The Scandal of Service

It took me one day to start dreaming in Russian again. It's hard to describe it, but I always say its like my brain switches over into a different gear. It skips over the past 12 months and remembers words in my sleep I can't quite understand while awake. It comes easier.

When I left Nashville I was ready for the little stuff to fall away. I prayed to God for something to break me and change me and teach me how to serve. I asked him to show me how to love big in beautiful messes, because nothing in life has been clean lately. I asked him to engulf me in something so much bigger than myself that all I could see was hope and glory and the raw hearts of other people. I was ready to be drawn away from the things in Nashville that make me think small, that make me forget the big picture. 

I started making a list of themes from this trip on the first day. Every trip is so drastically different that I can measure my life in Russia years. In 2006 I saw the world was big and met Karina and Aidar. In 2008 I realized loving those kids was going to mean heartbreak because loving anyone with your whole self means pain. In 2009 I met the orphans and in 2010 I turned 19 there, living with people I now call family. I can easily recall the themes of each of the 7 years, but this year was simple: it's not about me. 

Every day the themes of service and selflessness found me. I read Jean Vanier's The Scandal of Service on the plane over, and it gave me the mental picture of Jesus washing our feet, a picture that stayed with me throughout the week. The point for me was learning how to serve last week, yes, but also learning to start by experiencing him serving me. Washing my feet. And allowing him to serve me is not something I'm good at. 

Jesus told Peter in order for us to be a part of the Kingdom we must allow Jesus to wash our feet. I must allow Jesus to serve ME. I must accept his absolutely unconditional adoration, his invitation into clean life, his complete knowledge and pardon for my every imperfection. And how broken, how humbled, how childlike and receptive that makes me. I am drawn to tears imagining my King on the floor washing my feet, and yet he tells us this is how the Kingdom works. This is the sort of thing we are signing up for here. This scandalous service and reversal of power relationships is the mark of God's Kingdom on earth.

And so I learned a little more each day about serving, serving from a place of being served, serving out of the broken gratefulness of having met with Jesus the Servant.

I learned a lot about deferring to others in humility and not needing to stand up for my opinions. About working on a team in this way. 

I asked myself how to serve like Christ would if he were in my body and I decided he would hug them, ask them questions, smile a lot, and hold their babies tight. So I did a lot of those things. 

On Monday morning before our campers arrived I went out on a balcony in the sun and wrote to Jesus about how I was in awe. In awe that I was there, in the morning shadows of the great Dombai mountains. In awe that in a few short hours I would be holding babies who were in mommy's tummy last year, hugging the necks of women who had been mothers to me, and laughing with men who are my fathers and brothers. I told God I was so proud of who they are, so blessed to be able to speak to them in their heart language, and so motivated by love to serve. 

And all of this, every last bit of this, is straight from the hand of the Father. Who am I to experience this? Who am I to have been entrusted with this work since I was 15?

Humbled. 

It's not about me.

God started telling me that in the Spring when I found out two of the families I lived with weren't going to participate in camp. They're out of the church, moving to a new city. I got frustrated. I felt like all the time I invested in getting to know them, all this relational ministry stuff I've been doing, was for nothing. And I selfishly wanted to see them, wanted to spend camp week with them, wanted to hold their little kids. But after a while I realized actually it's not about just them, and it's not about me, it's about the big picture of why we go. It's about our partnership with New Life Church and the importance of the camps we lead. It's bigger than my eyes can see. It's not about me.

The camp facilities this year were challenging. Dim lighting, mold smells, broken elevators and broken toilets. Not enough space for everyone. And yet Jesus taught on boats and under trees. It's not about me. 

I felt my body getting weaker every day from jet lag, not enough sleep, weird food, different routine, constant mental activity and less exercise than normal. But in all of it was immense joy because I was with the people my heart is soft toward and whose hearts are soft toward me. I was doing the things I knew God had equipped me for and asked me to do. And none of it was about me. 

On Tuesday I wrote as I prayed, telling the Lord most moments held a mixture of pure joy and yet longing for something better. I wish it was a prettier picture. I wish I could say I wanted to spend every day of my life right here doing these things, but the truth is there is struggle all mixed into the beauty. My weakness and selfishness are built into the glory. 

But it's not about me. It's not even about my weaknesses. 

I want to be a better servant. I want to be a better communicator and question asker. I want to be lesser, humbler, more willing to defer to another. I want to love strangers and not just those close to my heart. I want to be better with kids. I want to be others-focused instead of looking to my own interests. I want to be more hospitable and generous. I want to be a person who levels power relationships, who lifts up the ones who feel inferior and advocates for the cause of the forgotten. And these are the things, the exact things, He allowed me to practice there every day.

Слава Богу. Praise the Lord. Спасибо...Thank you.