Feeling
like I belonged made me brave.
+ + +
I used to be an extrovert. Then
at some point I turned into more of an introvert as a defense mechanism. It was during my
sophomore year of high school, when we moved to Michigan and I didn’t
fit in anywhere. I felt like an awkward outcast, so I kept my mouth
shut. I learned to be quiet so that I couldn’t reveal how little I knew, how truly clueless I was. Now I’d say I’m an introverted extrovert. I’m not always
good at striking up conversations or thinking of things to say. I love alone time. I
second-guess how my goofy yet dry sense of humor will be received. I
hate trying to make small talk.
But
the bravery I felt helped to diminish my fear of talking to strangers.
I found it easy to start conversations, to engage in playful banter, to
take conversations to a deeper level. I found it easy to share random
stories from my life, and I didn’t feel too guilty doing it. People made
me feel like they wanted to know about me. And I realized I didn't feel like that much as an adult. Maybe people
just assume there isn’t much to know about a 30-something pastor’s wife.
But the people we met in Texas made me feel interesting, and I was
interested in them too.
+ + +
Being
in Houston was a simple adventure. We weren’t doing anything glamorous,
just working on homes that were damaged by Hurricane Harvey when it hit in August 2017.
It’s funny how most of the country has forgotten about Harvey, but there
is still so much work to be done. We weren't even supposed to be there, we were planning to go to Haiti. But our change of plans was God's plan all along. He had work for us to do.
On the outside, most of the houses in Houston
look beautiful. But the inside is a different story. And isn’t that a
metaphor for the human condition—outside we look so put together, but no
one knows how broken we are on the inside, or how empty. So many people left and never came back, we were told.
We
talked about this, and looked for signs of Harvey’s aftermath as we
walked the neighborhood where we worked. Dead patches in the St.
Augustine grass and remnants of discarded debris told stories of what had been dumped
on front lawns. So many things had been ruined by the water. Videos and
photos of the devastation reminded us what had happened where we stood.
+ + +
The
house where my team worked was owned by an older gentleman who our team fell
in love with. The first day he described how much water had
been standing in his home, and how it had been a year since anyone had worked on
his house. I fought back tears. It changes things when you stand in a
home and look at a person face-to-face. It gives a voice, a name, a
human spirit to the things you see on the news.
I
was so glad our team got to work in his house. We felt like a little
family, spending the days talking and laughing in between the work. It
didn’t feel like we really did much—we spent the whole time installing trim.
But it was one important step in the work that would continue after we
left. And eventually maybe his house will feel like home again.
+ + +
We
also spent a lot of time praying—each morning before we started working
we “prayed in” the day. We also prayed at lunch, and at the end of the
day. For a little while each day after lunch we went on prayer walks through the
neighborhood. We didn’t see many people in the middle of the day and the
Texas heat, but we still prayed for them. We hoped that teams after us
would be able to interact more with the residents, to tell them
why we were there and what we were doing.
We did get to meet Mr. Stewart in another neighborhood 15 minutes away, where a team from our group was working. Mr. Stewart told us stories of growing up as an African American, and what people called him. He fed us mustard greens and corn bread. He had us write down our phone numbers so he could call and make sure we made it home alright. Mr. Stewart sits in his garage every day and waves at everyone who drives past. I couldn't help wishing I could spend a year sitting in his garage, hearing his stories.
+ + +
On our last full day in Texas, a local church hosted a dinner for our group, and whoever from the community wanted to come. We all shared stories from the week, ate delicious food, and celebrated the ways we had seen God working throughout the week. We celebrated the simplest of things, like changed plans and safety navigating the complex Texas highways. It's amazing how good it feels to do something for someone else, how good it feels to watch people come alive again, how good it feels to come alive yourself.
Leaving Texas, I realized I could do that—I could help people come alive, I could help people feel important. And that it really doesn't take any extraordinarily special skills. Just the ability to look someone in the eye, to ask them a question, to listen to their answer. The ability to make someone feel seen and heard, it was an ability I had forgotten I possessed, but I didn't want to forget again. It is an ability that can open the door to so many other things.
+ + +
There was once a girl who lived in Texas and loved it—the baking heat, the state pride, the trips to the rodeo, the people she knew, all of it. And she never dreamed of living anywhere else. But over time she moved to other places, places where she never ever thought she'd live. And truthfully, at first she hated it, and wanted to move back to Texas. But then she grew used to it, and eventually accepted it, and lived in six other places after leaving her home.
And then one day she found out, after all of the years and miles had passed, that she was going back. She was going back to Texas with a group of people she had met in those other places. People who reminded her of the goodness of God, even on the darkest of days. People who showed her the beauty to be found beyond the familiar. And she realized that it had all been a gift—the leaving, the heartache, the new friends in new cities—a gift that brought her to this moment. A gift that gave her purpose.
Life was never what she expected, but it had become beautiful indeed.
