Three Weeks: Thoughts, Words, and All Else

It's hard to believe that I'm approaching the end of my first month here in Germany! It's kind of ridiculous for me to imagine that I've already been here a month, but then it's even more nuts for me to remember that I still have two more months left! This has been a really good opportunity for me to be challenged in my faith, learning to rely on God, and understanding that, yeah, in reality, I still do fail and my faith and trust in God aren't always where they should be. I'm beginning to realize again that I'm just human and I can't expect to take on the world by myself, I need help. A lot of it. It's been very easy for me to imagine that--yeah, I'm doing big things and really stretching myself, and then to remember that, in reality, there are still a lot of big things I need to figure out and sort out in my own life, so how am I supposed to reach other people?

Thankfully, it's God's grace, and not me, that saves people. I've really been "re-realizing" here that salvation and life transformation are God's work. Only he is big enough to bring people out of these messes of their lives. Only Jesus is big enough to get Christians out of their mindset of 'religion' and into an idea of living by faith.

It has been kind of hard for me to be here in Germany for the past three or four weeks. The language situation has been better than Lithuania, but don't grasp everything, there is plenty of things that I'm just kind of in the dark about. In addition to this, I'm learning what it means to be a part of a team, especially cross-culturally. One thing I've noticed is that, in essence, people are the same. The things that drive people in the States, in Germany, in Lithuania, in South Africa--they are the exact same things. We all have the same desires and core things we feel in our hearts. To me, that is evidence of a creator. How can it be that people who have never been within 10,000 kilometers of each other can have the exact same feelings and emotions that I have? These feelings and emotions must transcend humanity. They have to be something outside of our humanity. They are part of our eternity. They are part of our soul.

That, to me, has been really interesting to watch. Another thing that's really been challenging to me is approaching the subject of language. What the heck is language? Languages, in reality, are meaningless. All languages do is express the emotions that we have in our soul. Therefore, if humanity is a universal train, then so is the idea of language. Language exists for the purpose of communication and expression. What those words are is absolutely irrelevant because they have no eternal meaning. They simply are a medium through which our souls interact with other souls. At the same time, those words that are meaningless are actually, in fact, extremely important. They are important because they are the means by which we bare our soul to the world. So the use of language is very important because it is through specific words that we bare our souls and we receive from others what their souls say. With these words I am able to speak into eternity. That requires wisdom and responsibility.

So with these things on my mind, I've been thinking--what the heck does it mean to live as part of a team or to live in community, especially when our understandings are different but our soul-being is the same?

I've been learning, and this just over the past week, that it is my job, my responsibility, to lead and guide the others who haven't quite grasped this yet. To the others, we're people--important people made in God's Image, but people nonetheless. In reality, we're soul-bearing humans with a piece of eternity inside of us. How do you express that to someone? How do you get that point across?

Here is why it is important: Our group comes from very, very different backgrounds, cultures, and understandings. Most of my team are just realizing, or just figuring out what it means, that we are adults. Adults. Grown Ups. Big People. We want all these Big People Privileges while still maintaining childish responsibilities. Unfortunately, that can't happen. People try it; we call them Prisoners, Addicts, Strippers, but sometimes we even have to call them Mom or Dad. And that is a shame.

Here's my point: God wants me to be a leader to be an example to the others on my team. Example in what way? Well Paul says an example in "speech, actions, love, faith, and purity." (1 Tim. 4:12) What does that mean? That I need to have those things under control, not only for me and for Jesus, but for my team--for my friends, for my family. My words need to speak heavenly eternity into people--not damning words. My actions need to show that, yes, in fact, my faith is fully in Christ and I trust him completely, and that, yes, I love my friends, family, and team in the way that I treat them and in the purity of my life. They are all connected.

I have no idea how all of that relates to my life right here and now in Germany, it just kind of popped out, but to those of you who need a conclusion, I will try to tie it all together in a concise way.

I'm kind of done being here in Germany. Read that again. Now don't get me wrong, I love the country, the language, and the people are nice. But here's the thing: this life isn't a cakewalk. We are on the road a lot, sleeping on the ground, going days without showers or a good night's rest. We are a bit cut off from the outside world. To me, the combination of those things can be very hard. But in the same moment, this is exactly what I need and I wouldn't want to be in any other place. Why? Because this place is comfortless. And that's a good thing. I don't have what I would normally survive on. It's Jesus and me. And I'm learning that that is more than enough. It's tough, but in the same moment, it is amazing.

But that isn't the end. The reason it is odd is because the city I live in is so comfortable. People seem to have everything together. So it's odd to have no comforts but to look outside and see a perfectly comfortable world. It's contradictory. But yesterday I had an opportunity to experience the opposite. Simon, his girlfriend, and I went into Darmstadt because there's a big music festival going on there. It was amazing. It felt like home. Everyone was smoking, a lot of people were drunk. It was great. I hadn't been in a city and seeing people like this since Lithuania, and I've missed it. Why? Because it reminds me exactly why I'm here in Germany: To be a missionary. These are the people who need Jesus. We've been doing outreaches at these Christian events, and don't get me wrong, a lot of the people we talked to weren't Christians. The situation here in Germany with the churches is a bit jacked up. But to me, I want to go to the city, to the people who no one is talking to. These people at these Church Days here the gospel all the time, and they reject it. The people drunk in the cities, smoking weed--the people who Christians are afraid to go up to; Jesus wants these people in his church too.

So it was a great reminder to see this all and to remember that yeah, I'm here to reach people and to live my faith out. I'll go with my team to wherever we go--the place, truthfully, is irrelevant, but what is important is my attitude towards it, that I approach it with a willingness to serve and to love others with the love of Jesus Christ. My life here needs to be completely about Jesus--to my team, who could use leadership and an example at times, to the people we are reaching out to who may never know about Jesus. My life here is to serve the others in true service.

That was a lot more than I expected to write, but there it is. A little note on my language skills, yesterday I had a really sweet realization that I'm starting to get to the point where I don't need to translate in my head anymore, but rather, the understanding is starting to take root in my mind and I'm beginning to be able to think and process things in German. Thank you, Jesus.

Thanks to Jesus, who alone is faithful and good, even when we are faithless and evil. May I be about your Kingdom and Your work.