I'll have to admit that as my time winds down I am having a lot of difficulty staying checked in and fully present here. Some days I honestly feel like I'm just drifting through a dream. But I know that when I do leave and I come to realization that I really was living in Bukavu of the DRC I will wish that I had been fully present at every moment. So that is my current battle, how to keep my mind engaged in the here and now.
By the end of today I'll have finished testing all my students. Tomorrow I will mark their tests and begin to create certificates. Also over the final few days I'll be trying to visit friends throughout the city to say some final goodbyes. As well visiting some familiar spots to take a few final breaths there and be sure to properly etch memories of this place into my mind. So that when I look back and remember this place I will not remember the city as a place of desolation, poverty or corruption, but rather as a place where God was needed and where God was at work.
Now as I try and stay engaged in these tasks, I do still want to be preparing myself for the next step. If there is something I have while here it is not an intentional life is no more important overseas than it is at home. I don't see why I should feel such a thrust to live with purpose here but at home it is alright to be a bit more comfortable. No no. The people at home are no less deserving and no less in need of someone to encourage, uplift, invest in and have the love of God made known to them, than the people here are. God doesn't love the people of Africa more than the people of Canada.
So perhaps I shall move forward in these final days with a semi-detached mindset. Being both present here, but at the same time preparing myself for the mission to come. As I had prayed and prepped before heading to the Congo, so may I pray and prep before returning so that I will enter with the same mindset. The mindset that acknowledges I am heading into a land full of people needing love, full of earth and adventures and opportunities, full of forces obvious and discrete that would distract and pull people away from who they are really called to be.
I've had the thought many times that perhaps the need for me to try and be intentional in Canada is actually more important than while I am on the "mission field". Its easier to be intentional here, and much harder when you're seated on a comfortable couch with cable TV. Not that comfort's a crime, but it can be a prison cell. I'm too guilty of too often locking myself in my house and just floating through time without any real direction or purpose. 'Just passing the time' I'd say. When all along its really time that's passing me by. While I sit at my computer or TV opportunities flow by me like river waters over a stubborn rock that refuses to move. It will never know all that the river could show it. I'm curious to see how rich life can be in Canada should I choose to live with the intentionality and spirit of adventure that I have lived with here. Will I see life in so many colors as I have seen it here? I now that my perspectives, attitudes and choices affect what colors I am able to see. They change my world so much, even if their effect on the world entire is small. This is not about carpe diem. I often fool myself into think that living intentionally is about getting the most out of life, seeing the most beautiful sights, climbing the most beautiful heights, but that is not the best way.
Living intentionally is not about getting the most out of life,
it's about giving the most away in this life.
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