Deeper Now

The second half of training took place in the jungle.  We drove 5 hours to briefly visit the ministry sites where the short term teams would be staying.  We visited Missauli, Shandia, Puyo, and Shell in 3 days.

There were several monkeys roaming around; we had to be careful so they wouldnt steal anything.
I was personally terrified by these critters, along with the Python, and boat ride because of the fish and snakes ..but we gotta face our fears sometime.

It was a perfect view of Cotopaxi on the way back home.

Training, like I said, was challenging, not just challenging in that I had to take in a lot of information, but challenging, in that God opened my eyes to things I hadn't seen before, specifically the importance of community.  As a team host, I not only will be engaged with the relationship of my team but also the relationship of the ministry site.  So many people view missions as to give give and give, but there is no relationship built if you don't receive.  Relationships are a two-way street; in which, missions should be a reciprocal discipleship, meaning the ministry site and the mission team both give and receive.  I found this difficult to endure for many reasons.  How can a relationship be made with people that I will only see for 5-10 days?  How is it possible to make a relationship with someone that doesn't speak my language? How can I be vulnerable with people I don't even know? But then God answered all of my questions as the team and I visited a church in Shandia.  Many of the people didn't even speak Spanish, let alone English.  We sang a few songs in Spanish and English and then quickly introduced ourselves with our name.  After the sermon, we greeted everyone with kisses. What blew me away was that almost everyone I greeted already remembered me by my name. I realized that community isn't about knowing the person next to you in an impersonal manner, but knowing the person in a deeper way.  I only knew those people for a few moments, but calling me by name showed that they valued me and loved me despite the time we had together.  Reading Romans 12 later on made it so clear to me the importance of having deep relationships.  Although my spanish may not be the best, love has no language, and actions speak louder than words.
As training wrapped up, I realized that God has challenged me this summer to just be in the presence of people and engage as much as I can in deep relationship.  So, next week, I, along with 4 others will be visiting a very small community and living in the pastor's home for 4 days.  We intentionally will have no ministry plans in efforts to just be in the presence of the people and loving on each other.  Sometimes making plans gets in the way with the most important part, relationships. So, as an experiment, we want to avoid plans and just live with these people. I think the core of the community are the relationships made, not the daily repetitions of everyday functions.God revealed to me the importance of putting relationships in the center of forming a community.  It is so easy to live selfishly by doing the bare minimum, but life is so much more fulfilling when it can be shared with one another through deep relationship.
Communities are hard to form, but it all starts with someone going a little deeper than just scratching the surface.  So take the time to engage in relationship, and make every second of the day intentional.  People are on this Earth for a reason, and it's not to just do your job and make money; it's about loving on each other and creating more disciples of Christ. In order to have a community beautiful inside and out, we must live not to hold back, but to be vulnerable in relationship, loving as Jesus did, to everyone.

"For as we have many members in one body, but all the members do not have the same function, so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another." Romans 12:4-5