losing my self

This past week our team met to discuss and review our trip so far. A few of the questions dealt with the way that we had worked together over the past five months, the last question related to how we operated as “church”. Church is a pretty hot topic with people my age. We’re good at dismantling it, dissecting it, and exploiting the weak areas with indignation and a little bit of a false sense of superiority. Church doesn’t meet our expectations, it doesn’t fulfill our needs. It simply doesn’t entice us. And while there is a lot of disillusionment wrapped around the thought of church and even though the feeling that something isn’t quite right lingers, I’m not sure if it’s because the church isn’t ok, or if we aren’t ok. What it comes down to is that I’ve probably had the church conversation with twenty different people, twenty different times. And I’ve gotten worked up and passionate each time I’ve had it. I think a lot of people must have that conversation. The conversation that focuses on what’s wrong with the church, what the church really is, what it should be, how it should meet needs and what it should look like. I get pretty defensive sometimes. I've grown up in the Church, my whole family- we've grown together in Christ through the Church. And I love my church. But there's still the church in general, the church of America. I’ve taken classes on church, read books on church, listened to speakers speak on church. But what I’ve realized on this trip is that church isn’t something to talk about or discuss like politics. The definition of Church isn’t found in books or articles or lectures. Church is something that’s meant to be lived, not talked. And of course we all know that. Just like I know so many other things about Christianity, but sometimes I think I just know them, I don’t own them. And that’s what makes all the difference.

And church is beautiful really. It’s not boards of people and committees and pot lucks and Sunday school classes and fellowship halls. Church is the people living life. It’s Christ’s Sacred Bride, it’s His love. Church is the body fully alive, fully His. And I’m not sure that it’s a noun really. I mean, it’s a thing, but it’s so much bigger than that. And when I realize how precious and set aside the Church is by God, I’m a little hesitant to throw my ideas around so flippantly. There’s a fine line between edification and devastation. And to mock the bride of Christ, that’s not a small thing. The church in the New Testament seemed so raw and real. Paul and John and Timothy- they all write with urgency and a deep intense passion about the church. Acts records the daily life of the body. The fellowship and possessions and life that they shared. And the power of the church, wow. God really moved. He shook the world up through the church.

One of the questions that we had to ask ourselves was if we were the only representation of Jesus, what would the Malians believe about Him through watching us. Ouch. It’s hard to go some places mentally. In the past five months, I think we’ve lived maybe one where we’re on the path of that high calling of church. Of team and community. Of an extended reflection of Christ and his heart for the world. I know that in the beginning of the trip, I wasn’t very concerned about the team’s welfare. I was pretty self focused. And then as classes wore on and our team settled down we focused more on the academic spin of life. We sort of sat on the sidelines and watched Mali with maybe a little bit of disdain, a little bit of curiosity, and a few moments of compassion and helplessness. But we weren’t really concerned about each other. We were more focused on surviving this country, these classes, and not missing out on life back home. Then I think we got to that stage where we realized that we were stuck with each other, that we needed each other, and that we had to work together to make it. So we moved together out of necessity. We acted as one, but our hearts weren’t right. And that’s not what we were made for, and it wore on us. Until finally we let pretense slip a little and we slowly revealed glimpses of who we really were. I think that that’s when we started loving each other. But that was a process. So around the fourth month we decided that it was necessary to start meeting weekly, not for meetings, but for the sake of our hearts. And that’s when things really started happening. That’s when honesty and hurts and pain and joy were shared. And we started carrying each other and lifting each other and living for each other. Late night talks began, tears were cried, wounds were shared. We’ve come a ways.

But the hardest question is, what do we do with what we’ve learned, with how we’ve lived, with the level of community we’ve dove into. Because in some ways it’s easier here. We only have each other, there aren’t other teams to choose from, other places to go. And in this world we need each other to survive. But when we get back, when we arrive home to our big, busy, disconnected worlds, then what. We’ve had this experience where we ate together, shared together, ministered together, fellowshipped together daily. We’ve gotten a little bit of Acts in Mali. I used the word community a lot before I came here, but I’m not sure I really knew what it meant. Or that I used it correctly. Mali, the country- it’s based on community. Family and people and relationships are so important here. So maybe it’s easier as a whole to live together, to help each other. But America. Where individualism and self sufficiency and pride are all so blatant. We’ve almost choked out that cry for community with our internet and phone calls and categories and inspirational books and schedules and conveniences. We’ve replaced our need for each other- our need for time spent with each other, our need for touch, for encouragement from each other, for love from each other with impersonal substitutes. I think that that may be the hardest adjustment for us. To determine what we’re supposed to do with what we’ve seen here, lived here, learned here. Is everything that happened here just part of the experience, or does God expect us to continue, to live like we need each other, to love for Him. My life is so spread out and scattered back home. I’m not sure what intentional intimate relationships really look like. I’ve almost made them impossible with my schedule. And usually I sacrificed people instead of life when the two conflicted. Maybe life needs to be smaller. More closely knit. Simpler. I think that will be my journey when I get back. How to get from here to there physically, mentally, spiritually and emotionally. From Mali to America. From communal living to... Without losing what I had or what I learned. Without forgetting what I saw and what we did.

Only three weeks left. I’m not sure what I’m feeling right now about that. I’m sleeping less, thinking more, noticing more. I want to soak it all up. I think it might take the rest of my life to work through what we’ve done and learned here. To find words to attach to the experiences, feelings, people. I’m excited about that.