have one of her little boys run to the store for my stinkin' cup of coffee. There was nothing I could do to stop her. One day when we went into town when I first arrived here I wasn't sure exactly how to get back, she forced me to take a taxi, not allowing me to pay, even though I knew her resources were very scare. It was completely foreign to me at first. It has grown to be the warmest care I've known. She has given me a deeper understanding of what it looks like and takes to give freely, to give with complete joy and trueness. I have found a secret within many people I have met here, when you have less it some how creates the space to give more. Somehow in that simplicity you know and truly understand that it is not yours, so you share with your neighbor, as though what is yours, is already theirs. In all of this enjoying the truth of giving is better then recieving because of the pleasure it brings to others, and the beauty of caring so deeply to please and delight another.
She homeschools her boys, it's like they don't have a clue of the coldness this world is capable of, all they know is the warmth of their mothers love and arms. Though I slightly fear for the day the world out there will hurt them, I also slightly envy the safety they've been raised in. I tell her every day she needs to pray for their wives, that God will unite what ever distance it takes for them to find such another rare human.
These are the other reasons I am grieved to leave this community. But thankfully I will visit somewhat regularly.
I will have to write about the garden yet again; another time...
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