So, I’m in Costa Rica otra vez, for more language study. I love it, but I’m missing my family & friends back home and especially my friends from last year. It’s weird to be in a place I connect in all of my memories with certain people, and those people are not here with me.
I suppose I’d have the same feeling if I visited Gator Camp now.
Weirdness.
I have settled back in with my host family very well, and it’s like I never left, except the boys are a year older. I love them, and couldn’t ask for a better family!
This kind of situation brings out my introverted side. I know, I know, some of you are thinking “WHAT introverted side??” But it’s true! I do have one! Being in a country where understanding people beyond normal everyday conversation topics takes a lot of concentration, and not having close friends nearby makes me do a lot more thinking, and spend more time alone. Which, I suppose is good for me. I’m not used to that, living with my big family in our smallish house!
Anyway. I feel sort of pensive tonight, and probably shouldn’t be blogging, but hey.
Just a warning: I don’t promise that this will be all that entertaining.
Thoughts…
So, I’ve been hearing a lot about how WWIII is going to start this year, Obama is going to enact martial law, Jesus is coming back REALLY soon and such, and I honestly can’t figure out how that knowledge (if it were true) is supposed to change my life.
For instance: if the world is going to end this year or next, why am I in language school? Why do I have a boyfriend? Why do we bother to make our farm payments? Or planting a crop? Why are you in college/going to school/working at your job, buying that car, buying those shoes, etc., etc., etc.
If I really believe that there is life after death, then whether the world ends next year or 200 years from now shouldn’t affect me greatly, because every single day could be my last.
I could die crossing the street on my way to class tomorrow (and in San Jose, the chances of that are pretty good). I could die in a plane crash on my way home next month. In any case, I KNOW that inside of 70 years – let’s be generous and give it 80 – I WILL meet God.
Does that then mean that everything I’m doing right now is for nothing? That school is a waste of time? Work is pointless? Everyone considering marriage should give up on the idea? People should stop having kids?
My point is that I can’t know the future. God has given me His Holy Spirit, and all I can do is walk as far as He leads me. Right now, He has me studying Spanish. If the world really does end this year, and I never get to use so much as a “Hola” of my Spanish, even then, I know that what I’m doing right now is NOT a waste of time, because it is done in obedience to my Father.
Wasting time would be sitting around bemoaning the state of the world, worrying about the future and wondering if I’m wasting my time. That kind of mentality can only put you in a holding pattern. Nowhere in the Bible do I read that Christians should enter a holding pattern because the world is going to end. Or that everyone who isn’t witnessing on the street corner every day is wasting their life.
If you’re preaching on the street corner, who is going to witness to that man or woman you work next to every day? Has it ever occurred to you that God has placed you where you are for a purpose?
If God has led you to go overseas, GO. If He has convicted you to talk to your neighbor, or the girl at the grocery store, DO IT. If God has led you to get married, by all means do so. If God has led you into your current job, work at it with all your strength until He closes that door. Has God given you a relationship? Continue in obedience as far as He leads you. Grow where He has planted you!
All the while, do what you do to the glory of God. Live your faith out loud. Walk in obedience.
Everything ELSE is a waste of time.
“He has told you, O man, what is good, and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God. “ -Micah 6:8
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